Post Office Tree

In 1500 a Portuguese fleet returning from India was scattered by storms, and one captain, Pedro de Ataíde, left an account of the disaster in a shoe or pouch hung in a milkwood tree beside a spring at this bay. It was found the following year by João da Nova, sailing out, and the tree became a recognised message drop on the sea route - the first postal system in southern Africa, in effect. The milkwood standing here is identified as that tree and is a national monument; milkwoods are slow-growing and long-lived, so the identification is plausible without being provable. A boot-shaped postbox stands beneath it and letters posted there are franked with a special mark. The tree is inside the Bartolomeu Dias Museum Complex, which also holds a full-size replica of the caravel Dias sailed in 1488, built in Portugal and sailed to Mossel Bay in 1987.

What you actually see

• The 1500 message drop - the tree where a letter was left and found a year later.
• The boot postbox - a working postbox with its own franking mark beneath the tree.
• The caravel replica - a full-size Dias ship sailed from Portugal in 1987.
• The monument status - a milkwood old enough to make the identification credible.

When to go

All year. One hour, more for the museum complex around it.

Honest expectations

It is a tree, and the story does the work - visitors expecting a monument are underwhelmed. The identification is traditional rather than proven. The museum complex charges entry and the tree is inside it.

Nearby

Mossel Bay's beaches are close; the Garden Route runs east.