Skip to content
Book
The farm’s red cattle grazing a green pasture in the valley, with wooded hills behind.

The farm

Twenty years of making a farm

The Bryant family have farmed around Riversdale for generations. In 2005 Alison bought this farm on the Goukou, and has spent twenty years turning it into the place it is today.

Stonehouse is a 70 ha game-fenced family farm on the Goukou River near Stilbaai, owned by Alison Bryant since 2005. It runs Rooi-poenskop cattle, Dorper and Damara sheep, horses and Koekoek hens, keeps springbok, bontebok and gemsbok in the game camp with bushbuck, duiker and grysbok wild in the bush, and grows 30 ha of olives that are pressed on the farm.

How the Bryants came to the Goukou

The family farm was first at Oude Muragie, near Riversdale, with a holiday house in Stilbaai for weekends. In time the farming moved to Stilbaai for good.

On a family holiday in 2003, cruising up the Goukou by boat, Alison spotted this farm from the water. The Kleinhans family had farmed it for several generations and it was for sale. She bought it in 2005.

The Stonehouse was renovated first and a game fence went up around the property. The dam was enlarged and its drainage improved, fields were cleared and pastures established, and in 2008 the olive grove went in.

The river and the canyons

Below the houses a private slipway and floating jetty sit above the sandbanks of the Goukou, where the river is deep enough to water-ski at any state of the tide; it is navigable for about 15 km from the mouth. Boating from the farm is by arrangement with Alison. The farm has 400 m of frontage, with reed beds, a lawn on the water and a thatched riverside lapa with a stone braai. Upriver the Goukou narrows into a wooded gorge.

The river lawn is also where the farm hosts weddings on the Goukou. Inland, three indigenous canyons climb from the river into fynbos and coastal bush. They are where the bushbuck, duiker and grysbok live, and where the fish eagles hunt. A hiking trail runs up through them towards Riethuiskraal.

The dam and the wetland

Below the houses lies a large freshwater dam, enlarged and re-drained when the farm was bought, and a wetland fringed with reeds and red aloes. The dam is the farm’s bass dam, and in the evening it is the best place on the farm to watch the light go.

Olives

Thirty hectares of the farm are under olives. The grove went in during 2008 and now has more than 5,000 trees of five cultivars: Kalamata, Mission, Frantoio, Leccino and Coratina. The olives are hand picked from May to June and pressed on the farm into a single-estate extra virgin olive oil.

The land

River, wetland, orchard and veld

  • A wide view over flowering red aloes to the wetland pond and the flat-topped hills.
    Aloes in flower above the wetland
  • A panorama of the farm wetland at dusk under a pink sky, the white cottage at the edge.
    The wetland at dusk
  • The Goukou River from the farm jetty: a boat moored alongside, blue water and wooded hills.
    The Goukou from the farm jetty
  • Heading upriver by boat into the wooded gorge of the Goukou.
    Upriver into the gorge
  • The two farm dogs on the terrace looking over the Goukou River and the hills.
    The terrace over the river
  • A white farmhouse on the slope above the farm dam, reed beds and aloes in front and sunlit hills behind.
    The farm above the dam
  • Looking out through the thatched farm gatehouse down the gravel drive to the hills.
    Through the gatehouse
  • A fiery sunset over the farm lawn and cottages, the hills dark against the sky.
    Sunset over the farm
  • The 70-ton bulldozer and ripper that opened up the soil for the olive orchard in 2008.
    Opening up the soil for the orchard, 2008
  • Planting one of the first olive trees in the Stonehouse orchard in 2008.
    Planting the first olive trees, 2008
  • A grass track between rows of olive trees in the Stonehouse orchard, under a blue sky.
    The olive grove today
  • The farm’s red cattle grazing a green pasture in the valley, with wooded hills behind.
    Rooi-poenskop cattle in the valley

Animals

Animals on the farm

Children collect the eggs, feed the calves and hand-reared lambs and say hello to the horses. In the bush, look for bushbuck rams at dusk.

Rooi-poenskop cattle

A herd of Rooi-poenskop, a hardy, naturally hornless red breed developed in South Africa, grazes the pastures between the river and the orchard. Calves arrive through the year and are a favourite with visiting children.

  • The farm’s red cattle grazing a green pasture in the valley, with wooded hills behind.
  • Red cattle and a calf on the green pasture, the river and hills beyond.
  • A red cow grazing the green pasture beneath a big milkwood tree on the Stonehouse farm.
  • Red Rooi-poenskop cattle at the paddock gate, with fynbos in the foreground.
  • A young red Rooi-poenskop calf standing on the farmhouse lawn.

Sheep and lambs

Dorper and Damara sheep, watched over by the farm’s Australian shepherds. In lambing season there are usually hand-reared lambs to feed.

  • Sheep grazing in a fenced pasture in golden evening light, with milkwood trees behind.
  • The farm’s Australian shepherd with the sheep at the water trough by the paddock fence.
  • A ewe and her lamb at the paddock trough, with one of the farm sheepdogs looking on.

Free-range chickens

Indigenous Koekoek hens and their roosters roam the farmyard. Children are welcome to help collect the eggs.

  • Free-range hens and a rooster scratching in the farmyard.

Horses

The horses live in the paddocks by the stables and come to the white fence to say hello.

  • A palomino and a bay horse looking over the white paddock fence.
  • A palomino and a bay horse side by side at the paddock fence.
  • A grey horse leaning over the paddock rail, the stables and blue sky behind.
  • A bay horse grazing beside the white paddock fence, with a grey horse behind it.
  • A bay horse with a fly mask resting at the paddock fence in the shade.
  • The white horse standing under a tree beside the paddock post.

Springbok, bontebok and gemsbok

The farm is game-fenced. A family group of springbok was introduced in 2015, and a new herd arrived in 2019 (Missy, below, was born into it). There is a pair of bontebok and gemsbok in the veld. Bushbuck, duiker and the little grysbok antelope live wild in the bush and come out to browse at dusk, along with hares and angulate tortoises.

  • Springbok in a fenced green pasture on the farm, with dense coastal bush behind.
  • Springbok grazing a pasture beyond a farm gate, milkwoods and bush on the slope behind.
  • Two bontebok facing each other on green grass on the farm.
  • Gemsbok (oryx) grazing in the fynbos veld on the farm.
  • A small antelope grazing beside the paddock fence under a tree.

Peacocks and birdlife

Peacocks strut the farmyard and fan their tails by the stables. Wild birds are the bigger draw: African fish eagles hunt over the dam and the river, and BirdLife South Africa counts at least 230 species around Stilbaai, with kingfishers, ospreys and salt-marsh waders on the Goukou.

  • One of the farm peacocks with its tail fanned out in full display.
  • A peacock with its tail fanned in front of the stone stables, a peahen beside it.
  • Peacocks on the farm road by the white paddock fence in the evening.

Fynbos and flora

The farm sits in the coastal fynbos and thicket of the Southern Cape. Red aloes flower across the slopes above the wetland in winter, old milkwoods shade the pastures, and the garden beds are planted with indigenous succulents and daisies.

  • Red aloes in flower on the farm, with a wetland pond and the flat-topped hills of the valley behind.
  • A wide view over flowering red aloes to the wetland pond and the flat-topped hills.
  • Red aloes in flower above the farm wetland, with the flat-topped hills of the Goukou valley behind.
  • Pink daisies and aloes on the bank above the dam, with green pasture and the Langeberg foothills in evening light.
  • The entrance to Stonehouse Lodge framed by aloes, palms and a stone wall.
  • A single olive tree among rocks and fynbos at the edge of the orchard.

A farm story

Missy, the springbok we hand-reared

In October 2019 a new herd of pregnant springbok ewes began to lamb, and the dominant ram turned on the newborns. Alison reached one lamb while she was still wet from birth and carried her out of the camp. That was Missy.

With no colostrum from her mother, Missy was bottle-fed every two hours on milk with egg yolk mixed in, and grew up in the house. A few months later she fractured her pelvis and lost the use of her back legs, so it was back to the spare room for six to eight weeks of round-the-clock care, first in a dog bed and then in a sling Alison made for her, while the bone mended.

Missy's story was covered by:

  • Springbok grazing a pasture beyond a farm gate, milkwoods and bush on the slope behind.
  • Springbok in a fenced green pasture on the farm, with dense coastal bush behind.

The family

Meet the family and the team

Alison Bryant crouching in the grass with her Australian shepherd.

Alison Bryant

Owner and host

Former co-founder and merchandising director of @Home stores, Alison was ready for a new challenge and realised a lifelong dream to own a farm. Her business sense and her love of nature and animals have made Stonehouse what it is.

Gavin Bryant in a sun hat and glasses on the farm.

Gavin Bryant

Fisherman

Alison's husband and a fisherman of note in the Stilbaai area, who knows the dam and the river. Guests can book a skippered river cruise on the Goukou with him or Alison, for a fee (bring your own drinks); there are no sea-fishing trips from the farm.

  • Aaron

    Housekeeping

    The longest-serving member of the team and the one who keeps the houses as guests find them. Jack of all trades, always smiling.

Come and see it

Where to stayThe olive estateThings to do