Imhoff Farm Redux
This is another in a series of Redux caches, in which a popular cache which has been archived for whatever reason, is ‘resurrected’ by the placement of a new cache near the same location. This cache has been placed in recognition of MnCo’s GC20GHW Imhoff Farm Village which was placed on 30/3/10 and archived on 27/7/15 after some 48 finds and 5 favourite points. Despite multiple steps, these are all within a small area and completing the cache should be possible within 30-45 minutes.
Thanks are due to the management of the farm for kind permission to place the cache.
Note that the given coordinates are for the parking area near the farm entrance.
To find the cache:
Step 1: After parking and securing your cachemobile at a convenient spot in the extensive car-park, head for S 34 08.541 E 18 21.061 where you will be near an art gallery, the number over the plain green door to the right of the gallery entrance = A
Step 2: Continue a short distance through a doorway and down to S 34 08.528 E 18 21.075 where you will be at the side of a popular café-restaurant and next to the entrance of a small farmyard. Here you will find a large metal manhole cover at the centre of which is a 4-character combination of 3 letters and the number B
Step 3: Now head back and on to S 34 08.528 E 18 21.053 where you will see an old form of transportation which has C spokes on each of its two large wheels
Step 4: Head across and around the corner to S 34 08.520 E 18 21.047, the location of a shady wooden
bench above which is a small window with D panes of glass
Step 5: Onwards to S 34 08.530 E 18 21.035 the entrance to the horse-riding centre, the black metal gate of which has E horizontal bars (ie. including the top and bottom of the gate). ***Update 18/10/10: the gate has gone so use E=6***
Step 6: Proceed the short distance to S 34 08.541 E 18 21.033 where you will note there are F steps leading up to a passageway giving access to the Freshwater Research Centre and other enterprises
Step 7: Move on to S 34 08.547 E 18 21.041 the location of a tree stump which (after careful inspection) you will note has G faces carved into it
Step 8: Continue to the entrance of the farm shop @ S 34 08.549 E 18 21.057 where there are 2 small plates above the door, one with the room number (8) and the other with a 12-digit registration number – the year part of which (ie. the first 4 numbers) is 199H
Step 9: Finally, exit the main village area and move down to S 34 08.556 E 18 21.099 where, above the entrance to the snake farm, you will note the spotlight has a white sticker on it with J numbers and J letters. ***Note: The snake farm has disappeared with the new developments underway, so use J=3 in the formula***
The cache, a small camo-taped tablet pot, can be found at:
S 34 08.(A-B)(F+G)(C-10) E 18 21.(J-2)(E-D)(H-1)
Imhoff Farm History
In 1741, the Directors of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) finally decided to save their ships from the constant barrage of her deadly winter storms and stopped anchoring at Table Bay. However, the new, safer anchorage at Simon’s Bay was not a perfect alternative because, once on land, the return trek on foot to Cape Town to get vital supplies for the fleet took four days.
The company therefore sent Baron Gustav Wilhelm von Imhoff [various alternative spellings] to Cape Town in 1743 having been appointed as Governor General of the Dutch East Indies and Commisioner Extra-ordinaire at the Cape with the task of setting up a refreshment station / harbour facility in Simon’s Bay and of providing food for ships calling at the Cape. Among its mandates was the cultivation of lands in the Fish Hoek and Noordhoek valleys.
Christina Rousseau (nee Diemer) a widow who farmed cattle and vegetables in the southern Peninsula and who also supplied the ships from her farm Zwaansweide (also referred to as Zwaanswyk [Steenberg]) approached Von Imhoff for a grant of land in the Simon’s Town area. Von Imhoff responded to her application by granting her a piece of land above Simon's Bay called the ‘Goede Gift’. The ‘Kommetjie land’ and a piece of land which is now known as ‘Noordhoek’ were also granted to her. The former stretched all the way from Chapman's Peak (Noordhoek) in the north to Kommetjie in the south (including where the current Ocean View is) and was known as the farm ‘Slangkop’.
In honour of Baron von Imhoff the farm's name was eventually changed to ‘Imhoff's Gift’. The terms of the grant were that vegetables grown on the farm had to be supplied to the Company at a fixed price as there was a need for supplying fresh market produce to the ships lying at anchor in Simon's Bay. The vegetable garden on Imhoff's gift farm became
known as the Compagny's Tuin or Company Garden.
Over the years the farm had various owners but in 1912 was taken over by the Van der Horst family who still own it today. They lived on the farm and utilised it to farm cows and produce milk. In addition to the cows their farmyard boasted a number of horses, a couple of goats and fowls.
The 50 years after the proclamation of the town of Kommetjie in 1903 were relatively uneventful. Then in 1958, the unthinkable happened, a runaway bushfire blown by gale-force south east winds swept across the valley and down onto the farmhouse and burnt it to the ground. Two wooden busts (historic figureheads – salvaged from shipwrecks and given pride of place at the front entrance - mounted either side of the stairway to the homestead -were still burning three days after the fire had been put out.
Less than 10 years later, in 1967, another portion of the farm was expropriated by the then apartheid government, under the Group Areas Act, to form the township of Ocean View. This was to be the new home of coloured people forcibly removed from the surrounding (newly declared) ‘white’ areas of Simon’s Town, Glencairn and Noordhoek.
In 2003, the land between the vleis (marshes) and the sea was transferred to the Table Mountain National Park.
The dairy and livestock farming of the past is no longer viable on this once remote stretch of land. Having been restored after the fire, the farmhouse and its surrounding buildings were subsequently opened to the public to visit and enjoy. Located on a busy tourist route around the Peninsula, the farmstead has evolved into Imhoff Farm Village, a commercial hub with old-world charm.
The old homestead now houses the Blue Water Café while the stables, silo, smithy, slave quarters and milking sheds are occupied by local artists and various craft, furniture and food shops. On the stretch of land between the farmhouse and Noordhoek are a number of lakes which form a wetland area - one of few on the Atlantic coastline of the Peninsula.