A Weekend in the Mountains

First weekend of my holiday and I have decided to head off into the mountains with my nephew and two good friends, just to unwind and leave the hustle and bustle of the city. And so the roadtrip begins with a two hour drive to a very unknown place called Matroosberg, once you get past Paarl already you feel like you are in a different world as the scenery changes from dark bland buildings to the most beautiful mountains and views you can imagine.

Already I start to feel calmer and more at peace with the world. On arrival we are as usual greeted by the pleasant site of our lodgings which used to be the old Matroosberg Station, now transformed into a stunning little cabin.

Again I take note of the noises or lack thereof, silence except for nature, pure bliss, nothing to do but take in the sites and relax. As I sit around during the course of the day, I wonder what this little train stop village must have been like years ago, surely life was simpler and had less issues than the modern world. Even now, there are no televisions, or cell phone reception, you are completely cut off from the outside world. Although we have a lot of comforts I am sure they did not have years ago like solar power and gas, it is still rather rural in comparison to what I am used to. We all settle in and then wonder what on earth we are going to do with ourselves for 3 days, funny with a 13 year old the options are endless, so we decide to start off with a swim in the pool, so we take about a half km walk up to where we are expecting to find a sparkling blue pool to lunge our hot and weary bodies into.........

This is not to be as can be seen by the pic above, but boys will be boys and they have a bash at cleaning it and then jump in the horrid green mush, the girls however just sit on the sidelines and decide to wait until we can fill up the makeshift "hot tub" back at the cabin. We head back and try to figure out how this "hot tub" works and decide that for now with the heat we certainly only need a "cold tub" and so the filling up starts, it is huge and takes ages to fill, my nephew is in and out constantly and cannot wait for it to be filled,

after a few hours the tub is filled and once again the girls have issue with the chilliness of the tub and only manage to dangle their feet in it, ofcourse the boys are in and out the icy mountain water.

As night draws near the fire is started as this is how we will be cooking our dinner (or should I say how the boys will be cooking), strange how the male species are all drawn to fire,

they run out of wood soon enough and head out to collect more in the bush, they return with nearly what I would call entire trees enough for a small community to survive for a week, but I am told this is for their bonfire later. The cooking commences by torch light

and soon enough diner is served on tin plates and by the light of a lamp, absolutely delicious.

Soon enough the bonfire commences

it is strange how a fire can mesmerize a person, and soon many thoughts are running through my head, the last week has been one of the happiest and one of the saddest all rolled into one for me, and sitting here listening to the sounds of the night, staring into the fire, I try to find perspective on my life, not sure how far I got with that but it made me wonder if all the modern day living is worth all the pain that goes along with it, out here with no technology would surely be a great place to raise a child, to have a relationship, to just be happy. There is no pornography, no bars, not many people, not even any shops, would life not be bliss living off the land.............. okay I know that is a bit of a silly daydream but a nice one none the less. The girls head off to bed with our lamps and leave the boys to continue practicing their fire making skills.

Laying in bed trying to go to sleep, I notice that the silence is nearly deafening, coming from living in the city with noise around me all the time I am finding the deadly silence a bit eerie, eventually I head off to la la land. I wake up as usual at first light around 5am, again the noises amaze me, only birds chirping and cocks crowing, I sneak out quietly so as not to wake the others and am greeted by a most beautiful sunrise through the lapa.

The day starts off with a hearty breakfast and then for a shower which ends up being freezing cold water from a hosepipe as we have not figured out how to work the running water and the gas properly, the screams from us two girls is hysterical to say the least. Then we go exploring the countryside, the old railway line which runs along the cabin reminds you that once upon a time this was a lively little pit stop, but today remains unused, it avails itself for stunning photo opportunities, wish I was better with my camera.

We are going in search of the waterfall and hike about 3.5km to discover nothing, although nothing is not really the right word, it is all beautiful none the less, we head back to the cabin our shadows leading the way.

The rest of the day is spent playing games,

eating, more eating, eventually figuring out how the "Hot Tub" works and we eventually get one of the locals to sort out the gas and water for us. We run out of water and have to ride into the closest town 30km away - Touwsrivier which is as backward in its own right, life really just seems so much more simpler here. The sunset over the mountains is a stunning site to behold, although the sunsets over the ocean are beautiful this in some way just seems more serene.

The next morning after getting better directions we once again set off in search of the waterfall, eventually we come across the dry river bed and follow it to what is normally the waterfall and the dam where kids can swim and play with the frogs and fishes, now is this not life????

Later as the sun crosses the sky,

we pack up our belongings and head back to suburbia, at this very moment in time I really wish I could just have stayed there and not known or had to deal with many of the things that life throws at us, that are not always pleasant but I suppose you have to have the bad to get to the good, and after all this is life, day by day. Actually I have wonderful life and have much to be thankful for so no I am not sad to be back and I can run away to escape there anytime I wish, so I have the best of both worlds.