ABOUT US

Gannaga Lodge is situated in 20 hectares of its own ground within the Tankwa National Park. It is located in the Roggeveld Karoo, in some of the most spectacular countryside in the Northern Cape, at the summit of the breathtaking Gannaga Pass.

The Lodge lies 28 kilometres from Middelpos on the dirt road between there and Ceres. Middelpos itself is situated on the R354, exactly halfway between Sutherland and Calvinia. Gannaga Lodge is the only establishment within the boundaries of the National Park that offers bed and breakfast, half-board and full-board accommodation, as well as restaurant and bar facilities.

The Tankwa National Park (formerly the Tankwa-Karoo National Park) has recently been greatly extended through the acquisition of land both above and below Gannaga Pass. While the park cannot offer the big five, it can offer small animals, bird and plant life in abundance, as well as two radically different types of Karoo scenery, climate and ecology (above and below Gannaga Pass).

HISTORY

Farming on the grounds began in 1775, then under management of the Louw family and part of the larger farm, De Hoop. At the turn of the 19th century, the farm Agterkop was acquired by Willem Visagie, known colloquially as Willem Karba.

The recently beautifully restored ‘Kliphuis’ was the first built structure on the grounds and operated as the farm house in the early 1800’s. ‘Die Kliphuis’ can be seen on route to the Gannaga Lodge reception, when driving from the Gannaga pass. Due to a lack of water at the location of ‘die kliphuis, the son of Willem Visagie, Izak, started construction on a new farm house, now know as the ‘old Farm house’. The old farm house was completed in 1931.

It was at this time when Izak ‘Agterkop’ Visagie also implemented a small school and post office, as the closest post office was in the neighbouring Free State province. These facilities were housed in the ‘farm stables rooms, as well as donkey and horse stables. What is currently room 6 was used for wheat, corn and oat stores, and a grain mill still resides behind the green door between rooms 4 and 5.

The twenty hectares on which Gannage lodge is situated is what remains under the Visagie Family name to this day..