march
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10
We
decided to skip the morning game drive since the chances of seeing leopard
(the only big five animal we missed) were very slim in the pouring rain.
So we slept in and headed to breakfast in the boma around 9 am. After
filling up, we took a short walk to the snake area and admired the horses,
then hit the road.
Our
next stop was the Gouritz river bridge, the sister site of the highest
commercial bungee jump in Africa near Plattenburg Bay. The gorge was very
low and the weather in general was pretty lousy, but we continued on.
Mossel Bay was the next stop, specifically for the Diaz
Musuem. This complex had a lot of history about Mossel Bay and a small
aquarium, but the big draws are the life-size replica of the Bartholomeu
Diaz ship and the Post Office Tree. Since boarding the ship was extra,
we skipped that and spent the time filling out postcards to be mailed,
and consequently, stamped from the Post Card Tree as souvenirs.
We
took a detour to Little Brak next to check out a possible vacation site
for the Meyers caravan and boat. The beach gave us views of Mossel Bay
with lots of birdlife and no dogs, or many people for that matter.
A beautiful turnout on Dolphin's Point led us downstairs under the highway to a view of the ocean, then the steam train tracks and tunnel over the river. On our way back to the car, we saw a little wet dassie (rock hyrax) looking at us, so Eric quickly snapped off a few photos before he ran back into the bushes.
We
stopped off at a wood shop to look at some unique and extraordinary furniture
and items and learned a bit about the different types of wood here. Yellowwood
and stinkwood being the most interesting. No one is allowed to cut down
stinkwood (which gets it's name from the awful smell it creates when cut),
so they can only use naturally felled logs for carving and furniture-making.
About 30 minutes later we pulled into the Brenton
Hill Guest House around 3 pm. We moved all our luggage into our rooms
and took off again after chatting briefly with the owners. Veda took us
to the Lake Brenton caravan park that they visit every year in January
for three weeks of summer vacation.
Even though it was still very misty and cloudy, we drove over to the Heads to see if there was any scenic view. At this point we were pretty hungry, so along with the misty view we had some champagne and appetizers at Paquita's on the lagoon. I had the springbok carpaccio and Eric and Veda had chips (fries).
We
continued our pub hopping to the Long
Barn Tavern in downtown Kynsna. This place was definitely a local's
hangout, playing American 80's music at happy hour. My R24 ($4) bought
us two glasses of red wine, two bottles of cider and one half-price pint
of stout! We found a bench by the pool table and chatted a bit trying
to finish our large amounts of alcoholic beverages. By now we were ready
to eat, so Veda took us to Persello's Pizzeria where Eric and I split
a ham and mushroom pizza and a bottle of red wine. Upon visiting the shop
next door, Eric is now the proud owner of a new T-shirt with 'powered
by mamas' on the back. We ended the evening at almost midnight with a
beer at Crab's Creek on the way back to Brenton
Hill.