Blogs from Wilderness, Western Cape, South Africa, Africa

Well excuse me speaking with my mouth full. Cyclops is a guinea fowl with one leg, who lives on the banks of the Touws River in the Ebb and Flow National Park in the shadow of the Outeniqua mountains. His lack of a limb does not worry him too much. He is a seasoned beggar and enormous as guinea fowls go. He also has a very clever looking-after-my-family tactic. Three quarters of the way into consuming the cracker being offered to him by Gogo, his family arrived. All 42 of them; including 11 ever so cute little chicks, but it is the teenagers who take the cake. They lined up in disciplined fashion in front of the car and systematically picked away at the kamikaze moths and insects who had splattered themselves against the car on ... read more

On Thursday Jeff and Cornel came through with a very cunning plan. They both took the day off so we could get away up the Garden Route a day early and beat the Easter traffic out of town. So off we went, north via Stellenbosch then Franschoek and over a mountain pass to the farmland on the other side, called the Overberg. Franschoek is surrounded by mountains and chock full of wineries and quaint white buildings. Quite a french town after the Huguenot (sp.) settlers, whereas a lot of the rest of the area around Stellenbosch is more Dutch in architecture and influence. We'll probably head back this way later on and test the local vintage, not that I'd know what to look for. Over in the Overberg it was dry rolling country and the roads ... read more

We got up very early this morning and left Franschhoek at 8am. About 1/2 hour into our drive we (finally) met a family of baboons. We saw 8 adults and a juvenile; they were playing/foraging at the side of the road. Brian pulled over so we could take photos -- but we did not get out of the car (to avoid having our passports stolen by the baboons -- not a joke!) Later on we saw a momma with a tiny baby clinging to her back. We drove for four hours with one main stop (at the "Country Pumpkin") -- and a few shorter stops for views, gasoline, etc. The drive went by very quickly -- the scenery was absolutely magnificent. We drove on Route 60 then Route 62, through several small farming villages. The mountain ... read more

Day 42 We had more pancakes before setting off on the road once more. The first part of the drive before the Garden Route officially starts was very dull and unattractive - a seemingly endless succession of murky industrial areas and slums, interspersed by a few farms. We stopped briefly in a town called Mossel Bay, which is on the border of the garden route and according to the guidebook is a real hot-spot for surfers. We had previously thought it might be a good place to stay but on looking around the place we decided not - it was dominated by the tourism trade, the only buildings visible being high rise, ugly tourist flats; the beach was practically inaccessible because it was blocked off by such buildings and when we did finally manage to find ... read more