Mossel Bay
At the station of Hartenbos a railway spur continues down to the town of Mossel Bay.
Mossel Bay, named after the Dutch name for a molluscs - 'mussel' due to the mussels and oysters flourishing here.
Mossel Bay has several sides to its character.It has grown mightily over the past twenty years as a result of the political decision made by ex-President PW Botha to develop an offshore gas industry to help South Africa overcome sanctions against the Apartheid government. It is a popular holiday centre for water sports, rock angling and big game fishing (especially black marlin). Mossel Bay also boasts a niche in history.
It is the site where Bartholomeu Dias, the very first Portuguese navigator to pass off the Cape coast in 1488, landed to take on fresh water. He named it Agueda de Sao Bras. After continuing along the coast for some distance, and landing near modern-day Port Elizabeth, his crew prevailed upon him to turn back to Europe.
Because the bay has a spring, which never runs dry, it became a provisioning stop for sailing ships on the way to India. In 1500, with what little remained of his fleet after confronting a fierce storm, Pedro d' Ataide ran for shelter in the bay and left an account of the disaster in an old shoe which was hung on a milkwood tree. Joäo da Nova visited Mossel Bay in 1501 and found d' Ataide's report in the shoe.
The Post Office tree is a venerable milkwood to which a sea boot was nailed for many years. Seafarers collected letters from, and posted them in, the boot. Today the tree is part of Bartholomeu Dias Museum complex and letters posted in a boot shaped post-box next to it are specially franked.
It was to take another ten years before Vasco da Gama reached this spot on his fateful journey to India. Close to the spring where Dias took on water is the Dias Museum which has a full scale replica of Dias' Caravela. This little 300-ton vessel was built in 1987 in Lisbon and sailed to the Cape in that year in a re-enactment of the event, 500 years later.
The museum was built, minus a wall on the seaside. At high tide, one day, the caravel was sailed into the museum, the tide went out, the wall was built in and there it stands as one of the most unusual and imaginative museums in the country.
Mossel Bay, named after the Dutch name for a molluscs - 'mussel' due to the mussels and oysters flourishing here.
Mossel Bay has several sides to its character.It has grown mightily over the past twenty years as a result of the political decision made by ex-President PW Botha to develop an offshore gas industry to help South Africa overcome sanctions against the Apartheid government. It is a popular holiday centre for water sports, rock angling and big game fishing (especially black marlin). Mossel Bay also boasts a niche in history.
It is the site where Bartholomeu Dias, the very first Portuguese navigator to pass off the Cape coast in 1488, landed to take on fresh water. He named it Agueda de Sao Bras. After continuing along the coast for some distance, and landing near modern-day Port Elizabeth, his crew prevailed upon him to turn back to Europe.
Because the bay has a spring, which never runs dry, it became a provisioning stop for sailing ships on the way to India. In 1500, with what little remained of his fleet after confronting a fierce storm, Pedro d' Ataide ran for shelter in the bay and left an account of the disaster in an old shoe which was hung on a milkwood tree. Joäo da Nova visited Mossel Bay in 1501 and found d' Ataide's report in the shoe.
The Post Office tree is a venerable milkwood to which a sea boot was nailed for many years. Seafarers collected letters from, and posted them in, the boot. Today the tree is part of Bartholomeu Dias Museum complex and letters posted in a boot shaped post-box next to it are specially franked.
It was to take another ten years before Vasco da Gama reached this spot on his fateful journey to India. Close to the spring where Dias took on water is the Dias Museum which has a full scale replica of Dias' Caravela. This little 300-ton vessel was built in 1987 in Lisbon and sailed to the Cape in that year in a re-enactment of the event, 500 years later.
The museum was built, minus a wall on the seaside. At high tide, one day, the caravel was sailed into the museum, the tide went out, the wall was built in and there it stands as one of the most unusual and imaginative museums in the country.
posted by African Luxury Train Destinations at
7:17 AM
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