A big thanks to my friends Tonia and Pete Woodburn for ‘lending’ me their citrus and sugarcane farm in the beautiful Carisbrooke Valley to expand my portfolio and to learn about these two agricultural industries! CBK Farming is a new beginning for them and I am so excited to be able to document this chapter of their journey! These two industries really appeal to me in that they are labour intensive….and photographing people in the agricultural industry is exactly my thing! So folk, this page one for Pete and Tonia, and for me too!
Pete and Tonia grow oranges and lemons in the Carisbrooke Valley, near Ixopo in KwaZulu-Natal – the very valley that Alan Paton writes about in his book Cry the Beloved Country, “There is a lovely road that runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass-covered and rolling, and they are lovely beyond any singing of it. The road climbs seven miles into them, to Carisbrooke; and from there, if there is no mist, you look down on one of the fairest valleys of Africa.”
Over the next few months I will be photographing this project and the annual citrus operations from beginning to end, as well as the state of the art Carisbrooke Valley Citrus Packhouse which is just down the road form CBK farming. Carisbrooke Valley Packhouse will be packing Avo’s too in the near as the Ixopo and Highflats district transitions into a major Avo growing region in South Africa. I am hoping to expand my knowledge of fruit farming and orchard management in Africa and capture it through photography. Here are few photographs from my first shoot at CBK Farming.
Lianne Ashton Photography ©2022
Lianne Ashton Photography 
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