From Orkney down the R30

In the Stilfontein article I promised to return to the KOSH area (Klerksdorp, Orkney, Stilfontein, Hartebeestfontein) for one more story. Here we are: I am in Orkney! The mining town on the banks of the Vaal River is better known for the Afrikaans sitcom "Orkney Snork Nie" (Orkney Doesn't Snore).

Orkney, however, is named for a group of islands off the north coast of Scotland and, apparently, it means "young pig" in a Pictish lingo spoken by some ancient tribes in those cold northern parts of Scotland.

Enough of hogwash about ancient tribes. I'm not in Orkney to stay long. I'm here for a one-night stand, to pump up for the start of my drive down the R30 to the Free State the following day. So my midday arrival is suitable for my plan to relax and stock up in this midway town to anywhere. In essence, I will snore away my one night here and hit the road at daybreak, skipping breakfast. Of course, not for the sake of avoiding the bacon... I'm no way put off by the thought of "young pig" meaning of Orkney. I just can't eat very early in the morning.

There's plenty of time before sunset, and enough cheap sleepovers to choose from in town. After settling in, I go out for a walk, sightseeing and lunch grub. On the town main road - the street sign has misspelt Charlotte Maxeke - but everybody including the cops whose station is located here call it Milton Street. I don't know, maybe the municipality people forgot to complete the legal process of renaming,since even Google Maps does not know Sharlot (sic) Maxeke.

Anyways, the main street and others adjoining it are adequately supplied with chow places and watering holes of different degrees of attraction and notoriety. But as we say in Sesotho, which is a big language in these parts, "motsamai o ja noha". This means when you are travelling don't be picky about what your hosts offer you. I gladly consume what the "Young Pig" offers me and later took to the streets again.

The Orkney golf course built on the banks of the Vaal River was opened in 1939 and has produced such stars as Simon Hobday and Jannie Le Grange. In rainy seasons the flooded Vaal covers parts of the golf course.

I notice that Orkney street names originate from various British and Celtic tribes, clearly to be in sync with the origins of the town name. For a few examples, these include Kipling [origin England's North Yorkshire], Patmore [Hertfordshire], Fitzgerald [Irish], Drinkwater [Anglo-Saxon], Campbell [Scottish] and Flecker, which I will use to exit town centre to the R30 running outside of town the following day.

It's 6.30am when I drive out of Orkney town, using Flecker until the R30 t-junction where I turn left. The right turn takes one north to Klerkdorp and beyond to where the R30 originates, in the Rustenburg area, outside the Olifatsnek Dam. From there the R30 runs parallel with Rooikloofspruit, which leaves Olifatsnek Dam through its west flank, until the one-horse town of Derby.

From Derby, the R30 runs through Ventersdorp town centre before cutting through Klerksdorp to get to the junction where I am right now. Behind the junction is a strap of veld acting as a buffer between Orkney town and Kanana township.

Less than 5km from Orkney, the R30 crosses the Vaal River, another icon of the South African landscape. I strain my eyes for "Welcome to Free State" sign but I don't see any. Maybe I passed it, maybe it's not there; I don't know but I am in the Free State. The town lying ahead, 40 minutes away, is Bothaville, where I have planned to stop for breakfast.

The bacon, eggs, baked beans, bread and rooibos are hugely significant to this town, which hosts Africa's biggest agricultural trade show. The NAMPO [National Maize Producers Organisation] show, held annually in May, is a gathering of food producers and corporations such as Grain SA to discuss issues of main interest, innovation and economic challenges to agriculture.

The annual NAMPO festival organised by Grain SA in Bothaville is the biggest agricultural expo in southern Africa. Bothaville is SA's capital of maize production.

This year a massive turnout of 81 000 visitors was recorded, including Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Sfiso Buthelezi, who described NAMPO "as the best-kept secret" of the agricultural sector that should be experienced by everybody who consumes food in SA.

The road passes the venue for the agric trade show on the left hand side, a short distance before Bothaville town. But a strange thing happens: as the R30 enters town, it does so as R59 before a split at the south-end of the town allows the R30 to resurface in south-east direction while R59 continues to southwest towards Hoopstad. (We'll be here in due course.)

For a small town, Bothaville offers a decent variety for restaurants - from well known national brands like Mugg & Bean and Steers, to local family-owned outlets such as Casa Mia. But on my solo runs like this one down the R30, I prefer fast food outlets, so Highway Cafe on the main road is the one.

After breakfast, I do my usual walkabout in town and I must say all the tourist attractions are old structures with heritage value for the Afrikaner people. These include the town hall, church buildings, Boer War memorials and a small privately owned museum keeping the history of the area. There's also one interesting place for motoring enthusiasts - the Datsun museum, which keeps vintage models of the Japanese car. I felt a close affinity to the museum as also important to me as well as I too grew up with a Datsun at home as family car.

Bothaville by the way is named after one Theunis Louis Botha, the original owner of the farm on which the town stands. In 1991 it celebrated its centenary, which means this year it's 128 years old. Judging by its good looking suburban homes, Bothaville is relatively wealthy for a platteland town, complete with an impressive golf club. The par-72 course flanks the Vals River, the town's east-end boundary. For clarity, Vals is the tributary of the Vaal which it meets just a bicycle ride to the west of town.

Still midmorning, I am ready to hit the road again, but then I thought I should check out the local township, Kgotsong. It did not strike me as a vibrant place, even though I was there on a Saturday. If that's the kind of pace the township moves, I can only hope it at least lives up to its name, which means "a place of peace".

Back on the road, to Allanridge, a 30 minutes drive on a superb road, both sides are marked by cultivated by cultivated farmlands, which show where Bothaville's wealth comes from. In parts, the farmlands are punctuated by dry pans of varying sizes - only a few of the pans have some moisture in them, which may point to places with a higher water-table.

Then as I enter Allanridge, one cannot help but notice a pan full water on the left hand side of the R30... and the flamingos in the water and its edges. The flamingo lake also acts as the buffer between the town and the township of Nyakallong up the hill from the pan.

Around Allanridge there are many dried pans, except this one overlooking Nyakallong townships. The flamingos that have made Stinkpan, as the lake is called, their home are perhaps the brightest thing in this decaying town.

Though Allanridge is young, after it was founded after the digging for gold on what was a farm in 1947, the town is now effectively a ghost town. There are rundown structures everywhere and vandalised houses left behind when the mining industry closed its shafts in the 1990s.

It's hard to believe that this used to be a shiny town helped in its glory days by Loraine Mines Ltd. Needless to say, I beat a hasty retreat from the spooky town and park adjacent the Flamingo lake on the other side of R30. It's called Stikpan, but nothing offensive hits my nostrils as I watch the bright pink feathery creatures go about their avian business. I ask the flamingos what happened to their town; where are the people? Using their beaks, the birds point towards Nyakallong on the other side of the lake. Ok, I will go there.

Nyakallong, I still don't know what's the joy about this hood but then that's how townships were named during apartheid, with a heavy dosage of enthusiasm. But I must admit, it was a better habit than offensive and hopeless names of new townships. It's nearly midday, so I qualify for a lager. A young man on a street says I can try Jazz House but suggests he better accompany me because "those boys there are rough". Thanks bro, I am on a solo run... no hangers-on on this journey. Nyakallong streets have no names but I find Jazz House. There's no jazz here, but because it is early in the day I can stomach its soulless vibe. So one Long Tom down my parched throat I am good to go.

Leaving Nyakallong for Odendaalsrus just a short distance down the R30 there's no much to write home about, with cultivated fields with their lines interrupted by more dry lakes or pans, and some mining operations on both sides of the route. I sneeze once I find myself in Odendaalsrus. It looks important, and signs of glory days gone by but there's life here, unlike Allanridge. I learn later on there's a big claim to history here, that Odendaalrus is Free State's first gold mining town. Though the town was founded in 2012, real mining activity started in 1946. Today however the sector is marred by violence and criminality by illegal miners knows as Zama Zama. Reports of kidnap of mine officials for ransom by Zama Zama gangs are a regular feature in the news here.

Away from the mines chaos, there's brisk trade in town, with a strong presence of foreign nationals running small shops for all sorts of goods and services. Despite SA's social problems, including crime, I get the sense of a harmonious community in Odendaalsrus. Even more heart-warming is group of locals i pass trying their best to close the town's potholes.

I skip Kutlwanong township, which is out of sight on R30, because I am in a hurry to reach Theunissen by 4pm. Just 10 minutes back on the road, I come in contact with the west end of Welkom, the capital of Free State Goldfields. At first I am not too sure what the urban expanse is all about because I don't remember a sign with Welkom on it. Then, very close to the R30, I notice the Grriffons stadium, the home of the Griffons Rugby Union or Northern Free State Union.

Generally mining operations stand as an eyesore to travellers but somehow the appearance of the Beatrix mine ahead of Theunissen town appears to be adding some value to the landscape.

Beyond here the road goes to an uninspiring passage of the landscape, save for the greenery in the Sand River valley which the road crosses some 10km west of Virginia, another mining town in the Goldfields. Hereafter, it's back to cultivated lands and pockets of bare landscape with sparse vegetation. And just as the R30 hits the home straight to Theunissen, a massive mining operation emerge on the left side of the road. It's Beatrix mine, a gold mining and processing operation owned by Sibanye-Stillwater. Beatrix was in the news in Feberuary 2018 when up to 1 000 workers were trapped underground after power supply was cut off by strong winds. The winds had damaged two Eskom power lines supplying the mine, but after it all everybody was rescued.

According to 2009 report by Gold Felds (whose gold operations were bought by Sibanye in 2013), the mineral reserve of Beatrix will be depleted in 2022. There's hope however the mine will still have some operations going beyond this. Furthermore, the mine's high standard ore processing plants should be able to handle stock from other mines in the Free State Goldfields. That's should be encouraging prospects for Beatrix's massive workforce of more than 8 000.

I find Theunissen reasonably busy for a small town, right in the centre of Free State. The main road in town, Piet Retief Street, is too narrow by the standards of these platteland dorpies but at least appears orderly on my visit. I park at OK Grocer for my late lunch, and the food counter is excellent, neat with a variety of options. Beef stew, spicy rice and a fresh green salad with red onion rings. I am not alone tucking in outside... there are other travelers and truckers and the weather is good.

After downing half of my sparkling water to wash down the delicious lunch, I go walkabout in town. I am encouraged by options; you really can't say you can't find anything to buy and look top of the world. Banks, supermarkets, specialised markets like Senwes store, restaurants... anything you can think of is all there. Like in Gauteng, and other places I travel through, the cellphone and electronics shops here are dominated by foreign nationalities. This shows the power of the SA economy, attracting traders from as far as Peshawar and Gondar to the platteland.

I walk to near the edge of town, walk up Rubenstein and turn into Le Roux. I pass the police station which, as a traveler, is important to know its location. After the cop shop I see Cosmos Chateau guesthouse. I have made up my mind already, that I will not sleep over here. It's a tactical decision, not because of Cosmos. I return to my car at OK.

It's unlike me that I have not spoken to anyone in Theunissen so far, despite being here for an hour. I drive towards Masilo via Culemborg Road, even though it's just a walking distance. The township is stale, drab with few trees. I am not inspired by anything apart from seeing schools all over and other state service facilities. That's good, but a location must have a character, inspire hope for its children and wanderers like me. I don't see much that occupies the local youth's time. I ask for info and I'm told what I suspect: the youth drink themselves dead, while others are involved in all sorts of vice and crime. And what else? Well, many other youngsters, especially the girls, are members of new revivalist churches that have sprung up in economically depressed communities across the country.

I can see the R30 running down the western flank on Masilo, heading to Brandfort further south but I have made my decision. My run down the route will end here, and I will return another day to complete its end in the city of Bloemfontein. I vow to sleep over at Theunissen the next time, before starting the last leg of R30. But for now, I am turning to east - to Bethlehem.

When I'm on the road I eat from takeaway cafes or supermarket food counters, like this OK store in Theunissen.