We spent a couple of days at another nature reserve called De Hoop, which has some intereting vegetation and superbe beaches. It was too windy and cool for swimming but the scenery was worth the trip.

The crocodile farm is called Le Bonheur, as in ‘le Bonheur est dans le croc’ ; reminds me of a Monty Python skit about athletes being eaten....
The entrance is very attractive with a garden by a lake, and a veranda where you can sit with a drink and enjoy the view.
The croc pens are quite large but the day we were there they were mostly empty. Normally there are over 2,000 croc but most had recently been shipped somewhere else so only about 85 remained. The majority of those were carefully concealed in stagnant, dark green water. A few had crawled out to be fed on fresh chickens, nicely plucked and plump, which could have been mistaken for headless babies by those near-sighted. This impression was enhanced by the notice on the printed brochure which read “Phone to enquire about: Feeding times, Sunday Buffets, Children’s’ Parties”.

This one ate three or four in the few minutes we watched. They don’t need to chew; just swallow things whole and wait for their industrial-strength stomach acids to break everything down.

We were told that the crocs cool off by having their mouths open but I figure they were just laughing at the suckers who paid good money to watch them do nothing!

One thing we don’t always remember about being here is how strong the wind can be. It’s really a shock coming from Carlux where it is usually very calm. Mostly the wind is from the south-west and it can be quite violent. It moans and whistles and groans around the building and sometimes goes on for several days and nights. We’ve never experienced the Mistral in Provence, which is said to drive people crazy, but imagine it could be much like this. Here it is called the Cape Doctor because it keeps the atmosphere clean and bug-free, a good thing, but I’ve never seen white caps in a swimming pool until now.

Coming from France where things are somewhat expensive, we find many everyday items quite cheap here. Locally made goods, wine, beer, groceries, and gasoline are often not far off being about half-price compared to what we pay in Euros. Partly this is because of taxation; the VAT is only 14%. We’ve been using our cheap Canadian dollars (keeping our Euros for France). The local currency, the rand, has taken a hit because of concerns over the sustainability of the infrastructure (there have been wide-spread power failures), and in the month we’ve been here has fallen over 12% against the dollar, making things even cheaper. At these prices I don’t think we can afford to go home!

The leader of our photography course is also a member of the Helderberg Photographic Society and arranged for us to be invited on a late-afternoon coastal outing where we hoped to get some good sunset shots.

I'm sure some peole did but we also discovered other kinds of 'shots'!

Here we are with Gavin Whiteford, who supplied a very tasty local sauvignon blanc, (probably the most successful of the South African wines), and Nettie Warncke, Chair of the Society and Editor of the monthy newsletter. Nettie supplied the 'Fuji glasses', which were very useful. Now we know not to throw out those old film canisters, they may just come in handy.

Our apartment is right next to the swimming pool, which makes it very convenient, especially for Susan who like an early-morning dip. I prefer to wait until things have warmed up a bit. No matter what the time'it's very pleasant swimming surrounded by palm trees and hibiscs flowers under a blue, blue sky.

Our view from the front of the apartment overlooking the marina.

We signed up for a short course in photography with Nicole Palmer - see - http://www.desertlight.co.za/

and -
http://www.nicolepalmer.co.za/

and had a great time, learned some things and met some very friendly people. Mid-way through the course we had an outing to a conservation area nearby. In spite of the haze the scenery is terrific.

Susan took her usual tongue-in-cheek approach to the work.

As promised, we lunched at another great restaurant in a vineyard; this one with spectacular views towards Table Mountain. This was the Tokara Winery just north of Stellenbosch - http://www.tokara.co.za/


We were given a front row seat on the deck about six or seven meters off the ground. The food was good, the sauvignon blanc was better, and the frozen chocolate mousse was superbe.



We did a little tasting before lunch (hoping we'd be more retrained when it came to ordering than we would be after lunch) and came away with only six bottles; some sauvignon blanc and some cabernet sauvignon.



(you can just see Table Mountain in the distance in line with the rows of vines leading away)

On our way out we noticed a sign pointing to a small road which said 'Thelema'. I had just read about this 4-star winery and a specialty cabernet with distinctive mintiness and so we figured it should be investigated. This is rag week at the local university (the first week back after the Christmas break) andwine tastings are popular, particularly on Friday afternoons. Had the place not been full of said students, we might have stayed and tasted more but as it was, we got out with only six bottles, including a couple of The Full Minty.

We are frequently amazed at the amount invested in these wineries and suspect this may be a money-laundering operation - Russian mafia perhaps?

The word ‘strictly’ gets a lot of use around here. This reminds me of a customer to whom I had to write regarding his mortgage arrears, giving him thirty days to bring them up to date or the bank would have to foreclose. He came to see me and said ‘Oh, Mr. Neal, dat is too strictly a letter!’