The Messerschmitt jet fighter swoops down from nowhere to attack the Spitfire fighter but the latter is not fazed and engages the Messerschmitt in a dog-fight. Meanwhile, the Mosquito bomber carries on undisturbed towards its target. A little while later a Ratel armoured vehicle and a G6 155mm Self-Propelled Howitzer, both VERY impressive South African war machines, grab my imagination both as engineer and military enthusiast.
But let’s begin at the start of this exciting leg of our trip. We leave Bloemfontein a bit later than planned and we are now in a hurry to get to Buffeldoorn near Koppies, the farm of my son-in-law’s parents. Megan, my daughter, got married to Willem-Carel in 2019 and, when we travel north we try to visit Philip and Sandra, his parents, when we can. It is an highway for most of the three hour drive but the road gets more narrow and congested closer to our destination. We pass an accident. Philip advises us to rather take the main off-ramp to Koppies from the N1 because most secondary roads in the Free State are not well-maintained and potholes can be dangerous. We arrive just in time for lunch on the farm.
We really enjoy visiting Philip and Sandra – good old hard-working, christian Afrikaners you can go to war with, as the saying goes. We enjoy Sandra’s cooking and beautiful house and then Philip and I go to inspect the maize fields and pecan nut plantations. They show us their new guest house and Anette and I even have some time to do some target shooting. This is the most time we have spent together and our bond grows even more solid. We share a lot of values.
Once you have eaten and stayed at Buffeldoorn, you will not mind returning – even if that implies you will have to extend your holiday. This is exactly what happens and we promise Philip and Sandra we will visit them again on our way back home.
We leave on the Monday for Johannesburg. In fact we are on our way to a business meeting in Roodepoort which is about an hour and fourty minutes from Koppies. On our way we cross the Vaal River which is the border between the Free State and Gauteng. After our meeting we make a quick visit to the first house we have owned 36 years ago in Helderkruin, Roodepoort. It brings back old and happy memories. The house and suburb still look very much the same as it did years ago. Then we drive to Krugersdorp nearby where we will stay the night with old university (and Roodepoort) friends of ours, Eduard and Charlotte. Since we have seen them a couple of years ago, they have moved to a retirement village. Their house is spacious and we have a braai outside. The next morning, Eduard and I decide to visit the South African Museum of Military History in Johannesburg next to the zoo, while the ladies do their own thing (another clever idea by Anette).
This is single-handedly the best war museum I have ever seen. Now, admittedly, I have not seen that many war museums but I have seen the Imperial War Museum in London and some museums in Germany and also the Smithsonian in Washington and none compare with this one in terms of the diversity on display with regards to war. You can revisit all the South African wars from the Anglo-Boer wars right through the WW1, WW2, the Korean War to the Border War. They have anything from uniforms and firearms to planes, tanks, canons and armoured cars and anything in between, on display. The introductory paragraph of this article relives what I felt when I entered the museum. I have seen artifacts that I always have dreamt of seeing in real life – a Spitfire fighter, a Mosquito bomber, (the Messerschmitt jet fighter and the V2 rocket I have already seen in Berlin), a Sten sub-machine gun, Field Marshall Jannie Smuts’s uniform, a G6 155mm Self-Propelled Howitzer, a Ratel armoured infantry vehicle and many others. And the entry fee is cheap. If you are a military or engineering lover, do yourself a favour and spend at least a day there.
Later the day we meet again with the women at the Rosebank shopping mall and, after having something to eat, Anette and I depart for Edenvale on the eastern side of Jo’burg where my son lives. He is a chemical engineer and works for the research and development department of a company that designs and builds mineral extraction and processing equipment for mining companies world-wide. We spend two nights with him and on the day in between he takes us on a guided tour of their facilities. It is the first time I have been to his place and work since he has moved to Jo’burg two years ago. He is doing a great job of being his own man.
The last afternoon we do some final shopping and another braai before we depart for Mpumalanga and the Kruger National Park. Nine days of just being in the wilderness is beckoning…
