Category Archives: Africa

A collection of travelogues from my trips in Africa, peppered with reviews and recommendations of accommodation, walking tours, restaurants and pubs.

Travelogue Namibia 6: Windhoek

WINDHOEK

2 October 2021

Very quickly not used to early mornings and waking up to alarms, it was a necessary evil in order to get our Covid PCR tests done in time to get the results before our flight out the next day. Deemed mandatory for us to get home again, the labs would take anywhere between 6 and 48 hours to produce results – depending on what you’re prepared to pay. With Namibian towns being as spread out as they are, and the nearest testing station to our camp at Okaukuejo being 3 hours away (and in the wrong direction), we reasoned that it made sense to get up a bit earlier and get to Windhoek in time for the 14 hour one, at the R900 per person rate.

We kept to time, bidding final farewells to the watering hole and its exhibitionist wildlife residents just after 07h00, and still had time for a buffet breakfast (and the now-obligatory tyre check) before departing at 07h30.

It was tar road all the way, so the 4 hour estimate was accurate, and allowed for a leg-stretch midway.

We had booked our Covid tests at a “roadblock” station and, not sure exactly what we were looking for, we were fortunate that the little pop-up shop in a shipping container was both exactly where we expected it to be on our online map and adjacent to a matching pop-up Police station with loads of signage or we might have blinked and missed it.

Despite having completed the laborious online booking forms, the attendant was not expecting us. It didn’t matter though, there was no queue and so a quick clipboard and form later, he was poking swabs up noses and down throats, as per preference.

30km later we arrived at the APS Guesthouse on Robert Mugabe Avenue in Windhoek. We had lovely big en suite rooms… Not that we needed them for much since we left almost immediately.

We walked to the Heinitzberg Castle, a beautiful old building from the turn of the last century. Count von Schwerin had built the elegant castle in 1914 for his fiancee, Margarethe von Heinitz, and it would serve as a great location for our welcome drink, with its panoramic views over Windhoek and its old-world charm.

Our next stop was quite the opposite; a very down-to-earth locals’ pub called Andy’s, where we had to line the stomach with the chips platter with its thick cheesy, garlic and bacon bits sauce. 

Our highlight for the day was a trip to Joe’s Beerhouse, which by all accounts was a ‘must do’ when in Windhoek, for its combination of bric-a-brac decor and delicious menu. Inspired by both German and Namibian influences, the secret sauce in the menu was traditional favourites with a twist, like the Eisbein burger (that Michele had), the game lasagne (that Chris had) and the Oryx schnitzel (that I had, obviously). With great service and a very relaxed atmosphere, it was easy to pass more than a couple of hours relaxing at our table in the gardens. 

It started getting a little chilly in the evening, so we headed back to our guesthouse, which had a lovely pool deck and some very exuberant guests who kept us entertained as we shamelessly eavesdropped into their conversation.

SUNDAY

On our very last morning of what had been a very eventful week or so, we were able to sleep in a bit, and still get in a run before breakfast.

Having made no effort on the previous day, we felt it worthy to do a short circuit of some of the basic sights, that were fortunately all very easily accessible on the grid of landmark roads where we were staying.

We ran down Jan Jonker Street, named after a Namibian tribal leader from the 1800s, far enough to be able to cut across and back to our road to see the famous Christuskirche (built in 1896) and some monuments to Namibian government. A very easy 5km loop, nice and flat.

Breakfast was a treat with the a la carte menu offering both French Toast and Canadian Flapjack options, among others. With the long journey home ahead of us, we filled our boots to see us home.

Travelogue: Kommetjie

KOMMETJIE

14-19 July 2022

Our friend Candy had signed up for a website where you get to house and pet sit in exchange for free accommodation. Although the website offers homes across the globe, Candy had specifically looked for a South African beach destination to get her feet wet, as it were. She had secured a prime booking in Kommetjie (on the peninsula to the south of Cape Town) for two months over July and August – and we had promised to join her to keep her company.

The perfect opportunity to join her in Kommetjie arose when Christian was nominated at work to host customers at an international rugby match to be played at Cape Town Stadium in the middle of July. As a relatively last-minute plan and with the surcharge in local flights, we were grateful that lockdown had established ”work from home” practices as the new normal, such that we were able to travel down on the red-eye flight on Thursday morning and book the last flight home on Tuesday night, making for a lovely long weekend.

Never a dull moment, I realised as we got to OR Tambo airport at stupid o’clock in the morning that I had shuffled laptop bags and hand bags to be travel-efficient and consequently had no identification with me! Taking a chance, we checked in for the flight anyway and went through security. 

It was a tense 20 minutes wait in the lounge, but fortunately I was allowed onto the flight by showing a certified copy of my ID that was stored in my cloud drive and could be accessed on my phone. Thank heavens for the Cloud!

We arrived in Cape Town to a grey and chilly day. Candy had helped us arrange a driver to collect us and he was waiting for us as we entered the airport terminal. Gordon led us to the van and while he loaded our suitcase, Chris climbed in the passenger seat and I took a row in the back for myself.

Unfortunately I did not get to see much of the view to our home for the weekend because I had a meeting scheduled for 9 o’clock. Luckily with mobile technology I was able to log into the meeting on my laptop, and perform business as usual.

Arriving at the house, I animatedly mouthed my “hello” to our friend and host, and settled at an outside table to seamlessly continue my meeting.

Half an hour later, with the call successfully completed, I was able to do a proper greeting and get a guided tour of our home for the weekend.

How lucky we were! Our digs was a delightful mix of old world charm, with an extended wing that made for more modern and spacious living quarters. Christian later did some online research about our house, which revealed that it was one of the original four homes built in Kommetjie by the first settlers in the early 1900s. Our house was built for the Seeliger family and you could still see their original modest square home, distinct for the stonework on the outside (which was now swallowed in the back half by the plastered walls of the add-on extension).

The morning was a game of musical chairs as the three of us moved from workspace to workspace as we required quiet, chargers, company etc.

Part of the requirement for Candy’s petsit was to look after the owners’ two dogs and three cats. This included walking the dogs twice a day, so I joined in a midday walk to break the day and get an on-the-ground sense of our setting.

With the house being right on the beach, we could either turn right out the front door into the little town or left out the front door and were immediately on the sandy shore of the beach.

Turning right we walked parallel to the beach and Candy pointed out landmarks of interest. Since she had spent many years there when her son was a baby, it was a very rich walking tour of the town and her personal history in it.

Reaching the lighthouse at the end of the main road we did a hairpin and joined the wooden boardwalk that ran along the length of Kommetjie beach. The dogs, so used to this trail, were allowed off the leash and left to wander freely on the rocks and sands on either side of the path. There were many locals doing the same and it was wonderful to see how peacefully all the animals and people shared this beautiful space.

What a treat to get such a good break in the middle of a workday. The fresh sea air did wonders to prepare me for the afternoon!

We three all completed a very productive afternoon, with colleagues none the wiser that we were not sitting at a desk in an office in a building in Joburg. 

Chris had suggested in advance that our welcome dinner should be a traditional fish and chips since we were at the coast. Candy, knowing the area so well, lined up a short driving tour of the coast for us to end up in Kalk Bay for dinner at the legendary Kalky’s.

Arriving to wild seals spontaneously putting on a show on the quayside in an effort to get some fish treats off the fisherman, we knew this was a legitimate once in a lifetime experience.

Kalky’s is a very humble order-at-the-window type eatery… But we could see what all the fuss was about when our generous portion of  crunchy hake and slap chips arrived.

Being a school night (and having been up since before dawn), we returned to our home to light the fire in the cozy lounge and enjoy a welcome glass of wine with an endless conversation with a good friend who had so much to tell us about our new location. 

FRIDAY

We were all working on Friday, so it was another seamless game of musical chairs all through the workday. There was the farmstyle 10-seater wooden table in the middle of the kitchen, the large antique desk in the lounge next to the fireplace and under the window overlooking the pool and the sea beyond, or the sunroom off the pool deck which married the weather-proofing of being indoors with the scenic advantage of being all glass on 2 sides. The wifi was strong throughout the property, so with a laptop and headset, you could choose the perfect spot to suit your moment.

Again I took time out to go walk the dogs in the middle of the day and again wished that it could be a daily thing! 

Concluding our day at our very reasonable 16h00, we took a drive up to Noordhoek  for sundowners at Cape Point Vineyard, which had been recommended to us by friends who had recently, coincidentally, moved to Kommetjie (which is quite a coincidence being such a tiny enclave), and had happened  to visit the Vineyard that afternoon.

Great recommendation! With super views of the on-site lake, the town beyond and the sea as its backdrop, we would not have had opportunity for anything like this if we were at home on this day. We took the barman’s recommendation and bought a bottle of their white wine speciality, which we paired with crayfish samoosas – and great conversation, as we giggled about good times and discussed all the things we wanted to do with the weekend.

Candy also had the inside track that there was a free wine tasting every Friday evening at a place called Furny’s, so that was a natural second stop on our tour. We got there at the tail-end of the tasting, but still sampled 3 or 4 local harvests, settling on our favourite and treating ourselves to a bottle of the same to wash down a portion of the arancini balls which Candy had had previously and praised so highly that we couldn’t not.

Having head nibbles at both of our sundowner venues, we had thwarted our own dinner intention, but we still popped in at Jake’s anyway to round off our trip to Noordhoek. 

Last stop on the way home was to Fishermans Garden, which was a few hundred meters from home and which we had passed on each of our dog walks, so definitely warranted poking a head in to see what it was all about.

Lovely to end each day with a few logs in the fireplace (which looks like it had been built with the original house) and quickly warmed up our space’, while we sipped on a bottle of Pinotage procured from the Vineyard on our way out earlier that evening. 

We were treated to some unexpected entertainment, when 3 otters took to our pool. They frolicked in and out the water and poked a curious nose through the bannister that separated the stoep from the pool. They looked like they were having a whale of a time!

SATURDAY

Christian was meeting his colleagues early in the afternoon so we had the morning to ourselves. We started the day with a run around our now-familiar neighborhood, of course with the dogs.  Running through town we went past the lighthouse and circled back for a hair-raising trail and a bit of a rockclimb down to the beach. The dogs were definitely more agile than we were, and their tails were wagging enthusiastically at their adventure.

Having worked up an appetite, we made our way over Chapman’s Peak to Hout Bay for another fish and chips meal at Fish on The Rocks. When in Rome!

The meal was massive, delicious and fresh. Again the battered hake was melt-in-the-mouth, and so well-complemented by the calamari rings. 

It was time for Christian to head off on his mission, which left Candy and I the afternoon to wander around the Hout Bay market on the harbour front, and then return to Kalk Bay to windowshop along the high Street, which was some thing we had decided to do when we had visited there on the first evening.

Candy was looking for a mirror for a DIY project as well as an antique backgammon set, so at least we had a purpose to our mission.

Popping our heads into any store that may produce the goods, we managed to come right with finding the perfect mirror in one of the many antique stores.  We had certainly sampled a fair slice of history in the stores we had visited!

Very pleased with ourselves, we celebrated with a cocktail at local landmark, The Brass Bell. Already filling up with patrons preparing to watch the rugby there, we were reminded that we had made arrangements for our friends who had just moved down to meet at our house to watch the game.

Fortunately nothing on this peninsula is very far away so we were back at home in good time to get the game on the telly before our friends arrived.

Kim and Brett were very excited to see us, not just as a reunion with me and to meet Candy, but also to get a look at our house, since apparently our road is a highlight of the small town and we were especially spoiled being the home directly on the beach front.

I can’t say we watched much of the rugby as the conversation flowed, with stories of back home and this new hometown for our friends.

After hours of stellar company, we made plans to continue the conversation at lunch together the next day and said our good nights. Not much later Christian returned from his day at the rugby,  which sounds like it had been quite spectacular at the stadium, and he had done another good job hosting his clients.

SUNDAY

We took another direction for more sightseeing, and made our way to Simon’s town, another enclave nestled against the shore, that had served as a naval base for more than a century

Our visit began with the Simon’s Town Navy Museum; not something I ordinarily would have thought I would enjoy but the exhibits we’re very easy to browse without too much intense reading or concentration, so it was quite some thing to take in so much history of ships that had been based or passed through this little town over time,

It was another beautiful day in the Cape, so our next excursion, a walk along the promenade to visit the penguins, was just perfect. The wooden walkway has a mesh fence on the beach side, and the penguins seem quite nonplussed at the steady flow of humans gawking at them, cooing at their babies and snapping photos of these flightless birds nesting, napping and posing.

By now it was time to meet Kim and Brett at a restaurant called Camels Rock in our neighboring town, Scarborough. 

Known for its hippie eccentricity, Scarborough was a mix of down to earth setting and rapidly-escalating property prices. Camels Rock represented this juxtaposition with a top class menu generously sprinkled with vegan-friendly options, in a simple courtyard setting with a stage for live music.

After a delicious meal (the curry menu on the specials board distracted us from a hat trick of fish and chips), we avoided the threat of the live jazz band – jazz being Christian‘s worst ever! – by putting in a visit to see Kim and Brett’s new home in Kommetjie.

Since the town is so old, we were told that many of the houses are fix-me-uppers or armadillo’s tails with extension after extension leaving a disjointed combination of living and sleeping rooms. Their home however had been purchased, renovated and flipped, so they were fortunate to acquire a modern, airy and spacious home without any of the inconvenience that renovations always require.

With both of them working from home and each having their own dedicated workspace, it was easy to see how they could trade the big city for their new location with a park on one side and the beach on the other side. The New World certainly accommodated promoting lifestyle without sacrificing any commercial ambitions.

Sad that the weekend was over, but pleased that we would still have work-from-anywhere for another day,  we closed the weekend in our cozy lounge, with our fire going, and our otters again happily frolicking in our pool.

MONDAY

We had been told that the weather in Kommetjie could be unpredictable and had anticipated a grey and rainy winter’s weekend. However, we had been treated to magnificent weather throughout. While a little chilly, which is to be expected in the very middle of winter, the sun had shone and we had every opportunity to enjoy our stay and all it had to offer.

It was a treat to get a run along the beach before starting work,  where I was based at the large wooden desk in the lounge and able to peer through the window at the rolling sea while listening in on my meetings and largely being a productive individual.

We had made arrangements with Brett to accompany him to town at 17h30 for the Kommetjie running club, which had an established trail that went up the mountain to the looking points and then down the other side through the town along the beach front and then meet at a dedicated spot, where we were told they would be a cooler box filled with beers waiting. Since Kommetjie is so small, nothing is very far away and Brett ran from his place to ours to pick us up for the run, which started just across the road from Fisherman’s Garden. 

The running group was a very loose arrangement with people starting as and when they were ready and running at their own pace. I sense that Brett was humoring us since he is very fit and an experienced runner, and now had localised knowledge of the area in this trail. He ran at a pace slow enough that we could continually ask questions, take pictures of the beautiful sunset and comments on our surroundings so it was more of a tour than just a run .

The trail took us almost past their house, so Kim joined us for the last section of the run – and of course the celebratory beers, which were exactly where they were anticipated to be.

For our last meal in our holiday town, we had agreed to try the Green Room, one of the three restaurants in what could only generously be described as the middle of town (which is essentially a handful of businesses around a traffic circle).

It was a good suggestion and we enjoyed a fiesta from the Mexican section of the menu. Washed down by the local shipwreck lager.

Sadly, being a school night, we had to throttle our capacity for having a good time. We treasured the novelty of being able to walk home, not just because it was safe to do so but also because we knew the place like locals by this time.

TUESDAY

It was bittersweet to take our little holiday dogs for a last morning walk  before starting the workday. Again we were treated to fair weather and fresh air which is a pretty good way to start a day.

With work eating up the whole morning we saw little of each other, now old hands at finding our preferred spots to execute our various work requirements .

Candy kindly was driving us back into Cape Town to the airport so we left at around 13h00 so that she could do the return journey without having to take on the traffic returning from the city to these small coastal towns which now had burgeoning commuter traffic.

With plenty of time to spare, we were able to relax in the lounge, grab some lunch, tune into afternoon meetings and countdown the last bit of our holiday before returning home.

It would have been too easy to seamlessly close the book. Arriving at the beginning of the queue to board the plane, I was refused entry  based on a digital copy of my identification! Panic!

With some heated interrogation, I ascertained that they would accept a print-out of my digital copy, and so began the hunt for a shop that would be prepared to print out my ID for me. 

Although it only took a few minutes, the queue had been processed so quickly that by this point Christian was standing at the entrance to the plane and negotiating as to whether they were leaving without us (which would require taking our luggage off the plane) or wait for me and my print out. Fortunately, the decision never needed to be made as the luggage shop had printed my copy. I went tearing onto the plane at the very last minute. What a nailbiter!

Travelogue W.Cape 2: Robertson to Hermanus

WESTERN CAPE PART 2

November 2021

Tuesday began with a lovely venture through the vineyards and around the little dam on the Rijk farm. Incredible to start a day with the sun peeking over the mountains, the fresh smell of the dewy vineyards and the sound of absolutely nothing all around. And then a multi-course breakfast to boot!

With 105km to cover for the day, we drove through the town of Worcester and then used Michell’s Pass to descend into Ceres. Nothing caught our eye, so it was little more than a drive around town and then back over the pass to regain our route to Robertson.

Robertson is one of the bigger towns that we stayed in, and we had booked a garden room in Gubas Hoek Guesthouse in one of the established suburbs. It was very easy to find and we were pleased with our choice, taking time to rest and regroup on our patio after dropping our bags.

Even though spoilt for options in this rich wine-tasting country, we had narrowed our choices to the Top 2 we wanted to visit, thinking we would trade blitzing around the area for quality time to sit and enjoy. 

First was Van Loveren, which has been in the Robertson Valley since 1937, as a small farm gifted to Hennie Retief by his father and re-named after his wife’s ancestor, Christiena Van Loveren, who had come to South Africa in 1699 so establishing her family’s local lineage. From its humble beginnings and over 3 generations it has grown into South Africa’s leading family-owned winery. 

Known equally for consistency, innovation and award-winning wines, our host at the guesthouse also shared that the farm is very aggressive in securing the best from the region, either through buying the best grapes to be produced under the Van Loveren brand or under the up-and-coming winefarm’s own name but within the Van Loveren stable.

It’s impossible to miss the Van Loveren farm, famously marked with the rows of red Canna plants that line the road alongside all of the estate’s vineyards. Today the empire is run by the 3rd generation, Hennie’s grandchildren, four cousins who very fortunately happen to be a farmer, a winemaker, a lawyer and an accountant. They introduced the equally popular spin-off brand, Four Cousins, in 2000.

We thoroughly enjoyed the 2 sampling flights we ordered; a Cheese & Wine combo with 3 reds and 2 whites as well as a Taste of Africa Pinotage pairing with biltong, wors, dark chocolate and chocolate-coated coffee beans. A real sensory delight that prompted us to plan dinner at the Four Cousins restaurant that evening to see what else they had in store for us.

After quite a story and a tough act to follow, we headed off to Graham Beck. A far younger story, Graham Beck only bought his farm in 1983, with the ambition of making a world-class winery with a sparkling wine flagship. Fortunately, Robertson with its perfect climate and soil proved ideal for cultivating Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, two of the three Cap Classique varieties. Today, Graham Beck Cap Classique sparkling wines are one of the country’s finest as well as being a contender in the international wine arena.

From the looks of things and the fondness with which our wine-tasting hostess spoke, Graham (who passed away in 2010 at the age of 80) seemed equal parts liked and admired. His successes as an entrepreneur and pioneer on top of his dedication as a philanthropist earned him respect; his appreciation for the finer things in life are clearly represented in the elegant tasting room, where we sat perched on high stools at the tasting bar, with a painting of Graham and his pack of hounds keeping an eye on us.

We signed up for the Non Vintage Collection Tasting (for me, 4 for R65, wines blended from multiple years) and the Vintage Tasting Collection (R100, grapes blended from a single year) for Chris. The Vintage ones are “aged with extended lees contact (whatever that is) creating single-vintage bubblies more complex in style”, which basically means they are fancier, more expensive and we hadn’t tried them before.

The hostess poured us generous samples of each, into big crystal glasses. They were shaped like red wine glasses rather than champagne flutes which we thought was odd, so she poured us a comparative sample in a flute to demonstrate the difference. Remarkably, the sparkling wines smelt and even tasted quite different – and much better when served in the large rounded open glass.

All in all, I liked the Bliss Nectar Rose and Chris liked the Ultra Brut Vintage, so we joined the Club, ordered a few bottles of each and between the entertaining hostess, the generous tastings, the Black Friday special, free delivery and the waiving of the tasting fee because we had made a purchase, we had had a great time and got a pretty sweet deal.

Quite pleased with our afternoon and quite sure that our double-bill was enough for one day, we returned to the guesthouse to drop off the car and head to Four Cousins on foot.

It was still quite early so we detoured past a lively place called Bourbon Street that advertised Guinness on tap, so we thought we’d sneak in for a cheeky pint to add to the Guinness Index. At R43 it earned a #51 and since we posted it on Facebook right then and there and with a photo of ourselves, the owner saw our post and came over to thank us for the support, giving Christian a Guinness Cap and braces for our efforts!

He’d been so nice about it that we decided to continue to support the place for dinner and never made it to Four Cousins in the end…

WEDNESDAY

Tuesday’s indulgences had left a mark on Wednesday morning. We had a fantastic continental breakfast at our guesthouse and were on the road just after 11 which made our first stop, Weltevrede Wine Farm, impractically early to get back on the horse. Consequently, we just took a wander around the gardens, admired the vineyards, exchanged pleasantries with the hostess and returned safely and soundly sober to the car.

With no wine-tasting and only 64km to Swellendam, we arrived earlier than expected, so pulled into the Drosdty Museum. An open air museum consisting of several historic buildings, we walked across the lawn to find ourselves in the original Drostdy, built by the Dutch East India Company in 1747 as the residence and offices of the Landdrost of Swellendam. Outbuildings housed slaves, domestic animals and there was a wagon-house. It has served as a museum since 1939, with a fine collection of late 18th and early 19th century Cape furniture.

The second building was the town’s old jail, with a tradesmen’s yard in the back with little cottages housing exhibitions of a variety of artisans’ and craftmen’s tools and equipment.

The 3rd building was a house called Mayville, which was built around 1853 and was a blend of Cape Dutch and Cape Georgian detail. Furnished to represent the lifestyle of Swellendam’s middle class at the end of the last century, you can view each room to see what life was like for the average family back then. The garden was laid out in formal Victorian lines with a scattering of benches should you wish to proverbially stop to literally smell the collection of heritage roses.

The last building, Zanddrift, was an old Cape Dutch farmhouse that was relocated from Bonnievale and now served as a restaurant. A quick Google revealed it to be high-brow fine dining, so we would be giving it a skip and happy to admire from the outside.

Now in time for check-in, we drove (literally) around the corner to find our B&B, Berg View Guesthouse, so-named for its location on Berg Street, in turn so-named for its position perpendicular to the base of a very big and beautiful mountain.

Our guesthouse was charming, our host even more so and our welcome further warmed by the news that we’d been upgraded! Our home for the night was a tastefully-decorated cottage overlooking Berg Street, complete with a comfy couch on the stoep so we could admire the mountain and watch the day go by, if we were those sort of people.

Of course we are not, so we had no sooner dropped bags than we were off again on foot to go and explore the little town of Swellendam. 

A more picture-perfect town you have not seen! The walk down the main drag was like a slice straight out of time; easy to observe many of the more than 50 heritage sites in this small town. Most notable was a massive imposing church, largely unsurprisingly an NG Kerk. Swellendam is immaculate and seems like everyone in the whole town has recently painted everything all at the same time.

Completing a big loop and back at our cottage, we worked our way through the dinner option recommendations on the laminated card our host had provided as part of the Welcome pack. She had said that several of the restaurants were very popular and required booking ahead to avoid disappointment. On calling our first choice to make a reservation, we were very sad to find out that they had not survived the hospitality industry challenges of the past year and had closed at the end of November. We were a day too late!

We ended up at a gem though. Decorated as a beach-side restaurant, complete with sea-sand floors and whitewashed tables and benches, The Garden Shack offered a simple menu of seafood classics with a few chef’s specials. Advised that they were famous for their sushi, we ordered salmon California Rolls to start (something we seldom do) and could see what all the fuss was about. Very light and packed with salmon, we thoroughly enjoyed every bit. 

More along our usual lines, we packed in a hefty mains combo of crumbed calamari, battered hake and creamy mussels all washed down with a delightful Bonnievale Rose. Full to bursting we wished we could enjoy a walk home to settle the belly, but alas it had been threatening rain when we left home so we had driven.

THURSDAY

Getting very used to the B&B lifestyle, we pulled up a chair at the main house dining table just in time to be served the Full English breakfast we’d ordered when we checked in. With all the trimmings, juice and a pot of tea, we were better prepared for a nap than a 110km roadtrip!

Nonetheless, we packed the car and waved goodbye to pretty little Swellendam and were soon admiring the change of scenery as mountains became vineyards (is there anywhere in the Western Cape that doesn’t grow grapes?!), then the considerably less pretty Bredasdorp, and finally we got first glimpse of the sea.

The night’s stop was L’Agulhas coastal village and holiday resort, chosen for its claim-to-fame as the southernmost tip of Africa. Since we hadn’t stopped on our drive, we were a bit early for check-in so we went straight to the local sights.

The Cape Agulhas Lighthouse was first lit on 1 March 1849 to warn sailors of the treacherous Agulhas Reef, is the second oldest working lighthouse in South Africa and is the starting point for the walkway that takes you down to the monument that marks the southernmost point. The monument includes a marker that shows the meeting point of the Indian and Atlantic Oceans and has a 30m map of Africa that shows the direction of the compass, has indicative 3D topography and includes several African landmarks. Well done Agulhas National Park; well worth a visit!

With the culture portion of the tour concluded, we could set about finding lunch in the enclave of restaurants along the seaside. We chose the highest ranked on Google and were not sorry with our very fresh and crispy favourite, Calamari + Hake + Chips combo at L’Agulhas Seafoods.

We were once again very pleased with our choice of accommodation, the very lovely Tides’ Song. Our host gave us the guided tour through our brand-new spick-and-span apartment, right on the beach. They had really put in the effort to make us feel at home, providing a loaf of fresh bread (still warm) and a couple of beers in the fridge. 

No time for that though, we had to go to Struisbaai to meet Parrie the Manta Ray. Only 6km down the drag, we were very soon in Struisbaai Harbour. A beautiful natural harbour in an old fishing village, its little wonder that this is where Parrie has chosen to take residence. Having viewed videos on the internet, it seemed beyond belief that such as unusual creature would be so unfettered by the comings and goings of this working harbour, but true’s nuts, there he was.

Walking along the jetty, we didn’t have long to wait before seeing the dark shadow through the turquoise water. He floats about and comes right up the shoreline, skirting along the ramp where the boats enter the water. I walked around to get better pics and he was largely unfettered by me looming over him and was even game to flap his sides a bit. I’m sure it was more a case of him not noticing me than posing for the camera, but still. How awesome!

Having ticked all the boxes, we returned to our house for a bit of down-time. The view and the setting caught our attention though, so we were soon taking a long walk along the seaside, working our way back to the enclave of restaurants to find ourselves a sundowner. We found a tiny little pub with no more than 12 stools at the back of the Zuidste Kaap restaurant and had a couple of pints of the local craft brew, Saggy Stone, shooting the breeze with a local about all the appeals of small-town life.

FRIDAY

Our plan was to book-end our trip with reunions on either side. Today was the Kennedys turn. With the coastal strip all Agulhas National Park, we would be winding our way back inland for the 128km to Hermanus, stopping in Napier and Gansbaai to break the journey.

Not much to report about Napier, but Gansbaai was a little more substantial so we did a loop around the town and stopped in at the harbour for a fresh seafood lunch (the slappest slap chips you ever did have!) and then were on our way.

Hermanus seems to have grown a lot since I was last there, some 5 or 6 years ago (or it could just be the angle of approach since the last visit was also just an overnight pitstop). We met Nic at the Old Harbour Brewery where he works and were treated to a quick tour of the brewhouse and a couple of pints at the on-site pub, catching up on who had been doing what and how we’d managed the last couple of years.

We then went past the Kennedy home – brand-new, they had only moved in 3 weeks prior! – to collect Lizzie. 

Hermanus is a very active small town with all sorts of events and activities throughout the year. We were coinciding our visit with an Art Appreciation initiative called Artwalk where on the first Friday of each month the town’s 11 art galleries stayed open until 8pm and displayed hundreds of artworks pegged in clear slips on washing lines inside and outside their galleries. 

Browsers can collect any pieces they are interested in and deposit R100 per artwork they’d like to buy into the marked glass jars, to be donated to charity. According to Lizzie – an artist by trade and by nature – you could pick up real bargains, by well-known or up-and-coming artists or even by amateurs to whom you may not normally be exposed.

I happened upon one of Lizzie’s pieces outside the last gallery we happened to visit, so I bought it as a commemoration of our holiday and a small karmic token of all we’d been fortunate to see and do in the last week.

We rounded off the visit to the village with dinner at Fisherman’s Cottage. It was very festive with a marquee tent in the square and a live trio belting out classics. The Kennedys know a lot of people in town, so we had quite a few locals stop by our table for a drink and an introduction. 

It seemed fitting to have a final fish and chips on the last night of our holiday. Beautifully prepared, the chips were fried masterpieces and the massive piece of Hake like a meringue the way it crunched on the outside and then melted in your mouth! 

SATURDAY

The last day of holiday can be depressing when it’s all about packing and leaving so it was welcome to have a last excursion to see us off. 

Nic works a Saturday Market so we popped in to have a breakfast with him. There were so many delicious aromas coming from the food court that we were pleased to be in tow of locals to guide our choice and I was soon sipping on the most amazing hot chocolate while waiting on my French toast and mountain of free-range bacon.

Bellies full, we hit the road, with loads of time in hand so we could take the more scenic coastal road through Betties, Pringle and Gordon’s Bays back to Cape Town for our flight. 

Travelogue W.Cape 1: Cape Town to Tulbagh

WESTERN CAPE PART 1

November 2021

Having had holiday hopes dashed in July when our ski trip to Lesotho fell prey to border closures courtesy of Covid’s Winter Wave, we were savvy to plan our year-end holiday early to be in advance of any summer shutdowns. Having enjoyed roadtrips in the Eastern Cape the previous November and then the Northern Cape in August, we figured we’d hattrick with a roadtrip in the Western Cape. Having done the Garden Route several times, we settled on an inland tour of Route 62 through the winelands.

With several of our friends moving to the Cape in recent years, we paired our holiday with a couple of  reunions en route.

CAPE TOWN

Landing in Cape Town on Saturday afternoon, first stop was an overnight with the Hunts in Croydon, a suburb on the outskirts of Somerset West – and a very fitting start to the theme of the holiday since their estate doubled as a working wine farm, with homes set between the vineyards.

It was wonderful to reunite and catch-up on what we’d been up to in the last few years and who we’d seen recently, cross-pollinating our stories with what we knew about mutual friends’ status and getting the brief on the new friends we were due to be making that evening, with dinner plans already in place.

We spent the evening at a lively new Portuguese restaurant called Dias Tavern; it was the first time that anyone in our group of 11 had been there, so it was a trial run for all concerned. The food was great and the company better, and we were still there when the call of curfew came round and sent us home.

We awoke to a murky Sunday morning, which was great weather to work off Saturday night with a run through the vineyards in our weekend home, Croydon Vineyard Estate. It started to drizzle while we were out, but it wasn’t cold and the setting was lovely so it didn’t matter much.

Having worked up an appetite, we were ready to set off on our adventure.

PAARL

First stop was 50km away in Paarl, lunching at Cucina Giovanni’s on Laborie Wine Estate (based on the Hunts’ experienced recommendation). We were fortunate to get the last available table for the lunch sitting – and would surely have been completely out of luck had we not been so early!

The setting was gorgeous, even on a grey day. We were tucked into a table for 2 in the cosy restaurant and could view the vineyards through the window, with the mountains in the background looking like a painted backdrop. The pasta was incredible and the panzerotti and seafood linguini paired perfectly with the Laborie Pinotage.

Full to bursting we welcomed the sun breaking through the clouds for our afternoon excursion, a wander around Babylonstoren. Besides being one of the oldest Cape Dutch wine farms, the estate boasts beautiful fruit and veg gardens, set at the foot of the sublime Simonsberg mountains near Franschhoek. We ambled around the garden’s 15 clusters, comprising nuts, citrus, berries, bees, herbs, ducks, chickens, a prickly pair maze and a pofadder-shaped covered feature tunnel at the far end. 

The gardens are laid out such that gravity feeds water throughout, from a stream flowing through ponds and the 300 or more species in the garden are either edible or have medicinal value. There are harvests all year round that determine what is served in the 2 farm-to-fork restaurants.

Entertained and exercised, we were ready to get back on the road for the 25km hop to our home for the night, Wellington.

WELLINGTON

At the foot of one of the oldest mountain passes, the Bainskloof Pass, Wellington and its 62,000 inhabitants form the centre of the Cape Winelands, producing grapes, fruit, wine and brandy. A charming small town, with a main road that still boasts the facades of buildings centuries-old, we drove from the Moeder Church at one end of the high street to the ‘Welcome to Wellington’ sign at the other end, admiring how clean and well-maintained it was.

It was also relatively bustling for a Sunday afternoon so, after checking into Cummings Guesthouse in one of the side-roads off the main drag, we sampled a couple of the pubs for a sundowner to round off our first day.

MONDAY

We started the day with a wholesome 5km run around the town, appreciating the view and the crisp morning country air. Our host at the B&B, seeing us return all rosy, was very impressed with our efforts and insisted I have an extra egg – on top of the 3 course breakfast she’d already laid out for us – “for energy”. 

We checked out and drove down to the main street to visit the Wellington Museum, which Google had recommended as “well worth the visit at the price”. For R10 we enjoyed a good half-hour of edutainment, learning all about the region, how it came to be and all the ups and downs that came with life over the last few hundred years.

In 1652, Jan Van Riebeeck and co. landed in South Africa, first of many. Surviving on stale and mouldy foods on the ships, by 1658 hundreds of vines and apricot trees were planted to service passing ships with fresh fruit, to which nutritious dried mebos and raisins were soon added. When the French Hugenots arrived n 1688, they were allocated farms in Wagenmakers Valley, particularly suited to the production of fruit, and this is where Wellington, the dried fruit capital of South Africa, was established in 1840 and named after the Duke of Wellington in honour of the Battle of Waterloo. 

The next win for the region was the completion of the Bainskloof Pass (29km with 11 bridges) in 1853, built by 300-400 prisoners between the ages of 18 and 40, mostly first offenders serving anywhere from 3 months to life. This allowed connection to the north and is a heritage site today.

Mentally nourished, we jumped into the car, headed 33km down the road to Riebeeck-Kasteel, one of the oldest towns in South Africa.

RIEBEECK-KASTEEL

Settlers in 1661 happened upon a lonely mountain and fertile vista, so named it Riebeeck Valley and established the sister towns of Riebeeck-Kasteel and Riebeeck West, which has birthed 2 Prime Ministers, Jan Smuts (1870) and Daniel Malan (1874). Farmers established themselves in the valley and in the 1900s the town was laid out around the existing church and what is now the oldest hotel in South Africa, The Royal Hotel.

With some 2700 residents, including some of South Africa’s most famous painters (drawn to the town by its picturesque valley), Riebeeck-Kasteel is often referred to as “Franschhoek 15 years ago”. It also has a great butchery and deli, where we picked up some dry wors and koeksisters for padkos.

Another 40km down the road was our final destination for the day, Tulbagh.

TULBAGH

We were quite underwhelmed by the town as we drove through; a line of the usual retailers overshadowing the smattering of historical buildings in between. The backdrop was breath-taking though and we were pleased that we’d opted to stay on a wine farm on the outskirts of town, closer to the pretty mountain range.

We had never heard of their wines, and had chosen Rijk’s Wine Estate & Hotel by the pictures on the booking site. They did us well and we were greeted with magnificent lushness of the green vineyards with a block of fresh white cottages, from where we could peacefully survey our surroundings. Sadly, Rijk’s didn’t offer winetasting on a Monday so we were forced to go out to sample the region’s fares.

We started with Twee Jonge Zellen, a very impressive wine estate offering tastings of their sparkling wine collection. Chris was in his element from the tasters while I gulped the view which was exquisite!

With an hour to go, we figured we could squeeze in 2 more quick tastings since everything was so close together. We chose Theuniskraal first, spurred by my connection having lived in a road of that name during high school. It was an unmemorable experience though, with no atmosphere in the tasting room, little pomp to the tasting itself and no stand-out wines from what we sampled. Flippenice was a bit better, with a larger range of testers and some (flippen)nice surprises of wines we’d seen but never thought to buy before.

We rounded off the tour with a beer-tasting (for a change of palette) at Obiqua Cafe, before returning to Rijk’s to enjoy the sunset from our patio before indulging in a wonderful local specialty, Bobotie, for dinner paired with our host’s homemade Pinotage.

Travelogue Namibia 5: Etosha

ETOSHA

30 September – 2 October 2021

Nearing the end of our grand roadtrip, the drive from Palmwag to Etosha mapped at 322km. We had done enough driving in Namibia to know that the mileage meant nothing; the terrain would dictate the travel time.

Spotting 5 giraffe almost immediately upon exiting the gate at Palmwag Lodge was a clue that we were in the bush and should expect slow going.

What we did not expect was the 10km of the Grootberg Pass, with its white-knuckle narrow roads, and the car occasionally slipping and sliding on the loose gravel, nudging toward the low pile of rocks acting as a guardrail between the road and steep gorge. We were grateful to be in the big and burly Hilux – and wondered if the burnout cars commonly found along our route had proved powerless in these circumstances and just been abandoned in favour of something more suitable.

Our midway stop proved to be a fail. Fortunately for us we had had more than our fill at the Palmwag Lodge buffet breakfast because Kamanjab turned out to be a bustling petrol station and Spar; more of a rank than a one-stop.

The intersection did herald the start of 61km of glorious tar road, on which we could make up some lost time and perhaps even get in the afternoon swim that has eluded us the previous day!

There was much excitement when we spotted the first Etosha Conservancy sign and, with kind roads at our disposal, we arrived just after 15h00 at our camp, Okaukuejo.

Etosha is one giant pan, and the basin of a massive prehistoric lake that was around 300m deep in places. With scale like that to contend with and the park’s reputation as one of the greatest in the world, we had been entirely pragmatic in our choice of Etosha accommodation – chosen purely for being the shortest, easiest drive back to Windhoek for our flight home. And we had gotten very lucky.

Okaukuejo Camp’s claim to fame was a floodlit watering hole that attracted animals throughout the day and night. And our chalets were right on the edge of the watering hole, so we had swathes of animals coming right to us! This suited the agenda for our last stop perfectly: see as much as possible while doing as little as possible.

There were 4 rhino lazily wallowing in the watering hole while we unpacked our bags from the car and settled into our homes for the next two nights. They paid little attention to their onlookers, observing from the benches dotted around the rock-wall crescent that separated the human domain from the animals’.

With a giraffe silhouetted in the background and elephants entering from stage right, we knew we were in for very easy animal-spotting at Okaukuejo and could afford to take a load off with some wallowing of our own in the human swimming pool.

The Camp was compact but had everything you might need – a restaurant, a bar, a tourist office, snack shop, filling station and even a castle with spiral stairs you could climb to get a 3-storey high vantage point of miles and miles around. We took advantage of all but the filling station, revelling in being able to park the car for a solid 36-hours of downtime.

We had booked a dinner, bed and breakfast package, so the biggest task for the evening was to choose a meal from the set menu. Opting for an Oryx steak (for the third day in a row) was a great decision. Yet again juicy and tender, fast becoming a favourite that was bound to be craved and missed on our return home.

FRIDAY

We had already seen enough wildlife at the watering hole to completely discount the need for a game drive, so there was no rush to get moving on the last day of our roadtrip-proper.

Easing into a buffet breakfast just after 9H00 (to meet the 09h30 cut-off) was about as pressured as the day was going to get. And even that warranted a little lie-down, after the obligatory check-in of the watering hole.

There was always something to see, with what looked like a hundred or more Springbok taking their turn, while a handful of Kudu were slowly edging in from the one side and Wildebeest trundling in from the outskirts. By the time we resurfaced, the players had again changed and a dazzle of zebra were playing swapsies on the far edge of the watering hole, with a few remaining Springbok who paced skittishly in anticipation. Ever faithful, a pair of giraffe obliged in the background to complete the (current) picture.

Our game play had been to hit the swimming pool at midday in the hopes of securing a set of loungers. A complete holiday cliche, all loungers had been spoken-for the previous afternoon, with towels and belongings claiming territory for absent persons.

Our thinking paid off and the pool area was near-deserted. Whether it was lunchtime, siesta or the crazy desert heat we head to thank didn’t matter, we got our loungers. We showed our appreciation by spending 3 long and lovely hours poolside, enjoying the day, the water and snacks from the tuckshop.

We were packed up and ready to go back to our chalet when we overheard another guest announcing excitedly that there were elephants moving towards the watering hole. We chivvied along and were rewarded with the sighting of a lifetime.

Almost on cue, as we got back to our homebase vantage point, 3 elephants came trotting in – literally trotting; I have never seen elephants move so fluidly – and entered the water on the edge closest to us. Then another 3… And a baby elephant… And a few more… And then a few more. They streamed in, a long line of all shapes and sizes, motivated to get to the watering hole and slotting in very neatly side-by-side so all could access.

There must have been 30 or more by the time the whole herd arrived. Some were drinking quietly at the edges, some splish-sploshing in the water, one was shooting water into the air from her trunk, two younger males were playfully locking tusks (until they got a stern look from a massive male).

And then, as organised as they had arrived, the leader started making tracks back into the bush, the herd restored its trail and within minutes they were gone again. I can’t recall having seen anything so mesmerising on any wildlife shows – and have seldom seen so well-executed a show as the effortless and seamless display the herd had put on for us.

Somehow our splish-splosh in the shower was less spectacular, but a necessary process to prepare for sundowners – on the chalet patio, watching some more “Watering Hole TV” – and another dinner on the terrace at the restaurant.

An early start the next day (necessitated by time constraints to get our mandatory Covid test results in time for our flight on Sunday) warranted an early night.

I happened to wake up in the middle of the night though and on the off-chance popped by head out the front door to see what was going on at the watering hole. Not much, just a mother and child set of rhino, being observed by some very diligent nature-mad humans. Good night, everyone!

Travelogue Namibia 4: Palmwag

PALMWAG

29-30 September 2021

Banking on a relatively short (3 or so hour) next leg on our journey to Palmwag, there was time for a run along the beach and a hearty steak (Oryx), egg (scrambled) and hash potatoes (imitation of the night before) breakfast.

We pointed the car toward Henties Bay and began to drive the requisite 70km along the Skeleton Coast.

We stopped to view a shipwreck, grounded as recently as 2008; surprisingly recent given the assumption of modern nautical navigation technology as well as the dilapidated state of the rusted remains that bear testament to the brutal weather that probably drove the ship ashore in the first place.

We had little to do in Henties Bay with no sights or excursions to speak of – and not ready to eat again yet. However, it was a good opportunity to pitstop (last loo for 200km of dirt road, and we knew from firsthand experience that you never know what might happen on these treks) and stock up on roadtrip essentials (water and biltong for the drive; beers for arrival).

There was precious little to see and do on our route, so big ups to Chris for planning ahead for a lunch break in Uis, which was more or less halfway through the 420km we needed to do for the day. And was a “blink and you’ll miss it” town, at best.

Brandberg Rest Camp was modest and welcomed in equal parts; allowing a leg-stretch around the terrace and a laugh at the novelty decor (including an L-shaped pool table) while we waited for our toasted sarmies.

The second half of our drive seemed to stretch on and on, slowed as we navigated the mountains, with their narrower roads, uneven surfaces and twists and turns that we hadn’t had to negotiate on the flat, straight, endless desert roads. During our planning, we had read on several reviews that drivetimes are guesswork at best and it’s always advisable to add 1-2 hours allowance on each leg. True story!

We arrived in the Palmwag Lodge camp at around 17h30, much later than we had intended, thinking we’d arrive mid-afternoon and lounge around in the pool, to beat the heat.

Nevermind though, our glamping tents were spacious and comfortable, each with a table and benches on its private patio, and fully-kitted for self-catering, including steel wine glasses, which was all the sign we needed to open our bottle of red to accompany the sunset.

Palmwag is famous for the elephants in the surrounding area, so it was hardly surprising but still delightful when all it took for elephant-spotting was to walk into the open-air dining room for dinner!

The thatched A-frame had clearly been designed to provide for a panoramic view, with no more than a wooden bannister across the far end. The few diners already seated were watching as a herd of elephants casually made their way across the veld, with a perfect orange ball of sun setting over the silhouetted horizon behind them.

Dinner in the restaurant was a multi-course affair with wine pairings, which was beyond our current appetite so we opted for the a la carte pool bar restaurant instead. A far better fit, with wraps, burgers and melt-in-your-mouth Oryx steaks.

Thankfully, we’d already seen the elephants so there was no pressure get up early to go on a game drive, so we could lounge at the pool area after all, with a few beers and shooters to loosen up after a long day in the car.

The glamping tents offered the best night’s sleep! Equipped with anything and everything you’d expect in a hotel building (including a portable aircon), the beds were every bit as comfortable, with light duvets, warm blankets and soft pillows that worked with the dead-of-night darkness and middle-of-nowhere silence for optimal slumbering.

I was very surprised when a gardener pointed out some footprints, showing that elephants had walked through the camp the night before! They must have tip-toed for us not to hear them…

Travelogue Namibia 3: Swakopmund

SWAKOPMUND

27-29 September 2021

With a spring in our step for the daily desert rise-and-shine on a work-free workday, we started the day with running a loop of our Sossusvlei camp, down to the main gate and across and around a neighbouring camp we discovered had been hiding behind the rocky outcrop against which our chalets were nestled. Thankfully we were out early enough to benefit from the flat and dry desert course, before the sun sapped all energy and any will to move at all.

Having worked up an appetite, we were grateful for the leftovers from the braai the night before, wolfing down our Oryx, fried onion and cheese steak rolls.

We packed the truck and hit the road, with 346km – of mostly dirt road – to contend with to get us to Swakopmund.

The Namibian countryside is so vast and varied that parts of the journey seem disconnected, like you’re on a completely different road on a completely different roadtrip to the one you were on a few kilometres back (or a few kilometres forward, for that matter). Sure, a lot of the view is arid, deserty desertness… But then a massive charcoal-coloured rocky outcrop will appear, or you’ll drive through a deep gorge that must have been a raging river at some point, or tightly overlapping golden hillocks that looks like someone took to the land from above with a massive rotary beater.

Most of the journey is flat and wide dirt road, dry and compacted to allow for some speed, but rocky enough to caution against going too fast lest your tyres pay the price. The bits through the gorge can be quite harrowing though; steep and narrow, and making us grateful for the stability of our big, heavy double-cab truck with its 4×4 capability that we hoped not to need.

Arriving in town, we had little trouble finding our Airbnb accommodation since it was adjacent to a substantial landmark, the sparkling new Platz Am Meer shopping centre. In a light and bright modern complex, our fully-kitted duplex promised to serve us well for the next couple of nights.

Hungry from a long day’s travel, we dumped our bags and headed straight out. Surprisingly, the temperature had dropped radically and it was barely 20 degrees! Fortunately not windy as Luderitz had been, so perfectly manageable with a change of holiday uniform, into jeans and a hoodie.

We found a cosy garden cafe called Wurstbude, across the road from the beach and sheltered by overhead vines, and settled in for a leisurely late lunch/early dinner, with a very cosmopolitan mix of samoosas, seafood, pizza and goulash.

Although it was chilly, it was still worth a walk back across the Paddock Gardens to the Platz Am Meer, and braving a seafront terrace table for the sunset. It was good to round off the day with making plans for the rest of our stay, before heading home for movie night.

TUESDAY

We awoke to a grey day. Not quite raining but not quite not raining, the air was thick and wet. Not great for sightseeing… But perfect for a morning run along the promenade.

With no clear intention, we ran around the beach side of the mall and past the pretty Paddock Gardens (that already had the sprinklers going).

Conveniently, there was a paved path that ran along the beach – literally, a few metres from the water, not the usual roadside pavement! – on the whole stretch between our mall and the waterfront and lighthouse on the other side of the strand. It was an easy run, at sea level and in a light mist from the cool morning. As an added bonus, our loop encompassed the local Park Run route, so another box incidentally ticked.

Juices flowing and appetite stoked, we showered and jumped in the car to go explore Walvis Bay.

The roads were good, but there was not much to see en route bar the odd sprout of a suburb on the sea side and sand, sand, sand on the inland side. We stopped for a photo opp at Dune 7, so-named (according to Google) because it is the 7th highest in the world, at around 383m. To give perspective, the Big Daddy at Sossusvlei the day before had been around 350m… Although it did look a lot bigger, probably because of the context of the setting.

There are 4×4 and quad biking excursions available at the dunes and, judging by the odd trail of footprints, some souls choose to hike up and barrel down, but we had a different agenda so kept moving to Walvis Bay.

We planned our arrival as a drive-through experience to see us to the quayside for some fresh seafood, but had to make an obligatory stop to photograph the flocks of flamingos treading gingerly in the shallow foreshore.

The modest waterfront had a handful of restaurants and shops; we chose the Anchors and were soon feasting on delicious fresh battered hake and fried calamari.

We had left Ian at home, working, so made our way back once our lunch was done.

After a rest stop, Chris and I drove to the Swakopmund old Town – no more than a few kilometers away – and used an online walking tour to self-guide through the quaint little town, making note of what to show our friends when we returned as a group later.

The town is remarkable since most of the buildings date to the turn of the last century and have been maintained in pristine condition. The town has all the old-world charm of yesteryear, but look like they were painted yesterday!

Being a holiday town, there is a high concentration of pubs and restaurants. The walking tour circuit had given us a chance to see a lot of them up close – and review the menus displayed outside.

With experience on our side, the evening’s running order was a relatively simple choice: Butcher & Brewer on the waterfront for sundowners (because it housed Swakopmund craft brewery), then Fachwerk beer garden (because it was the oldest building we’d seen, 1899) for pre-dinner and lastly Brauhaus for dinner (because the internet reviews placed it as undisputed best German food restaurant in town).

It was a winning combo. We were back at the waterfront well in time to enjoy a couple of draughts while lapping up the seaside view. Then we had a fun game of Giant Jenga in the Fachwerk beer garden, while the other patrons were participating in a very leisurely game of Bingo. Then the Brauhaus dazzled us with perfect schnitzels, eisbein and crunchy bratkartoflen (roast hash potatoes).

Travelogue Namibia 2: Sossusvlei

SOSSUSVLEI

25-27 September 2021

Leaving behind lovely Luderitz, we hit the road to take us into the desert at Sossusvlei. The roads in Namibia are really well maintained – which must be no mean feat with the wind and the desert constantly trying to cover them – but also very economically distributed between landmark towns.

Consequently, we needed to retrace our route, past the Ghost Town we had passed on our way in and then visited properly the previous day, and about another 100km inland to get to the turn off to move north towards Sossusvlei.

This new route, although a main artery, was a dirt road, which slowed our progress somewhat. With the first item on the day’s itinerary being lunch at a German restaurant pitstop, Helmeringhausen, there may have been sense of humour issues had it not been for our holiday high spirits, a downloaded playlist (we had already learnt that consistent cell network is not a thing in Namibia) and the benefit of experience meaning we’d planned and packed padkos snacks.

Once again, our landscape view shifted from light sand to rocky outcrops to the sort of desert you see in the movies (dark peppercorn knobbles of shrubs on a red sand scalp) and then to the golden longer brush you expect in a game reserve back home. With a low mountain range – we suspected to be the Tirasberge – framing on all sides, the view could contend to be what Uncle Peter would call a vistarama.

We attempted the much-talked-about game of I Spy, but once we’d gone through Sand, Rock, Fence, Road, Sign, Sky and Telephone Poles, the options were pretty much to start again or quit. We chose to quit while we were ahead.

Arriving in the booming metropolis of Helmeringhausen revealed nothing more than a handful of buildings; a general dealer, a house, a post office, the hotel/curio shop/restaurant lunch stop and a 2 pump service station … Which proved usefully-timed as Chris spotted our back passenger tyre was flat as we left the restaurant.

The garage attendant popped a plug into the tyre and we were off, crisis averted.

Except it wasn’t.

About 100km later our back driver-side tyre burst. Argh!

Fortunately, the boys knew what to do and – besides a big mission to get the jack in the exact right place to hoist up the massive car – it was a relatively smooth operation to change out the dud tyre for the spare, which had been nested under the car.

We had been very fortunate to break down somewhere with cell phone signal – which had been at best erratic on all roads – so I was able to make myself useful and contact Avis  Car Rental to report the mishap and get instructions.

The lady at the Avis call centre found a matching tyre at Maltahohe, 80km down the road (and not a whole lot off our route) and we dutifully obliged; spending a half hour in another of Namibia’s tiny towns while the tyre was replaced and the spare renested.

The detour meant that we arrived in our homebase for the next two nights much later than expected. It was after 18h30 and we were chasing last light to get safely to our haven in the very remote and daunting terrain. We were relieved and delighted to arrive at the Desert Quiver Camp in one piece (and 5 functional tyres) as the darkness enveloped the road.

Sossusvlei and surrounds are famous for the dunes and the desert experience, which are immensely popular with international tourists and nature buffs alike. Consequently, accommodation options vary from camping to glamping to eye-wateringly priced luxury camps. We had taken our chances with the reasonably-priced chalets at Desert Quiver… And our bet had paid off.

Simple but tasteful, modern and very comfortable 2-sleeper chalets with aircon (essential!), kitchenette, braai facilities, and generously spaced for unobstructed views of the desert on all sides, with a serviced clubhouse with pub and pool, if you felt social.

After a fairly harrowing extended day on the road we declined the option to drive 4km down the road to Sossusvlei Lodge for buffet dinner, opting rather to have a sundowner at the pub and fashion a picnic dinner from our leftovers from Luderitz and our padkos supplies.

Great decision, leaving us to appreciate the great outdoors and continue with our newly-acquired amateur star-gazing hobby while Chris stole the show, whipping up fried cheesy hotdog toasties on the hotplate in our kitchenette.

Awaking to an already-warm 07h00, we applauded ourselves for heeding the advice of the receptionist the previous night; she had warned us that leaving for the dunes too late could ruin the experience because of the oppressive heat.

With fruit and leftover hotdogs in the fridge, it was quick n easy to get a slap-up breakfast together and hit the road.

We were ideally placed, with the Gate to the Namib-Naukluft National Park a few kilometres down the road (just beyond the restaurant we had declined the previous night). However, once in the park it was another 60km to get to the shuttle that transports tourists around the dunes.

The shuttle drivers were very friendly, got us packed into the game drive vehicle efficiently and before you could say “so much sand”, we were trundling across dry salt pans and over the silky red sand dunes to get to the Dead Vlei valley with its graveyard of trees, unable to survive the dry saltiness of the ground in which they had been seeded.

The Big Daddy Dune arched above and was a 1 – 1.5 hour hike to complete end-to-end but, with the sand already as hot as it was, there was no incentive to commit to more than a few mid-dune pics for posterity and perspective. No regrets; it was an awe-inspiring landscape and the magnitude and rugged beauty can be appreciated from any level!

The shuttle then took us across the plain to the smaller curved Big Momma dune, which sheltered a watering hole below. We were able to walk from the parking area where the water was little but a mirage on the horizon, and cross the caked clay to the water’s edge. The driver told us that when the floods come, the entire basin gets filled – way beyond the area where we were currently parked – demonstrating exactly how extreme the ecosystem is.

By then it was past 11h00, over 35 degrees and a long time since breakfast, so we jumped back in the car, retracing our footsteps and stopping for the occasional photo as we drove back to the permit office at the Gate for lunch in the adjacent restaurant.

We got back to camp at around 13h00 and since we’d been admin-forward in ordering a braai kit from reception in the morning (they offered a shopping service where you select meats, veg, salads and breads from a checklist and they deliver in the evening), we had absolutely nothing to do all afternoon besides relax at the clubhouse and enjoy the pool.

We thanked our lucky stars that we had gotten all our sightseeing done early; by now it was baking hot – around 40 degrees – and there was a blustering hot wind. The wind was so strong and so consistent that I had to position myself to sit facing into it to avoid a faceful of hair like Cousin It from Adams Family. It was also so hot that it was like having a massive hairdryer pointing at you. Fortunately we didn’t have to lift a finger because everything would have been an effort!

Once our braai pack arrived, we set about making our fire. The pack included a homemade firelighter that required us to gather dry sticks from nearby bushes to act as kindling for the wooden logs provided.

We had ordered generously, so feasted on delicious Oryx steaks, Namibian lamb chops and local wors, with foil-wrapped potatoes and onions as well as tubs of coleslaw and pasta salad. A fitting finish to a fantastic day.

Travelogue Namibia 1: Luderitz

LUDERITZ

24-25 September 2021

A Namibian trip had been on the cards for years; deprioritised for the very many other adventures that had swallowed up all the not-enough leave days.

Having robbed us of a planned trip to Lesotho in July with our friends Michele & Ian, finally the pandemic provided the perfect window of opportunity for a cross-border flit, between a brutal winter 3rd Covid Wave and any hope of travel abroad opening up again while South Africa was on the Red List.

Highly motivated, Christian took it upon himself to sketch a magnificent roadtrip for our Awesome Foursome that would include desert, sea, mountains, bush and city breaks all wrapped up in a 10 day whirlwind tour. With the magnitude of expansive Namibia, it was going to be a lot of driving. But with good company and lots of exciting excursions ahead, we jumped at the chance!

We booked our flights; holding our breath that the Covid infection numbers would stabilise and the borders remain open. When things looked promising, we booked all the accommodation and the rental car and that was it, the (impatient) countdown began.

You could tell we were hot to trot because we’d booked the red-eye flights out to make the most of our first day of holiday. This meant leaving home at 03h30 for the airport – and a very long hour’s wait between check-in and boarding, in an eerily quiet airport, with “closed until further notice” signs in the Lounge windows.

The flight was uneventful (no doubt thanks to the ridiculous hour and the smattering of passengers sleeping off the early start) and we were soon disembarking the little plane, on the runway in what looked like the middle of nowhere. No city to be seen in any direction; just dry brown semi-desert. How awesome.

We got our rental – a big double-cab Hilux that would see us through even the most rugged parts of our route – and hit the road, with an ambitious 500km of open road standing between us and lunch in Keetmanshoop.

Heading South, the miles sped by on well-maintained roads with little traffic. And not much to see bar the same dry barren veld on either side of the road.

Needing to break the journey, we randomly settled on Kalkrand as a roadside dot on the map. It proved to be little more than that when the reality presented itself; dry, closed petrol pumps, a dodgy pub, a rip-off tuckshop and public toilets at N$2 per person for the pleasure (loosely-termed, with no toilet seats or cisterns and toilet paper rations allocated on upfront cash payment – with exact monies required or no change issued).

Back in the car with massively overpriced water and chips, not 10 minutes later we drove through Namibia’s version of the Harrismith one-stop. Would have been far better suited to our intentions. Typical!

By 2 o’clock we reached Keetmanshoop, which was the town at the crossroads at which our southerly journey turned west towards the coast. It proved to be an awkward time to get lunch, with several places already concluded their lunch sitting and only reopening for dinner at 5.

Determined not to do a fast food chain lunch, we found the Bird’s Nest Hotel was open, and happy to serve us in their courtyard terrace. We ordered wraps and had our first Windhoek draught to celebrate our arrival in Namibia.

Far from done with driving for the day, we were back in the car by 15h30 with another 330km yet to do to get to Luderitz.

The terrain gradually metamorphosed from the dry veld generously dotted with brown shrubs, to rocky landscape and then to the sandy desert we had been expecting all along. Not an ideal drive to be playing I Spy, with so little stimulus!

We were very pleased when we eventually got our first glimpse of the shimmering Atlantic. Even though it was just gone 18h30, it was still light and we got to enjoy spectacular views from our digs for the next two nights; sea-facing suites in an Airbnb on the Shark Island peninsula that jutted out into the ocean from the base of town.

Luderitz was a sweet and compact little town so nothing was very far from our homebase. We decided to get moving to catch the last of the sunset at the Luderitz Yacht Club, a few hundred metres away at the waterfront, obviously.

The barman served us ice-cold Windhoek draught in ice-cold beer mugs and we celebrated our arrival before heading off to The Portuguese Fisherman, which our host had recommended to us for dinner. We saw why, with a magnificent meal of fresh seafood plucked straight off the local coastline.

Curfew and the long day curtailed any further shenanigans and we were pleased to get an earlyish night to recharge the batteries.

We had driven past Kolmanskop on our way into Luderitz and had a sneak peek of the famous Ghost Town, which was #1 on our To Do list. A few inquiries revealed that there were guided tours at 09h30 and 11h00, so we chose the latter to allow for a breakfast in the restaurant in the Ghost Town beforehand.

The tour was brilliant. Our guide set the scene with the story of Luderitz, named after a tobacco dealer from Bremen. Looking for copper, he had completely overlooked the diamonds that existed in abundance just down the drag. Over 5 million carats were mined in Kolmanskop; 90% gem quality diamonds (10% industrial) compared with 60/40 in Kimberley.

Although even that was relatively short-lived when 1927 saw the start of the death of Kolmanskop when bigger diamonds were found on the other side of the Orange River so all the people and equipment went there. There was mass exodus from the town which eventually died completely when the hospital closed in 1956.

Kolmanskop was an open air museum, where visitors are guided through the existing buildings to get the history and anecdotes, and then are free to wander at will in and out of the houses and businesses of the deserted town.

The tour began in the Town Hall, which sounded pretty lush for this weird man-made oasis in the Namib, at the turn of the last century. The Hall had a champagne lounge for the ladies, a smoking and poker room for the men, with a restaurant that had bell strings suspended from the ceiling and over the tables such that each could command personalised service from the kitchen, where you can still see the original stoves that prepared hundred of meals a day. It also had gym equipment and housed the first library in southern Africa. Below was the bowling alley – complete with still-operational mechanism to return the ball from the skittles end to the start of the lane! – with the original bar and bar-fridge still in place.

The Hall was on Kaizer Wilhelm Street (Millionaire’s Row), where you were still able to walk through many of the buildings, including the architect’s house, the Quartermaster’s house that also acted as B&B for the VIP guests and international artists who came to put on shows on the stage in the Town Hall.

Our guide told us that the houses were very advanced for their time. There were seawater taps in the houses. Fresh drinking water was imported from Cape Town in barrels, by the thousands of kilolitres! There was even a seawater swimming pool with diving board.

The hospital was also very advanced for its time and could bed 250 people at a time – which seems like a lot since there were only 300 German adults, 44 children and 800 Namibian workers living in Kolmanskop – and first Xray machine in Southern Africa, which was an essential not for health purposes, but rather to detect diamond-smuggling. There was also a wine cellar below because the Head Doctor believed all patients should have a glass of wine every day.

Even though the town was established in 1911, every house had a telephone and electricity. There was an ice factory that used sea water tanks, ammonia gas and electricity to freeze in about 24 hours. Complimentary frozen blocks were delivered to everyone each day to put into their cold cupboard to keep their food cold, along with a crate of lemonade and soda water; all delivered by mule-drawn taxi.

One of the colourful anecdotes shared was in the butchery, where the story goes that the menfolk would get hammered in the bowling alley bar, get into trouble with their wives and then break into the butchery to steal all the sausages when their wives refused them dinner. The butcher would then consult the barman to see who had been at the alley and consequently send them a bill for their haul. Sounds like a fun caper – and like a reasonably good existence in general, bar the actual living in the remoteness of the desert and the punishing windiness.

We suspected the excursion was going to be the highlight of our tour. A great start that was going to be hard to beat!

Still full from the sumptuous breakfast, we skipped lunch in favour of a drive around the Peninsular that we could see across the bay from our deck. Our hosts had put together a printed album of the highlights of Luderitz so we knew to expect a 60km loop with several bays and lookout points.

We picked the more interesting ones; Diaz Point (for the cross placed there by Bartholomew Diaz in 1488) and Halifax Bay for views of the Penguins on Halifax Island and the grave of George Pond of London, who had been outcast from Luderitz and walked to Halifax Bay to reach his only friend on the island, but died of hunger and thirst waiting for the low tide so he could get across. It was, as we suspected commonplace, blowing a gale, so George probably had quite a miserable end of days, poor chap.

Very pleased with our day’s achievements so far, we took a time out at a pizza bar in town called Ritzi’s to grab a cold beer before our walking tour of town. With everything so close together, we figured there was no rush.

Good thing too, because the 2 sights we’d earmarked in town turned out to be literally a couple of hundred metres apart. It was a 20 minute affair to see the famous Lutheran church with its spectacular views and original stained glass windows and Goerke Haus, which was built on Diamond Hill by the richest man in town for his lady, for her arrival from Germany. No expense was spared and he built a fabulous mansion, with everything fully imported from Germany. All for nought though; she got to Luderitz and couldn’t abide the wind so left him and went straight back to Germany.

To be fair, it really is a windy town. But we still enjoyed the view from our relatively sheltered deck as we recounted the many highlights of the day, so this Mrs Goerke might have been a bit hasty.

We closed off our time in Luderitz with sundowners at a fun local pub in town called Bottles, dinner at Essenweitz at the Waterfront and then star-gazed from our deck, thanks to the clear skies and carpet of bright stars that seemed so much closer than at home.

Travelogue Northern Cape: Part 2

NORTHERN CAPE PART 2

03 – 07 August 2021

KAKAMAS

Having already spent our first night in the Green Kalahari belt in Keimoes, the plan was for our second day to be spent travelling to the farthest end such that the remainder of our trip would be spent winding our way back (slowly) in the direction of home.

This meant that Wednesday’s plan began with a visit to Augrabies Falls and had us sleeping in Kakamas.

With only 70km to cover and very relaxed hosts at Bezalel Wine Estate, there was no hurry to start our day. With the sun up and the makings of a lovely morning, it was very refreshing to put on our running togs and take a jog through the vineyards again while we discussed the finer details of the plan for the day.

We settled on a picnic at Augrabies Falls. And we already had all the supplies. Bonus.

On the road with our friends, Motley Crue (the audiobook into which we were now thoroughly engrossed), the time (and the endless bushveld scenery) whizzed by and we were soon at Augrabies Falls National Park.

We pulled up at the main building and – whether it was because of Covid, being midweek or just winter in the Northern Cape – discovered we had the place to ourselves.

Taking the winding path down to the gorge, it was a now-rare pleasure to be able to enjoy the open-air excursion mask-free. The Park has set up wooden walkways and viewing decks along the edge of the gorge and we walked end-to-end, able to admire the fierceness of the falls, the magnitude of the gorge and the scary drop between us on the overhanging viewing deck and the water so far beneath us.

Having done 2km along the walkways, we were ready for our light picnic lunch and enjoyed our sarmies, watching the little dassies sniffing and scurrying about the place, like chubby little Daxies.

The Kakamas Hotel was also directly on the N14 which runs from Upington to Augrabies so we’d passed it on our way through and, with the hotel being on the far side of Kakamas from the Augrabies side, by the time we checked in we’d had two passes through Kakamas which, thanks to boundless graphic signage, was enough to give us locals-level qualification on lay of the land and a very clear agenda. Wine-tasting and pizza at Die Mas.

The Kakamas Hotel for all its small town lodge charm boasted a 4-star rating, which showed in the efficient way we were managed from car to our ultra modern suite, with slimline admin consisting only of our obligatory Covid declaration form and the three little words everyone is always excited to hear: Breakfast Is Included.

Pausing ever so briefly to appreciate our pretty home for the night – from the gravel pathway across the shaded lawns down to the pond where the local gaggle was lazily sliding across the still waters – we were motivated to get back in the car and on our way to our next adventure.

Die Mas had come recommended to us by friends in Jo’burg, and lived up to the anticipation that had been set.

With Wine, Brandy and Gin tasting on offer, we settled (as the only customers, spoilt for choice) at a bench table at the outer edge of the grapevine-covered terrace to enjoy the beautiful sunshine and wonderful view, and ordered the white wine flight.

The chap serving us had no sooner poured into the tasting glass when a gust of wind came along and blew it right over! With no intention of wasting any more wine, we moved inside to an upright-barrel table.

Having thoroughly enjoyed the white flight, we ordered the red as well. While swirling and sniffing and sipping and critiquing, a couple of swarthy chaps came in and sat at one of the sets of table and chairs.

With awe, we watched as they ordered the wines, the brandy and the gin tastings all in one go. AND a Brandy and Coke long drink each for in between. They did a bit of swirling and some sniffing, but mostly slinging and giggling and having the best time.

We, meantime, had been served the bad news that the kitchen was not operating. So no pizza. But, when in Rome and all that, so we did a brandy tasting (seemed to be working for our neighbours) and ordered a bottle of Rose Pinot Noir instead.

The wind had died down so we moved back outside and enjoyed the start of sunset with the lovely local’s finest, pleased to see our super-tasters from inside leaving with arms laden with the cases they’d bought to take home.

An extensive Google to try and find a dinner alternative revealed a distinct lack of options. Not believing what we were seeing, we took a drive through the part of town that seeped inland from the N14 and despite finding schools, the usual handful of town buildings, a compact and neat suburb and after a brief foray into the local settlement, we found that Google had indeed been telling the truth.

Fortunately, our hotel had a restaurant, so we had a very pleasant poolside dinner with another bottle of Die Mas Pinot Noir for good measure.

UPINGTON

While our hotel was a pretty slice of the countryside, it was also right on the main road, which left nowhere to do our now-ritual morning run.

Good opportunity for a sleep-in and a hearty brekkie before the hop back along the now-very-familiar N14 to Upington.

We’d called ahead and arranged early check-in at our hotel, the Oasis, which soon proved to be a lot of value for our money, from the prime location on park-and-walk-anywhere Schroder Street, to the airconditioned reception to the access to the amenities at the Protea next door. And yes, Breakfast Was Included.

Since it wasn’t yet midday, we had plenty of time for a session in the fitness centre in the Protea. Chris opted to do weights and whatnot while he had access to the equipment and I filled the gap of my missing running partner by running along with the Olympics contestants on the telly in the gym. I did 2 sets of 3000m steeplechase with the world’s finest athletes, cheating a bit since I didn’t think the hotel would appreciate me leaping on the treadmill or splashing through the kiddies pool for authenticity of my virtual event.

Our pre-planning had uncovered a local offering called “Sakkie Se Arkie” that looked worth a try. The review promised a relaxing couple of hours of sunset cruise down the Orange River, which sounded about our speed. Showered and ship-shape, we prioritised going down to the jetty to book so that we would work timings around that excursion.

Fortunately we had taken the car purely because the Orange River Wine Cellars tasting rooms were 4km from the hotel or we would have felt very foolish driving to Sakkie Se Arkie, which we’d assumed as a turn of phrase when the Oasis receptionist had told us it was ‘around the corner’, but which turned out to even be understated since it was just on the other side of the Protea Hotel building!

Sadly, the cruise season had not yet begun (combination of weather and lack of demand) so there would be no Arkie for us. But there was wine-tasting, so all was not lost.

And neither could we be since the tasting rooms were literally on our road. Four short kilometres straight-straight down dead-straight flat-as-a-pancake Schroder Street.

We were very soon seated at a table at Orange River Cellars with a flight of 7 of their finest wines to sample; 3 whites and 3 reds of our choosing + a bonus red one that was new and being promoted.

We worked through the rainbow of generous tasters while lunch was served and then, with nothing else on the agenda, ordered a couple of glasses of our favourites and frittered away the afternoon, absorbed in the novelty of wine-routing.

We had hoped to get a pint of Guinness somewhere in the Northern Cape to add to our online Guinness Index. Some Google research had offered the promise of an Irish pub in Upington. And of course it was said to be on Schroder Street.

A few doors down from our home base, we had driven past it on our way out. It looked shut at the time, but we irrationally hoped it was something odd like small town hours or curfew-related restrictions or somesuch.

No such luck. On our return to our side of Schroder, a close up inspection revealed a note in the door that advised the pub was closed owing to lockdown and it was unknown when or if it would reopen. Equal parts sad for them and disappointing for us.

This only left the Red Ox for us for sundowners.

A complete surprise, the Red Ox proved to be a particularly shiny hidden gem. Upmarket enough to be associated with Sandton’s Butcher Shop or Rosebank’s Grillhouse, but with the added appeal of being riverside with spectacular sunset views over the Orange, our only regret was that we had eaten so recently since the delicious cuts on display in the counterstyle showcases and in the “Buy to Braai” fridges at the entrance were nothing short of mouth-watering.

We made do with sampling the local Kalahari Lager and Red Ox pilsner as it got dark and we planned our next day.

KURUMAN

When we had done our planning, we had only booked up until Upington, leaving the last couple of nights free in case we wanted extra time anywhere or got referrals along the way. Neither being the case, we were flying a bit blind, with the internet as our guide.

Scrutinising the route home, we made two decisions; firstly, to spend Thursday night in Kuruman (because we’d heard of it and there was a hotel in the same chain as the Kakamas Hotel that we’d so enjoyed) and secondly, to return home on Friday since the remaining distance was manageable and there was nothing else ‘must do’ en route.

Thursday morning began with a last run in the vineyards, accessing them by crossing the Orange on the bridge we’d seen from the Red Ox the night before, followed by a hearty breakfast at the hotel – a rare-pleasure buffet, carefully managed by the banqueting staff in line with rigid Covid protocols.

The only stop we made on the trip to Kuruman was at Kathu.

Established as an iron ore mining town, our limited view of Kathu gave us the opinion that although nice enough, there’s not a hell of a lot to see and do, so we settled for a quick visit to the local mall.

Leaving Kathu, it would appear that the town holds future promise with a lush looking country club and some adjacent residential development.

We did not hold a similar opinion of Kuruman which, sadly, was dusty and dilapidated by first impression.

When at check-in the manager at Kuruman Hotel warned us off the town’s claim to fame, the Eye of Kuruman, because of threat of vandalism and theft, the day’s fate was sealed.

We had booked a garden unit and it was right next to the pool so we did with our last afternoon on this roadtrip what we so seldom do on holiday. Absolutely nothing. And loved it.