Prince Albert Road is a village located in
Laingsburg Local Municipality,
Western Cape
The Western Cape is a province of South Africa, situated on the south-western coast of the country. It is the fourth largest of the nine provinces with an area of , and the third most populous, with an estimated 7 million inhabitants in 2020 ...
.
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
The Cape Government Railways (CGR) was the government-owned railway operator in the Cape Colony from 1874 until the creation of the South African Railways (SAR) in 1910.
History Private railways
The first railways at the Cape were privately own ...
's western main line and its stations, from
Cape Town
Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second largest ...
to the diamond fields at
Kimberley.
A railway station was built at this particular point due partly to its location roughly halfway between
Beaufort West
Beaufort West (Afrikaans: ''Beaufort-Wes''; Xhosa: ''eBhofolo'') 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 Beau ...
and
Laingsburg, and a road was run to service the town of
Prince Albert, at the foot of the
Swartberg mountains
The Swartberg mountains (''black mountain'' in Afrikaans) are a mountain range in the Western Cape province of South Africa. It is composed of two main mountain chains running roughly east–west along the northern edge of the semi-arid Little Kar ...
, 40 km to the south. This road was therefore named Prince Albert road (now the
R407), and the railway station was likewise named "Prince Albert Road". Soon, a small hamlet developed around the station; from this, the modern village grew.
In 1886 a coach service connected Prince Albert Road to
Oudtshoorn
Oudtshoorn (, ), the "ostrich capital of the world", is a town in the Western Cape province of South Africa, located between the Swartberg mountains to the north and the Outeniqua Mountains to the south. Two ostrich-feather booms, during 1865– ...
far to the south, and village's mud-walled kraals served as an occasional market and trading point for the farmers of the surrounding district.
Attractions
It is today known for its fossil trails in the surrounding Karoo.
The artist Jan Schoeman ("Outa Lappies") was possibly the town's most famous resident.
He was an artist, recycler, and philosopher, who was voted as the Western Cape Tourism Personality of the Year in 2000.
He died on July 7, 2011.
Update: Outa Lappies remembered
Oudtshoorn Courant, July 6, 2012
References
{{Central Karoo District Municipality
Populated places in the Laingsburg Local Municipality