Slightly desperate, it still exudes a frontier mentality.

The maintenance being done on the national road (with a high percentage of female employment), and the wind farms generating power, giving some assurance that development is happening.

Stunning architecture, struggling against a tide of poverty. No charismatic charm of some Karoo towns and villages, this is where it gets real. 

Frontier real.

Our history entwined in two rows of picturesque Colonial houses. One designer perfect, whilst the return street is struggling not to internally combust. 

A stop at Lani’s Farm Kitchen, next to the butcher and down the road from the magnificent Dutch Reform Church, for a tasty lunch. I probably should only have had the deserts and cakes that looked scrumptious. 

We didn’t see any signage to the ‘Cradock Four Memorial’, and the Olive Schreiner Museum was closed. As there wasn’t another bookshop, our idea of getting her book of ‘Story of an African Farm’ will have to wait. 

Smiling, carefree, school children in the sprawling economic development part of town, the barometer of priorities?

Frontier real.