Another big day!

We woke up in our cabin in the Karoo and set out on a little hike around the farm.  The temps were supposed to be in the high 100s (but luckily a dry scorchingly unbearable heat.), so we got up early to try to avoid that.  But of course, we didn’t and it was super hot!  We saw some great lizards, got a nice view of the farm, and got to spend  a few minutes with the owner, her two probably Australian shepherds, and oen ridiculously goofy, gigantic Great Dane puppy.

The little black lizards are pretty exciting the first time you see them.

 We packed up and left pretty early, cause we had a ton of driving to do. Our first stop was in Calitzdorp- the heart of the South African Port-style fortified wine country.  It was a little early for port, alas, but we did pick up a little purple hippo to add to our ceramic hippo collection (yeah.), and had a tremendously good scone at Eberhart’s pipe shop (where they do sell pipes!)  We almost missed our next appointment because they apparently had to make the cream from scratch (including raising cows to maturity, the milking them and whipping the resulting cream).  but it was worth it!  That scone was tremendous!  Tremendous!  I mean, it wasn’t big or anything, but we were both quite tremended.

Even in Africa… #tbtmms

Post Calitzdorp, we rushed over to the Cango Caves, where Brett  was too much of a wimp (claustrophobic he claims, like giving something a Greek name makes you something other than a wimp) to take the “Adventure Tour” which involved some real tight passages, but we still went on the regular tour, which was still pretty impressive!  The closest-to-the-surface areas of the caves hve been occupied for tens of thousands of years (!!!), but the internal areas weren’t discovered until much more recently, like the 19th century.  Pretty impressive!

The first big room had really great acoustics and was  until recently the home for various musical performances.  Our guide used the opportunity to sing some gospel songs- ostensibly to show off the quality of the auditorium, but felt more like just showing off his own pipes.

Folks in a cave!

Post-caves, we went to the first ostrich farm we could find, cause this is ostrich country!  It felt like it might be a little cheesy, but OMG IT WAS AWESOME!!  Our guide had an amazing accent, especially when saying the word “ostrich”- which she said a lot!  IT was great!  Brett kissed an ostrich, basically, thanks to the guide convincing him to hold a food pellet between his lips.

The sickness we’d contracted in Cape Town (or on the plane, more likely) had jumped from one of us to the other, so we stopped in the booming metropolis of Outdshorn for lunch and pills.  The pharmacists there are all fantastic- asking you about your symptoms, etc, before suggesting the right drug.  There was also a broken automatic door at the pharmacy, which we dumbly stood in front of for 30 seconds until someone pointed out the “BROKEN, PLEASE PULL” sign.

Driving south to the coast, the landscape quickly changed from dry, red desert to lush mountains and then back to a Central California-looking cliffy coastline.  We found our hotel- the Pink Lodge- and walked out onto the water.  A gigantic (like..  3 feet across?  Or should I say 1 meter…) jellyfish greeted us on the shore, along with hundreds of tiny snails, which, to our surprise/chagrin/disgust/etc apparently eat beached jellies!  Hooray!  We ate at the strongly recommended Salinas, which…  idk, let’s just say if it was named after Salinas, Kansas, I wouldn’t have found that shocking.  But we saved the cork from our champagne, so we’re likely to remember that mediocre meal for ages.