Mike Simpson

town of the month w sedgefield The Centre oftheUniverse … is how residents of Sedgefield describe their village. MIKE SIMPSON finds out why Pictures Jeanette Simpson, OlivePink Photography and Supplied L et’s be clear; I love Sedgefield, the village located midway between George and Knysna on the Garden Route. I’ve been visiting the village for many years and have become a fan of the great beaches, many waterways and the laid-back community vibe. But it can be an acquired taste, and many of the people who travel the N2 that dissects the CBD are less than impressed initially. “It’s a hole,” says a friend, who has never turned off the N2 to explore what’s on offer, and bases her opinion on the view from a car window. Bomber Webb, the editor of The Edge newspaper in Sedgefield, once had a similar attitude. “I told my wife she should shoot me if I ever decided to settle here,” he recalls. “I thought, like a lot of people, that Sedgefield just consisted of the main road and a few scattered shops.” He’s now been here for 18 years and wouldn’t be anywhere else than in this village of about 8 000 people. “It’s only when you start looking that you realise what Sedgefield has. There are more – and better – beaches than Knysna, for example, and there’s a great community spirit.” Talk to the locals and the sense of community is much in evidence. Perhaps it’s best encapsulated in the Slow Town ethos. Sedgefield prides itself on being South Africa’s first Slow Town, an Italian concept that’s about avoiding the rush, enjoying life and encouraging people to stop and smell the ABOVE: Tourism bookings officer Nicole Moore (left) and tourism manager Belinda Hobson provide useful information to visitors at the local tourism office. ABOVE RIGHT: Bomber Webb, editor of The Edge newspaper, once thought the village wasn’t worth a second glance. Now he’s a committed Sedgefielder. BELOW: Surrounded by water – including five beaches, a lagoon and a freshwater lake – Sedgefield has an impressive aerial view. ABOVE LEFT: Mosaic fish at the mouth of the Sedgefield Lagoon. Gericke’s Point, a well-known local landmark, is in the background. LEFT: Business hours in Sedgefield can be flexible, depending on mood. June 2018 www.countrylife.co.za www.countrylife.co.za 027 June 2018 town of the month w sedgefield proverbial roses. There’s now a regular Slow Town Festival here that typically takes place over the Easter Weekend. Tourism manager Belinda Hobson is understandably enthusiastic about everything that Sedgefield has to offer. “We’re a lovely seaside village surrounded by beaches, lakes and sand dunes covered in fynbos. We’re known for our pristine beaches, water sports like kite surfing and canoeing, and for our excellent paragliding. If it’s outdoors, it’s out here.” Indeed, paragliders floating serenely under multi-coloured canopies are a common sight over the village. “We’re one of the best African destinations for paragliding,” Belinda tells us. “We do a lot of international training of paragliders. People will come here for two weeks to learn to paraglide. It’s a safer place to learn to fly than the likes of the Swiss Alps. It’s also cheaper.” Sedgefield may also have another claim to fame, as a hotspot for mosaic art. Outside the tourism office in the main road is a giant mosaic tortoise called Slow, but if you wander around town you’ll find everything from mosaic benches to fish, an orca, and even a giant octopus that forms the centrepiece of an interactive and child-friendly mosaic garden. The mosaics are the brainchild of Masithandane, a local non-profit organisation that cares for people in need, ranging from young children to the elderly. According to chairperson Jacky Weaver, creating the artworks fulfils the dual need of skills transfer and job creation. “People learn how to do the wire work inside the artworks, how to weld, how to attach the glass-fibre shells, and then how to apply the mosaics.” Apart from public mosaic projects funded by the likes of the National Lotteries Commission, there are now also many privately funded projects that add to job- and incomecreation. “We want to be the mosaic capital of Africa,” says Jacky enthusiastically. For some, cars are works of art too. Just off the N2 is one of the village’s unsung attractions, Sedgefield Classic Cars. Run by petrolhead Sheridan Renfield for the past 12 years, it entices a steady stream of visitors LEFT: A peaceful scene on the Island, the suburb overlooking the lagoon. BELOW LEFT: Cape Town visitors Lula and Leo Hattingh play on the giant mosaic octopus at the Sedgefield Community Mosaic Interactive Park. BELOW: Jacky Weaver, chairperson of local NPO Masithandane, poses with Slow, the mosaic tortoise. She’d like to see Sedgefield known as the mosaic capital of Africa. June 2018 www.countrylife.co.za to view its 60-plus collection of pre-war and post-war machines that range from VW Beetles and Kombis to Alfa Romeos and even a RollsRoyce. Sheridan welcomes callers and says it’s not unusual for tour buses to stop there. A refugee from Johannesburg, who was lured by Sedgefield’s lack of industry, Sheridan first worked in the tourism sector before returning to his first love, cars. He agrees that a relatively isolated Garden Route village is an unexpected location for a car dealership specialising in niche-market vehicles. “Technology helps me. We get a lot of sales via the Internet,” he says. “People from across South Africa are happy to buy our cars without ever seeing them in the metal because they trust the very accurate and honest information that we give on the website.” His favourite car on the lot? “I can’t tell you that,” he says confidentially, “the other cars will hear me.” Not far down the road we find more Gauteng exiles, this time from Pretoria. Joe and Louisa Groenewald – known unofficially as ‘Joe Pie’ and ‘Louisa Pie’ – run one of the local institutions, the Steam Whistle Stop. www.countrylife.co.za ABOVE LEFT: A paraglider enjoys soaring over Sedgefield. The village is well known as a training location for international paragliding students. ABOVE: Joe and Louisa Groenewald, seen here with long-serving employee Silvia Nkulu, have been making scrumptious pies at the Steam Whistle Stop for more than 20 years. BELOW: Sheridan Renfield of Sedgefield Classic Cars. His premises attract plenty of visitors and his cars are sold nationally. 029 June 2018 town of the month w sedgefield ABOVE LEFT: Susan Garner (left) and Rose Brettell run the Wild Oats community farmers’ market. It’s the oldest of the village’s three very popular markets. ABOVE CENTRE: Real estate agent Mario Ferreira says high demand has seen local property prices rise by 23 per cent a year. ABOVE RIGHT: Sedgefield resident, Demi-Leigh Nel-Peters, during a parade through the village to honour her crowning as 2017 Miss Universe. ABOVE: Turning elephant pooh into profit. Owner André Knoetze at the entrance to Scarab Paper. TOP RIGHT: Gauteng holidaymakers Kerrin Meerholz (nearest camera), and Ryan and Tyla Meerholz, with Jeanette Delport, explore the rock pools at Swartvlei Beach. ABOVE: Saturday is market day and attracts huge crowds, particularly during holiday season. They’re known for their chicken and peppersteak pies, as well as Cornish pasties. They also have the distinction of operating from a railway station that’s been without a train since the devastating Garden Route floods of 2007. Every day from 1997 to November 2007, they catered to passengers arriving on the steam train running between George and Knysna. Then one night the floods came and destroyed the tracks. The train hasn’t run since, although there are hopes of a return by the end of this year. “Our life changed in one night, as about 75 per cent of our business came from the train. It was very scary,” recalls Louisa. “Luckily we have awesome locals and they supported us by offering us premises in town where we could sell our pies. Some people even gave us money.” Today, Steam Whistle Stop pies are as popular as ever and the couple say they haven’t June 2018 regretted their decision to leave the jewellery industry and relocate to Sedgefield. “Here, our children grew up as normal kids, going to school barefoot, eating fruit from the trees, playing tok-tokkie,” says Joe. Some people here make a living from pies, but others make it from pooh. Scarab Paper is surely the most unusual attraction in the village and makes its living selling paper and artworks made from recycled elephant dung. “No, it doesn’t smell,” says owner André Knoetze, explaining that a scarab is an Egyptian dung beetle and the Garden Route is an ideal location for an industry like this because of the presence of two elephant reserves from which the raw product can be sourced. “It’s not widely known that elephant dung is ideal for course-fibre paper,” says André. “Artists like this fibre as you can use pencil, ink, oil, acrylic, whatever on it and it doesn’t 030 smudge. We sell the paper to artists, and my wife Rita, an artist herself, creates artworks that we reproduce as postcards or prints. “We are the only company that prints on elephant-dung paper on a commercial scale and we distribute worldwide. The demand for our postcards and limited-edition prints, particularly wildlife prints, is very strong.” The manufacturing process is fascinating and involves mixing a small quantity of ellie pooh with shredded paper to form a pulp. This is treated, washed and passes through 25 processes before the finished product is sold to people as far afield as Britain and the United States. “There’s great novelty value,” André tells us. If ellie-pooh paper is the most unusual attraction in Sedgefield, then the village’s three markets are surely the most popular. On any Saturday morning you’ll see remarkably large www.countrylife.co.za crowds thronging each market, the oldest of which is Wild Oats. Run by Rose Brettell and Susan Garner – known locally as Susie Wild and Rosie Oats – it’s been operating as a food and farmers market since 1999 and offers about 70 stalls, a number that the ladies feel is manageable. “We don’t allow stallholders willy-nilly to join the market,” explains Susan. “We carefully select them based on what they want to sell and what is already being sold at the market. We may also pick people based on enthusiasm.” The policy is to sell only locally produced products – even Cape Town is considered ‘foreign’ – with an emphasis on healthy, organic produce. Despite the enormous crowds the market attracts, the pair are steadfast that it should be open for only four hours each Saturday. “We could be open for longer, but then people just trickle in all day. We want to create an ‘event’ where sales are explosive for our stallholders,” says Rose. And the biggest thing to hit the town? Bomber Webb says it’s surely the crowning of Sedgefielder Demi-Leigh Nel-Peters as Miss Universe 2017 in Las Vegas in November. Everyone seems to have a Demi-Leigh story. “My son dated her,” someone tells us. “My daughter went to school with her,” says another. “My daughter had her photo taken with her,” we’re told by a third. So, for now, it seems that little Sedgefield really is at the centre of the universe. n Map reference G4 see inside back cover Making g dun elephant in Go to paper www.countrylife.co.za ld Sedgefie LEFT: The Island is a popular residential suburb overlooking the lagoon, where tortoises and birds are a common sight. Tuck In Trattoria da Vinci -) in the main road offers high-quality evening dining with an Italian theme. For a casual vibe visit the Pili-Pili Beach Bar at Myoli Beach for daytime and evening meals-. Sleep In The Sedgefield Arms offers luxury selfcatering cottages and apartments close to the centre of town -), as does the adjacent Pelican Lodge Guesthouse -). For more options contact Sedgefield Tourism-. Get Out and About Sedgefield has a wide range of activities for outdoor enthusiasts, including canoeing and paragliding. There are also numerous shops selling everything from antiques to decor items. Sedgefield Tourism for more info. Property Peep There’s a shortage of quality property, says estate agent Mario Ferreira of Chas Everitt, and prices are escalating at about 23 per cent a year. Beach- and lagoon-side properties are particularly sought-after, but prices are generally more affordable than in Knysna and Wilderness. Prices vary from just over R1-R30 million for exclusive Myoli Beach and Cola Beach. June 2018