A step into the Past!
Maybe my or your great grandfather was arrested here 184 years ago Hahaha
For today I just want to share some historical buildings with you in our local town. Winter is about to freeze us and we had to go and look for some cheap under garments. I don't believe in brand names and as much of the stuff here is imported from China, their sizes do not fit me. I am too tall, my arms are too long and my feet are too big. I also don't wear banana shaped shoes Lol.
But let's take a step back into history.
The plaque above (1835) was mounted on this old cop shop.
This is the old 1898 Magistrates Court.
And this is the 1933 Town Hall, still in use today!
One wonders how many Pinocchio's walked through these doors at the town hall.
A view of the mountains that dominate the town!
And finally, a closer look at the mountain.
Before this town was proclaimed so many years ago, this entire area was all one big farm called "Vergelegen"
The Vergelegen wine estate still exists today and their wines are in great demand worldwide. Over time the town grew steadily and now at this time there is a huge migration into the area.
We were told by a local estate agent that there are now 200,000 houses in the town and new developments are springing up every month.
Amazingly there are 2000 houses on the market at any given time and there are 800 sales agents in the basin. Of course these are not cheap houses and it works at approximately 2 houses per agent to sell. If a good agent sells 4 or 5 houses then the others lose out somewhere along the line.
Moral of this story is that if your are thinking of moving to the area, please don't become an estate agent.
The town is about one hour's drive away from the city and 20 minutes from an international airport.
Hope you have enjoyed the photos and thank you for visiting a post by @papilloncharity
Team South Africa banner designed by @bearone
center>
Stepping back in time with these shots, I to am not big into brand names, I just when I need something and find what I like whoever it is made by, I have never been a trendsetter and never will be
Love looking at old buildings!
I like the architecture of these buildings with the arches, pillars and beautiful doorways! Plus everything is so white!
That is quite something that that whole area use to be one estate!
It looks like a beautiful spot so I can see how people would want to live there - thus the expansion!
Thanks for this historic photo tour!
Thank you my friend.
The place is filled with history since the first landing of Jan van Riebeeck in the Cape.
The farm "Vergelegen" was claimed by W. A. van der Stel, the son of the first governor of the Cape in 1700 and the size of the farm was 30.000 hectares.
The land that the town in my post is situated on was a part of this farm.
It is in a large bay that is fronted by the ocean and backed by a mountain range. The ground in the valley is perfect for the cultivation of vineyards.
Glad you liked the post!
Blessings!
Hello!
This post has been manually curated, resteemed
and gifted with some virtually delicious cake
from the @helpiecake curation team!
Much love to you from all of us at @helpie!
Keep up the great work!
Manually curated by @vibesforlife.
your town looks so peaceful though and yeah cold too :p
Thank you and it looks cold because winter has arrived here my friend.
We have two months of winter with rain and the rest of the year it is HOT.
South Africa is known as the country of sunshine, barbeque and friendly people!
Blessings!
OOOOO sunshine, barbeque and friendly people, sounds awesome combo
Nice to know you have winters for just two months, how hot does it get?
Thank you Vibi, and our country is very different heat wise.
Over here in the South it can get up to 39 degrees Celsius, but up north it can go into the 50s.
Hot enough to bake an egg on a rock.
Blessings!
Oh damn , 50s, how do you guys survive when its that hot?
Easy hehehe, we wear no clothes! Lol
Nice to see a different perspective of Cape town.
Theres also a city here in UK called Somerset. Beautiful panoramic scenery of the coast.
Thanks for sharing this historical site Dear Papillon! It let me see & know more about Cape Town!
Blessings!
Visited Vergelegen Wine Estate many years ago, long before the influx of people, the old dutch style buildings, painted in white always make a pretty picture.
Have not been down that way in 40 years, much has changed sometimes I ponder on whether it is better to hold onto the sweet memories of how it looked Stephen.
Best is always to remember it as it was Lady Joan.
Once the populations start to multiply everything changes and I bet 40 years ago, this place had to be wonderful.
Blessings!
Last visit to the Cape was with the boys being very young so more about train trip down to Simonstown, going up the mountain, more entertainment for boys to enjoy.
Hearing your description I wonder if the magic has not disappeared somewhat in becoming over developed.
The magic is stll around Lady Joan, but one now has to go off the beaten tracks to find it. Even though some of the new developments try to stick to the old gable style of Cape architecture, it is still an eye sore at the foot of the mountains.
Then of course one also has the moneyed people that try to build extravagant palaces everywhere.
Fortunately it is not as developed and there are more farms on the other side of the mountains.
Those areas will soon become my new playgrounds.
Blessings!
Beautiful architecture and amazing nature around.
But I'm worried if you managed to buy the right clothes?
Thank you my friend and no stress about the clothes, as I always find something.
It is just a big search every time.
Sadly I cannot find any wide fit shoes, as all of the shops stock the pointed toe canoe style shoes.
Blessings and thank you for the care.
Howdy sir papilloncharity! Very interesting post and those mountains are stunning! I particularly liked the information about the real estate agents as my wife and I built a successful real estate firm in Ohio and ran it for 12 years. God got us into it, guided it and blessed us.
Great the hear this Sir @janton, and then after the estate venture you decided to buy a farm and retire?
Blessings!
Howdy sir papilloncharity! No sir, I wish. lol..I know that's what it looks like but what actually happened was that we had to quit the real estate business because Mrs. J couldn't handle the stress anymore. It was a brutal business working 7 days a week, every single thing we did was on time limits by the banks, because we were working for the banks processing their repossessed homes and selling them.
Other agents were dropping like flies..dying from heart attacks, cancer, etc and my wife said it was killing her so we had to leave. It was my dream job but we had no choice. So she hated the cold and always wanted to be in warm weather. We searched for a couple of years and the only place that had what we wanted, mostly privacy and some acreage, was in Texas so that's where we went.
We've been looking for work ever since and she finally has a good job now. Did I tell you what she's doing? She's a guard at the county jail! Our big dream is to have some type of half-way house for women when they get out of prison. We've had alot of experience with prisons, ex-cons, etc for years and understand the challenges they face when they're trying to get their lives back on track.
Howdy Sir @janton, so incredible!
I have two long term projects here in the cape.
One is to build a new clinic for the people of Grabouw.
But here's the surprise.
Years ago I started a church in a city prison called "Sun City" and my second long term project is almost identical to yours.
We want to buy a farm and build an empowerment center on it.
Then we will approach the juristic department of the government to send all of the short term prisoners to the farm, instead of to jail.
Guys that are convicted for minor crimes.
They will be empowered with new skills at the farm and receive training to run their own small businesses selling agricultural produce from the farm. A percentage of their sales will go back to the farm for self sustainability.
Marian and I both burnt out after 17 years with Papillon in the city and we also had to seek change urgently. The invite from the lady at the farm to move down here came as a hidden blessing.
And so, I think our stories are very similar don't you?
All of the best for what you guys are trying to do over there.
If you are interested in what we are doing, have a look at this post that I have placed now.
Blessings!
https://steemit.com/esteem/@papilloncharity/the-effects-of-false-promises
Howdy again sir papilloncharity! yes we have very similar plans, that is so cool! In fact there is a 10 acre plot behind us with no one living on it and we want to buy that and put a half way house farm and garden on it with similar training that you are
talking about! lol. I that project is a few years down the road though.
oh yes, ministry will kill you off for sure, you could work 24 hours a day! I'm glad you did a post on what you're doing, I'll get to it.
Howdy Sir @janton, one important thing that I have learnt at Papillon. Don't try to do it all by yourself. Surround yourself with experts in the different fields and let them do the work.
Only keep your finger om the pulse.
Blessings!
howdy this fine Sunday sir papilloncharity! Did you teach or preach somewhere today?
I agree totally with your philosophy about letting experts do their work. Unfortunately I don't have
that luxury with work around the property but that's okay, it keeps me learning and on the farm we always did everything ourselves even if we didn't know how to do it.
But your situation, experts cost the most money, are you able to get them to donate their time?
It's possible we where alive those days, only with different faces.
Cool pictures!