River islands have always fascinated me and especially so in the Northern Cape where bridges span the banks of the Orange River and signposts point to a bevy of islands with interesting names like ‘Brakbos’, ‘Rooikop’ and ‘Melkbos’. The one that always catches my attention is ‘Kanoneiland’ (Cannon Island), the largest of the islands, which has a fascinating beginning and a name with an imaginatively embellished story.
With an appearance like any other small ‘dorp’, the (short) tree-lined Hoofstraat has some residential houses and adjacent to them several buildings housing the NG kerk, police station, school, bottle store and Winkelsentrum with post boxes on the outside wall. The rest of the 2500-hectare, 14-by-3km island is farmland, mostly planted with export table and raisin grapes, complemented with some cotton, lucerne, maize, onions, and pecan trees. The work on the island is seasonal, but even in the dry season it’s a common sight to see a tractor or two trundling down the road.
Hidden from the eye are two monuments that reveal the island’s origins and stories. The one is an old cannon on the school grounds and the other is a memorial stone in the church garden, inscribed with the names of the 52 original residents of the island.
I crossed two bridges, the ‘Eendrag’ (One Lane) bridge, built in 1940, and the double-laned ‘Manie Conradie’ bridge, built in 1954, to reach the well-stocked Kanoniki Padstal. Amongst all the delicious homemade fare and ‘tuisnywerheid’ (home industry), I met owners Thea Bekker and Petro Möller. Over roosterkoek and coffee, I heard the Kanoneiland tales. “My husband’s grandfather, Hennie Engelbrecht, was one of the original 52 farmers who started the island,” Petro told me.
Until 1928 the island, marooned in the middle of the Orange River, overgrown with reeds and bisected by waterways, was uninhabited. This changed when 52 farmers from the region rowed over and began the hard work of redirecting the river by creating channels for irrigation and clearing and levelling the fertile alluvial soil to create land worthy of cultivation. The farmers started their work upstream and slowly moved westwards. They built simple houses out of straw and clay on the higher ground and walked the ten kilometres back and forth every day to work on the upper-side of the island.
Although it’s a small island, Kanoneiland has various areas with their own names: Sandeiland, Bo Eiland, Rooirand, Agtereiland, Fritzrand and the most interesting one, ‘Baklei (Conflict) Eiland’, and I had to wonder how that area got its name. No-one’s telling. Bo-Eiland (Upper Island) was the spot where it all began, where the farmers built a small dam to channel a section of the river. In the early days they used a pontoon to cross the river. Petro informed me that the remains of the pont were erected above the cannon at the school for posterity.
“What about the cannon?” I asked her, “What is its story?” She laughed and said “Well, there’s the local story and then the true story.” According to history, in 1878 this area of the Northern Cape was a stronghold of the Koranna people, who were led by Klaas Pofadder. It is said that during the second northern frontier war the Cape Artillery Corps blasted them with cannon fire, driving them on to the island.
“But there’s another story that they tell,” Petro told me. Thea, who bakes Kanoniki’s popular ‘wortelkoek’ (carrot cake) related the second story. “The Korannas retaliated by hollowing out the trunk of a large quiver tree and filling it with scrap metal, stones and gunpowder, aiming it across the river and firing. It exploded, blasting debris all around them. When the smoke cleared, they apparently said “Don’t worry, if it looks this bad over here, can you imagine what it looks like on the other side?”
“The rest is history,” Petro added smiling. “Farming, farming, farming.”
And then it was time to find out about the story of the padstal. The industrious pair told me that it was a dream come true when the Orange River Wine Cellars building, next to Karstens Boerdery, became available. They started the padstal in 2021 with Thea’s husband, Joa. Their aim is to keep it local, stocking pecan nuts and raisins (sultanas, hanepoort and the dark and juicy sugra35) grown on Kanoneiland, making padstal staples like roosterkoek and hamburgers and chips, and buying in fudge, koekies, preserves and jams from the local women.
I left Kanoniki and its namesake Kanoneiland behind me as I headed north to Namibia with a basket brimming with new stories and a large bag of sultanas under my arm, delicious produce from this abundant island surrounded by the water and waterways of South Africa’s longest river.