During our recent trip to Cape Town we took a week and hit the road in the direction of the Klein Karoo. The idea was to follow Route 62 through the Klein Karoo and then cross the Swartberg Pass to Prince Albert, but the weather has it´s own plans which meant that we had to alter ours, but thats the beauty of a road trip, you never really know what to expect. We were on the road for about 8 days but I didn´t shoot every day, or every place we stopped, so I´ve divided the trip into 3 blog posts, this is the first section of the journey.

Route 62 is often compared to the more famous Route 66 in the USA, and shares a similar story. Back in the old days Route 62 was a national road connecting Cape Town to Port Elizabeth and was a main arterial road crossing from west to east in the Cape. Then in the 1950´s the N2 highway was built and traffic dwindled on the R62, taking local businesses with it. In the last few decades the Route 62 has become quite an attraction as an scenic route through the western and Eastern Cape and tourism has brought new life to the towns and businesses along the way.

Ronnies Sex Shop has a funny story behind is and it’s current fame is a bit of a happy accident.  Ronnie is a local farmer and about a decade or 2 ago decided to convert an old building on his property into a little shop… it was visible from the road and he figured he’s be able to make a bit of extra cash selling surplus produce from his farm. So he tidied it up, gave it a fresh coat of paint and a big sign in red: “Ronnies Shop” One night a group of his friends thought they would play a trick on Ronnie and painted “sex” next to the name on the shop… but before Ronnie had the chance to fix the sign he noticed that more and more people were actually stopping to see exactly what it was that he had for sale there. A sex shop in the middle of the desert? Passers-by couldn’t resist, and so the sign stayed, the shop is now a restaurant and bar and it visited by travellers from around the world. Ronnie and his shop are living proof that sex does actually sell…