Hundreds of millions of years ago this area was part of a huge inland lake, fed, some say, by snowmelt from a mountain that, if it still existed today, would tower above even Mount Everest. Then the super-continent of Gondwanaland drifted apart, the mountain crumbled, the snow disappeared, the lake dried up, and all the creatures that inhabited its waters died out. Proof of their existence is preserved as 250 million-year-old fossils, some of which are on display in the small but impressive museum in the town of Victoria West, and a palaeo-surface can be seen near Fraserburg. Today this lakebed forms the most extensive plain of its kind outside Asia, and has the largest variety of succulent plants anywhere in the world. The southern reaches of the Karoo incorporate wide flat expanses of seemingly desolate space punctuated by prehistoric landscapes of rugged mountain ranges, ridges of sun-burnished rock, and conical and flat-topped hills. Here the gravel roads criss-cross the land leading to isolated farms, their existence denoted by small clumps of trees standing tall on the shimmering flats. By far the most common sight in the region are the wind-pumps that bring forth life-giving water from the subterranean depths, and without which the farms would long ago have perished. Towns in the area are small laid-back settlements a world away from modern society. Most contain fine examples of vernacular architecture, as well as Victorian, Gothic, and Edwardian, and the area around the pretty village of Loxton is home to the unique Corbelled Houses built by the trekboers (pioneer farmers) in the 1800s. The entire Karoo offers awesome night skies, thanks to zero light and air pollution, and not far from Loxton lies Sutherland, with its dubious reputation as being the coldest place in the country, but also known for SALT (Southern African Large Telescope). A journey through the region should not be fleeting, and visitors who take time to explore the Karoo will find it�s not just an aimless wander through a barren desert, but rather it�s an odyssey across a new frontier far removed from the tourist crowds. --- By Brent Naud�-Moseley
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