This article first appeared in THE WEEKENDER

14th July 2007

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The map of the KwaZulu-Natal midlands is awash with neo-romantic place names – reminders of why this part of the world was once known as “the last outpost” of the British empire. Balgowan and Dargle call to mind the quieter corners of rural Britain. Fort Nottingham (named after the “Sherwood Forresters”, a colonial regiment from Nottinghamshire) is associated with the mythology of Robin Hood and his merry men. “Granny Mouse’s Country House” seems to come straight from the pages of a Beatrix Potter book, while “Toad Hall” is borrowed from The Wind in the Willows. The “Rose and Pig” and “Hedgehog and Otter” could be pubs in the Yorkshire Dales or the Cotswolds. St Ives and Tintagel (as in Cornwall and the Arthurian legend), Penny Lane (no prizes for guessing), Cranford, Hawklee, Oatesdale ... there are Anglophile country inns and cottages beyond the counting. Some natural attractions even have names with Celtic roots, none more so than Beinn Mheadhon, after the mountain in the Scottish Argyll. Little Kilgobbin nature reserve harks after an area in county Limerick, Ireland.

For many visitors, Kuala Lumpur (KL) is a transit city. Those heading for Malaysia’s white-sand beaches and diving hotspots usually don’t want to spend much time in the capital. Likewise, although Air Malaysia’s reasonable prices make KL a useful starting- or ending-point for those joining the South-East Asian trail, backpackers are typically either en route to somewhere else or – bodies exhausted, wallets empty – eager to fly home. This is a pity, as KL has much to offer, and merits its own place on the destinations list of any would-be explorer with itchy feet to scratch.

Hilton and Michaelhouse, South Africa’s own Eton and Harrow, always seem to be associated – despite the best efforts of John van de Ruit and Spud – with words like “prestigious” and “elite”; a standard joke is that the Hilton Hotel (a well-known traditional hotel in Hilton, not the worldwide chain) is where the boarders at Hilton College stay. The pockets of wealth and privilege in this part of the world have a colonial air about them, a feeling endorsed by the thunder of horses’ hooves on polo fields and the obsequious smiles of service staff as they attend to orders of gin-and-tonic or champagne (or, a local favourite, Hansa pilsener).

This somewhat aristocratic lifestyle is, of course, part of the appeal for visitors to the area. There’s nothing quite like sitting on the verandah, eating pancakes and sipping tea while looking out over lush green lawns. Yet at the same time the Midlands Meander tourist route is pitched as a family-oriented, down-to-earth part of the world – “quaint” rather than “upmarket”. Although some of the area’s hospitality options are very much in the top price bracket, the Meander maintains an atmosphere reminiscent of its humble beginnings back in 1985, when a group of artists, weavers and potters who had settled in the area as flower children of the 1960s decided to establish an arts and crafts route.

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However – especially when one ventures away from the Meander – there are proper nouns in the midlands that contest any assumptions about the natural “Englishness” of the region. Historically, this is Zulu territory, as towns such as Kanzakane and Impendle, or rivers such as the uMgeni and Mkomazi, attest. Other names are resonant with a centuries-long history of conflict between the English, the Afrikaner and the Zulu. The foothills of the Drakensberg produce high peaks that contest for linguistic sovereignty: Elandskop, Ntshangwe and Gladstone’s nose; De Magtenburg, Mvundlweni and Trafalgar Kop.

Amongst these is Spioenkop, and other battle sites of the Anglo-Zulu-Boer wars of the nineteenth century – Blood River, Isandlawana – are not too far away. At closer quarters are places where factional fighting erupted periodically under apartheid, during the years of transition and even, more recently, under the democratic dispensation.

And yet, despite this manifest evidence of violence, the midlands remain in the South African imagination (and, for the most part, in reality) an area of rolling hills, gentle mists, attractive villages and cosy farmhouses. The preponderance of natural beauty despite the suffering of many people is perhaps best encapsulated in the name Ixopo, immortalised on the opening page of Alan Paton’s Cry, the Beloved Country and made famous throughout the world – even though few people can pronounce it properly.

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With all these richly suggestive names in the midlands, I find it odd that every time I go there I end up spending an inordinate amount of time in the mundane-sounding town of Howick – so called after the Northumberland home of erstwhile British Colonial Secretary, Earl Grey. Howick is the south-eastern gateway to the Meander (which runs diagonally up to Mooi River on the northwestern side) and probably not high on the priority list of most visitors. At times, the town can feel like a suburb of Pietermaritzburg removed a few kilometers up the N3; there has been quite a lot of development in recent years, with residential complexes and shopping centers springing up. Nevertheless, it has retained a certain charm, and is a useful based for exploring the surrounding countryside.

In Howick itself, there are museums and the country’s best-stocked curio market (Craft Southern Africa) to explore, but the main attraction is undoubtedly the 100-metre waterfall that plunges into the Umgeni valley on the outskirts of town. The Zulu sobriquet for the Howick Falls lends a bit of rhetorical flair and is appropriately dramatic – KwaNogqaza, the Place of the Tall One. There is an attractive hike into the river valley, and it’s possible to abseil down the gorge if you’re in an adventurous mood or, if not, to follow a six-kilometer car trail along the perimeter.

The Umgeni Valley nature reserve, stretching from Howick to the Albert Falls, is popular with twitchers for its 200 bird species. If you’re hankering for more cascading water, head north to the Karkloof nature reserve, where there is more birding, hiking and trout fishing en route to the Karkloof and Woodhouse Falls. (A footnote to world history: in 1840, thirty years before the Wright brothers first beat gravity, two Karkloof brothers launched a flying machine of their own design off one of the ridges; it crashed, but there were no fatalities).

I also find myself strangely attached to the prosaically-named but hugely impressive expanse of water that borders Howick: the Midmar Dam. I fear that this is a purely sentimental attachment, as we used to have family holidays here when I was young and I subsequently took my girlfriend (now my wife) there for a weekend in one of the bungalows dotted along the shore. Still, even when viewed without the rose-tinted spectacles of nostalgia, it’s a lovely spot. Most people have heard of the Midmar Mile – thousands of eager swimmers descend on the dam in February each year for the world's largest inland ultra-swim – but the other eleven months see plenty of watersports and fishing, and there’s a game-park alongside the dam with springbok, zebra, hartebeest, oribi and blesbok.

Finally, as you head out of Howick on the R103, and before you forget all those messy historical details that spoil the picturesque views of the Midlands Meander, look out for a small monument at the top of a hairpin bend in the road. This marks the site of a not-insignificant event: Nelson Mandela’s arrest in 1962, prior to the Rivonia treason trial.