Fun on the ‘farm’ at museum open day
Importance of raising awareness
Bread baked in a woodfired oven, tractors (lots!), delicious things to drink and eat, including a taste of competition potjiekos, and real value at the many craft stalls made the Bathurst Agricultural Museum’s Farm Fair Day on Saturday a worthwhile occasion.
The day was in order to raise much-needed funds for the museum, which is run by volunteers and relies entirely on donations.
It was vintage agricultural engineering in action as the water wheel, forge, hay baler, Dutch oven and a handoperated butter churn turned, baled, baked and churned.
The museum’s curator, Alan Pike, said the event hadn ’ t been as busy as the previous year, but they were very satisfied nonetheless.
“We may not have raised a lot of money for the museum but we definitely raised awareness; there were a lot more visitors walking through the museum.”
Once the Kowie Museum moved on to the premises later this year, there would be an additional influx of visitors, Pike said.
“Everyone enjoyed the day and the weather played its part.”
For the next occasion, the museum team aims to stage even more working exhibits.
Donors to the farmer’s market included KatCo (naartjies), Geoff and Guy
Bladen (butternuts and Grahamstown marrows), Dave Duncan (cabbages and lemons), Carrara AgriProcessing (preserved peppadews and other delicacies) and Three Valleys (proteas).
Charlie and Lynn Crawford did the dairy demo, selling the resulting fresh cream and butter at the market.
Best of all were slices of bread fresh out of the woodfired oven, with freshly churned butter.
Basil Mills firing a twopound
cannon at the stroke of midday was a highlight, with a fascinated crowd gathering a safe distance away to listen to his explanation of the gun and how it was used historically.
The potjies got going early in the day, and with six teams vying for the title, the competition was hot.
A token system was used to get “citizen” judges to vote for their favourite of the six potjies.
It was Team Border Kei who got the most votes for their butter chicken potjie.