Groot Marico
The Marico Bushveld Of Herman Charles Bosman'S Oom Schalk Lourens Stories, Which Are The Best Loved Short Fiction In Afrikaans And Are Set In These Exact Thorn Tree Farms With An Information Centre That Exists Mainly To Send You Out Into The Veld With A Book, And A Mampoer Distilling Tradition That Is The Other Local Art · Groot Marico, North West
Herman Charles Bosman taught at a farm school in this bushveld for six months in 1926, and spent the rest of his life writing about it. The Oom Schalk Lourens stories - told by an old Marico farmer who never quite says the cruel thing directly - are the best-loved short fiction in Afrikaans and among the best in any South African language, and they are set in these exact thorn-tree farms, along this road, among these people's grandparents. That is the whole proposition. There is no monument, no restored house, almost nothing to photograph: there is an information centre whose real function is to send you out into the veld with a book, a mampoer distilling tradition that is the district's other art, and a bushveld that looks exactly as described. If you have not read Bosman, read him first or do not come. This row is honest about that, because no other row in this set depends so completely on a book.
On the N4 in the North West bushveld between Zeerust and Swartruggens, Groot Marico, North West, South Africa
A village on the N4 rather than an attraction. THE INFORMATION CENTRE keeps informal daylight hours and is run on enthusiasm rather than a budget - it is the place to arrange a guide, a farm visit or a mampoer tasting, and IT IS WORTH TELEPHONING AHEAD rather than arriving and hoping. Bosman literary walks and veld tours are arranged through it and are the point of coming. MAMPOER IS UNREGULATED FARM SPIRIT OF HIGHLY VARIABLE STRENGTH - tastings happen on farms by arrangement, and the row says plainly that you should not be driving afterwards. There is fuel on the N4, a shop or two and a handful of guest farms and campsites. Zeerust is 40 km west, Johannesburg 220 km east. MALARIA-FREE.