Wharf Street, beer and history.
We set off around lunchtime on Thursday 10th with me driving along the East London road turning off at a small development of thatched roofed 'cottages'. It turned out that my sister had tried to visit this restaurant on two previous occasions and, true to form, it was still closed. This proved to be a rather fortunate occurrence as it led to two interesting days spent around the area of Wharf Street back in Port Alfred.
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| Yes I really am here! |
We parked outside the Brew Pub and entered for a superb lunch. Whilst there I explored the building which includes a cellar and an art gallery in the dining area upstairs along with many photographs of the history of Port Alfred. A tunnel leads from the cellar to the river which now houses the wine cellar. There were various rumours attached to this tunnel from slavery to smuggling. In fact it was used to transport stored rainwater to replenish the freshwater stores on the ships before they sailed. Whilst there Toby booked a tour of the brew house for the following day. The tour is R30.00 and is well worth a couple of hours of anyone’s time – more later.
We settled down to a leasurly meal each course prepared from fresh ingredients, you will see Bram – proprietor and chef in the markets early each morning. I had chicken livers, Toby small beef cubes in a sauce and my sister sartre chicken. I was given a small sample of each of the beers from the brew pub and chose the ale rather than the light, larger like brew or the heavy porter. The main course for me was a rack of ribs in bbq sauce the size of a dinner plate. Any hopes of loosing weight whilst in South Africa are receding fast! Bram came and joined us for a drink and highlighted some of the aspects of the building which whetted my appetite for the following day's visit to the Brew House.
Friday 11th April at 11:30 hours the Brew House tour starts. I was joined by a family who own a cattle ranch outside Grahamstown around a bench table where Ian Cooke, one of the three proprietors and our tour guide for the day gave us a hearty welcome. His opening question is “Would you like some history of the place as well as the tour or just get straight down to brewing?” My interest piqued from the day before I was keen to learn more of the history as well as the brewing process, fortunately everyone else agreed too.
In the early 1800s a British Army garrison was established at Grahamstown to deal with tribal wars in the area and later the Boer War. In those days it took 12 days by ox-cart to transport men and supplies from the established Port Elizabeth so it was decided to build a port at the mouth of the Kowie river. It can be seen from the early photographs that this became a very busy place regularly having six or seven ships a day tethered along the wharf. It is even more interesting that this is a tidal river so, at low tide, there is only a stream running here.
In the mid-1800s it was decided that a permanent harbour masters office, customs and bond were required. The building, now housing the Brew House and Brew Pub, opened in 1853 and has been in continuous use in one form or another ever since. It is also unique in that the structure of the building has never been altered so as you look around you see exactly what the settlers and sailors saw in 1853. Wharf street grew with the building of the 'Trading Post' and other essentials, probably a pub, and this became the original town.
Port Alfred wasn't always Port Alfred, originally named Port Kowie it has had half a dozen names over the years. It is believed that Kowie was the name of a great chief of the indigenous tribe who lived in the 1700s. In 1876 Port Francis as it was know at the time was renamed Port Alfred in honour of a Royal visit by Prince Alfred representing Queen Victoria. The butting was hung and a ball arranged however Prince Alfred never made it. On his way by road from Johannesburg he spotted a herd of wild elephants and decided to go hunting sending three of his party in his stead.
By the end of the century the army had moved north to deal with other conflicts, the railway arrived (and went!) and the port fell into disuse. The building was handed over to the municipality and became the town hall for the next twelve years. I has had many functions since becoming the town cinema in the 1960s before becoming a brew house about 12 years ago. The current owners bought the brewery in 2008 and started production in 2009. Water, barley, hops and yeast are the four ingredients required to brew a good ale. The water is supplied from vats of filtered rainwater collected throughout the year rather than a local stream or well as is usually the case. The barley and hops are both grown in the Western Province. An example of a hop plant grows outside the Brew House and is often mistaken for a vine! I will leave it to Ian to explain the intricacies of the brewing process and, that way, you get to. sample the brew.The last photographs in this particular set were taken after the visit as I wandered around the new shopping centre of Port Alfred as a contrast.
Port Alfred did, in fact, eventually receive a Royal visit in the mid 1920s as can be seen from the crests on the row of cars in front of the Port Alfred Motor Co. garage and the fact that the Golf Club is 'Royal Port Alfred' one of only five in South Africa.
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