Enjoyed
a long lie in, the noisy neighbours went to bed at 2am and were up
again at 8 with their music on loud, wow, I thought I would get away
from that selfishness once I left Joburg, doesn't seem like it. We
had coffee and a walk and left, stopped in town to walk along the
river and phone Sue to make arrangements to be at her place today,
she is on her way back from Hermanus, they do a monthly market their
and have family they visit. We drove to Heidelberg and then to
Riversdale and passed an horrific accident on the way, a 4x4 double
cab with one side wiped out, a large sedan in the ditch on the side
of the road and a small red car squashed like a concertina, clearly
the occupants are no longer with us. Would you believe, it took
awhile to get past the accident going in single file, papers and
rubbish and car parts strewn all over the road, a massive accident
that must have had lots of bodies to clear up, we were seeing the
after effects, and yet going up a hill a little later, on a blind
hill with a solid white line a 4x4 came flying past me and would
never have been able to avoid an accident if a car had come over the
rise coming the other way, this idiot must have gone past the same
accident I did and was doing exactly what one of those three cars
did, overtook on a solid line while speeding, and yet he didn't care
enought not to do the same thing, made me drive even slower which
really pisses everyone off, but I don't care, I still value my life.
view from our cottage
dinner time in the great outdoors
our double bed
We
came into Riversdale and stopped in a lovely park area for a walk,
then went to the lazy squirrel for lunch and next door for some
petrol where I was hailed by someone calling 'BUBBLES' wow who here
knows me I wondered? Turned out to be Sue, they saw the camper and
knew it had to be me so she wanted to come and say hi before running
off on some errands leaving me to wend my way the 26km to their farm
in my own leisurely way.
Beautiful
here, they sure do have a little bit of paradise here, her and her
hubby and 6 year old son Max. It is a l77ha farm overlooking the
Langeberg mountains which they only rent and may be sold by the
owners soon so life for them is in limbo at the moment. Had a lovely
walk down to the brook with Max before settling into a cottage away
from the house where Sue's mom was living, her mom is now in the
house with them before leaving for a stay with other family members
and a brand new great grandson. The cottage has the best view of the
Langeberg mountains and is luxury personified for the three of us,
bedroom, lounge, kitchen with fridge and microwave and kettle,
bathroom with shower and bath and lots of hot water and electricity,
this is like a 5 star hotel for us, even has a double bed, what luck.
our lonely cottage in the hills
the workshop
The
dogs are a menace though, they kept fighting with Pepper, Sue's dog,
who is the sweetest thing and Jos has her eye on the 4 cats, so I
took them away after a pleasant family dinner and will have to keep
them on leads around the house as Max is scared of them fighting
having previously been bitten by a dog, after Cami-Leighs episode
with a dog I don't want to be the cause of a 6 year old becoming
afraid of dogs fighting, I also don't want a dead cat on my
conscience and as my cottage is on a large property I think I can
relegate my dogs to staying in the cottage if they can't behave. This
is a great break for me and I don't want them ruining it, I also know
that Sue needs a lot of help to get things planted for orders she
already has so I want to stay the week I promised I would stay. The
dogs are forever after coming out of the camper so now they can enjoy
farm life for awhile.
So
we spent a very nice night in the cottage with space to walk around,
coffee made easy with a microwave to heat my milk and milk that has
come straight from the cow, no pastuerising and no removing the thick
cream on top, it doesn't taste like the milk I know, crazy. I have a
double bed to sleep in and I bet the dogs will still lie on top of
me, I do feel sorry for them as they must be really confused with
life but I have no way of helping them understand and I really wish
they would not be so aggressive, makes life very difficult. I have no
cell phone coverage and Sue has spasmodic internet so for the week I
am here I will be out of touch which will be nice although I will
miss my calls from Lorraine, will have lots to talk about when I get
back into circulation.
So
all is well and tomorrow I will be planting potatoes and clearing
alien vegetation.
Sleep
like bears tonight, hibernate well.
Work
day one
Up
and at work at 8am after a night of no sleep, just not tired enough
to sleep so ended up with about 4 hours. It was a dead sleep though
as it is pitch dark in our quiet little cottage in the mountains, a
bit like a hermits retreat and far enough away from the main house to
hear no sounds from each other barring barking dogs. With all the
home comforts the cottage has, it's great to be out of the camper for
awhile.
The
dogs are proving a menace to cats, kids, dogs and chickens so kept
them on a lead around the house and spent my day clearing vegie
patches and cutting wattle slats along with walking the dogs in the
fields as much as possible. My hands are soft but other than that the
physical work was great and I discovered I am quite fit and can do a
full days work without a problem although my feet hurt in closed
shoes, I've only worn slops up to now. Great day to work,overcast and
warm with no wind, the rain only came after dinner and it was light.
Had
a vegie soup and homemade bread lunch and a salad and vegie dinner,
and I was starving, have not wanted to eat this much in ages, work
can do that to a person. I have no cell reception at all and that is
okay with me, nice to not worry about any forms of technology.
I
took a Baldacci book from the house and after a hot bath I plan to
tuck into bed with a book, just like being back home even the dogs
are happy to have a double bed to sleep on again and are snoring away
as I write this blog. I learnt a lot from Jan at dinner, he runs an
alternative power business and he gave me gen on portable gasifier
power, horizontal wind turbines, water resovoir and stream power with
a turbine, also the university of Cardiff run a course on how to make
your own power source called CAT, I will need to look that up. So
lots of affordable options out there to explore before settling onto
my own plot.
Definately
going to sleep like a dead person tonight.
Work
day Two
I
planned to sleep in this morning as Sue did not want to get into the
garden until after school time with Max at about 9am, so I sat on the
stoep and drank in the view along with my coffee until I saw Jan
setting out with the tractor, so we went over to see if he needed
help with anything and he did, we collected stones from the field and
filled the trailer, served two purposes, one was to get the stones
off the field that was needed to plant pumpkins in summer and the
other was to use the stones to fix the very bad driveway ruined by
rain, erosion and a leaking dam. Filling the trailer became an all
day affair, first I started the process, later in the day I had help
from Sue then still later we added more stones with Grannys help and
Max's but still the pile did not seem to grow much. The rain came
down most of the day in a steady drissle so no potato planting, plus
the forcast is apparently for heavy storms on Thursday so it was
decided that I would leave in the morning and go on to Shantals a
little earlier than planned because heavy rain would mean my camper
will not get out the drive nor make the 18km of sand road back to
town.
So
my afternoon job was seperating leek seeds from their husks this
being Sue's income stream at the moment, the sale of untreated seeds
to various merchants around the country like Living Seeds. A finicky
job and not one I would like to do regularly but the only one she has
for indoors when the weather is shitty outdoors.
Had
a great lunch of vegie soup and homemade bread again and a dinner
that included some good info from Jan to solve my accelerator cable
problem in the camper. We got talking about my story of our
Australian odyssey that they both pushed me to write as a book, have
always wanted to and may just do it now that I have time on my hands.
Sue has a blog that I want to go and read, built around organics, I
also hope in future to be able to buy my seeds from them once they
come up with a place to live should this farm not end up becoming
there's. Apparently Jan is owed the money he needs to pay for it but
for 5 years now the funds have been promised but have not
materialised. Sustainableangel.blogspot.com is her blog. Sounds good.
Pepi
is covered in tiny ticks from putting her head in the grass she has
been eating all day and I am battling to get them out so I will have
to take the tweezers to her tomorrow becasue I do not want a
recurrence of her biliary.
Back
to our comfortable cottage to feed the dogs with Sue's delicious dog
food full of rice, chicken and veggies which the dogs lapped up. The
family very kindly told me once linked to the sustainable community
the link was forever and we would meet again, which of course I fully
believe in.
our kitchen
morning view
So
a nice night even though it is still raining gently, I am still not
cold and my double bed is warm and comfortable so we will enjoy our
last night here for now.
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