Tulbagh – The 6-Part Serial Adventure! (6/6: Tarzan Boot Store)

Part 6/6: Tarzan Fabriekswinkel, Home of the Ultimate Boot in the Swartland

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Here at the BootsnAll.com Travel Network, we’re deeply concerned with matters leather, rubber, steel and engineered arch support. In short, we like good boots. We always check for double stitching and waxed laces, and we only test drive new footwear in our thick, gray hiking socks.

Now, SA Blog brings the good news that boot lovers need never be stranded without a trusty pair of “treads” in the Swartland. If you’re within 50 kms of Tulbagh and you need boots, just ululate lustily: a bare-chested white man will swing overhead on a vine, dropping a shoe box in your general vicinity.

(Digressing slightly, Your Correspondent wonders if anyone has ever tried to transliterate the famous Tarzan yell – ? Here’s an attempt: uhhhhh-UH-ah-UH-uh – UH-ah-UH-uh – UH-ah-UH-uhhhhh! That’s fairly useless; I entreat readers to send in improvements.)

Back to boots. What I’ve written above is all lies, except the parts about BnA obsessions and the availability of good boots in Tulbagh. We thus conclude our Tulbagh Serial Adventure with a quick peek through the windows of the famous Tarzan Fabriekswinkel on the town’s Main Road. We catch glimpses of sturdy, hand-made boots inside; pairs of veldskoen (pronounced FELT-skune – they’re extremely rudimentary and durable “field shoes”); jackets and shirts that wouldn’t be out of place at a Garth Brooks comeback tour concert; and Stetson-style hats, to keep the sun off your neck. Everything, we note, is made in the adjacent Tarzan Factory.

In short, Tarzan is your one-stop gear store for transforming into – with apologies to Edgar Rice Burroughs – the King of the Tulbagh Valley and its mountainous wilderness, the Groot Winterhoekberg. Plus you’ll be supporting local commerce during your makeover (which no doubt counts as “extreme”).

PS This post is now the home of the very first SA Blog illustration – we’re working terribly hard to set up Flickr interactivity, and more pics will come soon.