Long overdue post

Both my sister have now reprimanded me as I have been rather remiss in my blogging activities.
What with a new job with longer hours, plus attending lectures 1 weekend a month, plus working 1 weekend a month, as well as running a home, looking after kitty and HTB as well as trying to crochet (yes – me – crochet) a blanket for HTB – I have been far too busy to blog, but I will resume and perhaps blog on a weekly basis.
About the blanket – this is no ordinary blanket! It’s a blanket in the Johnstone clan tartan colours. You see, HTB had a Scottish mother from this clan, so he thinks he is Scottish, so I am crocheting this blanket for his birthday.
We have just returned from a 2 week sojourn to the W. Cape and back. We left on Friday the 25 June. After spending all of Thursday night packing, we set off with kitty yowling in her box, as she had to be dropped off at the cattery first. We dropped her off, and then proceeded to fetch a key from someone that we needed to get to gain access to a mountain hut. Once the key was collected, HTB got lost and disorientated, so it took us 45 minutes to get out of Hillcrest with much cursing from HTB ensuing.
Once we managed to navigate out of Hillcrest, we were well on our way. We were headed for a tiny town called Smithfield where we spent the night at a B&B. We had supper at the local pub where we met some interesting locals as well as 2 pommies out to follow England in the Soccer world cup. We left the next day for our next stop, it was freezing at 0 degrees.
We then entered Karoo country. Much delight expressed by HTB as he was in his beloved Karoo and could smell the fynbos and he was now home. Our journey through the Karoo was lovely, and we spent the night in a self catering cottage on a farm in the area. It was so lovely, we have vowed to go back and spend more time there.
The next day, we set off for our favourite destination – the Cederberg. We spent 6 days there and it was magnificent. We had divine weather, and went off hiking every day up and down the mountains with the most awesome rock formations. The only problem was that we forgot to organize booze, so we had and enforced alcohol free week – nuts!!
The accommodation in the Cederberg is self catering, very basic but perfectly fine, on a working farm called Driehoek, which has a lovely menagerie of animals. They have the obligatory cows, sheep, goats, horses, dogs and cats, but they also have a pig, that thinks it is a horse. This piggy is best friends with one of the horses, and rubs its snout on the horse’s legs. When it saw us, it came running over and then lay down to be scratched. Shame, and we eat them!
We sadly packed up and left Driehoek and headed off to spend 2 night in Fishhoek with HTB’s father, who is 86 years old, still lives in the big family house, will not go to an old age home, will not have a maid and the house is filthy, and he is also a bit demented. Say no more!We did manage to get to see 2 of HTB’s brothers, and their families, which was nice.
After surviving the family saga in Fishhoek, on the 4 July (my birthday) we headed off to our next destination which was the Du Toit Kloof Mountains. We were hiking, with full backpacks to a remote mountain hut. We were carrying sleeping bags, food, clothing, utensils everything. It was not easy. We finally arrived at the hut, which is lovely, but bear in mind, no electricity, just a gas stove for cooking, there is no running water inside either, only a long drop loo out in the bush and a small tub outside with cold water to wash with. This is fine, usually, can handle this as I am tough, except for one minor catastrophe. I was up this mountain, far away from civilization, no running water or flushing loo, and my period has to start, and I do not have tampons or sanitary towel s! Well, I just had to make a plan, suffice it to say, I had to revert to what our great grandmothers and grandmothers had to do, and made use of my cut up bath towel, newspaper squares and plastic strips cut from plastic packets. I won’t gross you out with anymore details. In spite of this, we managed to have a good time, we spent 3 nights there, the last night being so cold that we had to make a fire in the fire place, which kept us warm but made us rather smoky and smelly
We then decamped to Somerset West to stay with a good friend. HTB’s car was also due for a service that was arranged in Somerset West. What a palaver. I told HTB, never again! Anyway, apart from that, we had a good evening out with our friend, and the next morning set off for our next destination, Groot Jongensfontein. This is a small seaside resort near Stillbaii. Very unpretentious and basic. One of HTB’s brother ( there are 3 altogether) was coming to join us, and in fact, when we arrived, he had got there before us and started the fire for the braai, which was very pleasant. We drank copious amounts of wine and devoured our braai. We spent a very relaxing day reading and chilling at Jongens, unfortunately, the next morning, we had to leave to head fro home.
We set of nice and early on the Saturday and headed or Smithfield where we spent the night. The following morning, we set of and trekked home via Clarens. We got home safe and sound on the Sunday afternoon. It was a really good trip and we had a blast. We have now decided to aim for a holiday in Spain at the end of the year.