Magic Mountains
Friday was a national holiday in South Africa and it could not have come at a better time. Work has been nonstop craziness since the day my parents left. My days have been starting too early and ending too late, and although the work is really interesting and I am enjoying doing it, it’s been wearing me out. So this long weekend was oh so welcome. We jumped in the car on Thursday afternoon and drove straight north, not stopping until we reached the little town of Haenertsburg. From there we took a dirt road into the mountains and ended up in this cabin on this river.
For the whole of Friday we lay on those rocks doing nothing and going nowhere. It was just what I needed.
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On Saturday we mustered up the energy to see the nearby sights, which included Debegeni Falls and The Big Baobab which may or may not be the world’s largest baobab tree. It is, more definitively though, home to the world’s only pub inside of a baobab.
This is what the inside of a baobab looks like. I find it amazing that the natural structure is so conducive to serving and drinking beer.
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All this was well and good but the real highlight of the trip was our visit to the Modjadji Cycad Forest and Rainforest. We arrived, hopped out of our car eager to see 2,000 year old plants and immediately started walking down a long hot hill following signs to a dam. We walked down and down and down. At some point I realized that it was foolish of me to leave my water bottle in the car. But we kept walking down, determined to find the dam.
Now you might think that a rainforest would be a pleasant place to be in the heat of the day because the rain-saturated landscape would provide shade and lush environs from which to escape from the sun. Well, I too was surprised to see that in this corner of Africa, the rainforest looks like this:
My first rain-free rainforest!
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In retrospect this not-so rushing river should have tipped us off to the fact that there just wan’t any water to actually dam up, but even after crossing this very obvious dry riverbed we still slogged on down the hill for another ½ mile or so.
Eventually the signs to the dam disappeared and we arrived at this picturesque picnic spot.
Next time I am definitely packing a cooler so I can spend all day lounging in this little slice of heaven. The big question in my mind though is whether to park myself adjacent to the scorched (and still smoldering) grass, or just head straight into the middle of it.
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Finally, we decided that the damn dam was just never going to materialize and we turned around in the heat of the day and walked up and up and up the hill. It was hot and it was loooong. But we made it.
Proof.
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So, while I might never again seek out the Modjadji Dam I cannot wait to go back to this part of the world. What I have not shared here are the stunning views of mountains and valleys, the perfect little organic farm where we bought cheese and greens, the armfuls of proteas we got on the side of the road, and the azalea bushes blooming everywhere. It was gorgeous. And now it all of a sudden feels so much easier to dive into yet another long week of work. That’s what vacation is all about.
