Day 33

Slept like a bomb, woke to all 4 dogs cuddled inside the camper, what a beautiful morning, fresh and crisp, beautiful view over 2^nd beach where I had my coffee and walked the dogs, I can see why people would be smitten by this place with mornings like these, then the rubbish truck arrived down our little road, did a 22 point turn to turn around and noisily started collecting everyone’s rubbish, time for us to move.

our sleeping spot

view from up the mountain

our dinner reservation 

2nd beach

Lani taking a stroll

We drove one km to the beach over the bridge and passed 4 taverns, pubs or shebeens on the way and two places offering accommodation, parked on the beach and encountered rubbish, litter, beer bottles, broken glass and squalor, the dichotomy of Port St Johns.

I took the dogs up the same mountain we walked half way up yesterday, this time made it to the top for some absolutely awesome views over the wild coastline, people have houses up here and I know they are poor but what a place to live and what a view to open your eyes to every morning, if they would eschew the need for modern technology which forces them into menial jobs, they could consider themselves self-sufficient lifestyle millionaires, but money alays intrudes on ones idyllic dreams..

I tried to tour the area and check out first beach and get excited by this town, but the brochure lied too much and all I can see is the dirt, the noise and the depression of a small town in need of a wakeup call, we drew some money from the local Capitec and hit the road, drove through fabulous country, rolling hills, a magnificent road, pockets of houses everywhere, many painted a sick green colour which is either sold cheap because it is unsalable or it is stored in some Government warehouse somewhere and a local picked it up after it fell off the back of a truck and made a fortune with it because their are hundreds of green houses everywhere.

The beauty of this land is marred by deep pits of erosion, lots of dead animals on the streets and litter everywhere and of course no planting of anything edible anywhere except mielies, I wonder what fresh food these people eat because they can't possibly be hiking off to a local veggie shop every day, the nearest one is probably 50km away and none of these houses have driveways so clearly they lack motorised transport, I guess life is lived at a different level here.

I wander what the 1820 Voortrekkers would have done if all of their goods were wrapped in plastic, would they have left a pile of rubbish at every spot where they outspanned their wagons at night, or is litter just a modern conundrum?

I dashed through Mthatha, it was choc a block with cars and people were lined 10 deep everywhere, I have never seen so much chaos in a town on a Monday afternoon, a very modern town one must say but cars everywhere, music blaring from every window, people shouting, taxis hooting, I thought my senses were going to go into overload, and then the camper started heating up and I had to remember to put the fan on, missed a bump in the road as there was no sign and hit it doing 50km, thought we were going to nosedive, I scraped the front bumper on the tar and all the pipes screeched, I had to pull into the garage to check that the pipes were still all in one piece, as good a job as Theuns did, those pipes are still too low and every bump is a menace for me especially in towns like these where they are not marked or painted.

We found the N2 and got out of town fast, Mthatha sprawls for miles, the road out had roadworks for 20km which did not help my mood but we eventually hit the nice new highway and made good time all the way to Dutywa, stopping at a river on the way for a walk and a leg stretch, drove through another busy town, small but very green with trees, the first time I have seen trees in a town in the Eastern Cape, we passed what looked like a large wooden village, did a u turn and went back, it spoke to me!

Pulled into what looks like a deserted or half-finished village, decided this would be a place to camp over night, I don’t want to drive all afternoon to make Morgan’s Bay, the dogs are enjoying far more leisure time to walk and play and a lot less time in the camper so I don’t want to start stressing them out again with too many unnecessary hours in the camper.

The future eco village

We saw a few bodies wandering around and asked for permission to sleep over, someone came out and was very grumpy and said he would go and ask the owner, then later a young black guy came up and said he was the son of the owner, apologized for the previous grumpy guy who turned out to be his brother but is apparently always grumpy, we got talking about the place that the father built, mucked it up and then left and went back to Joburg, the sons are now left with the mess and no capital to finish it, it has great potential, of course, but potential without capital is just plain debt.

We spoke for hours about education, possibilities, backgrounds, solar power, wind turbines, plans for this place, permaculture, he claimed ignorance on most of it due to an education dealt solely with the three ;r’s; and nothing real about our universe and the natural order of things, he decided an eco-village is the way to go, had been bashing his head trying to come up with ways to get this place finished and looking good and being sustainable, his off to Google all we spoke about and invited me back in a few years time to see what transpires, a nice young guy with lots of energy, I hope he succeeds in his endeavors as he is also willing to use the place to demonstrate to others how easy it is to change ones thinking and turn to different ways of living to suit our trying times. He was happy to let us camp overnight, we had to go right down the bottom of the plot to get away from the noise of the pub, which is his money earner as he says everyone in town comes out here to drink every night, no wonder nothing gets done in this beautiful place.

Wonderful sunset, climbed into the camper, closed the curtains, turned on the light, got all 4 dogs cosy and sat and caught up on my blog, on word, not yet getting an 8.ta connection in these hills, see you all tomorrow..