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Monday 5th November
The Garden RouteOur guide and driver, Benoit, who was
Swiss, but spoke perfect English, arrived at 10.00 am. We loaded
our cases into the back of his mini bus and drove for quite a long
way as we had first to actually travel East to find the Garden
Route. Apart from a stop for lunch we got to Mossel Bay, which is
really where the garden route starts. This is a historic site
where the early Portuguese explorers landed. Derek admiring a
fossilised skull of some sort of giant whale. |
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| Here there is this famous tree. Probably more than
500 years old. Sailors who managed to land here would pin their
letters to this tree and then pick up for later delivery any
letters to be taken on the way they were travelling. Thus this
tree became the very first post box exchange. |
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Today Mossel Bay looks calm, but the waters can be
very treacherous and many ships were wrecked along this coast. |
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| A short drive further on from Mossel Bay took us
to Kingfisher Lodge on the edge of the Wilderness National Park.
This was to be our first night and we were greeted warmly by our
hosts and given tea and cakes. |
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Tuesday 6th November After a very
comfortable night we met outside for a wonderful breakfast. Here
we could watch the birds who were extremely tame. |
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| Some would even come and eat out of our hands. |
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This beautiful bird, the Lourie would not normally
be tame, but the owners had been feeding it for several weeks and
it would now eat out of their hands. It often brought a few
friends with it who would watch. |
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| Where we had breakfast was out of doors and
because the house was on a slope the trees were growing up
alongside and our hosts had hung feeding trays so that the birds
all came very close while we were eating. |
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The Lourie. |
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| Leaving Kingfisher Lodge it was only a 45 minute
drive to Knysna which lies along the shores of a large lagoon.
Here we got onto a boat from the jetty opposite and to the left of
the picture. This took us across to the Featherbed Reserve
situated in a private nature reserve. |
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Here we were all loaded onto two diesel trains
which pulled us half way up the steep hillside to an observation
platform where Benoit took our group photograph. |
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| The views from this observation platform were
quite stunning, and we could see the very narrow and treacherous
opening from the sea to the lagoon. |
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We could also look back from here up the lagoon
towards Knysna itself. |
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| At the very top of the hillside we abandoned Sue,
Jackie and Benoit who elected to return on the train, while Derek,
Dave and myself joined others to do a most spectacular walk back
down to the base again. |
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Wonderful views of the sea on the way down, |
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| and back at sea level spectacular waves breaking
over the rocks. |
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Finally we found this little creature. It was
fully grown and a miniature form of deer. |
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| We had an excellent lunch before taking the boat
back to the mainland again, then a short drive to the Tonquani
Lodge where we are to stay tonight. |
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Although it was still early we all elected to have
a few hours to relax in the sunshine. Sue and myself had a quick
swim in their pool, but it had to be a quick one as it was rather
cold. We are all staying in individual, and very comfortable log
cabins. |
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| In the evening we drove down to the water front.
Knysna is famous for its oysters, so we felt we had to have some.
Only Derek and myself were willing to eat oysters and we had six
each. |
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Wednesday 7th November This morning we
had a beautiful drive through the very best parts of the Garden
Route. Mountains and rivers. |
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| Also views across to the sea. |
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Then came one of the highlights of our trip. The
Tsitsikamma tree top canopy tour. Unfortunately only Sue and
myself were brave enough. We were dressed up in harness and thick
gloves. |
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| Then we set off in a strange diesel motor vehicle
for a point at the top of the mountainous slope where we could
start our tour. |
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We had ten wire rope slides from tree to tree
through the forest. Each tree, after the start had a platform
right up high and we had to slide down these wires like a flying
fox. |
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| It was too complicated to take cameras with us,
but when we got back we purchased a DVD that was made of our group
over the first three slides and also a CD with a number of
photographs. Some of these pictures can be seen below. |
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In the mean time, while Sue and I did our daring
trip through the forest, Benoit took the others to a very
beautiful garden. |
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And then they finished up at the sea side at
Jeffreys Bay. This bay is world famous as one of the very best
surfing beaches. Today it was very calm, but we hope tomorrow to
see some more action. |
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The following pictures were
taken by the official cameraman who sold me a DVD of our group
plus a CD containing pictures |
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