lisbonchick

Daily life is pretty similar to anywhere. We get up, go to work, come home, shop, cook…. We are slowly meeting new people and starting to feel like we can think about other things beside settling in. There seems to be a period of excitement on arrival, so many new things, so much to put in place. New home, new country, new school, new job, new people. So much to learn and understand that there is no space for much else. Slowly, the excitement starts to wane and reality sets in. We miss what we left behind and don’t always like what we have as we mourn what we lost. This is lifting slowly and we are finding our feet and making new connections.

One fun thing about moving is that there is so much to explore anew. I guess that is what we like, this stimulation and adventure. In the midst of our daily life, we find time to explore close to home and further afield. One trip in November was somewhere between Malongane and Mamoli in the south of Mozambique, close to the South African border. We rented an airbnb on the beach and were the only people around during our stay. It is a beautiful beach, long, sweeping and deserted.

This is the village of Malongane. Should have tried the hairdresser’s…

I had my first school trip to Tofu in the north of Mozambique with Grade 8 students. It was a tiring trip but fun at the beach with diving, snorkeling and surfing. Kids had a good time and the place was beautiful! We stayed in tree houses with lovely views.

We visited a local project – Boa Gente: https://www.boagente.com/, where they use coconuts to make oil, dried coconut, soaps and many other products.

We spent half a day at a local pottery where women pass down this age old tradition and handbuild precise items with amazing speed! The women work by the floodplain of the Mutamba River in Inhambane Province, Mozambique. An area rich in deposits of high quality clay which has been used for up to 1,000 years by the local community to produce traditional handmade pottery products and clay bricks for construction. The clay is so fundamental to local livelihoods that women artisans who represent the vast majority of skilled potters, have a saying in Gitonga, the local language spoken only in Inhambane. Unga lili mwana, lila libumba – don’t cry for men, cry for clay. https://www.libumba.com/products

We walked down to the river to see where the clay comes from and to see how they make local bricks.

December arrived and Marianne came to visit! We were very excited to receive our first visitor and to get to spend time together. We travelled to Kruger for a safari where we saw many animals, see if you can name them!

After Kruger we went to Cape Town. A busy, cosmopolitan city surrounded by nature, centred around Table Mountain, one of the New 7 Wonders of the world. It was such a busy few days, we were exhausted but had a fun, enjoyable time. What is amazing, is the setting. Everywhere you look, you get beautiful views of table mountain and the water. There was far too much to do and we didn’t manage to visit all the places we wanted but we had a good go!

We had a wonderful picnic at Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens. This is an important botanical garden nestled at the eastern foot of Table Mountain in Cape Town and one of the seven most magnificent botanical gardens in the world. It contains over 7,000 species of plants from only southern Africa, set in 528-hectares.  It is a truly magnificent garden and you really need a whole day to wander around and truly enjoy its beauty,

We spent an afternoon exploring Muizenberg and taking a walk to Kalk Bay although we cheated and went back for the car halfway through! Muizenberg to Kalk Bay is a 6.5 km walk , with several beaches and tidal pools where you can swim although it was a little chilly for water frolics when we were there.

One of the main reasons for wanting to go to Kalk Bay was to see the seals. We had read that they hang around the harbour but we were not prepared for what we found! They are just wandering about and they are huge and rather scary so the photos are me running away from them and trying to get a shot. There were quite a few jumping in and out of the water and playing. Kalk Bay is very scenic and worth the visit although we found the actual town a little too twee for our taste.

We had a wonderful drive on Chapman’s Peak and stopped at Boulders Beach to see the penguins. It was ridiculously windy so after being fully sandblasted, we retreated. The penguins were not active and were just lazing on the beach.

Chapman’s Peak Drive was hacked out of the face of the mountain between 1915 and 1922, and at the time was regarded as a major feat of engineering. This is such a spectacular drive, certainly deserving its rating as one of the most beautiful scenic drives in the world. Gorgeous beaches, stunning panoramas around every turn and lots of turns and twists with 114 bends. This beautiful road overlooks the sea and feels like you’re traveling alongside a mountain’s edge. It is only 5.59 miles long but you could spend hours taking it all in.

I didn’t take the first 2 photos as no drone but they give you a sense of the scenery and the road.

And onto the penguins! In the early 1980’s, a pair of African penguins settled on Boulders Beach and since then, the penguin population has exploded to between 2,000 and 3,000. The beach and surrounding beaches are stunning with huge boulders and clear water. You can’t get to the actual beach where the penguins are, but you walk on a boardwalk and watch the penguins from above.

We tried to go to the top of Table Mountain 3 times. The queues were massive, the wind was too strong but third time lucky and it was worth it. I think I spent the 6 days just going wow everywhere I looked in this place. Going to the top was the icing on the cake. Flanked by Devil’s Peak and Lion’s Head, Table Mountain makes up the northern end of the Cape Fold Mountain range. It’s hard to imagine, but the mountain’s distinctive flat top – a three-kilometre level plateau – was once the bottom of a valley! The mountain was given its name — Tabua do Cabo (Table of the Cape) — by Antonio de Saldanha after he climbed up Platteklip Gorge in 1503. The easiest way to get to the top is by cablecar which opened in 1929. The journey up the mountain takes about five minutes and the cars rotate through 360 degrees during the trip. We though about walking but it is a rather strenuous climb of around 5 hours.

They have giant cones in South Africa!

Break nearly over, Marianne flies out and we miss her once again… Looking forward to the summer where we can all be together again with Joshie and Sandra too. We took time to pop over to Nelspruit and Eswatini as we had work to do on the car. We explored north of Nelspruit and were pleasantly surprised. Beautiful scenery and so many waterfalls… We decided to visit the Lisbon and Berlin falls as they were the largest ones, so beautiful.

We visited God’s Window. Hovering 900 metres above the valley floor below, perched on the edge of a cliff, is the breath-taking view of God’s Window, a small section of a 250km long stretch of sheer cliffs and breathtaking South African scenery, nicknamed Garden of Eden. The viewpoint offers panoramic views of the Blyde River Canyon and the surrounds of Mpumalanga. The cliffs in the distance have thick emerald green forests of vegetation and many waterfalls. Sadly, a huge mountain of fog rolled in shortly after we arrived b ut I managed to get a couple of shots.

On the way back, we stopped at Graskop Gorge. Another stunning place with a lift that takes you 51 metres down into the gorge. There are wooden walkways and suspension bridges that take you around the indigenous forest below with views of the gorge and the waterfall.

We end our trip by driving through Eswatini back to Mozambique. Eswatini is a small mountainous country with spectacular views all around. It is an amalgamation of more than 70 clans with their own customs and although we weren’t there at the right time, there are many local festivals that look pretty impressive. It is a quiet place, it feels like being in a large village. People are very friendly and helpful and it is the perfect place to do nothing. At the end of May, a huge music festival takes place at House on Fire. From their website: named “Top African festival” by the BBC and hailed by CNN as one of the “7 African music festivals you really have to see,” MTN Bushfire is more than a festival, it’s a living, breathing ecosystem deeply rooted in African soil, yet inclusive and welcoming to guests from all over the world. This uniquely African yet globally infused family friendly festival experience welcomes thousands of people from over 60 countries in an atmosphere of tolerance and passionate commitment to music, the arts and the environment. We are looking forward to being a part of this! https://www.bush-fire.com/

On the way to Eswatini, we took the geo trail from Barbeton in South Africa to Eswatini. It is a spectacular 38km mountain pass between Barberton and the Josefsdal border post with Eswatini that has been developed as the Barberton Makhonjwa Geotrail. There is information about the area’s geology and it’s links to the plant diversity and history along the route. There twelve landscaped viewpoints with info panels and picnic stops where you can look at rock specimens, geological features, and view points to tell the story of how the early Earth evolved some 3.6 billion years ago. The tarred road cuts through some of the most spectacular scenery in the country.  

The border crossing was deserted and very small. I don’t think many people chose to cross there! In Eswatini, we stayed near Sibebe Rock. one of southern Africa’s most impressive geological features. This immense, three-billion-year-old volcanic slab, which rises to 1,488m and covers some 16,500ha, is the world’s largest granite dome. Only Australia’s Uluru beats it to the title of ‘world’s largest rock’. There is a decent art scene and we visited 2 good art galleries in the area.

I’ll leave you some South African patés, a beautiful horse and a chilled Pixie cat! Until next time.