The Nelson Mandela Capture Site and the Midlands

The Roadside Where Nelson Mandela Was Arrested In August 1962, Beginning The Twenty Seven Years, Marked By Marco Cianfanelli'S Sculpture Of Fifty Steel Columns That Resolve Into His Face From One Exact Spot Thirty Five Metres Away With The Midlands Meander'S Craft Studios, The Howick Falls And The Karkloof Forests In The Hills Around It · Howick, KwaZulu-Natal

On a road outside Howick in August 1962, police stopped a car carrying a man posing as a chauffeur, and Nelson Mandela's twenty-seven years began. The spot is marked now by one of the best pieces of public sculpture anywhere: Marco Cianfanelli set fifty steel columns of different heights in a field, and from almost everywhere they are an abstract thicket of rust-coloured bars - but walk back thirty-five metres to one exact point on the path and they align into Mandela's face. Fifty columns for the fifty years since the arrest. There is a small museum beside it. The KwaZulu-Natal Midlands around it are green rolling hill country of craft studios, trout farms and forest, the Howick Falls drop ninety-five metres in the middle of the town, and the Karkloof has canopy walks and some of the last mistbelt forest in the province. It is ninety kilometres inland from Durban, malaria-free, and the easiest stop in the province.

Beside the R103 outside Howick in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands, 90 km inland from Durban, Howick, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

The capture site is open daily in daylight with a modest entry fee covering the sculpture, the path and the small museum, and the sculpture itself stands in open ground. THE COLUMNS ONLY RESOLVE INTO A FACE FROM ONE EXACT SPOT on the approach path about thirty-five metres back - there is a marker, and visitors who walk straight up to the steel miss the entire point. The museum beside it keeps its own hours and closes earlier than the grounds. The Howick Falls viewpoint in the town is open ground and free. The Midlands Meander's craft studios, farm shops and restaurants keep their own hours, mostly daylight and many closed on Mondays; the Karkloof canopy tour and the conservancy hides are booked ahead. Howick is ninety kilometres inland from Durban on the N3 and about forty from Pietermaritzburg, and the Midlands are MALARIA-FREE.

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