From timber station to concert venue

What started out as timber station for the Dutch settlers in the Cape has become a unique botanical garden and ‘quite a special’ summer concert venue. The land of Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden has had different purposes in almost every century, but being part of life in Cape Town the character has only been further strengthened.

mountains on the side of kirstenbosch

“The view from this spot and indeed all the scenery around, is the most picturesque of any I had seen in the vicinity of Cape Town. The beauties here displayed to the eye could scarcely be represented by the most skilful pencil,” wrote botanist William Burchell after he visited Kirstenbosch in the 18th century. He was completely awestruck by its natural beauty.

Many before him and many others after him thought the same about this piece of land that lies between Wynberg Hill and the Constantia Nek pass, which is now called Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden.

“Nobody knows where the name comes from”
“If you read van Riebeeck’s diary you will see he always writes about Kirstenbosch,” says botanical garden tour guide Christien Malan.

In Jan van Riebeeck’s time the ‘bos’ (forest) was named after the free carpenter Leendert who held a small timber station there. Leendertsbos was only later in the 18th century referred to as Kirstenbosch. “But nobody knows where the name comes from”, says Malan about its latest name.

It could be named after its orchard of cherry trees (Kirsten Bosch, Kirse Bos?) or it may have been named after a member of the Kirsten family who lived nearby, but nothing is certain.

Covered with mystery
Kirstenbosch’s history is even more covered with mystery since the origin of the name of Skeleton Gorge, one of Kirstenbosch’ walking trails up to Table Mountain, is also not known. Malan can only tell that it used to be the route the woodcutters took to get to the timber.

Later the Kirstenbosch estate turned into farm land and it was here where the first vineyards were planted, not in Constantia. “That is where the name of the suburb Wynberg (mountain of wine) comes from,” says Malan.

Cast members from the new play now showing at a theatre in Lange

Hide-out for Capetonians
Nowadays, Kirstenbosch functions as a hide-out for Capetonians who want to escape the busy city for a day to have a stroll along the garden or to picnic on the grass. Foreign tourists have been visiting the place even before it was a botanical garden and have kept returning. Kirstenbosch also offers some of the best walks up Table Mountain: Nursery Ravine, or Skeleton Gorge provide perfect and steep hikes up in the morning sun, wandering over the Table, past Macclear’s Beacon to see the city bowl opening up.

Sunset concerts
“We have 17,000 visitors coming in on warm and nice Sundays“, says Malan. During the summer months from December to March musical sunset concerts are held on the lawns every Sunday. These sundowner’ concerts have become very popular over the last ten years and people are still talking about the gig Canadian rocker Brian Adams gave in the beginning of 2003.

In 1910 Professor Henry Pearson, the founder of the botanical garden, saw this rich land with its gently sloping flanks of the mountain that were covered with a tapestry of green, gold and grey colours of the Fynbos vegetation, he said: “This is the place”.

It all becomes clear why, when you see the richness of Kirstenbosch calm yourself.