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Published: October 4th 2007
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DIRTOPIA
It’s an old pig farm she tells us.
There are a dozen outbuildings made of orange brick. Tin roofed long ones with stalls inside to separate the little oinkeys, and interconnected pens out in the bright sun where the piggys were once dosed and inoculated and (squeal) made into bacon.
But that is in the past. What is happening now to this old pig farm is a far more compelling story.
Some of the pens are filled with plants and cactus and herbs. Walk on and see a large brick enclosure out back, bordering the vineyards that stretch on forever. It is filled with orange dirt that has been molded and baked in the sun. Ramps and banked turns and half pipes are packed in there in a frenzy of geometry and an invitation to madmen. In it five of these men are taking turns running the short savage track on their mountain bikes. It takes about thirty seconds, at the most, to complete the course. It’s a rare second when both wheels are in contact with the red dirt. Mostly these men are airborne.
Walk away from that hard-edged part of
Going down
ABOUT TO KISS THE SEA the old farm and see large trees, magnificent plantings, and a simple inn. The restaurant, with tables set in little multileveled outdoor nooks, and in oases of shade trees, is hidden away behind the lodgings.
On higher ground is the cheese factory. It is cool and uncluttered inside. “Taste this one,” she says, “and this gouda with the peppers, and the pecorino, and the herbed goat.”
Then there is the wine store. It is perched on a hill with one side open to the spreading green vineyards. Hundreds of varieties of wines line the walls. On the veranda is a long, heavy wooden table surrounded by chairs. There are six or seven open bottles out there glinting in the sun, and two couples “tasting.”
You can rent a mountain bike and ride through the vineyards and into the nearby hills. Walking is also a strong option. Their specialty is the full moon hike.
“Arrive about five,’ a woman behind the desk tells us, “and then we’ll start off about five-thirty up the mountain.”
A little to the north, beyond the stretching vines and a man-made pond, is a rugged looking outcropping, about a thousand feet
Strange fruit
MOON KISSING THE EARTH above us. It looks baked and severe against the blue sky.
We buy a Chardonnay, and a Cabernet that promises “mint.” We already have pecorino and goat and Gouda.
The full moon is in two days.
That day arrives clear and warm. There is smell of jasmine in the spring air. Trees are budding and leafing.
At Dirtopia there are about fifty people getting out of their cars and arranging their little packs, talking Afrikaans, laughing, waiting. A pickup truck and a Land Rover ferry us through the vineyards, up a steep red baked road to the base of the mountain. In our truck are seven women, and a young girl of maybe ten years old. They all chat in Afrikaans, but speak English to the young girl. Her feet hang off the back of the truck, while her mother’s arms are wrapped around the young girls chest.
“Don’t worry, don’t worry,” she tells her mother.
A thin trail rises and switchbacks, and packets of people from the previous transports are already on their way up. The sun, low in the west, is making long shadows of us as we ascend. The ten year
The beginning of moonglow
SEPTEMBER MOON, RIPE AND LUSCIOUS old flies past me on one steep leg of the trail.
“Oooh look down, look down,” she says to me, and then, “Mommy, Mommy, look up here.”
Down there it is bare, stark and steep. Burnt trees litter the hillside like strewn blackened matchsticks. A fire is burning in the valley below, and smoke rises from a huge pile of brush and wood.
After hiking for about forty-five minutes we enter thick gatherings of gnarled trees and piles of large rocks. The steep trail now turns into a stairway, with risers of boulders and treads of exposed roots. Bending low we pass through a tunnel of branches and then out onto an outcropping of broken rocks, into the expanse of sky. The spine of Stellenbosch Mountain, and of Simonsberg, look stunning in the fading light. We can see the ocean to the west, and Table Mountain in silhouette.
The hikers crowd close together on the top of this little mountain and begin to empty their rucksacks. Wine, beer, champagne, cheese, sausage, bread, crackers, chips. They are clinking, tasting, huffing, puffing. The cameras click. The ten year old climbs the little cairn that marks the peak and
Gold turns to silver
ALCHEMY IN THE NIGHT SKY she stands taller than all others.
“Up here Mommy,” she shouts down to her family as they struggle up the last hundred meters.
The sun sinks, reddens. Table Mountain darkens, and then hardens its distinctive outline as the sun is sliced in half by the horizon. Then quartered. Then swallowed altogether. The lower clouds are awash in pink.
We all turn our backs to the day and face the rising of the moon.
Some people lower themselves into the lee of the larger rocks as the wind picks up, blowing from the west. In the gathering darkness there are call and response conversations from different groups. Some friends are now hidden out of sight from one another. People continue to sip and snack and pull fleece from their backpacks.
Night is upon us.
Then.
“There, there,” someone calls out.
The plump edge of an orange full moon is sitting atop a far off mountain ridge, like a thin piece of fruit on a knife blade. It rises as slowly as the sun has set, showing off it roundness by luscious degrees until it lifts off the dark edge of earth like the end of a kiss. Orange into gold at first, it then silvers its way higher into the night sky. Pure alchemy.
The higher the full moon climbs the more its throws the reflected sunlight all around us. Little by little the rocks that we sit upon are illuminated and moon shadows begin to form. Cracks and crevasses emerge, and the trail down emerges out of the darkness as if some wizard willed it into existence, Harry Potter-like.
A small group of us, Americans, Brits, South Africans, are the last to leave the summit. There is an ongoing joyful and interesting banter as we pick our way down. As we descend, the steep hillside behind us blocks out the moon, but then someone notes the huge moon shadow being cast out into the valley. It is hard to discern at first, but then the rounded top contour of our little mountain can be seen on floor of the valley.
Inside the mountain shadow, coals from the fire that burnt and smoked on our way up now glow like lava. Beyond the shadow, out in the moonlight, two night trains from Cape Town slice silently along the flat valley floor, their windows lit up like little chains of jewels. Table Mountain is but a dark notion in the distance.
We step off the trail and walk in the full light of the unblocked moon. It shines brightly through the newly leafed trees. In the vineyards, thin repeating vine shadows are being cast as far as one can see, like an army of straight-backed ghosts.
The moon is now hot silver, rising like sterling on its journey to kiss the sea at sunrise.
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