Barrydale weekend

One of my favourite weekends away was a trip to a little town called Barrydale (well actually 6km out of Barrydale) on Route 62. It's about 2 hours out of Cape Town and six of us hit the road.

I know you're counting FIVE... but I'm taking the pic... duh!

We only arrived in Barrydale after 9pm so we were pretty starved ...but luckily we had a reservation at a cool place called Mez. We couldn't order much on the menu except a veggie platter. We weren't really expecting much but the platter was REALLY good. It was a selection of various tapas of some sort - but it was really delicious. Dessert was Turkish delight icecream.

Dinner at Mez

Kind of a Moroccan-inspired interior

 The other side of Mez looks like it's Greek-themed. It's cool because their menu reflects both Moroccan and Greek tastes and some Turkish and other flavours.

After supper we had to drive around and look for our accommodation. We eventually found it in the dark.. and I mean DARK. The place we stayed at is called Appelhuis and it sleeps seven in a self-catering cottage in the middle of apple orchards. We got to bed pretty early because our next day had loads of activities in store. I wouldn't really call it activities - it was more like sightseeing and exploring.

Appelhuis

Appelhuis has quite a nice wrap-around balcony

I don't remember the sequence in which we did our exploring but we visited the hand weaver in town, the Magpie Gallery, the labyrinth, the peace pagoda, Ronnies Sex Shop and Karoo Saloon. We also went into a really small market thing that wasn't really a market but they sold loads of random things no one needs. Ronnies Sex Shop is a pub on Route 62. Apparently it used to be called Ronnies Shop and one night when they were really drunk, Ronnie's friends decided to paint the word 'sex' on his signboards. The name kinda stuck. So now it's a world famous spot to check. You can leave your undies hanging in the bar if you want.

Magpie Gallery is a light and chandelier gallery that's well-known because of their quirky works and one of their lamps are in the White House. They're quite pricey though - but their work is amazing.

The labyrinth was really awesome. It was funny for us because you had to be all spiritual and quiet and reflect on life...hahaha. I couldn't stop laughing. It was refreshing though.  The peace pagoda thing wasn't anything to rave about but it's the only one in Africa... so that's at least something. We were then shown a baboon sanctuary of some sorts - that was freaky. Those things were crazy!

The Magpie Gallery was closed

The Peace Pagoda

The pretty labyrinth - close up

Chillin' in the middle of the labyrinth

A quick stop at Karoo Saloon

Danyaal about hang his undies in the bar

Getting our "pomp" on

 LUNCH TIME!!!! We had lunch at a place called Simply Food. It's owned by the sister of the lady who owns Mez (where we had supper the night before). Kudos to this lady's dishes...WHEW!!! Since we couldn't order the meat stuff, most of us had a veggie wrap and one of us had a deluxe muesli dish.

Nummy num!!

The delicious wrap

At night it was REALLY cold - you must remember we were in the Karoo area, and the nights on this side can bite! We braaied that night and watched some cheesy movies till we had to pass out.  I'm not 100% sure but I think that's all we did that day. The next morning we arranged for the host to take us apple picking - whoop whoop.  I'm not a fruit lover but it's kinda fun to pick the stuff yourself. We got some apples and some lemons. I think we were getting the last bunch for the season. Great fun.

Lemons!

Naturally, before we headed out of the town, we had to stop for something to eat. We wanted to go to the very popular Clark of the Karoo restaurant but it was really busy and the guy in charge was pretty dismissive - so we thought - FORGET YOU!! We got some icecream instead and then hit the road. There's one cute little icecream shop in the main road - and they say you have to 'getafix' of their flavours.

So that's the end of our Barrydale weekend - was great fun. If you ever head out that way, check out Appelhuis  www.appelhuis.com - it's a quiet place where you can relax and just do your own thing without worrying about nosy neighbours.

Barrydale as seen from the R62

The backroads :-)

Homeward bound :-)

Winner!

Time for some bragging again :-)   I entered Mr Price Home's 'Summertime with Family & Friends Competition' where you have to upload an image of your family/friends having fun - or what you're getting up to fo the summer. Something like that.

Here's my pic that got me a R3000 shopping voucher prize.

Buddies at Elands Bay

Presents, YAY!

It was my 30th birthday recently and I had a mad hatter's party. I was too busy to take lots pics so instead I took pics of my gifts afterwards. Once I get all the hat pics in order, I'll post it.

I got quite a bit of jewellery including necklaces, earrings, a bracelet and a ring.

The jewellery I got :-)

I got some chocs and sweets as well. I managed to finish the one box of Lindt already (with some help).

I finished about 2 chocs before I took this pic

Body stuff - yipppeeeeee. I got loads of body wash, body butter, perfume and other body-realted things.  They all smell AWESOME and I've started using quite a few of the products already.

Yummmy

The perfumes I got are Clinique Happy (+ lotion), Cacherel Amor Amor (+ lotion), DKNY travel perfumes and Tommy Hilfiger Loud. Body stuff included olive, coconut and shea body butter, a variety of body wash and banana shampoo. I also got a Body Shop gift pack (x2). There's a Sh'Zen gift pack as well with a loofah thing that really works well. I also got hand cream to pop in my handbag.
 

A jewellery box, jewellery chest and Cashmere soap

High School Musical Pillow (don't ask) and three picture frames

Before you start wondering...I'm not a High school Musical fan. I've never seen the movie or series in my life and I'm not quite sure why anyone would design a pillow dedicated to it. Nevertheless - it's a fun gift.. and I actually use it.

I enjoy scrapbooking and making cards and stuff so the scrapbooking book and kit was a pretty cool gift. I generally always get scrapbook stuff but this is my first book about it. I got two DVDs - My Father the Hero (was my favourite movie when I was thirteen, I think, and When in Rome is a movie I hired about three times so my friend thought it would be better if I had my own copy. I think it's a sweet movie and Josh Duhamel is hot. I like Kristen Bell because I used to watch Veronica Mars. she is awesome. I also got Eclipse - which is the only book in the Twilight saga that I don't have. Yes, I'm a twilight fan. I've read all the books but they weren't all my own copies. Now I finally have the complete set.

I got a Woolies gift voucher from my colleagues - which was really nice of them. I haven't spent all of it yet, which is really surprising.  Some cash also came my way - I'm sad to say that I've blown it all already, hehehehe.

The complete F.R.I.E.N.D.S series....booyah!!

Last but not least, I got a pair of shoes. First time ever! Whoop whoop. They're a pair of blueish leather high heels that I tried on about a month ago... and when I went back to buy it, they were sold out. Now I know why :-)

Cape Times Big Walk

So 10 kilometres isn't that much, but it's something and it beats my usual sleeping in on a Sunday...actually, it doesn't...but it was for a good cause, so it doesn't matter.

Dragging myself out of bed at 6am on a Sunday is sooo not my idea of fun! Seven of us decided to do the 10km fun walk from Cape Town to..uhm.. let's call it Mowbray because not many people know where St George's Grammar School is. The plan was to get to the Grand Parade at 8am and finish the walk by 10am. Did we get it right? Read on. In true Cape Town style, the race race started 5 minutes early (for those of you who remember the premature implosion of the cooling towers) even though there is a massive clock at the top of Cape Town Central Library overlooking the Grand Parade. See exhibit A:

07h55 and off we go

So the walk started out very slowly - we were all trying to squeeze through the streets of Cape Town until we got through the Company Gardens. From here it was free sailing.  I wasn't long before we saw a "6km to go" sign. I'm not sure how we reached that so quickly. A few minutes later we were at the halfway mark sipping Coca-Cola.  There's not much else to say except, we walked and walked and walked until we reached the finish line.

It was a fairly easy walk - not too long and not too short. Pics say it all:

The contestants :-)

The starting point

Thousands of people getting ready for the walk

This means nothing - I just thought the birds looked cool

Just past half way!

Smiley faces at the finish line :-)

Winners!!

Me and my medal.

Love is in the air...and friends everywhere

This is one of my favourite pictures of the people I spend most of my time with. It was at our friends' wedding on 9 October this year. Beautiful wedding, amazing food...wonderful people. The speeches could have been shorter... but I just like to complain :-).

Us at Danyaal and Sakinah Davids's wedding.

Been there, done that

I'm on a local "been there, done that" mission.. so here's my first Cape Town must-do. I'm kinda embarassed to say I've never been to Robben Island - so I'm guessing that has to be added to my to-do list. Another random one is to take a pic with Just Nuisance in Simon's Town.

So this is me after my fish and chips queueing at Mariner's Wharf in Hout Bay..on a sunny Sunday afternoon nogal!!

This was yesterday.. haha. I promise I've been there before though.

Some of the cool people who queue for their food

A pretty blue boat

This Sunday I'm doing the Cape Times Big Walk, I consider that another good one to add.... watch this space :-) 

Santa Shoebox Project

I think this is a really cool initiative and I'll encourage people to take part in it when it comes around again.  Basically, you get a shoebox (standard size), fill it with cool stuff (guidelines are provided). Wrap the box....and you've just made one child smile.  I think you're too late for this year's shoebox project but maybe next year you'll wanna give it a go? www.santashoebox.co.za

This box came to about R90 (Cheap cheap) but some of my colleagues spent about R250 on theirs (I'm not THAT generous).  Hahaha.

This box is for a 12-year old female. I don't know if girls that age still play with dolls but this is the only toy I could find to fit in this box!

The box must have a facecloth, soap, toothbrush and toothpaste. There must be one item of clothing, a toy, sweets and some stationery and they all have to fit into a medium-sized box.

Pretty cool. My birthday's in December - you're welcome to give me an age-specific Fatima Shoebox.

Thank you :-)