Witsand and Hermanus

My brother, Thane, farms outside the seaside village of Witsand, at the mouth of the Breede River. He and his wife, Elize, have turned a ramshackle purchase of a few years ago into a fully working sheep farm called Melkhoutkraal (Milkwood 'enclosure'). I love a lot of things about my brother, but mostly I am so proud of the wind generator and solar panels he installed to feed 36 batteries and provide all the power they need. Well, not quite. All except a gas cooker and the HWC, but the latter will change soon. And the water collection tanks he uses to be independent of council supplies.. The really pleasing thing is they don't get the utitlity bills that the people in the cities dread to find in their mailboxes. Such freedom! I wish my parents were still about to see his handiwork. Here he is.

Last Friday afternoon, Tim and I drove to Witsand, three hours away. We checked into the Breede River Lodge and were soon visited by Thane's daughters, Natalie and Liza. Natalie was on her way to spend the weekend with her boyfriend. Fortunately Liza was on hand to fetch Thane and Elize because the clutch of his 'bakkie' (pick-up truck) had collapsed and we wouldn't have been able to have supper together if it hadn't been for Liza and her boyfriend, Jannie. They set off in a tiny little bakkie to rescue my stranded brother. On their way back to Witsand, they had a puncture! Repair had to be done in the dark by the light of Liza's cell phone. That was the second bad thing to happen to Thane that day. Fortunately, meeting up with Tim and me was not the third. We had a fabulous meal with non stop chatting and lots of education about the fishing industry in South Africa, as well as wind turbines, sustainability, etc.

Saturday morning we visited the farm, see back view, above, and walked over the scorched earth (no rain) to look at the geese, the sheep and the two hand built and brick walled wells - their source of water. The wells were made by a previous owner. After the tour we sat inside the house and chatted for a few hours and then set off for Hermanus, the seaside town where I spent all my school holidays, and where my parents retired.

My father's sister, Ruth, turning 96 at the end of the month, inherited her parent's holiday home in a beautiful position on a headland overlooking the rocks and sea and, in season, the whales. Ruth's son, Peter, and his wife, Muffy, invited us to spend a night with them and what a treat that was. Although the fine Saturday weather didn't last and Sunday we got a bit wet on our cliff path walk, I loved being in the familiar places of my childhood, walking past the beaches and cliff pools where we swam and sunbathed, smelling the heady scents of the fynbos, treading magical paths through arches of indigenous trees and shrubs. My childhood was definitely spent in heaven!

Home again and a picasa photo album posted. This week has been mostly preparation for the upcoming weekend. We leave on Friday for our long awaited Field Trip to Clanwilliam. The one that was postponed in February because of the extreme heat. It looks like we may be in for extreme cold this weekend. We've had a week of torrential rain. Hopefully it will not follow us to the mountains!