1st of February 2011

I climbed out of the tent at 7.0am. It was very hot. Des and Helen called down to say goodbye, because they were leaving. They invited us to call in and visit them on our way along the coast, about 100 kms from here. We will.

Had a walk round the camp site and checked out the hotel - very nice. We called back later in the afternoon and tried out their scones and cream - really can recommend them! 

   

2nd and 3rd of February

Had a walk along the beach. A lot of big beautiful houses built along the beach. It is certainly an area where the rich live. You can really say that Africa is a continent of contrasts. You can go from extremes of poverty to riches, without driving more than a few kms. It makes you really wonder what the future of South Africa is. With so many whites having several houses and so many blacks still living in real poverty - something has got to give in the future. The problem is that the whites work hard for what they have, where as the blacks want it, but you get the feeling that they can't and won't work for it - and this is where the real problem lies! Things tend to lie in ruins a few months after they have taken them over. It really needs a strong government to steer the country through the next few years.

Decided to eat up at the hotel in the evening. They have a buffet with both fish, meat, salads and fantastic desserts - that's for me! Only problem was, that there was no fish while we were there, apart from calamari. It was okay though, to get away from making food ourselves for an evening. Enjoying life at the camp site, but tomorrow (Friday), we are on the road again.
 

In the waves at Salt Rock

 

4th - 6th of February - Scottburgh

We followed the main road, which by passes the center of Durban. We had no particular urge to see Durban , but would rather see some of the small communities along the coast on our way to visit Des and Helen in Scottburgh. Quite blowy today, so the Indian Ocean is throwing a lot of spray around. Founf a place on the beach to eat our lunch in a little town called Lllovo Beach. Arrived in Scottburgh in the early afternoon. Nice to see Des and Helen again and they made us feel very welcome in their beautiful house. We all walked down to the town a bit later, through and along the golf course where Des plays, but as no one was teeing off in our area, we walked down the fairway a bit, then down to beach. The place has a big caravan park and the South Africans really take everything with them when they camp in their caravans. Three tents are usually built onto the caravan and quite often the car has its own tent. Televisions , air conditioners, electric fans, strong lights, stoves are all part of the comforts they bring with them. Home from home you could call it. Des and Helen have a fantastic view of the Indian Ocean from their lounge, though leaving doors open in the house is a bit tricky sometimes, because the velvet monkeys soon pop in to steal a bit of fruit!!!.

 

Karen and Helen went down to the local "flee market" to do a bit of shopping, while yours truly relaxed with the newspaper in the house. Later on Karen and myself went for a walk down town. Scottburgh is a white town, with the largest portion of dwellers being white. No shortage of supermarkets catering for their needs. Walking past all the splendid houses, you could be forgiven if you forgot you were in Africa. Des took us for a ride around the area. The houses were even bigger as we toured round in areas where there were Indians only, then both English and Indians mixed together. They are still building new houses overlooking the Indian Ocean - so someone has money!!!

The climate here is the magnet, but even so the Indian Ocean can get very angry sometimes, so it's not always plain sailing.

 

 

Des and Helen and one "wild fig" tree in Scottburgh

7th - 10th of February

We left Scottburgh after three wonderful days with Des and Helen. Hope they get over to Denmark next time they are in Europe. We hugged the coast down to Shelly where we hit the beach to see the local waterfall. It was quite impressive. Carried on down to Port Edward where we decided on Leisure View Caravan Park, after checking out a couple of others. A fantastic view of the ocean which Karen was keen on swimming in, but when we got down there, the current and waves were too strong. The next day we entered the Eastern Cape Transkei as it was once called. We spent Christmas here in 1983-84, and now we are here again. As we drove down towards Port St Johns, the view during the whole 200 km trip down, was simply fantastic. It was if the road was lifted up on pedestals to give us an unhibited view of the countrside, the villages and the mountains. On the way down we diverted towards Umtamvuna Gorge, which as you can see on the right was well "ok". On the way back we called into Beaver Creek Coffee Estate to sample a bit of their coffee and a bit of cake - superb!

Got to Port St Johns where we said hi to a Dane who has bed and breakfast establishment in the town. It turned out that she was from around Silkeborg and was a cousin of Karens "Masseur" in Sorring - small, small world!!! 

 

Umtamvuna Gorge and Karen

Karen thanking our "guides" at the hole in the wall!

 

 Port St Johns was a place we last saw more than 25 years ago, while we worked in Lesotho. The campsite where we stayed then was quite run down and the security aspects if we had chosen to camp there again, didn't look too good. The beach had become a place where cows could spend part of their day relaxing, but still looked nice in spite of this.

We moved out on the R61, heading for Nelson Mandella's museum in Mthatha. Really worth the visit. The whole story of his life unfolds before you as you go through. It's tastefully done to pay "homage" to a man who has done and suffered so much to get the country where it is today. We spent the night at "the Hole in the Wall holiday centre, on their camping site - if that's what you could call it! It was a 700 square meter patch of uneven ground - without shade.

Next day we walked down to the "hole in the wall" and three guides, of the four legged kind, immediately offered their services - we accepted! It was fantastic. The Indian Ocean has simply, over thousands of years, eroded the rock away and now there is a hole about 10 meters in diameter, where the ocean simply forces its way through with a thunderous roar and a mass of spray and foam. Mother mature is still keeping us busy keeping up with her exploits.

We moved on to Coffee Bay where there is also a camp site and a fish restaurant that we have been recommended to try. Today is very blowy so we have taken a chalet which overlooks the ocean - doesn't get much better. We have booked in for dinner/bed and breakfast - we have to taste the fish.

Had a walk down on the beach, a bit of reading, solved a couple of crosswords and it was down for a gin and tonic and the fish platter. We weren't disappointed at all.

11th - 15th of February   "Hogsback" here we come!

Now we are on our way inland. Everything we have at the moment is damp and the vehicle is constantly covered with salt. We drove around 400kms on mostly good roads, so we made good progress. We called in at King Williams Town to try and find Steve Bikos grave. We did, in a graveyard dedicated to him, but as so often in Africa, the whole place was overgrown and it took a while before we found his grave. A really sad tribute to a brave man. I hope what he did is still remembered by the people who have benefited today.

 

 
 

Steve Biko's grave
   
Our final destination was a town called Hogsback. Reading about this place is not enough, you have to go there. Firstly the weather. No one can really predict the weather in this town. As one guy wrote - " I get up in the morning and the sun is shining. I go for a walk sweating, as the temperature reaches about 28 degrees C. It clouds over and starts to rain and goes over into snow. I have only been walking for 20 minutes. The temperature has dropped to 10 degrees C and now I am freezing. I head for home which is 15 minutes away. I arrive just as the sun appears again and the temperature is once again on its way up. I can hang my clothes out to dry now. They dry nearly as quickly as they got wet. An hour in Hogsback has just passed us by. Let's see what the next brings!!!

The guy who wrote The Hobbits was born here. They say he was inspired by the town. I don't know whether it's true, because he left when he was five years old - but who knows??? We stayed at a lovely site, with the equally lovely name of the Swallowtail Camping Country Estate. Unfortunately the owners were not around because of illness, but a local guy who works there was looking after the place. He wasn't there when we arrived, but more or less the whole village was involved in finding him. He came a couple of hours after we had arrived in the town.

   

We could see the mountains from the camp. Here we picked up the inevitable dogs - Patricia and Cathy. They would be our shadows where ever we went. Walking down through the village, they just followed us. Cathy, the little one, chased all the cars as they came by. My heart was in my mouth, because she was so close to the wheels. We went for a long walk to see the "big tree" in the forest. A so called yellow wood, which was 800 years old. We carried onto the Madonna and Child waterfall and arrived after a couple of kms. It was worth the walk, but no idea why the gave it that name. When we got back to the camp we were tired, because we were either climbing down or up. The two dogs just flopped down and didn't move for an hour.

On Saturday, Manchester United versus Manchester City was on the TV at the camp, so I could watch that while Karen went to investigate the town. There was a fantasy garden she wanted to see etc. When she came back she had booked us an evening meal at the King's Lodge Hotel, 200 yards up the road. The woman at the tourist information centre in the town had told Karen that she had lost one of her "jack russels" (dog) and suddenly later in the day we had an extra dog, which Cathy and Patricia didn't take to at all. Karen disappeared down in the town to she if she could find where the woman from the tourist information centre lived. Karen's qualities as a detective would have made even Mr Sherlock Holmes proud. Not 15 minutes later a car came roaring up to the campsite, coming to claim their missing dog. They were so pleased to get it back.

We walked down to the hotel for dinner and of course the dogs came with us. Luckily the people at the hotel know them, so they helped us keep them outside for most of the time.   
The next day we left and we got the security guy to keep the dogs up at the house while we made our exit. I am going to miss those two dogs!!!

Goodbye to Cathy and Patrcia - our friends

A Blesbuck

 The spectacular scenic trip continued on our way now to Mountain Zebra National Park near Cradock. The Cape Mountain zebra's stripes are not as broad as the Burchells Zebra's stripes and from a distance they seem black. They are very rare and in 1937 they were saved from total extinction. Their total now is around 300. The park also has other rare species such as the black wilderbeest, blesbuck, plus the more common oryx, springbuck. Buffalo, black rhino, black backed jackal we didn't see.

The park is one of the most picturesque I have ever been in. Completely surrounded by mountains and with no trees or bushes right at the side of the roads you drive on. We really enjoyed visiting this park. We can recommend it.
We are now travelling north west towards Graaff Reinet, but first we made a detour up to Nieu Bethesda, where you are met by a town that seems to be living somewhere back in the early 19th century. There was one monster of a black cloud hanging over the town - and yes it burst. After crossing a swollen river we found our way to The Brewery, where you could taste the beer and home made cheese. This made a great lunch. It had stopped raining now. We visited the garden and house of the eccentric Helen Martin. Strange sculptures of cammels, figures, owls completely filled the garden. we headed towards Graaff Reinet where we camped for the night. Not the best of campsites, but we managed. The town is the fourth oldest in South Africa and is beautifully kept. Saw the beautiful church in the centre of the town, from both the outside and inside. It is built of local stone, but has used the church in St Albans in England for inspiration when building it. A cactus garden filled with thousands of cactus plants was the next stop. This was an experience, because I have never seen so many cactus in one place before. One thing thing that was very practical, was that a lot of the cactus plants were growing out of car tyres which had been reversed and cut in a diamond shape on the edges and then painted. They looked quite good. Had lunch, updated our home page and on the road again towards Addo Elephant Park. Found the River Side Camping belonging to Sitruisdewer farmsite about 40 kms before Addo. Nice quiet place. The temperature at the moment is 34 degrees C. Earlier in the day it had been up around 40 degrees C.

 

 

 
 

A Cape Mountain Zebra

16th - 20th of February

The campsite is nice and belongs to a farm which grows oranges, lemons and grapefruit. All of it goes to export to Europe. The owner Johan was very friendly and told us about the farm and showed us around part of his house where he keeps old things he keeps buying. We walked around the plantation and later he came down to the campsite with some lemons for us. We decided to stay two days at the camp.

Now on our way to Addo Elephant Park. We had booked a campsite for one night. Drove round in the park all day, because it was raining a bit and it was better than sitting at the campsite. We didn't really see so many animals on our way around, but the park is nice, so we enjoyed it. We investigated the possibility of buying a "wild card" which gives entrance to over 80 game parks, but it would cost over 2000 rand to buy, so we deemed it a none starter. The cost of getting into the parks is really exasperating - I really feel that we are being "rolled" every time. Didn't do an evening drive because we had been out all day. An American guy came round to everyone on the campsite in the evening, because he wanted to borrow a charger, which no one had, or wanted to lend him. I think people were a bit dubious about him. We could hear him most of the evening, going round to everyone. He even wanted to buy our vehicle, but I couldn't take him seriously at all. You have to be really careful out here, you just cannot trust strangers.

Red Harder Beast in Mountain Zebra Park

  
 

18th - 21st of February

Left the camp at 7.0 am in a mist which threatened to engulf everything. As we drove through the park we saw elephant, a barking black backed jackal, red harder beast, Burchells zebra, a herd of elland, guinea fowl, ostrich, bush buck, kudu etc. On our way now to Port Elizabeth. Had some lunch - and what a lunch - paelle. It tasted really good. You could taste that everything was nice and fresh. Found our way down to "The Willows" resort on the coast and rented a rondavel for the night. Too windy for the tent. We had a fantastic view of the beach and the Indien Ocean and with our Gin and tonic we enjoyed the sunnset down on the beach. We stayed here in 2009 at the start of our trip.We had a noisy family next door and they kept up the tempo until 1.00am. We had to see two films to drown the noise out a bit - he he. Any excuse to see a bit of tv. Met an English couple (Kevin and Michelle). They are down here for a year and will see as much of Africa as they can. We all exchanged a bit of info..

Continued on down the "garden route" towards Tsitstikamma National Park where we stayed for a night. Our camping site was right overlooking the beach and we enjoyed a fantastic sunset while the G & Ts went down. We saw two bushbucks feeding right next to the camp. Maybe they were a bit tame. About 8.0pm a sea mist rolled in and it got a bit cold.

Next day we went a walk around the cliff edge to see a waterfall. After walking and climbing and then balancing our way over a beach littered with gigantic boulders that we had to climb over, we gave up and turned back. We met a girl who had made it all the way out. We had given up about 10 minutes before we would have found it she said. She was disappointed with what she had seen, so we didn't feel too dejected about giving up.

Karen is working very hard planning our route, so we get the best out of our trip. We have decided now to leave the coast and drive back from where we came and join the R62 and climb up into the mountains towards Uniondale. The trip up was fantastic, but Uniondale wasn't, so we drove on towards De Rust. Here the campsite we had found was right up in beautiful area, but there was no one home, so we had to carry on and we ended up in Oudsthoorn. We camped at Klein Plaas Holiday Resort. A whole load of Autocampers had already arrived when we got there, but there was enough room for everyone.

We went up town to eat and I had Fish and Karen had Ostrich. It was good, but not enough of it and expensive. We were both still hungry when we had finished. 

Camping at Tsitsikamma

Steam engine museum in George

21st -25th of February

Headed towards George, where I wanted to see the Steam Engine museum. Very interesting, with lots of engines from just after the turn of the century up until the 40s. Karen came in and pretended to be interested, but she did it for me. We carried on down the coast and into a campsite called Glentana, but we didn't like it at all. It was right on the beach, but you couldn't see the beach. So on we went.

We found Dwarswegstrand Caravan Park via the GPS (which was a first) and we could see the ocean and even more - DOLPHINS. We had a walk along the beach and came back along the road. Lots of really big empty houses here. I think the whites who own them use them as a sort of "summer house"

Karen did some washing and during the process one of her blouses disappeared from the clothes line - in other words stolen. It was her best, so at least the culprit had taste. We have stayed at some campsites where we have been extra careful, because we had the feeling it wasn't 100%, but here we hadn't even given it a thought - everything seemed - well, safe! It shows you that you have to be on your guard all the time. We had a good two days here, even though the mist crept in during the late afternoon and cooled things down a bit. It was even there in the mornings.
Left the coast again and hit the N2 through Heidelberg and then the R400 towards Ashton and then Montago. Stayed at the same camp we did when we started our trip in 2009. They were watering the sites so we couldn't park the vehicle and erect the tent straight away. We went down town for a cup of coffee, but came back disappointed - nothing doing. Had a swim to get cooled down. Next day, on the road to Cape Town, but we had to go through Ashton and we called in at Ashton Kelder, where they produce the "famous" wine. They had three flags flying outside and one of them was Danish, so we had to go in and see what all that was about. Most of the local wine growers deliver their crop to the winery and they get paid by weight. The winery then process the red and green grapes into wine, under the Ashton label.  They export to amongst other countries, Denmark.
 

Cape Town

Arrived in Capetown in mid afternoon and it felt as though we were coming home. We are sleeping in the house in a spare room upstairs because Hanne, Laura's mum is in the cottage, but we didn't mind at all, because we thought it great to sleep in the house. Great to see the family again, we have missed them.

The winery in Ashton, complete with Danish flag
 

26th - 28th of February

Weather hot and sticky - just the way we like it. In the swimming pool with Linu and Silas. We were making big ones - this means in layman's language "big splashes". The Camelion has come back to live in the bush in the garden. Difficult to see, because he is an expert at changing colour so we can't see him. He disappeared last year for some reason, but he probably didn't like the new neighbours so much, so he moved back!

Visited the local observatory, which has an open house arrangement every month. Interesting, but unfortunately the big telescope was not working at the moment. Two smaller ones were set up on the lawn, so we got a look at the stars close up.

A larger telescope that's set up in the "Karoo" area is so powerful, that it can see a candle if you lit it on the moon. So big brother isn't so far away.

We will spend a few days here in Cape Town with our "adopted family". How long depends a bit on our visa application, which hasn't born fruit yet. We will probably do some short trips out and about, until our visa comes through or doesn't, or the Selanders get fed up with us!!! The weather in Cape Town is really hot at the moment, so a lot of what we do takes place in the garden' or in the pool.
   
   
   
March