It remains a mystery to me what all the people in these settlements do to make a living. And judging by their appearance, houses and cars, they make a decent living. There are many schools, primary and secondary, with a lot of happy children, all neatly dressed in school uniforms. Cell phone towers are seen everywhere, covering the whole area. Many new, modern houses are being built. According to Ludwig, the Capitec POS technical support person for the area who travelled with us to Jeppe's Reef, the many hardware stores are the best businesses in the area.
Schoemansdal is a busy town that offers most shopping supplies, only 10 km from the border post. It is on the banks of Lake Matsamo, a huge 'dam'. Jeppe's Reef is also an area just before the border post, but I could not see any shops there.
The border post is very similar in all aspects to the one at Mananga. It is also used mainly by locals from Swaziland who come to shop in South Africa, and tourists travelling to or through Swaziland. At least 1,500 persons per day cross the border here with very few commercial crossings. The operational hours are from 7:00 to 20:00 except during Easter and December when the hours are extended to 22:00.
The name of the border post on the Swaziland side is Matsamo, the Swazi word for kingdom.
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| Entrance to Jeppe's Reef border post |
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| Matsamo, the border post on Swaziland's side |
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| Returning from the border post to the N4, we took the Kaalrug road off the R570 - a beautiful scenic road through fruit, sugar cane, forest farms |