KNYSNA AND BACK

Recently, I visited my sister-in-law in Knysna and also stayed my Cousin Bill's widow, Hazel. Wnedy took me to Leisure Island, where there is an art gallery and THE MOST incredible fresh chocolate mint icecream!



We went to the Yacht Club on an island one evening and saw the craft tied up along the quays, ate lekker South African food, and generally enjoyed the evening. Wendy has a paddle ski at that club and we visited another day to check on its condition as it stands exposed to all weathers.



Hazel lives in a house made of two ancient cottages joined up, on the edge of the forest on the steep mountain slope. The garden she has made is enchanting, and she knows the names and all about every plant in the garden. She even has an avocado tree, a guava, a lemon and other non-fruit trees. I loved the fruit that she was given from a neighbour's Custard Apple tree. It looks like a bouncy green rubber ball with pentagonal patterns on it. As it ripens, it becomes darker green and THEN, as you cut it in half, you find lots of pips surrounded by a creamy coloured mush - taste the mush, and you find it is like vanilla!! and it's quite sweet. Even my fussy grand-children loved it.



We visited Brenton on Lake to see a lady who lives among the forest there in a retiremt village. She opens her windows and we all sat about talking,when she told us that Wendy had got a bit surprise the other day. Alison had told her to sit quite still, and to put her hand out of the window with a banana in her fingers - what do you think happened? A small baby Bushbuck took it out of her hand!



The next day, Hazel fetched me early in the morning and we drove via Brenton on Lake to Brenton on Sea, over a high "Head", as the hills at the entrance of Knysna Bay are called. We found Castle Rock halfway out of the water, since the tide was coming in. At high water, the rock is almost covered by wasves. We had a walk towards Buffels Baai (Buffalo Bay), but after an hour, decided to turn back since the tide was coming in quite fast. The promontory called Brenton Head is famous for the tiny blue butterflies found nowhere else in the world, tiny gentle blue wings with white dots around the edges. These little jewels are threatened by development and various other problems. They rely on the indigenous vegetation fouind only at Brenton. Unfortunately, we did not have a net and were short of time, or we would have looked for the lovely little butterflies just to see them close up.



The forest trees near Hazel's house, just a few yards up the mountain slope, are famous for the timber they yielded in the past, but since the forests have been too severely harvested, these are now protected. There is the Yellowwood, like the ones on America, the Stinkwood (a dark wood with a unique scent), the Bouhinia, with slender branches reaching out straight to its sides), Tree Ferns of great beauty and height and many flowers which make the forest a place of real beauty.



Some of the timber was used in the past to build ships, to make beams for houses, and flooring. The most beautiful furniture was made of these woods, and ornaments, too. The Thesen family, famous for the small rowing boats and for wooden fishing boats built at their factory on an island in Knysna Lagoon. Our family used to live in Potchefstroom in the South Western Transvaal, where we enjoyed rowing on the very big dam in one of the Thesen boats during the 1950s.



MORE NEXT TIME, folks!