Taim-go-loer – a farm stay where time stands still in Napier

Taim-Go-Loer

The first thing to grab my atten­tion, other than the obvi­ous pret­ti­ness of our accom­mod­a­tion, is the name of the place we choose to stay just out­side of Napier — a little town in the Overberg close enough to Caledon not to feel like a trek-and-a-half for a week­end break.

It's called Taim-go-loer.

I love words, and can't res­ist play­ing with this obvi­ously lov­ingly selec­ted phrase to describe our self-catering venue. Time to go and look, time for a walk­about? It sounds a little like pidgin English. That it has some­thing to do with time stand­ing still is obvi­ous, as no sooner are our bags on the floor of the bed­room than time slows. Continued

A Brief Escape to Magical Wildekrans

Wildekrans Country House

A recent mid­week break found us on the road to the lovely Elgin Valley, touted as an ideal des­tin­a­tion for nature lov­ers and wine enthu­si­asts, and gen­er­ally for any­one want­ing a break from city life out in the coun­try. The first sur­prise is its close dis­tance to Cape Town. Under an hours drive from the city makes this a great des­tin­a­tion when pressed for time or for those who don't feel like driv­ing for hours to their des­tin­a­tion. And once you get there? The views and ambi­ance will have you believ­ing you drove for hours to get to this little piece of para­dise. Continued

Lekker Velddrif and Laaiplek — it's bokkoms to you, sir

Velddrif & Laaiplek

It isn't only bokkoms that make the town of Velddrif so fam­ous. Enter the West Coast vil­lage across the white Carinus bridge that only recently, well his­tor­ic­ally any­way, replaced the pont across the Berg River and you will also pass hil­locks of white, shiny salt.

This is where we get most of our table salt. Any attempt to take pho­tos of the Cerebos pyramid-shaped salt moun­tains, how­ever, will bring you into con­tact with the rather surly  secur­ity guard, who might, if he doesn't mind the look of you, deign to allow you to turn your car around before you beat a hasty retreat. Cerebos, the other claim to fame in Velddrif, is not for vis­it­ors. And you can for­get tak­ing any pho­to­graphs – there is a sign on the gate that for­bids it. Continued

Coconut Grove in Pietermaritzburg — A review

Coconut Grove

Eating out these days is expens­ive and find­ing a res­taur­ant that offers genu­ine value for money is no easy task. However, a Sunday even­ing visit to Coconut Grove at the Liberty Midlands Mall in Pietermaritzburg proved that din­ing out can still be afford­able and enjoy­able at the same time.

Upon arrival, a friendly man­ager greeted me and I was ushered to my seat where my friends were already wait­ing. A wait­ress had already taken their drinks orders and not want­ing to delay pro­ceed­ings any fur­ther; I promptly reques­ted my usual red gra­pet­iser and began to look through the menu ... Continued

Grabouw for the day

Grabouw for the day

Our boot is full of apples and plums. We're talk­ing big, red, juicy apples. The type that, the minute you get home, hav­ing trav­elled a two-hour round trip to get them in the first place, you wish you'd been smart enough to stock up on three times the quantity.

The Peregrin farm­stall is burst­ing with people, fruit and good­ies. It is the second of at least four stalls on the side of the N2 after you leave the pin­nacle of Sir Lowry's Pass in a broad sweep­ing des­cent behind you. And I can assure you, worth a drive out here simply to sample the wares, see the views and enjoy the Elgin Valley ... Continued

Addis in Cape — eating with your hands is all it's cut out to be

Addis in Cape Town

As you have no doubt derived from the rather obvi­ous name of the res­taur­ant, Addis is a bit of Ethiopia bang smack in the middle of Cape Town.

I don't usu­ally do 'theme' res­taur­ants, par­tic­u­larly those aimed at tour­ists. To be hon­est, I don't get to eat out at night much at all – funny how that stops when the 'bundle of joy' arrives, and stays stopped until he's left home, although I'm hop­ing I get out and about before then... another twenty odd years without cul­ture will do my head in. But with mom-in-law down, a night on the town was oblig­at­ory, and Long Street was the obvi­ous choice (Long Street is where the night life is, if Camps Bay isn't your thing, which it isn't). Even if Addis is tech­nic­ally just around the corner from Long Street, on Church Street, it has incred­ible views of Long Street, and blends right on in with the other trendy eat­er­ies ... Continued

Grahamstown, the 'Festival City'

Main Street Grahamstown

Grahamstown is renowned as “the Festival City”, as it is host to the largest arts fest­ival in Africa — the National Arts Festival. Most people visit the town dur­ing the fest­ival period, and exper­i­ence the crazy bustle of thou­sands of tour­ists jost­ling their way down High Street, dodging between the hawkers tout­ing their African wares, and on to the next fant­astic show. In-between fest­ival time, Grahamstown is a sleepy town. Grahamstown is also known for its many schools, and Rhodes University, and the town’s pop­u­la­tion seems to swell dur­ing term time when the stu­dents return to this quiet town that many stu­dents refer to as “the bubble.” Continued

Paternoster — a palliate for the soul

Paternoster

The first thing that strikes me about the gor­geous little sea­side fish­ing vil­lage of Paternoster, is the har­mony – there is no 'right' or 'wrong' side of the tracks here. Instead soci­ety is lumped into the same hand­bas­ket. The aver­age hol­i­day maker encased in huge util­ity vehicle, here for the week­end, tends to drive with head turned away from the fishermen's cot­tages that lie cheek by jowl with hol­i­day homes in the vil­lage — an attempt to ignore the 'other' side of Paternoster, or cran­ing to see the sea? I'll give them the bene­fit of the doubt ... Continued

Hebron — an oasis at the pinnacle of the Piekenierskloof pass

Hebron

There is some­thing about trav­el­ling that brings with it an ele­ment of the mundane. I'm talk­ing about that glazed eyes feel­ing one begins to emit after an hour or two in the car so that even when faced with the incred­ible beauty of a pass like the Piekenierskloof, which marks the entrance to the Cederberg and Olifants River Valley (isn't it slightly freaky the way the river flows the wrong way?), and which wends its way down to the town of Citrusdal, you remain slightly impervious.

To call the Piekenierskloof Pass, which links Piketberg with Citrusdal on the N7, stun­ning is to do it a dis­ser­vice. In real­ity it is a series of rather daunt­ing twists and turns that over­look a patch­work quilt of multi-coloured farm fields, beau­ti­ful blue moun­tain ranges in the dis­tance. In days gone by there weren't any wheat fields down  below one, and most of what you see would have been Renosterveld ... Continued

Clanwilliam — rooibos, veldskoene, Tolla, and the living landscape project

Clanwilliam Tourist Info

We wander quietly into Clanwilliam on a par­tic­u­larly hot day, our air con­di­tion­ing turned up full (not great for my green street cred, but what's one to do when it's this hot?). The main street is busy. But then it always seems to be, what with the new and huge Spar to the right of us, and the myriad his­tor­ical build­ings oppos­ite it that make up one of the major charms of the pretty town.

I'm busy rat­tling off from a bro­chure about the many attrac­tions in Clanwilliam — great place to be dur­ing flower sea­son, the Clanwilliam dam offers a space for water sports, there is hik­ing (Clanwilliam lies at the feet of the Cederberg range of moun­tains and their pres­ence adds an extra some­thing to the town), rooibos is farmed here, as is cit­rus, and there are farms to visit, it is fam­ous for its 'veld­skoene' (there is a fact­ory you can visit), out­door activ­it­ies such as moun­tain bik­ing, 4X4 routes, quad bik­ing and horse rid­ing abound, and it's only two hours' drive from Cape Town. Bonus. Continued

So much to do in Mbotyi on the Wild Coast

Mbotyi, Wild Coast

Whether you’re look­ing for an adven­tur­ous hol­i­day or just a peace­ful break from every­day life, Mbotyi River Lodge can do both. In the Eastern Cape on the Wild Coast, the lodge is 26 km from Lusikisiki, on the Mbotyi river mouth. Snuggled between the undu­lat­ing hills of Pondoland, sur­roun­ded by flour­ish­ing indi­gen­ous forestry, this pic­tur­esque val­ley is the ideal loc­a­tion for any­one look­ing to exper­i­ence South Africa’s true beauty.

This pop­u­lar fam­ily resort, in the midst of Pondoland, is renowned for its friendly Pondo people, whose intriguing cul­ture has cap­tured the hearts of many and ensures their return time and time again. Be sure to exper­i­ence the true cul­ture of the Pondo people and take a walk in the vil­lage with a local guide. If you’re feel­ing adven­tur­ous visit a san­goma or have a drink at a she­been ... Continued

McGregor weaves a spell over you, and all resistance crumbles

"I am Gorgeous"

McGregor is a wee vil­lage, tucked away in a val­ley at the foot of the Riviersonderend Mountains. It also hap­pens to rest on a series of ley lines (spir­itual earth energy con­nects here in a big way) that lend the vil­lage some­thing the folk who live here term 'magic' (they usu­ally shrug their shoulders and look all starry eyed as they say it, as if it's all a little bey­ond them). A stay here, it seems, is incom­plete without fall­ing in love with the place, or cer­tainly exper­i­en­cing some­thing other than the ordinary.

Spring in McGregor is some­thing akin to gor­geous... Continued

Rustenburg — not so sleepy

Rustenburg

Rustenburg does not live up to its name. Meaning “place of rest” this once sleepy little town star­ted out as a small farm­ing com­munity pro­du­cing cit­rus and Virginia tobacco, but now it is known as the Platinum City due to its extens­ive min­ing. A hub of activ­ity and only a ninety minute drive from both Johannesburg and Pretoria it is per­fect for day trips or a week­end getaway.

Rustenburg has a fine bal­ance between his­tory, arts, cul­ture and nature mak­ing it a place that every­one can enjoy. Its his­tory is closely linked to the Vorrtrekkers who foun­ded the town in 1851. They star­ted to settle in the area and named it Rustenburg after they defeated  Mzilikazi and his tribe ... Continued

Citrusdal – town of endless citrus orchards

Citrusdal Tourism

Pretty Citrusdal is hot. And it is the height of orange sea­son, so the air is rent with the pun­gence of really sweet cit­rus flowers – no guesses about where the town's name ori­gin­ated as it's sur­roun­ded by cit­rus farms. The little coun­try vil­lage is pop­u­lar with Capetonians, who head out here at any time of the year for week­ends not least because it lies right in the heart of the Cederberg Wilderness on the banks of the Olifants River, but also because it takes but a couple of hours to drive here.

Petrus Smith, who has taken on the Rasta name of Naphtal, which I think means 'green', wears his hair in an astound­ing hat. He is quiet, unas­sum­ing but eager to tell me about his stud­ies in busi­ness that allowed him to take on his pos­i­tion dur­ing the hol­i­days at the local tour­ism office ... Continued

Louriesfontein and Calvinia — sommer net passing through

Loeriesfontein Windmills

'Just what is so import­ant that it war­rants a drive through to Louriesfontein?' my other half com­ments dubi­ously whilst thumb­ing through his recent acquis­i­tion — a book brim­ming over with the plant types we can hope to see around Nieuwoudtville – mil­lions of them. My wind­mills can­not com­pete, or can they?

'A wind­mill museum', I inform him, with as much 'ta da' as I can muster. I've seen pho­to­graphs of the array of eccent­ric­ally stacked wind­mills in the yard of a church in Louriesfontein, and I want to go – think of the photo moments. Besides which, it isn't that far from our accom­mod­a­tion. We tumble into the car and set off in a north east­erly dir­ec­tion for roughly 60 km ... Continued