Twenty-nine walk

We went to fetch Roos - and Charlie wanted to come too but he couldn't fit into the car. We also had to leave poor Dawnie dog behind because of space issues. Lucky we are quite small or we would have been left behind too because there was a good turn-out for our walk up Noordhoek Ridge: Us, our humans, Sue, Pauline, Kate from Canada, Roos from Holland, Lucy, Richard, Josie and Alice. We all met up at Silvermine Dam, then piled into the Land Rover and drove round Chapman's Peak to the start of the walk - which was all misty and eerie. Alice saw this giant Egyptian lioness god - Sekhmet - with a Pharaoh's beard looming out of the mist. At the crossroads. Richard with Kate from Canada and Roos from Holland. I was still feeling a bit spooked by the Sekhmet thing. Then as we climbed up and up and up and up and up, we suddenly popped out of the mist into the light. Chapman's Peak in the distance. There were lots of colourful and cheerful little ericas - probably Erica laeta, some of them covered with spiderwebs. According to Norman Larsen of Iziko South African Museum, this is the mist-bespattered web of a Plant Mesh-web Spider. And this little ant-like thing is also a spider - a species of Cydrela - (again thank you to Norman Larsen and Rudy Jocque for the id) belonging to the family Zodariidae. Not much is known about their biology he says, except that they prey on ants - hence their similar appearance. This is the first time he has heard of one on the Cape Peninsula. At tea Dougal found a pool to quench his thirst before plunging back into the fynbos in search of mice. It was Richard and Lucy's Twenty-ninth day Wedding Anniversary, and it was our humans's anniversary of TWENTY-NINE years. Longer than a Scottie can imagine. Pauline had bought some champagne.
A toast to the Twenty-niners from Sue and Pauline, and from Roos,
and from Kate from Canada and SueChampagne and tea on the rocks - Alice, Kate, Sue, Alpha, Pauline, Roos, Lucy and Richard - and me and Josie (who was being uncharacteristically friendly - or condescending - to me).
But where is Dougal? Hunting in the fynbos! Alice taking photos of the mist swirling around Chapman's Peak,and taking photos of me. (Makes me look distinguished - no wonder Josie deigned to be friendly to me earlier.)Gnidia tomentosa - that likes to grow above 330 m in moist places. It was quite moist and misty up there today.
At the end of the walk the Alpha went off with Sue and Kate to collect the Land Rover, and the Food Lady, Roos, me and Dougal got a lift home with Lucy and Richard. This is Josie buckling up. We have never seen car seat belts for dogs before.
The route.
Thanks Alice for letting me use some of your lovely photos.

Steaming up Steenberg

Spot the wheaten Scottie! Dougal in cryptic mood. Today we walked up the side of Muizenberg Mountain with Sue, Rachel (a visitor from England), Pauline and Wyndham who was staying with us for a conference (sadly without Tammy). It was a deliciously cool day - the best Scottie walking weather. There were lots of sugarbushes (Protea repens) in flower on this slope.

We all set off up the steep path side of Muizenberg Mountian with Lakeside, Rondevlei and False Bay below.

Dawnie leading the way up with Rachel close behind. Devil's Peak in the far background.

One of the Lakeside Needles.

A dead shongololo.There are 12 endemic Table Mountain species of millipede. (And 190 millipede species in South Africa, mostly restricted to forests).

Tea time. Sue, Rachel, Pauline, Wyndham and the Alpha. It was a bit windy in the Fat Lady Shelter, but just on the other side it was more protected.

Autumn means the oxalis or wood sorrels are out. This is the Narrow-leaved Sorrel or Vingersuring (Oxalis polyphylla).

At the end we bumped into lots and lots of dogs. In fact, there were so many I couldn't make up my mind which one to check out!

See route

Champion mouser

Dougal caught ANOTHER mouse in the house! These mice just don't learn. I even helped him with this one but Dougal insisted it was all his and buried it in the flowerbed.

NOT very funny!

Walking Dooimanspad

Today we walked from the Wolfkop car park, up Maiden Peak and onto Klein Tuinkop. Alice came, as well as Sue and the English newly weds (not Kate and Wills but the equally beautiful Lucy and Richard) and Josie, and Thea came without Boris. This is the Alpha and me waiting for everyone to get going ...

The Food Lady was looking at this funny little sedge,

and this lone Aristea. She wonders if it is Aristea juncifolia which is fairly unusual and occurs on the Steenberg plateau - but usually flowers in November and December. Maybe the recent fire here confused it. Tea time on top of Klein Tuinkop. Paul, Pauline, the Alpha and me, Sue, Lucy, Richard, Josie, Thea and Alice. (Dougal off ratting somewhere I suppose.) Alice bought some Foxes fruity sweets to celebrate the recent weddings - they were not really to our taste - we prefer Melissa's walnut rusks.All amongst Paul's curly grass was this pink daisy whose name the Food Lady can never remember - Anaxeton laeve. Apparently anaxein means to polish in Greek and refers to the shiny leaves. Levigare also means smooth and polished, but in Latin this time, so whoever named this plant must have been hugely impressed with the clean and shiny leaves! Having a wonderful mouse hunt in the fynbos on Klein Tuinkop. Eventually we were dragged away, through the amphitheatre and out above our favourite forest of Spes Bona - Hangklip in the distance. We were a bit alarmed to see this sign as are we quite scared of Cave Peak (all those dogs that perish in these caves according to the Food Lady who needs no excuse to whip out the leads) but we also don't like the sound of a Dead man's road.

Treading warily in case we came across some dooimans.
Some prickly Asparagus rubicundis. Not very good bushes for mouse-hunting.

Not a dooiman in sight. The Silvermine Valley at our feet and Noordhoek Beach in the very far distance.

Alice pointed out these male Common Sunshine Bush (Leucadendron salignum) cones,

and the female ones with their little yellow flowers.

The Brandblom (Haplocarpha lanata) obligingly growing in a recently burnt patch. ('Brand' means fire in Afrikaans.)

A drink in the shady stream that leads to the waterfall, and home.

The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men ...

Gang aft agley, as our fav'rit poet says
and this morning proved him right yet again. The Alpha was poorly and stayed at home, and it was threatening to rain so we decided to modify our grand plans to walk to Maclears and just do Cecilia Ridge and back to Constantia Nek. So out we set, Sue, Paul, Pauline, the Food Lady and us two Scots, through the protea experimental garden at Kirstenbosch (on the dog path) and up onto the contour path. "O' foggage green!" The mist was rolling and billowing and the Food Lady thought it was smoke from a smouldering fire!

The view over Wynberg right back to Tygerberg Hills. The rainclouds were not very encouraging as far as photographing and walking was concerned.

There were lots of these pretty wild sweetpeas coming up on the path to Rooikat Ravine. It is Indigofera cytisoides.

One of those noisy sugarbirds.

We decided to not go up Cecilia Ridge as it started raining quite hard and didn't look like stopping. So we just went via Cecilia Waterfall and back to Constantia Nek where Sue and the FL had left the Land Rover. Sadly, it was too wet for tea, but so what. Tails up! We love this weather!

This is us in the dense, shady, wet, wild woods above Cecilia. And those shade-loving loons that are always shouting for shade say there are no trees and no shade in the fynbos! They should come up here.

And just to refresh your memory - here is the whole poem To a Mouse by Robbie Burns. (Apt at the moment because Dougal caught a wee timrous beastie in the kitchen last week - having nibbled all the Food Lady's Easter egg presents, some candles and all the fruit and veg it could find.)

Wee, sleeket, cowran, tim'rous beastie,
O, what panic's in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi' bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee,
Wi' murd'ring pattle! I'm truly sorry Man's dominion
Has broken Nature's social union,
An' justifies that ill opinion,
Which makes thee startle,
At me, thy poor, earth-born companion,
An' fellow-mortal!

I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!
A daimen-icker in a thrave 'S a sma' request:
I'll get a blessin wi' the lave,
An' never miss't!

Thy wee-bit housie, too, in ruin!
It's silly wa's the win's are strewin!
An' naething, now, to big a new ane,
O' foggage green!
An' bleak December's winds ensuin,
Baith snell an' keen!

Thou saw the fields laid bare an' wast,
An' weary Winter comin fast,
An' cozie here, beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell,
Till crash! the cruel coulter past
Out thro' thy cell.

That wee-bit heap o' leaves an' stibble,
Has cost thee monie a weary nibble!
Now thou's turn'd out, for a' thy trouble,
But house or hald.
To thole the Winter's sleety dribble,
An' cranreuch cauld!

But Mousie, thou are no thy-lane,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men,
Gang aft agley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,
For promis'd joy!

Still, thou art blest, compar'd wi' me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But Och! I backward cast my e'e,
On prospects drear!
An' forward, tho' I canna see,
I guess an' fear!

Up Elsie's Peak

All set for a walk! We met up with Alice, Phakamani, Paul and Pauline at Alice's house in Fish Hoek ...for a walk up Elsie's Peak. (Which actually should be Else's Peak but everyone calls it Elsie's Peak.) I always choose the road less travelled which gets me into trouble sometimes, like today when I got a bit lost and had to be put on the lead when they found me. Us and the Alpha looking over Glencairn and Simon's Town.And Phakamani looking over us. The Box Phylica (Phylica buxifolia) is also starting to flower - its sweet smell quite pervasive. Tea below the peak - Pauline, Dougal, Dawnie-dawg, Paul, me, Phakamani, The Alpha and Alice. I soon found a good spot to survey for baboons and dassies, while Dougal was only interested in mice.It is very dry at the moment but there were quite a few flowers out - like this unusual erica that the Food Lady thinks must be the Sticky Heath (Erica viscaria - the one that used to be Erica decora), and Tritoniopsis dodii,and an ultra pale version of Autumn Pipes (Gladiolus brevifolius). The white metalasias or Blombossies are flowering all over the mountains around here - probably Metalasia muricata. (Appropriately, the PlantZAfrica entry is written by Phakamani.) A sunny Fish Hoek below. Returning on the firebreak path ...down Ravine Steps and back to Alice's house and the Land Rover.

But, will you excuse me for now, even though I am quite tired, I have a house to keep watch over.