Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
Week 7
We have had another fantastic week in South Africa and we are officially into springtime now.....its quite strange to go through spring again so soon (having had it in the UK already this year!) but its a great time of the year and so we really don't mind! During the weekday this week, we have been getting out for coastal walks and visiting new areas of the city once we finish work, we played crazy golf and got up close with more of the local animals, namely the baboons on the Cape of Good Hope!
At the weekend, we headed a few hours north of Cape Town along the Cape Namibia Route to an area call the Cederburg Mountains. The area is known for its stunning sandstone mountains as well as being the main area in South Africa for citrus fruit and rooibos (red bush) tea plantations. We stayed in an amazing traditional Cape Dutch style farmhouse on a citrus and rooibos farm for the weekend. The farmhouse was in an amazing secluded position surrounded by mountains and had a private pool and outdoor bath (both of which we tried out!). We spent the weekend taking walks around the orange groves and into the rooibos hills on the farm and took drives in the surrounding area. As it is currently the season for oranges, wherever we drove the air was filled with the scent of orange blossoms which was intoxicating. On the saturday night we even had a braai (or BBQ) which made us feel like locals! We are really lucky to be in the Western Cape at this time of the year as they have a very unique (and spectacular) phenomenon which only happens in this area of South Africa, the spring flowering of the unique fynbos flora. Fynbos (or fine bush) is only found in the Western Cape and comprises about 8500 different types of unusual plants flowers. They come into bloom from the beginning of spring for a couple of months when flowers (in all the colours of the rainbow) can be found everywhere: covering the mountains, meadows and along the coastline. We were lucky enough to see lots of this which was a sight!
Dipa started the first of her two weeks with Monkeybiz. As mentioned in the previous blog, the crafters at Monkeybiz produce a variety of amazing beaded crafts, in particular beaded animals. The animals are intricate works of art, some of which can take up to 3 weeks to make (see the accompanying pictures attached). This week Dipa has been helping out in the shop, meeting the crafters and learning lots of new beading techniques, helping with quality control and putting shipment orders together. We even had a chance to go into the Khayelitsha Township with one of the Monkeybiz staff for a monthly 'market day'. The 'market day' basically gives crafters living in a particular area a chance to all come together to share a meal provided by the charity and also the charity collects the finished crafts and gives out new instructions for work. Jonny took the day off from the hospital to come along too. We had an amazing time and really enjoyed the chance to go into a township to experience everyday life (not as a tourist like we did in Soweto), meet a fantastic group of ladies, visit the home of one of the ladies, enjoy the local hospitality and share a meal. We were even taught some Xosa, which is the language mostly spoken in the townships of the western cape, however it is quite hard to pronounce as many words contain different 'clicking' sounds mixed into the normal sounds....we gave it our best try!
Jonny's work is pretty much the same as last week and he has had plenty of spare time. This has actually worked out well as it has given us the chance to do more exploring and relaxing! He has enjoyed the speciality though and has been watching more things in theatre, mostly things that he had never seen before.
Rugby fever has also hit South Africa with the start of the Rugby World Cup hosted by New Zealand....if you thought the English are mad about football this is another level of dedication to sport! Although its still in many ways considered an 'elite' sport supported mostly by the whites, it is now spreading throughout all the cultures in South Africa with a palpable buzz wherever you go at present and feeling of national pride. As defending champions there is a lot of expectation on the team (known as the Springboks, the national animal).....good luck the bokkies!
Turning to Jonny's 'Animal of the Week' for week seven; the baboon. There was a troop of about 15 of them, surrounding the car in Cape Point National Park. Luckily they were more interested in eating fruit and lying in the sun than us and our hire car escaped undamaged!!
We are now into our last week in Cape Town, we really wish we could stop time! We are (as usual) keen to make the most of the final week, Jonny plans to try out some of the local Cape Malay food and have more seafood and Dipa is keen to collect more beautiful shells on the beaches and visit as many craft cooperatives/shops as possible!
We hope you are all well,
Jonny and Dipa x
- comments
Manny nice one on Jonny having a bit of more time to play with baboons...
Sachi I'm so jealous! The crafting place sounds so cool!