Merweville is a town located in Beaufort West Municipality, Western Cape. Village 45 km north-west of

Prince Albert Road Prince Albert Road is a village located in Laingsburg Local Municipality, Western Cape. History The village of Prince Albert Road owes its existence to the route chosen by Prime Minister John Molteno, in 1872, for the Cape Government Railways's we ...

and 130 km south-west of

Beaufort West Beaufort West (Afrikaans: ''Beaufort-Wes''; Xhosa: ''eBhobhofolo'') is a town in the Western Cape province in South Africa. It is the largest town in the arid Great Karoo region, and is known as the "Capital of the Karoo". It forms part of the ...

History

It was established on the farm Vanderbylskraal in 1904 and administered by a village management board from 1921. Named after the Reverend P van der Merwe (1860-1940), minister at Beaufort West of the

Dutch Reformed Church The Dutch Reformed Church (, , abbreviated NHK ) was the largest Christian denomination in the Netherlands from the onset of the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century until 1930. It was the traditional denomination of the Dutch royal famil ...

, and chairman of the church council which established the town.

Description

The town is an isolated community that maintains an old-world charm, about 150 km from

. The surrounding region has been likened to that of

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

. It was one of the few towns or villages in the province not to be serviced by a sealed highway until the 40 km stretch of gravel road from the N1 was tarred in 2015.

Local events and attractions

Every year the Dankfees festival is held which attracts thousands of people for the weekend. The date is the weekend closest to 1 May.

In media

''Die Boekklub'', a hit drama series on kykNET and

Showmax Showmax is a subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service that launched in South Africa on 19 August 2015. Its majority owner is MultiChoice, which owns 70% of the Showmax group, while American conglomerate NBCUniversal owns 3 ...

, about a book club, is filmed and set in the town.Merweville, part two – Karoo Nougat Central
''The Daily Maverick''. 28 August 2024

References

External links

Merweville Town Website
www.merweville.co.za {{Authority control Karoo Populated places in the Beaufort West Local Municipality 1904 establishments in South Africa