Thanks for telling it like it is

We are writing to congratulate you on producing such an excellent magazine.

We have just returned to the UK after a three-week visit, staying with friends just north of Plettenberg Bay. They are honey producers who live in De Vlugt – a small dorp consisting of a scattering of a dozen small farms on the R339 in the middle of Prince Alfred’s Pass, halfway between the coast and Uniondale.

On the bedside table in the guest room was a copy of Platteland #13 (Summer 2016/17), which we read from cover to cover. We then discovered a hoard of three years’ worth of back issues and these magazines provided us with inspirational reading throughout the holiday.

We particularly like the “Town, people and things” features, your “no-nonsense/tell it like it is” reporting style of tales of many people and their struggles to survive – they are surprising, frightening and moving in equal measure. The entrepreneur stories are particularly inspiring, and we would love to move to South Africa and follow the examples of many of them.

We enjoyed the very useful articles on growing vegetables and have been inspired to start our own vegetable patch here – despite a slightly different climate!

The DIY articles are extremely practical and clear in their detail, but we suspect that the average reader would take about four times the allotted hours to complete the tasks outlined!

Keep up the good work and please don’t change the format – we just love it! Nick and Annie Bradley, ANGLESEY,

NORTH WALES, UK