Easter Weekend in Lamberts Bay

Ah, Easter weekend, at the last minute I got something of a bee up my bonet (except I don't wear bonnets never mind where you find one in this day and age) and convinced Simon we needed to go camping up the West Coast instead of driving to do the family easter thing in Knysna. Great idea but trying to book somewhere/anywhere to camp over easter weeked a week beforehand is something you get laughed at for. But if you look far enough away from Cape Town you can get something...Lambert's Bay, and besides there's birds and Muisbosskerm in Lambert's Bay (and 'Potato World"- I'm not kidding) I told myself.

So Simon and I packed the car up on Friday (not before Simon had done over an hours worth of ironing on two items of clothing with his new iron the night before [he claims its a 'power tool', ha!]) and headed up the N7. Not the most scenic route, mind, but we didn't want to be doing any dirt roads on account of the flat tyre a bit further down this blog not being fixed yet. Anyway, a stop off for a swim in Clanwillian dam cooled the last stretch down (not the nicest smelling dam!) and soon we were in Lamberts Bay, or about 4 km's out of it at the campsite to be exact. And what a cool campsite, we were pitched far away from all the screaming kids and other family and had planty of green grass to choose from.

View from our site

Simon hiding in the shade of the boma shelter thing on our site while making breakfast (not sure why they have the thing- doesn't provide any shade at all unless you're up at 7:30!)

The next day we headed off to Lamberts Bay proper to check out the cormorants nesting at the harbour and enjoyed the sight of the birds dropping in on their nests and doing funny bows etc, they really are quite entertaining to watch. That's about all we did (seriously, there's not much to do in Lambert's Bay unless you want to tour the lobster and potato factories).

All the gannets nesting

That evening we headed off to Muisbosskerm (Mouse-bush shelter for the none Safricans) for a R140 all you can eat open air buffet dining experience, and what an experience it was! Over 5 types of fish, calamari, paella, roast chicken, lamb and waterblommetjie curry, offal stew (which Simon loved-typical haggis eating scot!), roast leg of lamb not to mention the sweetest sweet potato, mielies, salad, very tasty farm bread freshly made in front of us, with farm jams (the apricot jam was just divine!) and to finish it off koeksusters and farm coffee (which had been on the boil the whole evening and really tasted very little like coffee). Anyway, the restuarant is on a beach in an enclosure made of dried branches about 1.5 m thick. All the food is cooked in front of you on the braai or in the cowdung/mud ovens (and man does the fresh bread smell good!). Stunning sunsets and you really are right by the crashing waves, I'd really recommend going if anyone is in the area!

Temperature on the way to Yzerfontein (the campsite had only been 2C cooler, lucky Lambert's Bay Town was only 25C!)

Another stinking hot day followed with not a breath of air as we headed down to Yzerfontein to Steve's place for a bit of frisbee and beach cricket on a fantastic stretch of beach, with sparkling sea- I will make a point of going back there, what a great place. Steve's family hosted us for the evening (kindly not making us pitch tent in the garden), with sundowners and a dinner of all the yummy easter lunch leftovers thrown in.

The following day the boys headed off to do some kreefing [crayfishing] around Dassen Island where they caught some monster kreef, not to mention seeing breaching whales reallly close by, as well as dolphins and penguins nearby! Kicking myself for not going (a previous seasickness experience convincing me its better to stay on dry land)! Back to Cape Town after that (with a few kreef donated by Steve's mom), back to reality, but thankfully back for a short week (and there's another long weekend end of April- this time I think it'll be Hermanus for some more kreef!)