Thursday, 3 January 2013

Driving to Cape Town ...

Morning departure visitor - we think this is a juvenile baboon spider.
Kai and Pippin - way up at the top of the Beacon Island Hotel in Plett while waiting for the VERY late rental car.
Auntie Elbie and the kids enjoying the sights from up high.
On the road - a stop outside Sedgefield - gorgeous views and gale-force winds!
Heading inland towards the Klein Karoo - we saw this troop of baboons just beside the road (there were way more than this.)
The rental car with stunning scenery in the background - it is hard for a picture to give it justice.
Klein Karoo houses and countryside - just about 3 hours outside of Cape Town.
Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous mountains in this area.  The bushes on the roadside have thorns at least 5 cm long!
Kai and Auntie Alex in her stunning home in Montague.  We arrived just in time for tea-time!
Catching up in the kitchen.
The lounge at Alex's with one of her trusty doggies.
View from Alex's top veranda.  Montague is one of the most stunning little towns in the Southern Cape area (we think.)
Chocolate goo-goo treats for tea!
Some kind of Ibis - there were about a hundred in the surrounding trees!
View from the car on way towards Stellenbosch - the top wine region in South Africa.

Prince Albert Pass and more...





















Tuesday, 1 January 2013

New Year 2013, Knoetzies and odds and sods

New Years Dinner
It cooled down, so we had a nice warming fire ...
Good South African Boerevors made by Elbie
This picture is for John and Bay -- This is David Reid and his wife ... Think France.
The lovely vegetation across the valley from the house
Settlement on the way to Knoetzies beach -- land of extreme contrasts...
Knoetzies beach from above - our beach destination for New Year's Day.
The beach
At the beach ... Pippin in a canoe. The rain came in with a vengeance after a lovely patch of blue...
Castles built on the beach in the 50's ... now part of a very fancy hotel...


Another view of our little group - beside the Knoetzies estuary/river.
Yogesh in his garden on the phone

This piece of furniture came to my Dutch grandparents for sheltering a Jewish man for 2 years during the second world war in Holland. It was given to them after the war in gratitude.
Heads made by Donald ... at Ma's house.
Kai chilling out ...