Viva El Vino

We had one of these at the weekend, one of my favourite Spanish producers from the Ribera and it's a league or two above your normal Spanish plonk from Rioja etc. Tempranillo grapes are kings here, blueberries and red fruits for days with nicely integrated oak, a properly serious red wine. I seem to remember this having a different label back in the day? The new one is good though, clean and simple, about thirty'ish quid in places like Majestic but you can find this wine in most places, I bet it will age well too, recommended!

RSA - Part XI

 

We eventually arrived at Matjiesfontein, lucky we didn't listen to our satnav as that was directing us in completely the wrong direction up some gravel track to oblivion! Did I mention that this place was in the middle of nowhere, it certainly is, even Google maps hasn't got a clue.

Anyway, upon arrival we decamped to our (rather old fashioned) room, in fact in the picture above our room was on the first floor just to the left of the entrance (with the ornate veranda) It was kinda like stepping back to the 1880s, a Victorian time capsule, a mad hotel built by some eccentric Colonel trying to make his mark on Empire! 

In reality the hotel (and surrounding compound) was built in 1889 by a Scottish railwayman, James Douglas Logan, it was the centerpiece of a Victoria health spa (there's a small river running through it) and bizarrely Logan was a Cricket fanatic and also built a full size pitch within the compound. It was named after the Governor of the Cape at the time (Lord Milner) and has played host to many famous characters of that era like Cecil Rhodes, Rudyard Kipling and Randolph Churchill. The Cape railway from Cape Town North to Johannesburg runs alongside the compound and apparently touring cricketers used to stop and get some practice in on their way up country! There is still a station here (see below) and the hotel is a popular stop for tourists travelling on the luxury "Blue Train" from the Cape to Pretoria.

During the second Boer war the compound and hotel served as British Army HQ and several of the buildings acted as a field hospital for soldiers, in fact if you walk out onto the Karoo and scuff around in the dusty soil you can still find old cans of Victorian bully beef, it's said that at one point there were 10,000 troops stationed here on their way to fight in the North.

Next to the hotel (in fact joined to the hotel) is a pub, called "The Lairds Arms" it's interior has hardly changed since the 1880s, old fashioned wooden paneling and a solid hardwood bar with the walls adorned with Queen Victoria's portrait, old photos of cricket teams and blokes with handlebar mustaches! (see below)

I snapped this picture of the bar inside the pub (see below), we parked ourselves here for a couple of hours after we arrived, it was a great place to sit and chat with fellow travelers, it felt like we were all Victorian explorers with tall tales of Africa to tell!

The other thing that this hotel is famous for is the shortest bus tour in the world, it's true, there's an old routemaster in the car park (see below) and at 5 'o' clock a trumpet sounds and everyone is summoned to the bus, we of course headed upstairs (for a better view), it pulls away and turns the corner by the hotel, the chap narrating the tour explains that the building next to the hotel served as courthouse, jail, post office and general store, we turn another corner, "here is museum building", another corner, and another and hey presto we're back where we started! Total time 5 minutes, it's a fabulous tour..

After our tour the trumpet sounded again, we were being called to dinner..

The dining room was something else (see below), another Victorian time capsule, everything was either wood (mahogany) or Iron and all the waiters wore suitable red waistcoats and white gloves. I snapped a picture of it (below) the menu was simple, only a couple of main dishes including the famous "Karoo Lamb" which we both had, it was delicious, not Haut Cuisine but a huge slab of perfectly cooked meat with vegetables on the side and a tasty jus. We retired to our rather spooky room with full bellies and happy hearts, this place certainly was a different experience!

Being miles from anywhere in the middle of the Klein Karoo you can image that the light pollution was practically zero, the sky there was amazing, you couldn't help but stare up in awe at the trillions of twinkling points of light, photographs don't really do it justice but I snapped one never the less (below) Not the most luxurious night of our trip but certainly a memorable one!

After a night under the stars we awoke fairly early and headed down for a hearty breakfast, after that we packed up and checked out, we were headed back toward the city and the penultimate stop of our trip and one that I was particularly looking forward to, we were headed to "wine country", read all about it in the next and final episode.

London Stories

 

We went up to London yesterday (Saturday) to see the Ramses II exhibition at Battersea Power Station, it was a glorious day albeit a little chilly at either end. I hadn't been to Battersea for years so it was good to see what they'd done to the old place, wow, what a stunning renovation! The power station has been converted into a up scale shopping mall and apartments, all very swish but retaining the original  industrial nature of the place.

The exhibition was pretty interesting, a collection of pieces relating to the Ramses II, the greatest pharaoh of them all (according to him) It was amazing to see his original coffin made of cedar wood (on the left of this collage) and jewelry belonging to his wife, how this stuff has lasted so long is incredible let alone the excellent state of preservation. 

RSA - Part X

 

The drive to Oudtshoorn was quite spectacular, from Plett we drove down the coast on the main N2 highway to a place called George and then headed inland on the R62 which is a winding road that rises and rises up (in altitude) to the "Klein Karoo" (little Karoo) which is a scenic, semi-arid valley in South Africa's Western Cape, bounded by the Swartberg and Langeberg mountains. Oudtshoorn is the largest town on the Klein Karoo and is famous for Ostrich farming. This took off in the mid 1800s when the demand for feathers (to go in Women's hats) was rampant, many fortunes were lost and made and what was in 1865 nothing more than a farm grew to a town of nearly 2000 people by 1875 this was known as "the first Ostrich boom" when the price of feathers (by weight) almost exceeded that of diamonds! Like all these things there was a massive slump in 1885 as supply exceeded demand, however, after the Anglo-Boer war in 1904 there was again a surge in demand and there followed a period known (unsurprisingly) as the second Ostrich boom! The population rose to 9000 but it wasn't to last, after the first world war demand again slumped. Today the population is over 60,000 but the economy is more diverse, wine, agriculture and mining are all things exploited there currently.

The area is still famous for Ostrich farms but these days the birds are reared for their skin, meat and other products, it's quite strange to be driving along and seeing a field full of these huge birds, and yes, they all move together just like in Jurassic Park!

Our accommodation for two nights was an old farm that had been converted into a B&B, it was a quaint place although in the middle of nowhere, we had a little "bungalow" all to ourselves (see above), it was nice, very quiet and relaxing.

The outside appearance was typically "Cape Dutch" in architectural style, more gables that you can shake a stick at and the surrounding hills reminding me of the film "Zulu", I could just hear Colour Sergeant Bourne saying to Michael Kane "The sentries report Zulus to the southwest, fousands ovvem" in that wonderful Cockney accent. Fortunately there were no Zulu's only rather nice "home cooked" dinners and a tasty little collection of great value Cape wines to sample!

The next day we decided to venture out and visit the Cango Caves, a local attraction and signposted from pretty much everywhere along the main road. The caves themselves are quite impressive, around 4km long (although only a quarter of this is open to the public), there are two tours you can do, easy and hard, the hard one involves scrambling through very tight openings. After our experiences at Robberg we decided to take the easy route, it was still pretty good though.

These caves certainly give Cheddar a run for their money! Some of the chambers are huge and very well illuminated offering dramatic vistas of stalactites and stalagmites (see above)  The tour lasts around 40 minutes and the chambers get smaller and smaller as you progress into the mountain, like most caves as you go further the air gets thinner and the temperature rises, I wouldn't fancy going much further than we did but apparently the youngsters on the "difficult tour" do just that!

The formation above reminded me of the sorting hat in Harry Potter, Slytherin it is then..

After visiting the caves we headed back to the hotel, as we approached the Satnav flashed up a location right next to it that had the words "craft beer" in the name, my excitement level jumped! I had researched this place but had no idea there was the possibility of any crafty beer nearby. Anyway we parked the car and wandered down the long gravel drive to the end where there was the Karusa Winery AND craft beer brewery, well what do you know, we eagerly entered the establishment and settled into two of their sampling offerings, one for wine and one for beer, we also ordered a pizza (which was the size of our two heads combined!) 

Such a great place, and the wine/beer was excellent, we felt as though we'd landed on our feet that lunchtime and after a pleasant hour or so we headed further up the dirt track to an establishment I'd noticed on the drive up, the Cango Ostrich Farm!

Ostriches are such weird things, part bird part dinosaur, the farm was quite interesting and runs tours throughout the day, you get to feed the birds, feel their leather and stand on their eggs which doesn't sound too kind but hey, the eggs can take roughly 150kg of weight before they break, although at the time the guide looked nervously around the group of visitors, some of the larger ladies might have issues, and you can't really ask can you..

After visiting the Ostrich farm we retired to our bungalow and later had our final dinner at our hotel, the next morning we checked out early and headed up into the mountains to a famous road called the Swartberg pass which takes you from Oudtshoorn across the range over to a place called "Prince Albert", a rather eccentric and somewhat deviant name for a town if ever there was one! 

I had researched the road and it looked fine on paper but as we ascended it went from tarmac to single track gravel with nothing between the car and the 1000m drop off , and it simply got steeper and steeper! The experience was a bit like those narrow country lanes in Devon and Cornwall, you dread someone coming the other way as that would necessitate someone reversing up or down the track, except it wasn't a little hedgerow that caused anxiety it was certain death if you cocked it up! I was genuinely worried at some points as my little Avis hire car was utterly gutless and really struggled with the altitude (1575m) and the dusty gravel gradients. Anyway, we eventually made it over and yes, the scenery was magnificent! As we descended into Prince Albert we looked for somewhere for a bite to eat and so that our pulses could fall below 200 and the Adrenalin surging through our bodies could get reabsorbed!

This little place took our fancy and we stopped for coffee and a toasted sandwich, the building was quite interesting, colonial style and inside it sold everything from cakes to wine to scouring pads, a real old school "general store"! We still had quite a drive ahead of us, around 4 hours across the featureless Karoo, our next destination was a rather unusual stop, an eccentric watering hole in the middle of nowhere you could say, a Victorian railway stop called "Matjiesfontein" to give it it's proper title, read all about it in the next series post.

Saturday Smile

 It certainly looks that way!

RSA - Part IX

 

The drive down from Lalibela took a couple of hours followed by a quick left turn off the main North-South highway (N2) into the bay, this delivered us to our next destination for a couple of days. Plettenberg Bay is a small community built up around a long beach and steep escarpment as you can see (above) the houses are stacked up the hill! The views from some of these pads is stunning, a sprawling vista of beach, azure ocean and forested mountains, not too shabby!

The main beach is to die for, light coloured soft sand lapped by the warm Indian Ocean, you have to have your wits about you though as the water contains quite a few populations of man-eating sharks, there are signs everywhere and there's a permanent lookout on the peninsula above the beach. The best view however is from a rocky promontory called the "Robberg Peninsula" somewhere we'd get to know intimately during our stay at "Plett"! 

I snapped a picture from the top of the Robberg looking back along the Plett beach (see below)

Our hotel was very modern, luxurious and in a great location overlooking the far end of the beach (as you look at the picture above) The only negative I'd say was that each room, although swanky, had a clear glass shower cubicle in the actual bedroom itself (i.e. not in a separate room) I'm not sure which design genius thought this would be "cool" but for those of us who like a little privacy while washing our junk it was a little odd, anyway we found it amusing and enjoyed the relaxed vibe of the hotel, bar and restaurant, I think the staff here were the friendliest we encountered on the whole trip, unlike the common myth here in the UK, such nice people! The hotel had a lovely open veranda overlooking the beach below, just the spot for a G&T before dinner as the warm ocean breeze wafted across our sunburn..

The next day we awoke to bright sunshine and 30 degree temperatures, like mad dogs we decided it would be a good idea to have a hike along the Robberg, so off we went. What we hadn't realised is that the "hike" was more like a scramble up and down cliffs with 500m drop-offs! Whilst normally we're quite happy to walk miles, even up and down hills, this was a different order of difficulty, made more tricky by the stifling heat. Still, being English we kept calm and carried on, successfully navigating the 5km loop in around two hours, the scenery was spectacular and it was a real joy to look down on Cape Fur Seals frolicking in the surf hundreds of feet below! 

Here are a few pictures to sum up what it was like..

Secluded beaches, shear cliffs, sandy walkways and native South African fauna, and yes that's me in the cream coloured cap, surveying the wreck of a ship on the beach below (there are lots of ship wrecks around the Cape) in 1967 a Greek ship, the Athina, ran aground on the Robberg corner and couldn't free herself from the clutches of  the currents and swell around the peninsula, the ship was lost but the crew managed to scramble to safety, today the wreck is a popular dive site and a marine haven for all kinds of critters, you can still see the shadow of the wreck from where I'm standing in this picture! After our heady walk in the sun we retired to our hotel to immerse ourselves in after-sun, phew that was hard work! Anyway, we survived and had a nice meal in a restaurant just outside of town. 

The next day we decided to take a more leisurely approach, it was raining a little so we decided to visit a Monkey and Bird sanctuary just up the coast a little, so off to "Monkey World" we went..

The first thing we saw wasn't a monkey at all but a Ring Tailed Lemur (or "King Julien" as the kids called it), as we moved a little more into the forest some of the monkeys became apparent, in this case a little Capuchin (see below)

After getting our fill of Primates we walked next door to the bird sanctuary, even the drizzle couldn't dampen the amazing colours that some of the birds there showed off, here's a small sample of some of the Aves we spotted..

The next morning was our last and so we checked out and decided to take a walk along the beach before setting off, it was lush, sunny and warm with the waves crashing on the shore. The beach itself was quite interesting too, lot's of little white crabs scuttling into holes as you approached and quite a few little beached jellyfish (which we steered clear of!) Anyway, a great place, a great beach and some fond memories, although I didn't rate the surf rescue much!

Onwards and upwards (literally), our next destination was a place called Oudtshoorn a large town inland from the coast and a good three hour drive from Plett, we stocked up with water and provisions and set off for Ostrich central, more in the next part of the series!

Friday Smirk

The lads pointing out the rather glaring problem that most of our religious brothers and sisters have in that they can easily see the logic flaws in everyone else's religions, but when they focus their gaze back on their own (talking snakes and winged horses et al) there seems to be a pane of frosted glass in the way..

RSA - Part VIII

 

Our next stop took us roughly 100km North from Addo to another game reserve but this one wasn't a public National Park like Addo it was a private reserve called "Lalibela". It wasn't as big as Addo but was still pretty large at 26,000 acres (about the footprint of Bristol), most of the animals that we saw at Addo were here as well but there were much fewer people (around 100) and it felt more wild. We arrived around one in the afternoon ready for a game drive at 3pm and after being shown to our lodge and unpacking we mingled with our co-guests until we were called to our vehicles! Unfortunately it was raining, however this doesn't stop anything (the animals don't care) and so we all donned rain smocks and mounted our open 4X4 Toyota Land Cruiser to spend 4 hours driving around to see what we could see.

After about an hour we came across a pair of Lions, male (below) and female (above), they looked a little miserable in the misty rain but we stuck with it, the animals were really close (around 10 meters) which seemed a little scary at first but apparently they can't distinguish individuals in a vehicle, they just see a large object (too large to be interested in, prey wise) If you were to stand up though it many be a different story, anyone who needed the loo at this point clenched even harder.. Just as we were leaving we noticed another female lion hiding in the bush  that you can see in the foreground of the photo above, amazing camouflage, no one noticed (not even our guide who had x-ray vision for animals!) 

We saw quite a few things that afternoon, zebra, buffalo, various antelope and a Rhino family but to be honest we were all quite happy to get back to the lodge for a hot shower, change of clothes and a warm drink! (I guess it rains down in Africa, as the song goes)

The next morning we had a rude awakening, up at 5am for a 5:30am drive! As we drove off from the lodge the sun was just coming up (see picture at the top of this post) and our bleary eyes were only alleviated by the excitement for the morning and what we might see!

First up we saw half a dozen Giraffes, amazing animals, they all have such different patterns on their skin! Everyone in the group was thrilled to see them up close, the shock of waking up so early had almost completely worn off by now as we moved slowly among the Giraffe family. These huge animals look so improbable, but actually move elegantly and swiftly! Apparently (as our ranger informed us) they only live to about 25 years of age as their hearts give out after having to pump blood all the way up and down that enormous neck! Then, like most things they become Lion or Hyena food...

Excitement and anticipation in the back of the vehicle leapt as a distant voice crackled over the ranger's walkie-talkie, "we have Cheetah"... 

We left the Giraffes to munch on Acacia thorns (their favourite food apparently) and headed up to a high plane above the valley. Resting up here were a pair of Cheetah (brothers) apparently just lazing around in the early morning sun they looked magnificent, such elegant beasts and perfectly hidden in the tall grass on the hill. Soon another crackly message on the radio, "Bull Elephant spotted, west of your location", our guide fired up the motor and off we went across country to see.

After a 10 minute drive across bumpy grassland (like an aggressive massage in the back) we came across this fella, he had a good look at us but lost interest pretty quickly and wandered off, by the way if you're wondering what the white orbs are in the background of this photo, they are termite hills! At this point we were far enough away from our lodge to warrant heading back for lunch and after another 30 minutes of back pummeling we arrived back to a sumptuous spread and some cold drinks. There was much chatter in the group about what we had seen (and not), pretty quickly it became clear that a wish-list was evolving, our guide was going to get some special requests for that afternoon!

That afternoon we headed off down a single track at the bottom of a steep valley, after 10 minutes we stopped as there were Elephants coming in the other direction! At first we thought there were only a couple (see above) but it soon became clear that there was a whole herd headed our way, at least 40 animals, our guide quickly reversed and backed into a small clearing by the side of the track, we waited with much anticipation as the elephants came closer and closer, as we sat there watching the herd pass I noticed some babies mixed in with the adults, so cute, I managed to get a shot before they wandered past us (see below)

After our elephant encounter the whole group was buzzing with excitement, we headed off up to the high ground above the valley and stopped for drinks. It was a little weird getting out of the jeep, nervously scanning the surroundings for lions or leopards etc. Fortunately our guide knew the place like the back of his hand and quickly put us at ease, serving up helpings of coffee, beer or wine according to our preference, very civilized!

After drinks we headed back to the lodge and were treated to a stunning sun set (see below) once back and after a quick shower and change we headed to the dinning room where a lovely spread had been laid out, everyone was eager to eat and full of chat about what we had seen that day, I can see how people get addicted to safari!

Next morning we awoke with the lark, again, off into the sun rise and after 30 minutes or so the message came over the radio, "Cheetah kill, to your East", a mix of excitement and trepidation spread through the vehicle, we headed East back towards the lodge.

Our guide quickly homed in on the Cheetah family (how that guy managed to see these things from kilometers away was outrageous!) Anyway, we stopped near the group (see above) and observed them finishing off their morning kill, a baby antelope of some kind, everyone commented on the "circle of life" but it was a little gruesome in parts. After the Cheetah family breakfast we headed off toward a sighting of a pair of lions that had just killed another baby antelope (it's amazing that any antelope manage to survive at all!) I'll spare you the video that I took, especially the part where the Lioness crunches down on the skull of Bambi (the sound of that will stay with me!) but here's a still shot (below) of the scene we observed..

It was amusing to see most of the Women in the vehicle with their hands over their eyes and most of the blokes leaning out of the side to get a closer view! Nature certainly is "red in tooth and claw", the worst part of it was that the mother of the deceased baby antelope was standing nearby, just looking on wistfully, there goes 9 months of investment, ah well, such is life on the savannah! Later on we saw (up close) a couple of Cape Buffalo (see below), these beasties are just about 2 tons of pure muscle, extremely bad tempered and about the only thing that Lions won't tackle! It was our last sighting before heading back to the lodge and checking out, a wonderful couple of days, we saw some amazing sights and made some good friends, we vowed that we would return to Africa soon!

Lalibela was great, we enjoyed it very much and I haven't mentioned half of the animals we saw which included, Hippos, Jackals, Zebra, Pumba's, Ostrich, antelopes etc.. Our next destination was a little different, we were off to spend a couple of days coming down from the excitement of the safari and relaxing by the beach at a place called "Plattenberg Bay" read all about it in the next episode.

Midweek Mirth

It's only a matter of time...