Sky, Space, Stars and SALT!

And that just about sums up Sutherland!

After leaving Fynbos, we headed through Ceres and over the Hottentotskloof Pass, where brave men are erecting and wiring new pylons that march like broad-shouldered soldiers over the hills and valleys to goodness knows where!

Turn left at Matjiesfontein!

We joined the N1 just before Touwsrivier, and popped in to the Petroport to fill the car and empty us! Then we bought a few necessities like bread and a couple of packets of potato crisps to take with us to Sutherland. At the Matjiesfontein turn-off, we turned left and headed into the most beautiful, empty, vast, open farmland, dotted here and there with sheep, much to Alfie's delight! And we left the Western Cape behind us near Kruispad, as we crossed the unseen border into the Northern Cape!

Welcome to Sutherland!

If I Could Talk To The Animals.......

Remember these words.... 'This is not the post that I had planned for today, that one is written and waiting to be shared with you, but sometimes life gets in the way and plans have to change.'?

It's happened again.

I have shared interesting, funny, odd and sometimes sad, snippets of our life with cats. Daffy and Dilly were the first feral cats to share our lives, and since then we have welcomed Dopey, Basil, Kindle and Morris (who has had his visit to Aunty Vet and is now recuperating in our garden!) Dilly has been an 'oddball' since he arrived, never taming down to become a full member of the household, but tame enough to be around for meals and on a cold night to spend an hour or so on my lap before meandering off to pass the night in his 'nest' in one of my kruiwas.

Dilly's nest!

He would never allow me to carry him, and refused to stay inside any room that did not have a way out. He disappeared once for three months before re-appearing as if nothing had happened. He regularly stayed away for a few days at a time, but always returned.

Dilly and friend in the garden.

Until last week.

A Key in the Hand is Worth Two in the Bush!!

Here I sit, trying to remember what day of the week it is!

We are back from a lovely two week trundle round the Karoo, well the Klein Karoo really I suppose as there is a vast area to the north that we need to explore in-depth! But it was a wonderful trip and we are ready to head off again....so is Alfie I must admit!

Our first stop was at one of our all-time favourite places, Fynbos Farm. People say that animals don't remember places and people, but Alfie remembered exactly where we were, he remembered the ablution block and the walks that we took previously. He remembered the dogs there and I swear that Layla greeted him like a long-lost friend!

Even the chickens remembered us!

Anyway, Evening One and we were just relaxing, wine poured, chips in the bowl, braai planned, loving the absolute peace and quiet of an empty camp, (apart from us), when my phone rang. And on the other end was our house-sitter, with a slight problem! She could not get into the house! We had given her the remote for the garage as usual, but, the garage door was not opening as it should have been doing when she pushed the button! She had even replaced the battery in case that was the problem! And, she didn't have keys as we had neglected to give them to her, and they were lying inside on the little table where we told her that we would leave them this time!!! And we didn't have keys either! And we didn't leave a spare set with anyone else! No problem, we simply assumed that it was the usual Eskom mess-up and the power would be back within an hour or two and all would be well.........

Karoosing We Shall Go!

We are lucky living here.

In front of us we have the sea and behind us, not too far away, we have the Karoo. In between, we have mountains! On Thursday we are going to turn our backs on the sea, hook up Hyacinth, load Alfie into the car, head over the mountains and explore the land on the other side!!

Being retired is tough. We have days and days to fill, and all the time we need to fill them! We have places to go, caravan parks to check out and roads to follow, and this time we are heading into the Karoo. That vast, empty, endless-skies and uncountable-stars paradise, where sheep marinade themselves from the inside by grazing on a limited supply of herbs and fynbos.

We have booked our wonderful house/cat/fish/bird-sitter, we have made sure that there is enough food for all the above mentioned species, and we have started to load vittals for us (and Alfie) into Hyacinth.

We shall explore Sutherland, Prince Albert, Albertinia (that may take an hour), and Robertson. We shall find little places to eat and I shall sample the wines of the area.  Morning fry-ups for breakfast and evening braais are the order of the day and we can't wait! I need to do a lot of in-depth research so that my next blog will be the usual informative and witty writing!

So, two weeks of meandering, reading, eating and exploring.

Normal service will be resumed around the 4 October!!