Graaff-Reinet-Part 2: Sermons, Stillness, and Goodbye Roads.

 

Our Trip to Graaff-Reinet – Part 2: 

The Karoo blessed us with another glorious day — the kind of weather that makes even the dust sparkle a little.

We started the morning walking through the heavy doors of the Dutch Reformed Church, Groot Kerk.

An old, proud building where time itself seems to sit quietly in the pews.

The Dominee spoke of death — and that death holds no sting.

That no man, no plant, no animal decides their own moment to leave.

A message that fell straight into my heart, tying itself quietly into my journey as a death doula.

He also read the haunting poem Skoppensboer by Eugène Marais — death, personified, wandering among us.

It felt, somehow, exactly right. As if I had been meant to be there to hear it.

Breakfast — or Not Quite

After church, we went hunting for breakfast — but every local gem had shut their doors.

Only the big commercial places like Wimpy stood waiting, so Wimpy it was.

Not what we had dreamed of, but sometimes life hands you a plastic fork and you just have to eat the bacon anyway.

Reinet House: Whispers of the Past

Next, we visited Reinet House, a grand old lady from another time.

Hauntingly beautiful — full of creaking floors, worn furniture, and echoes you could almost hear if you stopped breathing long enough.

In one room, the old dentist’s surgery, I swear I could smell the sharp bite of antique medicine.

Maybe it was imagination. Maybe not. In places this old, you’re never quite alone.

(Website for the curious: Reinet House Museum)

The Boys and Their Wild Adventures

The boys peeled off after church — off to the dam and the wild rocks of the Valley of Desolation.

They came back flushed with sun and triumph, after a wild colour war — dust, water, and dye everywhere.

The kind of day that will live stitched into their memories long after their rugby boots are outgrown.

Sunday Stillness

For the rest of the day, we did what Sundays are for:

We lay about like flies, we breathed, we watched the light shift across the mountains.

There is a holy kind of resting that happens when you stop fighting time, and let it pass over you like a warm wind.

The Caravan’s Limp and Tomorrow’s Farewell

As for our faithful caravan — the stand that broke received the sort of fix only desperate, inventive hands can create:

some wire, a prayer, and the stubborn hope it will hold long enough to get us home.

True backyard mechanic style. True Karoo style.

Tomorrow’s plans have shifted — as they often do on the road.

We’ll stay only for one last rugby game before heading home.

My son-in-law has already left; my daughter will stay to see it all through.

Which means — for the first time — it will be just my mother and I left to pack up, hook up, and tow the caravan back ourselves.

Two women. Two sets of hands. And a road that waits without judgment.

We are ready.

Or at least — we will be.

“There are journeys you plan. And then there are the ones that forge you, wire and prayer and all.”

From the dusty backroads and the heart’s deep country — until next time.

Did something here speak to you?

Leave a comment if you feel moved, or simply sit with me in quiet.

If you’d like to walk this road with me, follow Nomadic Grandmother for new stories.

— x Elsabe