Home
Blood on the Path
Cycling
Books
Biographies
Humour
Travels
Writing
Journalism
Reading
Short Stories
Leisure
Features
Columns
Diaries
Contact Us
Links
Site Map
Copyright

Popular

Favourite Writings
 
Log In





Lost Password?

Friday, 30 July 2010
Home arrow Diaries arrow Hermanus Diaries arrow Day 10 - 13 April

Day 10 - 13 April

April 13

Helen is pregnant and going to present me with a third grandchild. Never expected to be so excited about such news - but I am. Unlike Helen and Mike who at first were thoroughly taken aback, if not depressed. Now they appreciate how magic it will be - especially when they are in their 50s and 60s.

 

As I write I can see, beyond the balcony, a pack of seals hunting fish. Too many seals to be able to count them - 50 say? They were there yesterday in the evening glow, foaming about while their babies frolicked and leapt from the sea, when a school of porpoises almost cut through them.. No friction between the two groups it seems. But surely they were hunting the same fish?

 

 

Have spent days researching the 1890s - perhaps the best-recorded era in our history; a time when everyone who was literate seemed to spend their energy writing notes, diaries and letters in the absence of computer games, intangible e-mail, videos and transitory television. On Sunday, however, I took a break and we walked the west end of the mountain contour path with Pam and Ernlie Day. I expected it to be a predictable and somewhat dreary stroll, for one could see the whole sweep of the route, but it turned out to be what Ernlie called a sensory overload. Pam pointed out to us one species of fynbos after the other. The groups of species changed almost every hundred yards, so that by the time Ernlie and I were halfway on our longer hike, we could absord no more. By then we had seen half hillsides of wa-boom protea; acres of pink ericas, and countless flowerinbg bushes on all sides. I finally identified the blombossies, with their strong honey-like fragrance, as meticalis (check), and the tight-foliated miniature towers with blossoms on their tips as penniasis (but I need to check again). The other thousand species will have to wait until I can absorb them.

 

Mist, preceding the hot days, has kept the coast relatively cool and relatively green. A trip to Caledon today, however, showed how hot and dry it is in the valleys hidden from the sea by the first line of hills.. The dead wheatlands are baked brown, where they have not been blackened by fire. Fires burn in the undulating grainlands on either side of the road; the air grey with smoke and rasping on the throat. When we got back, I found francolin perched on the doorpost next door, feeding beside a lush green lawn. Arum lilies are springing up both inside and outside our front garden - but we are warned that porcupines will "come in the night and eat the whole lot. . . and all the flower bulbs they can find. That's why you have bricks under your gate; so the porcupines cannot dig their way under". This is the wisdom of the gardener next door. He also says: "Whales are the best weather forecasters. When they jump and play, it will be a fine day. When only their tails stick out of the sea, the wind will blow. Wait and see." He adds with some disdain., "Those yellow flowers you are looking after next the path outside your gate - those are weeds."

 
 
< Prev   Next >

   
 
© 2010 Writing Inc.
Site designed and hosted by www.overberginfo.com