We only woke up at 8h30 after a wonderful night’s sleep in a very comfortable bed. Eleanor had already fetched her workers and she soon had coffee and warm croissants ready for us. She was going to have a very busy day and we decided to leave as soon as possible so that she could get on with her work (all her guests were checking out). We initially drove in very heavy mist and crawled up the Pakhuis Pass with fog lights on. As we went higher, we drove out of the mist. We stopped to look back onto the Clanwilliam Valley still clothed in a fluffy cover of mist. It looked rather lovely, but we were glad that we were now in sunshine and we had a deep blue sky above us. We decided to enjoy our morning coffee on the old track that leads off the pass and where we had explored on the previous trip. It was lovely at the old bridge and the coffee tasted good. Stephen decided to try out his metal detector at the old bridge and he soon had a loud beep signal. He got his spade out and started digging. At about a spade depth an old hammer head appeared. It was a bit rusty, but still good. This “artifact” must have been buried when this old bridge was constructed, probably in the late 1800s! Quite a thought. It was wonderful to be in the Cedarberg again. We briefly stopped at The Travellers Inn and made use of the strongly flowing Brandwyn River’s water to clean our mugs. There was a hive of activity at the weaver nests at the Acacia at the entrance. Spring was clearly in the air. As we dropped down into the Biedouw Valley from the Hoek se Berg Pass we could see sheets of colour, but initially we thought that there were less flowers than the previous year. Lots of cars were parked on the bend of the pass to admire the scene below. We continued. The farmer had once again opened up his fields for people to admire the flower spectacle and surprisingly there was still no fee charged. There were many cars and we parked as far as possible down into the valley. There were some noisy people frolicking amongst the flowers and we walked away from the crowds. We soon realized that the flowers were possibly even better than the previous year. We took lots of pictures and just enjoyed walking around in such natural splendour. On the way back we walked up the little riverbed where we once again found a lot of different species. We had seen a sign to a pop-up coffee stall and decided to investigate. It was rather busy there, but by giving them our own mugs and plates we seemed to skip the queue and we were served a lovely quiche and savoury muffin with good coffee in no time. Some people were looking a bit disgruntled because they had to wait so long for their food, but we discreetly ate ours at the car. Two friendly dogs kept us company. Wuppertal Moravian mission village was next on our route and we proceeded to drive up the steep narrow pass to the historic village high up in the Cedarberg. We were surprised to find some of the steeper parts of the pass cemented with concrete slabs, which made a lot of sense. Wuppertal had suffered a devastating fire which had destroyed many of the old historic buildings in December 2018 and we were keen to see how much of the village had been restored with funding from both local as well as international sources. Most of the historic buildings in the old center had now been beautifully restored, but the old Strassberger leather factory and the lovely old Lekkerbekkie tea room was not operational. Everything looked very neat, but sadly it was now a bit lifeless. People were still living in the temporary homes erected for them and they appeared to be quite happy with their new sterile prefabricated homes. There seemed to be a serious lack of initiative! We also walked around the historic old graveyard where many of the old mission families lay buried and also found the grave of Johan Gottlieb Leipoldt, the father of Louis Leipoldt, South Africa’s well known author. Next we decided to explore the track to Heuningvlei, another very historic old village deep in the Cedarberg. It was a delightful track through typical spectacular Cedarberg scenery. Sadly there was a lot of cloud cover which did not help for taking pictures. It must have rained a lot up there, because the track was very wet at times and as we approached the village, we actually had to drive through a river of water on the track. Heuningvlei is a very picturesque little settlement with old thatched cottages, many of them in a sad state of repair. Children were playing and a very bright girl in a neat school uniform told us that she was home from boarding school in Clanwilliam for the weekend and that she was preparing for her final exam. She was an impressive young lady and was strange to think that she hails from Heuningvlei. We asked her about the track leading from Heuniningvlei to the Pakhuis Pass, which I remember from my student years, but she said that only the donkey carts used it these days. The dogs were all friendly and did not bark at us and a little black and white Spitsy cat also made its appearance. The light was much better on the way back and we could take some good pictures. Flowers were everywhere. There were some mules grazing in the fields and a few people were cutting grass. We soon realized that the mules were still very much part of the transport system up there, because we came across two mule carts, one of them going at quite a speed downhill. There were some signposted tracks turning off the main route and we were very tempted to go and see what was at Witwater, for instance, but we had no idea how far away it would be and we should be starting on our way back. We took a slow relaxed drive back and at the Pakhuis Pass we kept a lookout for the track from Heuningvlei, but could only see a faint line going off into the hills. Back at Klein Boschkloof, Eleanor had steak on the menu for us. She grilled it on the inside braai. The fire was burning and we had another lovely evening around the fire place. Gilbert had fallen and was very sore and Eleanor was rather worried. We enjoyed another good hot bath before going to sleep. It was good to be back at Klein Boschkloof again.

Geschreven door Leartravels