Day 6 at the daisies

We dined sumptuously at Die Nedersetting last night – a buffet of soups, meat, fish and various vegetable dishes and salad assortments, followed by baked pudding and custard. The atmosphere in the restaurant was convivial, with a roaring central fire to keep away the night air’s chill. There were mostly tour groups, and a few tables of locals like us. There was a corner display of various crafts (knitted tea cosies with crocheted flowers) and homemade delicacies (quince jelly, apricot and fig jams and the usual array of biscuits) which no doubt is what the women in these towns make to occupy their time – there seems to be little else happening out here in the platteland. They were the cooks and servers at the restaurant – it was a little like attending an evening church bazaar.

Having eaten far too much, it was early to bed, but the mattress was not what I am used to at home, with lumpy springs and pillows either too thick or too thin, and it became very cold during the night, which didn’t contribute to a good night’s sleep. Tonight I will leave the electric blanket on.

Today we visited Nieuwoudtville waterfall, a most spectacular and unexpected phenomenon. Although it has controlled, paid access today, Mom and Dad discovered it by chance many years ago in 1981 when roaming the veld on a holiday. If they had chosen another area to go birdwatching, they would never have come across it, so they were fortunate to have seen it before commercialisation struck. The recent heavy rains ensured a gushing torrent well worth visiting.

Then it was on to the Kokerboomwoud (Quiver Tree Forest) where the largest number of these trees occur in a relatively small area. By the time we were clambering up the slopes of the kopje, the sun was scorching and it was amazing to find tiny flowers growing everywhere in the dry and rocky soil.

On the way back, we turned up a gravel road to an area where there were said to be good flowers, although without a spare tyre, there was some trepidation and occasional squeaks from Mother, but there were no rocks, only corrugations and we took it very slowly. There weren’t vast expanses but little patches of interest, and we came to a pond in a meadow where there were plenty of birds – spoonbill, coots, Blacksmith’s lapwing, cormorant and Red Bishops. We lunched royally on crackers and tuna mayonnaise with olives and avocado (the avocados all ripened together, so we are munching our way through them as quickly as possible), washed down by the remains of the mountain spring water from Kamieskroon (we were given 20 litres fresh from the spring at Arkoep, as they said the tap water wasn’t good to drink – it was the best water we have ever had).

The afternoon saw us at the Nieuwoudtville Nature Reserve, where we saw orange bulbinella, hesperantha, homeria, lapeirousia and sparaxis in very distinct but small areas. Such is the nature of our floral kingdom.

And then it was tea and afternoon nap time back at the cottage. A stroll along the dusty roads of a small Bokkeveld town, admiring the masses of flowers in every garden (none of them are cultivated and most houses were closed up), made a delightful end to a varied day.