The families who regularly spent their holidays camping at the lagoon often begged Barnardo to sell them the small portion of his farm on which they camped. Eventually Hendrik agreed, and in 1941 Frank le Roux surveyed this section and in 1942 1,6963 morgen was transferred to the original 9 Syndicate families. The authorities allowed them to buy the land as one unit but they could not get individual ownership of their respective plots as they were not part of a township. Thus the name Syndicate by which these group of properties are still known.
In 1943 Baron Ulrich Behr of Kurland bought Groote Rivier from Hendrik Barnardo in order to develop the farm. In association with Leighton Ashmead, a property developer from Cape Town, the Nature’s Valley Development Corporation was formed and the establishment of the Nature’s Valley township promulgated in 1953. Electricity was connected only in 1986.Today the village comprises the 426+ erven with 397+ houses, the majority being wooden structures.
Although most are used as holiday homes, permanent residents live on about 40 of the properties.
Short History of Nature's Valley
Nature’s Valley and the surrounding coastline showed signs of Old Stone Age life from 1 million years ago. San hunter-gatherers lived in the area from 10 000 years ago and about 400 years ago the Qua and later the Houteniqua (Strandloper) peoples lived in the Nature’s Valley area.
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Initially Nature’s Valley was known as Groote Rivier. After the completion of the Groot River pass by Thomas Bain in the 1880’s, the Forestry Department proclaimed three lots in the valley – one for its own use and the other two sold to private individuals.
The first person to settle in the Valley, who acquired a 69-hectare lot (Lot 1 of Groote Rivier which is the Valley) from Tefler Anderson, was Hendrik Barnardo who had been a foreman at the Bain’s Groot River Construction Camp. He built his house of yellowwood planks at the entrance of the Valley where house Libertas now stands and farmed the Valley. He sowed wheat, planted pumpkins, sweet potatoes and mealies (maize) and bred ostriches and longhorn cattle. Barnardo lived in the valley all his life, raised 3 families here and died in the Valley in 1948 at the age of 86.
Bernardo was an enigmatic character who knew these forests intimately – an excellent marksman and great hunter who it is said accompanied the Prince of Wales on a hunting trip in the Tsitsikamma to hunt buffalo and elephant. He went to extreme lengths to protect the trees of the area. He stood guard at a massive yellowwood tree with his shotgun, threatening to shoot the engineer if he intended to chop down the tree that was in the way of the road that was being built in the Groot River pass.
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One can say that the story of Nature’s Valley unfolded in the early 1900’s when Hendrik Barnardo gave Bill von Bonde permission to spend their summer holiday camping at the lagoon. Soon other families followed also spending summer holidays camping at the lagoon, while other families chose to camp on the banks of the river near the drift that crossed the Groot River. This was knows as Swann’s Camp. Barnardo allowed the first holiday shack to be erected in 1918.
