New paths to explore

Today we were not planning to walk as there was a LATE NIGHT and a SUNDAY LUNCH but they were up early and it was a gorgeous morning so joy-of-joys we were bundled into the back of the Land Rover and off we trundled to Silvermine.

Laddie was happy,

Harvey was happy - even though he is always in a state of extreme happiness -

I was happy, the Alph was happy, although he wouldn't let me out of his sight because "you-can't-be-trusted",

and the Food Lady was happy because there were so many lovely flowers - from tiny little pink Indigofera glomerata flowers

to large Painted Ladies (Gladiolus debilis). Spring is definitely here. In fact, it was so hot I thought maybe it was already summer. (Us Scots don't like summer over much. We prefer the thought of snow and cold, bracing walking weather.)

Harvey was overheating, and we were happy to find a natural pool for a dip and a sip.

A rather puzzling plant - but thanks to iSpot, the Food Lady now knows it is Morella kraussiana.  

Clutia alaternoides just chocablock with doll's house-sized flowers.

We met lots of very happy people coming up - some with flowers in their hats and bandanas on their dogs, all exclaiming on the lovely warm weather.

The Food Lady decided we had time to try a new path, so we explored a rather nice new path that led to the very tippy-top of Wolfkop Peak.

Here is the Alph's photo of her on the top - holding on to Harvey as there is a sheer drop all the way down and the Food Lady is rather nervous of dogs abilities to stay alive in such situations! 

The whole of Silvermine at our feet: you can just see the carpark and part of Ou Kaapse Weg below.

We had tea in a shady little gap in the rocks - and are looking forward to bringing the rest of the walking group up here soon. It is quite a steep descent from here to the carpark, so they reluctantly decided not to try it today and went back the way we had come. Thank heavens! (I am not really a mountaineering dog.)

We took a sort-of short cut back to the normal Fat Lady path, past these Senecio daisies filled with monkey beetles,

ignoring all the happy people on the way down in our desperation to reach the cool water at the bottom of the path.

Harvey was sorry we didn't do the long way down as he is a real mountain goat.

There are lovely spring flowers like these babianas coming up all around the dog-poo fertilised car park, 

Lad and Harvey contemplated starting all over again with these two friendly Huskies, but I hardly gave them a backward glance,

and was very happy to be back in the Land Rover. Laddie is wondering if this was a special spot for Land Rovers only. Then it was home to lunch with Graham and Daleen and lovely sleeps in the shade.