Download or read book The Historical Karoo written by Chris Schoeman and published by Penguin Random House South Africa. This book was released on 2013-09-30 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: To many people, especially those driving along the N1 national road at high speeds, the Karoo represents nothing more than a monotonous, hot and arid landscape to be passed through as quickly as possible. But in this vast, open region, history is everywhere, if visitors would only look for it. And that is exactly the purpose of this book: to point out all the many places, buildings, objects and associated personalities of historical interest in the Karoo. The Karoo has been the world of travellers, writers, statesmen and scientists, figures as diverse as Olive Schreiner, Rudyard Kipling, Winston Churchill and Dr Chris Barnard. It has also been the scene of serious conflict, of which the many old British blockhouses, forts, grave sites and memorials dating from the Anglo-Boer War are vivid reminders; and it still boasts old examples of vernacular and industrial architecture, and engineering, in the form of corbelled houses, water mills and bridges. The Historical Karoo is ordered according to three main routes that people drive through the area. It provides short histories of the towns along the way, and points out the sites, buildings and other aspects of interest that can be found there. Enlivened by historical and current photographs and informative side panels, this book is a collector’s item.
Download or read book Hidden Karoo written by Patricia Kramer and published by Penguin Random House South Africa. This book was released on 2021-03-01 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Karoo is big sky country; a land of vast open plains punctuated by flat-topped mountains, conical hills and secluded valleys, a land of scrubby bushes and hardy trees, where pioneers carved roads out of rock to set down roots in an unforgiving environment. Here dreams are born, legends are made, and outcasts find sanctuary. It is also an ancient place, whose story is revealed through geology, fossils and artefacts, and whose human lineage predates any written history. Today, the people who inhabit it must manifest the same fortitude that sustained those who left their footprints in the primieval mud. In Hidden Karoo you will find all this, and more. Through a series of superb photo-essays, this majestic place is revealed as a land where conservation and neglect are seldom far apart, where one town boasts splendidly restored buildings, while along a dusty back road lie forgotten villages waiting for ... something. Could it be a renewal, or a slow death? There’s nothing novel about the movement of people from country to city, and the Karoo mimics other parts of the world where rural areas become derelict as they are depopulated. Hidden Karoo presents a snapshot of the region as it is now, offering a glimpse into towns and villages, farmsteads and churches, important buildings and humble homes, all against a backdrop of awe-inspiring landscapes. Through words and pictures, it prompts us to consider what was, what is and, perhaps, what might be. One constant about the Karoo is change. A book can do no more than capture a moment in time or depict fragments of a place, but in doing so, it bears witness to the past and offers the hope that there may yet be a future for this unparalleled part of our country.
Download or read book The Plains of Camdeboo written by Eve Palmer and published by Penguin Random House South Africa. This book was released on 2012-09-28 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Karoo is a vast semi-desert region that extends across parts of the Western and Eastern Cape provinces of South Africa. This environmentally important area is the largest ecosystem in the country and is abundant in wildlife, vegetation, and ancient history. The Plains of Camdeboo is a celebration of this remarkable landscape. At first encounter the Karoo may seem arid, desolate and unforgiving, but to those who know it, it is a land of secret beauty and infinite variety. For generations author Eve Palmer's family have lived on the Karoo farm of Cranemere, situated on the Plains of Camdeboo. This family have battled for decades against this harsh desert; they have had to adapt to it, learning to fear, respect, and ultimately love it. First published in 1966, The Plains of Camdeboo has become a classic in South African literature. Here is a book that is not autobiography, not history, not botanical study, but all of these and more, blending into a uniquely vivid and personal account of life in the Karoo. The animals, the insects, the wealth of fossils, the countless flowers that spring miraculously to life after rain - all are woven into this rich and engaging story.
Download or read book Karoo Boy written by Troy Blacklaws and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2013-03-26 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: DIVDIVTroy Blacklaws’s acclaimed debut novel is the remarkable story of a boy coming of age in the wake of tragedy/divDIV When his twin brother dies in a freak accident, Douglas’s life begins to unravel. His mother leaves his father, taking Douglas with her to live in the Karoo region, a harsh desert landscape that is a far cry from Cape Town and the seaside life Douglas has always known. In this small village that is wary of outsiders, he makes two friends who change his life forever: a beautiful girl named Marika and an old man named Moses. Immersed in rich language and vivid detail, and set against the backdrop of 1970s South Africa, Karoo Boy is the story of a young man finding his way in the midst of chaos and loss./divDIV /div/div
Download or read book The Historical Overberg written by Chris Schoeman and published by Penguin Random House South Africa. This book was released on 2017-05-18 with total page 373 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Situated between the Hottentots Holland Mountains and the Breede River, the Overberg is a fertile agricultural region and a popular holiday destination for tourists and nature lovers who delight in the beauty of its mountainous landscape, abundant plant species and long sandy beaches. This area also has a rich history going back thousands of years, when the indigenous Khoi people originally thrived there, and when the first European settlers left their own indelible imprint on the culture, architecture and character of the region. The Overberg has been a home or point of interest for explorers, innovators, artists and writers, for figures as varied as Bartolomeu Dias, Sir David de Villiers Graaff, Uys Krige and Audrey Blignault. Some of South Africa’s oldest towns, houses and missionary stations can be found here, and its treacherous coastline has been the cause of hundreds of shipwrecks for centuries. The Historical Overberg provides a detailed account of this past by pointing out the many places, buildings, events and personalities that have made the Overberg the diverse and unique place that it is today. Enlivened by historical and current photographs and informative panels, this book is a collector’s item.
Download or read book Tales from the Old Karoo written by Guy Butler and published by Jonathan Ball Publishers. This book was released on 2018-08-15 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Griet approached the house via the kitchen and poured the potion into a glass, put it on a tray, and brought it into the hall. She offered it to the doctor with her characteristic little Victorian curtsy. He smelled it – wonderful herbal scent. But what, he thought for a moment, if it's poisonous?" First published in 1989, Guy Butler's Tales from the Old Karoo is considered to be one of the classics of South African literature. In celebration of the author's birth in 1918, this centenary issue is newly packaged and designed to appeal to a modern audience. The short stories in this collection are all set in the old Karoo – in a place and time before tarred roads, television and the internet replaced horse-drawn carriages, steam-engine trains and fireside storytelling. In his characteristically dry, humorous style, Guy Butler captures the essence of the people and landscape of the Karoo. It is a collection of delightful yarns and reminiscences about real ghosts, imaginary people, stubborn farm animals, and events that never happened – stories so strange they can only be true.
Download or read book Wild Karoo written by Mitch Reardon and published by Penguin Random House South Africa. This book was released on 2018-06-01 with total page 355 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After centuries of relative isolation, the Karoo – South Africa’s parched heartland – is a latecomer to the tourist industry. What was once viewed as a harsh and desolate place of limited attraction is rapidly gaining popularity with visitors who now make the Karoo their destination, keen to partake of its legendary charm, its extraordinary fl ora and the resurgence of wildlife that once again populates its plains. Wild Karoo documents Mitch Reardon’s 4,000-kilometre journey of discovery through the region. The book focuses on: local nature conservation in all its facets, the game, large and small – some recently reintroduced – plus birds, reptiles and invertebrates, the unique, arid-adapted flora, the landscape and geology, the history and lifestyle of the people who have made a home here, plans to combine public and private protected land to create wildlife corridors between isolated parks, re-establishing old migration routes and so reversing some of the effects of human settlement. Beautifully written, and illustrated with evocative photographs, this book is a must read for anyone interested in travel, wildlife and the environment.
Download or read book The Little Karoo written by Pauline Smith and published by Transaction Pub Large Print. This book was released on 1997-01-01 with total page 140 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of stories that captures the landscape and changing world of the Afrikaners of South Africa
Download or read book Karoo Kitchen written by Sydda Essop and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Plants of the Klein Karoo written by and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 571 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Timeless Karoo written by Jonathan Deal and published by Penguin Random House South Africa. This book was released on 2016-11-18 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This vast and unique region, at once awe-inspiring and secretive, will draw you close into its protective mantle; too close for casual inspection by the hurried traveller. The Karoo will share its secrets with you only if you’re prepared to sit quietly to learn its mysteries over a plate of bobotie, a glass of witblits, and a copy of Timeless Karoo. This beautifully illustrated and well-written book encompasses a vast area: the geographical expanse from Niewoudtville in the northwest, eastwards to Hopetown, south to Steytlerville and west to Montagu. Within this region you will encounter six Karoos: the Central, Hantam, Great, Klein, Tankwa and Northern & Upper Karoo, each with its own stockpile of natural and human history, its own complex tapestry and prehistoric rhythms. Each journey into the Karoo yields a fresh view, a different angle and an urge to cut loose, swing off the tar, and pursue an uncharted dirt road into an unknown horizon.
Download or read book Sonic Spaces of the Karoo written by Marie Jorritsma and published by Temple University Press. This book was released on 2011-05-21 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sonic Spaces of the Karoo is a pioneering study of the sacred music of three coloured (the apartheid designation for people "not white or native") people's church congregations in the rural town of Graaff-Reinet, South Africa. Jorritsma's fieldwork involves an investigation of the choruses, choir music, and hymns of the Karoo region to present a history of the people's traditional, religious, and cultural identity in song. This music is examined as part of a living archive preserved by the community in the face of a legacy of slavery and colonial as well as apartheid oppression. Jorritsma's findings counteract a lingering stereotype that coloured music is inferior to European or African music and that coloured people should not or do not have a cultural identity. Sonic Spaces of the Karoo seeks to eradicate that bias and articulate a more legitimate place for these people in the contemporary landscape of South Africa.
Download or read book Churchill s South Africa written by Chris Schoeman and published by Random House Struik. This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In October 1899, the twenty-four-year-old Winston Churchill sailed for South Africa as war correspondent for the Morning Post to report on the Anglo-Boer War. When he returned the following year, it was as a military celebrity. This book follows Churchill's footsteps across South Africa and gives his impressions of the places he visited, the landscapes he saw, the people he encountered and the events he was involved in. Churchill's South Africa covers the future statesman's travels across the Great Karoo and through the green hills of Natal, his capture by the Boers, his escape to Del.
Download or read book Circling the Great Karoo written by Nicholas Yell and published by . This book was released on 2021-03 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Following on the success of the previous edition, this re-edited, updated and revitalized version, chronicling Nicholas Yell's epic journey through the Karoo on an old scrambler, is a must-read for the historically-inclined adventure traveler.
Download or read book The Great Karoo written by Fred Stenson and published by Anchor Canada. This book was released on 2009-09-08 with total page 610 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From award-winning author Fred Stenson comes a richly evocative new novel, at once brutal and tender, spare of language, and profoundly moving. The Great Karoo begins in 1899, as the British are trying to wrest control of the riches of South Africa from the Boers, the Dutch farmers who claimed the land. The Boers have turned out to be more resilient than expected, so the British have sent a call to arms to their colonies — and an a great number of men from the Canadian prairies answer the call and join the Canadian Mounted Rifles: a unit in which they can use their own beloved horses. They assume their horses will be able to handle the desert terrain of the Great Karoo as readily as the plains of their homeland. Frank Adams, a cowboy from Pincher Creek, joins the Rifles, along with other young men from the ranches and towns nearby — a mix of cowboys and mounted policeman, who, for whatever reason, feel a desire to fight for the Empire in this far-off war. Against a landscape of extremes, Frank forms intense bonds with Ovide Smith, a French cowboy who proves to be a reluctant soldier, and Jefferson Davis, the nephew of a prominent Blood Indian chief, who is determined to prove himself in a “white man’s war.” As the young Canadians engage in battle with an entrenched and wily enemy, they are forced to realize the bounds of their own loyalty and courage, and confront the arrogance and indifference of those who have led them into conflict. For Frank, disillusionment comes quickly, and his allegiance to those from the Distict of Alberta, soon displaces any sense of patriotism to Canada or Britain, or belief that he’s fighting for a just cause. The events of the novel follow the trajectory of the war. The British strategy of burning Boer farms, destroying herds, and moving Boer families into camps weakens the Boer rebels, but they refuse to give up. The thousands of Boer women and children who die in the camp make the war ever more unpopular among liberals in Britain. (In fact, this conflict marked the first use of the term “concentration camp” in war.) Seeing the ramifications of such short-sighted military decisions, and how they affect what happens to Frank and the other Canadians, is crucial to depicting the reality of the Boer War. By focusing on the experiences of a small group of men from southern Alberta, Fred Stenson brings the reality of what it would have been like to be a soldier in this brutal war to vivid life. The Great Karoo is a deeply satisfying novel, marked by the complexities of its plot, the subtleties of its relationships, and the scale of its terrain. Exhilarating and gruesome by turns, it explores with passion and insight the lasting warmth of friendship and the legacy of devastation occasioned by war.
Download or read book Early Evolutionary History of the Synapsida written by Christian F. Kammerer and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-09-20 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Non-mammalian synapsids were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates from the Late Carboniferous to the Middle Triassic and play a key role in understanding the origin and evolution of mammals. Despite these facts and the outstanding fossil record of the group, early synapsids remain obscure. This book showcases the full breadth of contemporary research on non-mammalian synapsids, ranging from taxonomy and phylogenetics to functional morphology, biogeography, paleoecology, and patterns of diversity. It also underscores the importance and potential of studying non-mammalian synapsid paleobiology in its own right, not just in the context of mammalian evolution.
Download or read book The History of Geophysics in Southern Africa written by Johan H de Beer and published by AFRICAN SUN MeDIA. This book was released on 2016-01-25 with total page 641 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Geophysics is a comparatively young science which only evolved as a distinct discipline during the 19th century. However, its phenomena (like earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions and lightning) had been objects of fear, curiosity and speculation since ancient times. In this book, Johan de Beer and his research team reveal that geophysical activity in South Africa can be traced back to as early as 1488. This is a truly astonishing revelation which deserves to be firmly entrenched as part of the country?s proud history. The book also discusses the history and formation of South African geophysical institutions that made a huge and seldom acknowledged contribution to the technological development of southern Africa.
