Last week we went to Stillbaai to feed the freshwater eels. They have about nine (claimed — we only saw and fed four). When they get to be about 25 years old, they leave the pond, go down to the river, then the open sea and off to Madagascar where the lady eels lay millions of eggs each. When they hatch, they start swimming back to the pond. Alas, in 2014, only one made it; in 2015, only two got back. Talk about overfishing! But the ones we fed are still safe, they live under the rock overhangs in the pond and come out when you trail chicken liver through the water. They are very polite eaters, take the liver gently from your hand. And soft! They are so soft, they feel something like stingrays. They have blue eyes. Well, they have blue around their eyes, almost the same thing. They live in the tourist bureau’s pond, which is an old Cape Dutch farmer’s cottage. They have two rooms full of information on early man and the Great Migration of the human sort, out of Africa. Many of the beaches at Stillbaai are very rocky and it’s beautiful to see the sea crashing up; others are lovely sand beaches with much quieter water.
After petting and feeding the eels, we started back and stopped at Inverroche, a gin distillery. YUMMY! OMG, it is such beautiful gin! There are three varieties, a crystal clear (from limestone water), a more yellow (from somewhere in the middle) and an amber gin (from the mountains). Ahhhh, that amber one, sooooo delicious. Oh, but I said that about the crystal clear one, too. All are made with juniper from Italy and fynbos for the botanicals. Fynbos is the local, only-in-Western-Cape plantscape — many, many varieties, including aloes, protea, shrubs, small trees, almost all of which I don’t know the names of. Turns out I’ve been drinking gins and tonics wrong all these years. You’re not supposed to put the juice and fruit in them — it diminishes the gin oils –just a piece of the skin, a twist. They served one with grapefruit, the clear I think; one with orange and we can’t remember about the third. Anyway, she suggested to get all sorts of things, cardamon, cinnamon, etc and try different combinations. It is amazing what a grapefruit twist does for gin! And after our first two sips, one pure, one with twist, we were then given really good tonic (very low sugar content) — ohsogood, all ways! They hope to start exporting to the US in the next few months, so I have to get them all my contact information so I’ll know or can have them send me some, then we’ll have a party! Forgot to do it while I was there, I was way too drunk after the tasting. Turns out, everyone was passing me their glasses and I just kept downing them! We bought all three, but I’m sure I am not willing to try to carry them home. They also make rum from blackstrap molassass and Laird bought that one too. I’m not a big rum drinker, but it is quite good.
On Mother’s Day we took Marita and Matty to Jakkalsvlei winery (means fox’s pond, I think), second time for us and Marita as we had gone for a tasting earlier in the week. We had ostrich carpacchio with strawberries and balsalmic vinegar and parmesan custard with bacon jam (OMG good, that was! We bought extras to take home) for appetizers; we all had the hummus chicken for entree and chocolate mousse for dessert. And a great pinotage — very dark, coffee taste along with the deep fruit taste. We now have a big collection of Jakkalsvlei wines — we gotta get a lot of drinking done, because there are so many wines to buy in Cape Town! We go there on Friday.
On the way home from Mother’s Day, we saw seven giraffes, a couple of them babies, just peeking above the tree tops, and a bunch of eland and some gnus. Ostriches, of course — we don’t even remark about them.
Marita and Matty are wonderful cooks, and we take our turn, too, but I’m pretty sure we’re not losing any weight. That was Laird’s main goal — he had said he wouldn’t come if he couldn’t lose weight. I said “Sure — of course you can”, but I didn’t really believe it. Marita made oxtail the other night — so good.
Today, we’ve booked for a game drive at the Garden Route Nature Reserve. This is close to Albertinia, where we went last year a couple of times for an amazing 12-course traditional farm dinner. We had an equally amazing game ranger guide for the game drive. He showed us how the animals didn’t interpret the game drive trucks as predators, but when the guide stepped out from the profile of the truck, all of the animals instantly read his profile as predator. So I’ll take the big Nikon and see if my game pics improve.
Love to all. We are having a great time.
lairdandjonelle 
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