Beach Day and Scenic Route
G’day, March 5th. Well, we had not yet gone to the beach and we were so close to it. So after we wrapped up, we basically made it to the beach and it was very, very, very white and very, very beautiful. And lots of places that are right on the beach and are looking over that. I can see that would be a good place to hang out for for lots of time.
So then we had figured out that we wanted to do a scenic route, and we had to go through a place called, uh, Reindendal. And all these places can be just one farm, one something, uh, not much commercial activity. So we had to go further east and then headed north. That got us on Highway 62.
African Experience Bush Cafe
And somewhere around we made it to Hohe Kraal where there was something that we could stop at and that was called the African Experience Bush Cafe and Craft Shop. So they did a lot of interesting crafts. I had to get my part of it which I’m not buying hardly anything to take with me. Because you just have to slap it around, and that, that doesn’t do any good.
But what was really fun, that the coffee was really good, and they had fresh cake and pie, and they explained a little bit more after by giving us a tour. There were some outbuildings that were like classrooms, so they had a daycare there, and that was all day. And then there’s an after-school program where they try to teach the kids what they don’t get taught in school. And it’s all run by a foundation, and the person there was working for the foundation. So that made for a great, um, experience to, to see that.
Mossel Bay and Safari Camp
So then we headed further on the scenic route and ended up in, uh, Mossel Bay. And made it to the waterfront there. We just had enough time to do that. Mossel Bay is kind of a, a long ways to get to the tip, but that worked.
We had a reservation at a safari camp which we just made the day before, and the safari camp was about, uh, half an hour north of Mossel Bay, consisting of, um, some older farms that had been purchased by a person named Abraham. And Abraham had experience with owning lodges in Botswana, so this time he bought the farmland and let it grow wild. And it was very suitable to keep African animals on the farm, and it really didn’t look like a farm no more.
Safari Experience
So then they had hippos in a, in a, in a watery place. Uh, they had rhinos that, uh, Ron and Chris got to see the next morning. Lots of giraffes, uh, monkeys, uh, wildebeest. You name it, it was there.
So after us settling in, uh, we did then the tour with the safari vehicle, which is somewhat of a treat. It’s a four-wheel drive vehicle, which everything was pretty dry, so you didn’t really need four-wheel drive much. But it was a very entertaining, uh, guide who gave us lots of insights on all kinds of stuff concerning animals, flowers, bees, and the whole nine yards.
So that took about 3 hours and ended at at the lions, and they have the lions in a separate place because, uh, they wouldn’t stay around if they, if they did not. And our guide was able to call the lions, uh, so that they would, uh, roar. So that made it a, a fair bit of fun. The lions had been raised on a lion farm, so they were especially cloned for that kind of thing. They also do that for trophy animals, where people then buy the animals and, and go hunt them. Seems a bit of an odd thing, but anyway, that’s what life is in Africa, and it just makes for some commercial viability.
Dinner and Accommodation
So after that tour, we had a fancy dinner fancy, uh, because it’s, it’s expensive. It’s 495 Rand, which is really expensive for South Africa. It is not expensive for— in comparison to the US or, or anywhere in Europe, as far as I can tell. But fancy it was, and good service all the way all around a good experience.
So we had a nice little cabin, uh, two beds upstairs and one bed for me downstairs. It all worked out, and some, uh, interesting people to, uh, converse with at times. Well, thank you for coming along on safari. Oh yeah, we did talk to Abraham, uh, he exchanged a few words with us while we were having dinner. Fascinating how people get to do things that they really enjoy. And he’s got his son Tom in the business and his sister, so they’ll keep it going for a long time. Thanks for coming along.
