01 November 2012

A Hoerikwaggo Hike without dogs

They all went hiking on the Hoerikwaggo Trail last week without us - along Long Beach,
and up Chapmans Peak (note the Great Danes!), 
right to the top where they saw - a scottie! Matilda.
Then on they went over Noordhoek Ridge (this is Emma who I have never met photographing some Moraea ochroleuca flowers)
 to the Silvermine Tented Camp where they spent the night. For more dogless photos, here is a link the FoodLady's Facebook page.
 The next morning they woke up to Wachendorfia thyrsiflora spikes and bird noises - without us!
And breakfast and relaxing in wonderful surroundings (although the Food Lady says the one operational loo was a bit stinky and skanky!)
Paul pretending to be Monet.
Watching caterpillar/bug interactions at the dam. 
 
 But this scary snary octopus (a Virgilia oroboides) sent them scuttling home to us (while the more energetic and less osteoporotic of the party hiked up to Elephants Eye Cave).
Feeling rather guilty, they took us for a walk in the greenbelt to the dappled sunlight of my favourite swimming place. (The Food Lady breaks into embarrassing poetry* mode -
"Glory be to God for dappled things -
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced -
fold, fallow, and plough;
And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him" )
Are you quite finished? Good! I tried to gatecrash a party that was in full swing,  
and had to be forcibly removed by the Alph. Oh well, all good things come to an end. We look forward to next Sunday ...
* Gerard Manley Hopkins - Pied Beauty

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