Despite Covid-19 lockdown in South Africa, Erns Grundling keeps on walking in the new third season of his Elders series on kykNET as he this time undertakes the Pilgrimage of Hope across 13 episodes in one of the most scenic parts of South Africa.
I spoke with him as he talks about this local pilgrimage route that's not that well known, the challenges of organising and filming it during the lockdown period, his fellow travellers who join him for part of the route, and finding new hope and inspiration along the way.
The title of the show is Elders: Pelgrimstog van Hoop, in Afrikaans with English subtitles. When I saw it, I thought the name was the show's choice but the Pilgrimage of Hope route really exists in South Africa. What is the Pilgrimage of Hope and how does the route work?
Erns Grundling: The Pilgrimage of Hope actually began in October 2014. A Stellenbosch theologian, Frederick Marais went to go and walk the Camino in Spain in 2012 with his daughter.
He was so impressed and inspired by the Camino in Spain and he was looking to see if there isn't potential for a similar route in South Africa - not necessarily a copy of the Camino in Spain because you can't just copy-and-paste it.
He investigated a possible route through the Cape Winelands and Overberg that also snake past some of the oldest churches in the Western Cape - in Spain you also walk through towns filled with church buildings and cathedrals - and that was his guiding principle.
In 2014 he first recce'd and walked the route and he started in Robertson. But now you can start the route in either Stellenbosch or Robertson and hopefully eventually in Cape Point. The idea is that you walk over a period of 15 or 20 days, depending on your starting point, over 300km or 350km, and then you reach the endpoint at Cape Agulhas at the lighthouse.
When you walk in Spain you can nowadays also walk to Finisterre that is also by the sea and there's also a beautiful old lighthouse. So in a way the two routes are talking a bit with each other.
The past 5 years the Pilgrimage of Hope is been unknown and under the radar. Very few people known about it. About 100 and 200 people have so far completed the route but we hope that with the TV show it will bring it under the attention of more people who will undertake this journey in future because it's really a fantastic route.
How did you discover it?
Erns Grundling: In 2015 I walked the Camino in Spain myself and in 2017 my book Elders appeared. At the end of 2017 I went back and filmed Elders: Die Camino which was the first season and was on kykNET from January 2018.
During that period Frederick Marais invited me for coffee in Stellenbosch and in February 2018 he told me about this route and gave me a guide book and one of the red hats that is a symbol of the pilgrimage and I then already wanted to go and walk it and maybe do a magazine article about it.
Then I went to Japan for another Elders season and my whole plan with Elders has always been that it's more focused on overseas experiences and overseas hiking trails.
Then Covid-19 and lockdown happened, and I thought again: Isn't now a good time to do the Pilgrimage of Hope especially in such a confusing year? So that's why I went and did it in June this year.
What were the challenges doing this and organising this during the Covid-19 pandemic and undertaking this project and journey?
Erns Grundling: Initially there were just challenges. When we got greenlit for the season we basically had 10 days to do the pre-production, so it was crazy because it was during May and it was still very much during Stage 4 lockdown during which we had to do our planning.
You call a guest house because I had a team of 4 with me - two camera operators, a director and a soundman. So the 5 of us have to at least sleep somewhere when we've been walking and working the whole day.
You can a guest house and initially, they're so elated that somebody wants to come and stay. Then they get scared because it's against the rules and regulations. Luckily we had our paperwork all set. We obtained an essential services permit to film and with it we had no problem to stay at places.
Luckily we also started filming on 1 June which was the first day of Stage 3 so it helped a bit. We had one support vehicle that Frankie Opperman, our director, was driving. But I don't think there was another kombi in the Western Cape at that stage with more masks and sanitisers inside than our crew.
The biggest challenge of this season was that not a single one of us 5 could get Covid-19 or show any symptoms.
We had to be so extremely careful because the slightest symptom could have sunk the whole production. The further we went and the more we filmed ... later on we almost became paranoid at a stage thinking that if one of us were to fall ill we would have had to do 2 weeks of contact tracing and let everyone know that someone is ill. And we met so many people along the route.
Who will viewers meet who you walk with distance with and who do you talk to?
Ernst Grundling: With the previous seasons in Spain and Japan you always get fellow pilgrims and people you meet along the way which is part of the spontaneous nature of the show. You meet someone and you start a conversation.
Of course during the time Elders: Pelgrimstog van Hoop was filmed there was nobody else with a red hat on, on the route. So for content you had to plan because I couldn't walk alone for 13 episodes, you don't want viewer to fall asleep watching you walk on your own!
I invited a few people who've always inspired me and people who I know like hiking and walking. People who viewers might recognise and will know is TV presenter Kabous Meiring, the writer Dana Snyman, and the former newspaper editor and TV presenter Bun Booyens.
What's nice is that I could also invite people who had appeared in previous Elders seasons to come during lockdown to walk a bit and talk like Johan Symington the well-known reverend, the Springbok player Duane Vermeulen who I last saw in Japan who joined me in Hermanus, and singer and presenter Lynelle Kenned who've previously walked the Camino.
Rapper Hemelbesem met me in Genadendal that is also a famous and historical place as far as South Africa's history is concerned. It was wonderful to talk to him there.
The Elders: Pelgrimstog van Hoop season produced by Bonanza Films looks extremely cinematic with beautiful vistas and landscape shots. How did the filming technology change since you did Elders: Die Camino?
Erns Grundling: With all of the seasons we've been lucky to always have two camera operators that's a huge asset because you are somewhat limited with just one cameraman.
I definitely think being able to do some shots with a drone - especially given the landscape here in South Africa where we are so blessed with a landscape in the Overberg district that's very similar with the landscape in rural Spain - was wonderful to capture.
We had two very young cameramen - neither of whom are 30. One of them, Jaen Kleynhans, was also with me in Japan. They have some of the best camera equipment but I don't wear a fancy new GoPro when I jump into a dam.
What we also have for the first time with this Elders season is a dedicated soundman that enhanced the production values.
What new insights or perspectives about life, humanity, nature, the world of the Western Cape did you come to during this season?
Ernst Grundling: Often when you think about the world "elders" (elsewhere), you think of it as a place away from where you are; it's far away.
With previous season you go and find elsewhere in a faraway or a big historical place like the Spanish Camino, or you go to a more exotic and different faraway place like Japan.
What really inspired me with the filming of Elders: Pelgrimstog van Hoop was just the wonderful treasure buried right in our own backyard - not just in terms of the nature of the Cape Winelands and Overberg but also the stories and the people that are incredibly inspiring especially during this lockdown period.
The historical legacy especially along this route also makes you think anew about what it really means to be a South African.
That this route leads you all the way to the most southern point of Africa for me also led to a renewed reevaluation of the continent of Africa - the place where we live and where we find our way. It gives new hope - not just for me but for the whole of South Africa and its people.
For possible future Elders seasons is it something you'd consider - to tackle routes elsewhere in Africa or South Africa?
Erns Grundling: We still have one eye overseas. I would love to still go and do a season in Patagonia - there are wonderful routes there. Also China. I don't know if I'd be able to walk the whole of the Great Wall of China but maybe parts of it.
Given the uncertainty around travel now and into the future and the cost of flights I'm very open to look at hiking seasons within South Africa and maybe in neighbouring countries.
It might not be so easy again to find a focused, existing pilgrimage route where you journey towards a specific place but there are so many wonderful 5-day routes that all have such amazing stories and characters along the way that I think there's definitely potential for further seasons.
Elders: Pelgrimstog van Hoop with Ernst Grundling starts on kykNET (DStv 144) on Wednesday 30 September at 20:00.
