THE CIRCLE
1
VOLUME 18 SEPTEMBER 2022
In this issue:
1. Bay of Paradise
In the Phang Na Bay National Park in the Andaman Sea, you can visit the famous James Bond island, explore hidden caves in a long-tail boat, and enjoy a seafood lunch in a Sea Gypsy village built on stilts.
2. The lady who fought Sarah Raal decided, rather than being sent to a concentration camp, to join her brothers in their veld commando and fight against the British forces, disguising herself as a man.
3. The Karkloof aviator
There is a story that a KZN farmer built, launched and flew the world’s first glider around 1870, when the Wright brothers were still at school - and he lived to tell the tale.
5
1.Bay of paradise
INTRODUCTION
A few hours by boat to the north east of Phuket is a marine geological wonder. The Phang Na Bay National Park in the Andaman Sea has over a hundred small islands, with sandy beaches, sunken caverns, and startling rock formations rising out of warm emerald-green water. The sheltered bay is ideal for diving, snorkeling and exploration by sea kayak. Being a marine protected area, Phang Nga Bay attracts visitors from all over the world with its clean waters, unique flora and fauna, and limestone formations.
JAMES BOND ISLAND
The top destination in Phang Nga Bay is James Bond Island, the site for the 1974 movie 'The Man with the Golden Gun' from the Bond film series. Today hundreds of tourists visit the island where those of a certain age might recall Britt Eklund being held hostage by the melodramatic villain Scaramanga.
In front of the island is the world-famous mushroomshaped rock Khao Ta Pu (where the laser was hidden in the movie). The rock rises twenty meters above the sea and is the biggest attraction in the entire Phang Na Bay National Park.
KHAO TA PU
The sides of Khao Ta Pu have been worn down by erosion and it has been off limits to tourists for the best part of two decades. Large boats and speedboats are forbidden from passing too close to the rock.
James Bond Island is crowded with tourist boats during high season. On its eastern beach, where you land, there are stalls and stands selling overpriced souvenirs.
A SIAMESE JUNK
Tour boats of many shapes and sizes depart daily from Phuket. One option is cruising the waters of the Andaman Sea and the Phang Na Bay National Park, in a Siamese junk.
The June Bahtra, a traditional wooden sailing junk with large red sails, also featured briefly towards the end of the James Bond film. The creaking sounds of a wooden ship and the sound of the wind in the sails provide you with a different and unique experience.
The tour boats can anchor anywhere in the bay, enabling passengers to enjoy swimming and snorkeling in the warm ocean, enjoying the cool sea breeze and the beautiful views.
KOH TALU
On James Bond Island you can hire a long-tail boat and driver, to visit the island of Koh Thalu. The island is rich in its variety of fauna, fish, shrimps and crabs with hidden caves, mangroves and hidden lagoons that you can also discover by kayak.
THE MOKEN SEA GYPSIES
The sea gypsy village of Koh Panyee is a Muslim fishing village built on stilts, housing 1,600 people from 360 families. The village is only accessible by boat, and has a school, a mosque, a health centre, many souvenir shops, and a few restaurants.
THEMOKEN SEA GYPSIES
The people of Koh Panyee are Moken, or Sea Gypsies, who live their lives on their traditional boats called kabang.
The Sea Gypsies of the village of Koh Panyee earn a living from acting as guides in the Phang Na Bay National Park and from tourists visiting their village.
Sea Gypsy children learn to swim and dive before they walk. They have an extraordinary ability to hold their breath and can see under water for extended periods.
At the end of the afternoon as you return to Phuket you can watch the beautiful orange shades of the sun slowly disappearing behind the Andaman sea in a magnificent sunset.
5
2. The lady who fought
THE LADY WHO FOUGHT
The Lady Who Fought is the name of a book about a legendary young woman named Sarah Raal, during the Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902.
Sarah Raal deserves to have had a film made of her life. Her story begins with the outbreak of war and her father and brothers immediately enlisting, leaving Sarah, her mother and two small children alone on the family farm Olievenfontein in the Southern Orange Free State
5
SARAH RAAL
After a few months her father returns to the farm, his health deteriorating and unable to fight. He is accused of collaborating with the Boers, arrested and sent to an unknown concentration camp. A few weeks later her mother and sisters go into the local town for suppliesand don’t return.
One day British soldiers arrive to commandeer the farm’s large flock of sheep. Raal demands a receipt which is reluctantly provided by the officer in charge.
Alone on the farm, and concerned for her safety, Raal decides to join her brothers in their veld commando and fight against the British forces, disguising herself as a man. Her father had left 500 pounds hidden on the farm, which Raal sews into her dress and stitches into her hatband.
5
SARAH RAAL
She took part in several battles and skirmishes and witnessed the deaths of fellow Boer fighters and the enemy. She was then captured and spent many months in various concentration camps, sometimes in solitary confinement, while searching for her parents.
She continuously protested against the horrific conditions in the camps, and bravely confronted the camp officers on many occasions, developing a reputation as a troublemaker.
She was released at the end of the war, and returned to the now-derelict family farm, where she was reunited with her parents and surviving brothers. With the 500 pounds still intact and the British eventually agreeing to honour the receipt for the commandeered sheep, the family was able to begin rebuilding the farm.
5
SARAH RAAL
After the war she married and was urged by friends and family to write a book of her wartime experiences. Met Die Boere in Die Veld was published in 1936 and republished in English in 2000. The story is a straightforward and unique account of the Boer War events from her viewpoint. Much of the story is set in the Southern Free State where the family farm is located.
Raal, Sarah, THE LADY WHO FOUGHT, A young woman’s account
of the Anglo-Boer War, Stormberg Publishers, 2000.
It is 120 pages long, translated by Karen Smalberger with a foreword by Ann Emslie. You can find it on Takealot.
SARAH RALLFAMILY MATTERS
By a strange turn of fate, Sarah Raal is related to my wife
Marthinette. Sarah was her grandfather’s sister and her mother’s aunt. After the war Sarah married and had 2 children. She moved to Cape Town and is buried in the Maitland cemetery.
Marthinette never met her but did meet her daughter several times. She often visited Olievenfontein as a child. She recalls a beautiful farmhouse with a tennis court, a schoolroom, a sparkling fountain and a water furrow serving abundant fruit orchards with quince, apple and pear orchards.
Olievenfontein was sold some years ago. It is now used for breeding merino sheep and the farmhouse has been turned into a guest house.
The restored farmhouse at Olijvenfontein
3. The Karkloof aviator
THE KARKLOOF AVIATOR
The first ever powered aircraft flight took place in December 1903 in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, USA, when the Wright brothers flew for a distance of thirtyseven meters.
Seven years earlier the German Otto Lilienthal made the first ever successful manned glider flight in 1896, a length of 250 meters.
In South Africa, the first powered flight is credited to the French aviator Albert Kimmerling in 1909, flying a Voisin 1907 biplane in East London
THE FIRST SOUTH AFRICAN GLIDER
But there is a story – or perhaps a legend - that a KZN farmer built, launched and flew a primitive glider much earlier, around 1870, (when the Wright brothers were still at school), and lived to tell the tale.
There are a few different versions of this story, but what follows is one of the popular versions.
John GoodmanHousehold lived on the farm Der
Magtenburg, in the Karkloof area near Howick in KwaZulu
Natal.
He was said to be a brilliant inventor who began researching manned flight by shooting large birds, weighing them, measuring their wings and calculating the area of wingspan needed to carry his weight.
THE FIRST SOUTH AFRICAN GLIDER
It seems that Household consulted the Anglican Bishop of Pietermaritzburg, Bishop John William Colenso, who was a known mathematician and theologian. Colenso may have designed the aerodynamics of the wings of the glider for Household.
In 1870, Household and his brother built a glider and launched it from the top of an 80metre cliff. This first trial craft was a single wing hang glider with a shifting seat like a swing.
It was shaped on the form of a vulture and built of bamboo, river reed, oiled paper and rope. It was not a success.
THE KARKLOOF AVIATOR
Household’s second aircraft a year later, was of a similar design with the exception that the oiled paper was substituted with silk, and the bamboo with steel rods. The first flight in this redesigned craft, is said to have taken place in 1871.
The actual distance flown and altitude achieved differs from source to source but it is asserted that the distance flown was further, and the duration was also longer, than either of the flights made by Lilienthal or the Wright brothers.
5
THE KARKLOOF AVIATOR
During the second flight the craft soared for a while before a rapid descent in which it clipped a tree and crashed, resulting in Household breaking his leg in the process.
It seems that after hearing about her son's escapades, Household's mother, a religious woman, insisted that her son abandon his project out of fear that it would incur the wrath of God. On her insistence all records and designs were destroyed by burning everything. There is thus no written record or proof that John Goodman Household and his brother designed, built and flew the world's first heavier than air glider.
5
THE KARKLOOF AVIATOR
Household died in Pietermaritzburg in 1906, two years after the first Wright Brothers’ flight. In 1995 the Lions River Heritage Society and the South African Air Force Association erected the Goodman Household Monument to commemorate his achievement. The monument can be found on the district road between Karkloof and Curry’s Post, 23 kms from Howick in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands.
With acknowledgement to the Sunday Tribune June 4, 2017, and Oberholzer, H. Pioneers of early aviation in South Africa. Bloemfontein: Memoirs van die Nasionale Museum, Vol. 7, 1974.
There is no reference to John Goodman Household in either Encyclopedia Britannica or Wikipedia.
5
The Circle is a private hobby magazine for family and friends, and retired Midstreamers.
Photographs in this issue have been sourced from Phuket tourism, SA History website, Wikipedia, the Lions River Heritage Society, SA Gliding website, and my personal and related family collections.
Sterkspruit waterfall, Monk’s Cowl, Natal Drakensberg
