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A DIARY: DAY TWO
7th January 1999. (Well, this is clearly not a day-by-day diary)
Every morning I set out to walk the cliffs - and every walk turns into something else, each with its own unique 'happening'.
Sometimes an intended jog to ‘Angry Waters’ turns into a climb down the rocks near our house to see something which has caught my eye. Or a long walk along the path to Grotto Beach becomes a short scramble to a hidden wildflower garden discovered on a ledge between the cliff and the wave ledge.
Today the 'happening' was the sighting of a huge grey-speckled bird that floated along the cliff edge, standing almost motionless in the sky as it rode the South-easter - then half-turned and soared down-wind.
A Sooty Albatross!
Or was it? With these seabirds it's going to take many sightings, and perhaps more patience than I possess to identify them against a seascape that renders size irrelevant.
We were in Cape Town yesterday, preparing to ferry another Jeep-load of junk to our new home, but on my walk the morning before, the day's "happening" gave me a real scare. I had heard wheezing noises between the rocks on one of the higher wave ledges, and clambered down to investigate - making sure I never trespassed on the watermarks which showed where steadily growing combers were hurling their spray. The waves crashed into the rock and fell back, their hiss unable to drown the wheezing sounds emanating from a depression in the wave ledge. As the waves drew back, I crept closer and peered into a dark hole, its circumference no wider than a manhole cover. As I did so there was wooosh! of air, a giant exhalation, as a driving column of sound and air flung droplets of moisture into my face, nearly toppling me off the rocks in my fright.
I had come upon a genuine blow-hole - one that works quite out of sync. with the beat of the waves. I spent nearly an hour trying to work out its breathing pattern, marvelling at my discovery. Of course, it's no discovery at all. Probably every local - certainly every regular angler - would have known about it since boyhood, having learned about it from his father who was shown it by his father. Indeed, I soon learned that the blower can be heard at times in the houses above the cliff. But I am bent on making my own "discoveries", and adopting parts of the coastline, such as the pool ‘Serenity’, as my own. I am perfectly aware that they are no more mine - or anyone else's - property than are the sky and the sea. Nonetheless, it is fun to regard this pristine strip of fynbos, cliff-face and tumbling ocean as part of my unexplored garden.
There was a mongoose on our stoep when we first arrived. He patrols the public path not five metres from our verandah steps. Arlene was nervous, but I assured her it was only there to protect us from snakes. She had seen a black snake on the frontdoor step - away from the sea, facing the suburb. It was a small, loveable little thing, but it was the first time she'd actually observed a snake's tongue at close quarters - and she wanted to sell the house instantly.
We were well beyond that crisis when her visiting daughter-in-law rushed into the house to announce that she'd just seen a great green mamba lying on the cliff foot-path. I assured her there were no mambas in our fynbos. She indicated the size of it; a fisherman's arms-spread size that gradually reduced to about 75centimetres. I went to investigate, and found the snake still lying half-coiled and quite still in the path, where it winds narrowly between head-high bush. Approaching the snake cautiously, I was able even to touch it with my shoe, but it still did not move. It was dead, but clearly it had been there only a few minutes. Only very close inspection showed a tiny, fatal wound on the top of its head. Pecked by a bird probably, or could it have been a mongoose? Whichever it was, the predator must have been disturbed by walkers who had suddenly arrived in their droves for the Christmas holidays. I watched several pedestrians halt nervously at the sight of the snake occupying the path. Next time I looked, the dead reptile was gone.
On my morning walk on January 4, I watched a Grey Heron flying slowly along the surf-line below the cliffs. I didn't know herons actually fished at sea! The heron flew over Serenity, where I was watching rock-fish darting about in one of the fingers of the pool. It headed straight across an inlet of ‘Angry Waters’ to land among the shrubs on "my" secret wildflower terrace. The bird stood there for a long time, but I have developed the patience now to wait and watch. At last he left his observation post, and stalked through the flowers and shrubs in the customary quick steps and long motionless poses. Suddenly he dived, and emerged from the undergrowth with a snake wriggling in his beak. It was longer than he was, and he took a long time to gobble it down; long enough for me to walk round the cliff and climb down to a place not far from where he was struggling with his sinuous breakfast. When he had finished, he eyed me suspiciously, and flew off.
On Christmas Eve, as I was crossing the rocks directly below our house, I came upon a seal pup in distress. He lay on a rock that was being sprinkled by spray from the small waves in "our" relatively sheltered cove. As I stumbled upon him, he reared up but did not seem to have the strength to flee. Instead, he looked at me with those piteous, tearful eyes seals have.
I moved back, trying not to frighten him further. The pup managed to drag himself a metre or so further up the rock, then rolled over with his neck lying limp on the hard flat surface. I could see no injuries on him (or her), but could not be sure of this as the pup's skin was only smooth in parts, and lumps of baby fur still grew in patches. The seal's back was clear, however, and I could see its ribs. It's starving to death, I surmised.
I clambered up to our house. On the path I met some old hands, down for their annual holiday. "Don't touch it," they warned, "by handling a seal out of water you can damage its skin".
"Where can I get some raw fish for it" Will Animal Welfare look after it, do you think?
"At seven pm on Christmas Eve!"
I went back and watched it, helplessly for a while. Somehow it had managed to clamber onto a rock two metres higher, safe from the sea. It rolled is eyes, and its limp neck. I worried about its food while we gobbled our Christmas Eve feast. At dawn on Christmas Day I looked over our balcony, but the seal pups rock below us was hidden by bush. But I couold see a full grown seal lolling in the water just beyond the rocky point of the cove. I went down to the rock-strewn cove, hoping the pup had left in the night to join its family. At first glance the cove seemed empty, but then, on another rock, what I thought was driftwood took the shape of the seal pup. Blackened and dry. Dead? It stirred sluggishly, and the movement of its limp neck was instantly recognisable. As I approached it seemed to wriggle with fear. I backed off. . . but I would have to do something. As I set off along the rocks to fetch help, I turned to fix its position - just in time to see an extra large wave break on the dry rock. The seal pup sat up, sniffed the air - dived two metres into a pool below; slithered over a rock, and made its way swiftly out to sea.
Walker Bay, depicted as a half-hearted indent on maps of the South African coast, appears as a full rounded bay in real life. From New Harbour in the north-east to Danger Point in the south-east, the distance is about 20 ??kms. Danger Point lighthouse, first erected in 18/?? shortly after the tragic drama of the Birkenhead, is directly opposite my study window where I am sitting now - and is still about 20k km away, though I can see most of the modern lighthouse with my naked eye, and through binoculars, the high sandhill below it. The bay is as lively as the coastline. Otters swim in it; coming down the beach from the nature reserve beyond the lagoon to the west. Bottlenosed dolphins frolic in the swells, forming long scolloped lines up and down the bay. Great White sharks skulk in the blue water, waiting to gobble an unwary seal - or to scavenge the large chunks of meat trolled for them by tour operators who send their customers down in cages to view the rows of teeth of the Great Whites. And of course the whales. Last month they frolicked in the swells just beyond our cove. I could watch them while sitting at my desk. I felt I could throw a pebble onto one of their backs if I went down to the rocks.
The Right Whales have waved their tails at us for the last time this year, and gone south, to the Antarctic which lies directly over our furthest horizon - though a visitor excitedly asked my confirmation only last week of a whale siting two coves down. Sure enough a mother and calf were still in Walker Bay, no longer breaching and diving and playing, but regularly surfacing to blow not far from shore. Nonetheless, the sea seems comparatively empty at the moment - though Hermanus is suddenly filled with human life. The holidaymakers are here, and the village - usually so easy and empty - is filled with pedestrians, sightseers., and bumper-to-bumper traffic. I venture forth only to buy beer.
But of course I take to the cliff-path every day, even though it means making way for runners and strollers with their dogs every few minutes. Last week I bumped into Anton Rupert going past our house on his early morning walk.
"You live here? . . .But this is Millionaires Row. I live over ther-ere- e, at Voelklip," boasted the richest man in Africa. As he stepped into his car, he added: "Enjoy Hermanus - but keep using your brains. Write, and think. Thinking is all that keeps us going."
A few days later I saw Colin Eglin striding by our place, and have greeted quite a few familiar faces whom I can't quite put a name to, as usual. One couple stopped me on the cliff path at 6.45 a.m, (Lorna and George Thomas of Jhb) and produced a book which they wanted me to sign! All these smart (wise) people have second-homes here. Arlene and I bumped into Gavin and Jane Relly at almost the same place I'd seen Anton Rupert, about 100 paces from our house. The Rellys were escaping briefly from Hermanus's 'too-hectic social season', something they had warned us about, but which we were in any case going to avoid. Gavin seemed to be glowing with health. And I told him he looked pretty good. Three days later he was dead.
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