Photos

I took this photo on a Sunday (maybe) on one of our trips to the country. It was about 3 o'clock in the afternoon and the sun was very bright and in the wrong place but I stood in the shade and took the picture and I think it came out OK. I was unable to find something to say about this church so I will tell you something about this little town.

The beautiful little village of Riebeeck Kasteel lies at the foot of the Kasteelberg mountain in a Tuscany style valley 70 kilometres from Cape Town.
Riebeeck Kasteel and Kasteelberg was named after Jan van Riebeeck ( a Dutch colonial administrator and founder of Cape Town in 1652) by one of his corporals, Pieter Cruythoff.

It was only in the region of forty years after Cruythoff's visit, about 1701, before the first settlers arrived here. There's a long history to the sister villages of Riebeeck Kasteel and Riebeeck West.

The prominent wine farms of Kloovenburg and Allesverloren were first established during this period, giving the Riebeeck Valley a long history of viticulture.

Today the villages are surrounded by wheat fields and a relatively new crop is the nutritious olive, which has successfully led to an annual olive festival on the first weekend of May.

The inhabitants are descendants of all the original peoples, the early settlers and a new generation of city dwellers tired of the rat race, and immigrants from abroad.