lairdandjonelle

After a glorious morning at Sammie Marks museum — a house that is ideally suited for me, I must say, though the location is a little far from Santa Fe — and then an afternoon massage, I’m waiting to see if it’s swimming and steaming with Noekie before dinner.  Noekie and Mattie are coming for dinner and Marita is making babootie — I know it will be oh so good and I might have to cut short sitting in heat, wet or dry, to get back to gins and tonic, babootie and a wonderful wine we found.  We are going to come waddling home after all the grand breakfasts, dinners and suppers Marita has made — along with the gins and tonic and wines, of course.  Did I tell you about the dinner at Elsje’s last week just after we got back from Dana Bay?  Kudu pie, mashed potatoes, pumpkin and, I think but can’t remember, something else.  Crowned with Malva pudding with custard — a doubly wonderful way to end!  It was all so delicious, I can’t even say.  I have not had a single bad meal here — oh, there was one, a hamburger at a Wimpy’s — but no bad meals from Marita, Elsje or Mattie — what fantastic cooks they are!  Daniel, Dona and Judyth, y’all would be in hog heaven with these three.  The night we got back, Mattie made us a delicious lentil soup and chicken curry w/rice — and just-made bread — yummy.  Every time, YUMMY.  Laird and I are sure going to miss them when we’re forced to fall back on our own cooking skills much too soon.

Now I’m going to see if I can convince Laird to upload some photos, so you can see what we’ve been up to.  Happily yours, jm

Yikes, this is our LAST MONDAY of vacation!  Bummer.  We have so loved the last two months and had just a wonderful time — it’ll be hard to get back to the real world, methinks.  This weekend was nostalgia — Marita, Noekie, Laird and I went to Hartebeestport dam on Saturday, where we’ve been before, and Sunday was Monte Casino bird park, Noekie’s sister-in-law Mattie added to the roster.  The bird show is quite astounding — amazing that birds can be trained since surely their thought process is so alien from us.  Oh, the scarlet ibis! We got to walk around in their very large cage.  Alas, the lorikets (anyone know how to spell them?) were gone — it had been so much fun to go into their cage, where they would sit on your head, your shoulder, finger, whatever.  They loved to peck out the wax in your ears — a VERY funny feeling, believe me.  Then back, for a spaghetti dinner and lots of wine with them — the people, not the birds. 

Today we went to the natural history museum to see the winners of the National Geographic Photographer of the Year competition — as you can imagine, they were all astounding pieces of art. 

This is also Jonelle Makeover week.  Elsje gave me an excellent, wonderful feeling facial, manicure and haircut; tomorrow I go back for a massage — so yummy!  Then Noekie is going to take me swimming and then steam room and sauna — more yummy!  I’ll be a total noodle by the end of the day!

I also think we’re going to the Sammy Marks (probably spelled wrong) museum tomorrow — it’s a beautiful house out in the country.  So much to pack in before Saturday.  Speaking of Saturday, we also have to get our souvenirs packed and mailed — presents will be a later arrival than we are, so sorry.

I’d say “lately yours”, but I’m not fond of the connotation there — so nostalgically yours, jm

Well, our Great Adventure is over and we’re back home.  Daniel, for lunch today we had an unnamed dish that Marita made — spread good mustard over ham slices, wrap them around banana halves, make a cheese sauce to pour over and bake for about 1/2 hour, long enough to cook the banana.  It sounds odd to me, but I tell you, it’s really delicious!  And with good wine, even better.  I have to say, we have never had a bad bottle of wine in South Africa.  Everything we tried was just so delicious — even those wines that I think are weaker than I usually like, such as merlot and shiraz, were delicious.

Addo the elephant park was quite swell — more so because it was rainy and gray all day and we thought we wouldn’t see any game on the sunset drive.  But some of what we saw included eland, zebra, hartebeaste, kudu, secretary bird, ostriches, merkats, bushbok (well, Marita saw it), two jackals, an eagle owl, cape buffalo and lots of elephants.  Close up elephants.  Then after a lovely meal at the restaurant, we went to our chalets and sleep.  In the morning we decided not to do the drive, but just go on our own after a most marvelous breakfast with beautiful little yellow birds!  Maybe yellow-throated warblers?  There were swarms of them, so we gave them bread crumbs so they could eat along with us — there we were, on the porch overlooking lovely green landscape surrounded by yellow birds.  On the drive we saw lots of kudu and warthogs, but only one elephant close up — but any wildlife is thrilling, and warthogs are so funny, being so busy trotting along swishing their little skinny tails.  Addo had to satisfy us because we saw almost no game during the drive home — I saw a buck, that might have been juvenile eland, and we saw some blesbok and springbok.  The cows, sheep and goats we missed on the trip down, we saw coming home!  We feel like we can say we’ve really seen South Africa now, having been in Gautang, Limpopo, Free State, Northern Cape, Western Cape, Eastern Cape, KwaZulu Natal states (provinces).  Western Cape is the only province not under ANC control and it is the cleanest, best-run or so it appears.  We stopped in Blomfontein to see the supreme court (different from the constitutional court, which is in Pretoria) and got a great tour from one of the security people, a woman named Martha.  Don’t know if we would have normally gotten that, so we were thrilled.  Pictures to follow, sometime soon, I swear.  We also went to the national Afrikaans literature library, which also is the Sotho literature library, and that was exciting — going to have to search Amazon for Afrikaans writers.

Sandy, when we got home, Marita’s dalia tree was blooming — have you ever heard of that?  Beautiful pinky purplish flower, long petals with a yellow center, sort of reminiscent of cosmos except for the shape of the petal.  And you would so love all the aloes blooming everwhere and the proteas — the fynbos is FULL of proteas and they are in bloom now.  Fynbos is only in the cape region.  Read in the paper today that someone has just found another species of fynbos — a tiny blue-purple flower.  From my bed, through the banana leaves I see red hibiscus.  And green, green grass — what a sight.  Laird took photos for you of flowers and plants and Safari, the nursery where I want to live.  Plus, even though Marita hates them, I LOVE the palm trees — mostly date palms and others that aren’t Washingtonians, Queens or the like.

We have an appointment to go to a diamond mine in Cullinan on the 29th and another few adventures to go before we take the Big Bird back.  We miss you all and can’t wait to see you!  Africanly yours, jm & lg

Back from a great game drive, incredible fynbos landscape — proteas, ericas, heathers, all sorts of beautiful plants (Sandy, I kept thinking of you, how much you would LOVE the plants in SA, keep thinking you should just ignore the plane trip and come with me sometime) — plus animals, too.  Eland; gnu, including a golden gnu (very rare); impala, including black impala (also rare); waterbuck, lions (that had eaten yesterday so were almost comatose — we got very close and they just opened their eyes briefly, then shut them again), two females and a male; ostrich; mountain zebra; giraffes; and a tortoise.  Probably some I forgot to list.  Elsje decided against the game drive and went on an elephant ride instead.  Tomorrow we leave for Addo, an elephant national park, on the way back to Pretoria.  Every day has been terrific!  But lots of driving, so I’m sure Elsje will be glad to be home again, not having to be responsible for the hours upon hours of driving, watching us drink lovely wine at lunch.  We went to a cactus farm the other day, then went down the road to a restaurant that was FABULOUS.  It was OMG good!  Laird and I had kingklip (fish) baked with a shrimp crust; Marita had poached chicken wrapped with prosciutto and humus; Elsje had steak — L, M & I had the least expensive bottle on the menu and it was excellent.  Our next lunch we did the same, the cheapest bottle on the menu, again excellent.  What are the chances of that happening in the US?

I don’t know what we’ve been doing all these days, but at the end of every one, we have toasted with gins and tonic, or wine when there was no ice, and said how wonderful they had been!  How fortunate we are to have such friends!  And I can’t wait to share whatever memories I can remember with all you friends — you’ll finally be saying, “please, enough, no more, stop it!”  And I cannot wait for all y’all in Santa Fe to meet Marita when she comes to visit in the fall — what a great treat you have in store!  Dona and Bill, there will be large drinks at our house — we’ll go get Joan, too.  And she’s already agreed to make a SA feast for everyone — all the rest of us can be her sou chefs; Daniel, you’ll love it.  Maybe we can talk her into staying for thanksgiving and everyone can come, the CATS, Louise, Emily, Daniel, Dona and Bill, whoever else I forgot and Sandy, you can come from Fla.  Sharingly yours, jm 

It’s been so long since I’ve written, I don’t even know where to begin or what to tell.  We’re back in Danabaai (Dana Bay) after a few days in Capetown — actually sort of out from Stellenbosch.  We went up Table mountain one day, down to the warf area one and to an amazing auto museum in Franchoek one day.  But now we’re off again so I’ll have to come back to this — hurriedly yours, jm

The toilets in South Africa are marvelous.  Clean, with toilet paper — toilet paper you can flush!  I feel like I’m in paradise!

I thought the whole world was supposed to be connected through the internet, so what’s with all this trouble we have with getting on????  We FINALLY got connected last night, but with only two little bars — and let me tell you, it was a huge chore to get those!  But first, let’s start with our travelogue from Yekaterinburg.  We got up at 4:00 A.M. to get ready, straighten up the apartment, etc. — our friend Artom took us to the airport.  Get to Istanbul, through immigration, and YEA, WE DID NOT HAVE TO TAKE OUR BAGS, Turkish airlines had them sent through to Joburg, even though we had a 10 hour layover — plus, they were willing to give us a FREE hotel room.  If we had not been meeting our friend Pinar, we would certainly have taken them up on it.  We waited for awhile in the international arrivals hall, then decided to walk toward the domestic hall to see if we could find Pinar.  Lo and behold, as we were walking along, there she was!  What a thrill it was to see her!  Beautiful as ever, lovely of heart and soul as ever, we were thrilled to see her.  We waited around awhile thinking we’d take our hand luggage to the free hotel room, but then decided to just leave it at the baggage storage room and off we went for Istanbul adventure.  Oh, but it was May Day, there were demonstrations going on and public transportation was limited.  Pinar went to ask a guy about it and he gave her all the information about where the demos were, what was what, etc and he said it would be safest to take the ferry like Pinar wanted to go see the Princess Islands.  So off we went, bus to ferry, ferry to another ferry and then we were on the big island.  The guy, who had accompanied us at least half way on our journey, had told us of a restaurant to go to, so we walked to the Lido and had a fantastic seafood lunch, so delicious.  Salad, hummus and some other appetizer, seafood soup, grilled prawns, two whole sea bass later we were stuffed and ready for our horse carriage ride around the island.  What a beautiful place!  I saw many places I think the Graeser-Ladds/Sezer should rent for a couple of weeks some shoulder season — how fun, island living with a short ferry ride to Istanbul.   We reluctantly left Pinar on the Anatolian side, for her plane back to Ankara, and us back to the European side for our plane to Joburg.  As usual, it took less time than I thought (I’m the fretter about being late) to get back, so we had to wait to find our gate.  Then the brutally long trip to SA, no sleep on the plane, remember that 4:00 arising in Ekat?  Now it has been many, many hours.  It’s the next day at 10:00 or so when we land.  But I have high compliments for Turkish airlines and particularly for the man in Ekat who gave us the two side seats on an exit row — thank god we weren’t stuffed into the middle or any row behind.  Also, their cabin stewards are very nice — not always true with other airlines.

We got to Joburg, got through immigration, got our bags, out to the arrivals hall and there were Marita and her friend Elsje with candy and flowers, beautiful Birds of Paradise, which I’m looking at right now in a big vase on the kitchen island.  The new airport is quite nice.  Driving, after awhile, things started to look familiar, the closer to Marita’s house, the more excited I was.  I love her house!  And, also, there was the promise of bed after so very long without.  But first, tea, a bottle of wine, great lunch and LOTS of laughing.  Then a blissful shower and the most comfortable bed in memory.  So very hard to get up for light supper, then back in the sack.

Saturday, we went to Safari, the best, most wonderful nursery anywhere.  I thought about you, Sandy — you would really like this place!  You sure I can’t talk you into a trip here?  I want to live at Safari.  I want it to be my home.  There are waterfalls and plants and buildings and more plants and more waterfalls and pots and places to hang out all over.  There was an orchid show to see (not that orchids are my favorite flower, but still, many beautiful plants), a milkshake to be had — and drooling over just being there.  I think that’s all we did because I think we came home, had dinner, took a long nap, got up for supper, oh, but another bottle of wine, then bed.

Sunday was the day from hell, trying to get internet connection.  Saturday, somewhere along the way Laird had gotten his phone sorted out, but not internet.  It took HOURS and we didn’t even get connected.  Bummer.  I think that took up the whole day.  Maybe we were going to go somewhere, but it was closed, I can’t remember now.

Monday was extraordinary.  I said I wanted to go back to the cultural museum, so Marita thought this would be a good day.  We went early, hoping that this day, unlike every other time we’ve been there, might have a lot of customers.  But, alas, we were the only ones there.  Laird noticed a sign that said store room tours by appointment.  Marita said, “We want an appointment, please.  Now.”  After a few sputters, the guy at the desk said he would see if any curators were available.  So we went to look at a few exhibits and decided to have tea.  While in the restaurant, Corrine, the ceramics curator, came to say she could take us to furniture, anthropology, archaeology and ceramics.  We took gulps of our tea and jumped up.  The furniture curator, Anna Marie, had a doctor’s appointment, so couldn’t  spend much time with us, but she showed us through three storerooms and explained the history of furniture in South Africa — we saw beautiful, beautiful pieces, gorgeous armoires — she was very passionate about her topic, particularly furniture made by South Africans, fine furniture and farm furniture.  Then it was off to see John in anthropology.  Drawers and drawers and drawers of treasures, beadwork, tools, weapons, on and on.  The museum is light on exhibits upstairs because money is tight, but it takes very good care of its collections — temperature controlled, nice big (huge, actually) rooms.  We had some discussion of the ethics of museums and collecting of stuff that was made to be destroyed — interesting.  Archaeology was next, but to tell the truth, it was the least interesting.  Just separate little pieces of rocks and whatnots.  Frank told us he had 4 million pieces that had to be all catalogued by the end of this year!  All museums and cultural venues have been given three years to have every object fully catalogued.  He’s done 35,000.  He’s in trouble.  After a lovely lunch in the restaurant, Corrine came back to get us to show us her domain, ceramics.  She has some beautiful stuff, but she laments the holes in the collection.  We told her we would send her the green wedgewood tea service Laird and Emily got as a wedding present from Laird’s best friend Dick and his wife, Rhoda.  Emily, Dick, Rhoda, Chris or Kate, y’all don’t mind if it ends up in the African cultural museum do you?  What a glorious day we had — it was fantastic that we got to see behind the scenes of a major museum.  After that, I got to come home and poor Marita and Laird had to go back to Menlyn (shopping center) to find a way for us to be connected. 

Last night we had a great time at Elsje’s house — a braii her son cooked, meat and chicken, with salad and great bread she made, served with Marula jelly — yummy, and Daniel, she gave me a jar to bring home.  Gin and tonic, wine and more laughing — it’s perfect!

Tomorrow, after Marita and Elsje go to vote, we’re off to Dana Bay, which will take a couple of days traveling by car.  I’ll tell you all about it because I know it’s going to be swell!  In Pretoria, the weather has been lovely, though cloudy.  But not too hot, thank goodness.  When we get to Dana Bay, it might be pretty cool — I remember that Capetown was cool — so Marita told us not to send all our winter clothes home from Russia.

South Africally yours, jm