Soekershof — discovering the mystery of all things through plants

Soekershof ('seekers garden') invites an ele­ment of 'seek­ing'; dis­cov­er­ing the mys­tery of all things through plants that some­times strikes a chord as we uncover a sim­ilar mys­tery within ourselves.

If you're look­ing for unusual and you have a 'thing' for fat plants (more com­monly known as suc­cu­lents, and who is not attrac­ted by these water-retaining plants, some of which come equipped with water-saving fea­tures, and man­age to sur­vive in arid cli­mates?) then Soekershof belongs on your list of things to do ...

Just 10 kilo­metres east of Robertson, Soekershof lies in Klaas Voogds West — 10 hec­tares of amaz­ing mazes, a cac­tus labyrinth, a tree of grow­ing cre­ativ­ity, the world's largest hedge-maze, a stone-age cinema, a fin­ger­point­ing maze, earth sculp­tures, suc­cu­lents you didn't even know exis­ted, and a touch of magic.

As Herman van Bon, the out­spoken and some­times out­rageous cre­ator, together with his part­ner Yvonne de Wit, of this gem on Route 62, says: “no garden stim­u­lates asso­ci­at­ive minds as much as a suc­cu­lent garden.”

Essentially Soekershof is a small, private botan­ical garden that man­ages to be at once enter­tain­ing and edu­ca­tional. It is described by its own­ers as a sac­red enter­prise, based on the appre­ci­ation of nature, humour, play, cre­ation, expres­sion and respect for the land, and the growth and devel­op­ment of the people and plants that participate.

It is a place of mys­tery, peace and thrill­ing inter­act­ive dis­cov­ery. There are over 2 500 dif­fer­ent types of suc­cu­lents, and a nurs­ery too, for those who simply can­not leave without the hope of pro­du­cing sim­ilar some­where in a patch of their own garden, where you can get per­sonal advice on how best to cul­tiv­ate your newly acquired organ­ic­ally grown fat plants!

At 11am sharp on days when Soekershof is open — that rules out Monday, Tuesday (unless you've pre­b­ooked), the last two full weeks of Feb, and in July after the school hol­i­days — there is a maze quest with an intro­duc­tion by Herman.

Herman describes the Klaas Voogds maze (one of its kind with a sur­face area of 13 870) as fol­lows: “this maze is not a maze in the tra­di­tional sense of get­ting lost but is a reflec­tion of life; walk­ing from one story into another, which is rep­res­en­ted by objects, as ori­ent­at­ing points, tower­ing above the hedges. However there are, as in life, also a few 'stor­ies' you can look out for. And... you are invited to add a few of your own.”

With hours of con­tem­pla­tion and excit­ing dis­cov­ery, a trip here is ideal for fam­ily out­ings, garden clubs, photo and film shoots, school out­ings, team build­ing, wed­dings, or just about any­thing, really. Picnics can be arranged ahead of time and include a glass of hand­craf­ted local wine, minus the sulphates!

The vis­it­ors' centre is housed in the old­est exist­ing build­ing between Swellendam and Tulbagh, and includes a col­lec­tion of hand­craf­ted gifts made by local artists. Soekershof is a Fairtrade organ­isa­tion and as part of its com­mit­mentvest in local com­munit­ies it spon­sors the Klaas Voogds primary school, includ­ing teach­ing pupils basic hor­ti­cul­tural know­ledge and skills.

To quote Albert Einstein — “The most beau­ti­ful thing we can exper­i­ence is the mys­ter­i­ous. It is the source of all true art and science.”

Contact Details: Located in Klaas Voogds West, Robertson. Telephone: +27 (0)23 626 4134, Website: http://www.soekershof.com

Photo Gallery: Click on the thumb­nails to view large pho­to­graphs of what awaits you at Soekershof.

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