THE LONGEST TREK

This is the story about a family’s incredible journey. It’s also about a moving frontier of love, deception and violence. A hint of its inner boundary is on a map in the Historical Atlas of South Africa by EA Walker, published in 1922. From Hondeklip Bay to Burgersdorp is a shaded area: ‘The Colony’s Northern Frontier, 1798-1824’. In this area, during the 18th century, Boer farmers, /Xam hunters, Khoekhoen pastoralists, slaves, runaways and fugitives from colonial justice lived – all co-operating, squabbling, cohabiting and, from time to time, killing each other. As settlers with greater firepower claimed more and more