Willem's Planet – Page 5 – a weblog of whereabouts & interests, since 2010

January 14, 2025January 14, 2025

Monday night/ arrival in Munich

All went well with my 11-hr flight to Munich.
It is just frightfully cold here (-5°C/ 20°F) and it made for a rough 12-minute walk from the train station to the hotel.

Stepping on board the **Airbus A350-900** Lufthansa bird at Cape Town International airport’s Terminal A.

We are about to leave the African continent that lies 41,000 ft below us— 9 hours into the 11-hour flight to Munich.

This is the **Hirschgarten** S-Bahn (regional) railway station.
I had just stepped off the train from Munich airport, a 40 minute train ride.

January 13, 2025January 14, 2025

Monday morning/ Munich bound

It was time on Monday morning to squeeze everything into my suitcases and backpack, and head for Cape Town International Airport to catch the Lufthansa flight to Munich.

Two views from my hotel room window: from sunset Sunday night, and from early Monday morning.
In the distance, the mountains are from left to right: Table Mountain, Lion’s Head and Signal Hill.

January 13, 2025January 14, 2025

Sunday/ in Stellenbosch

My brother and I ran out to Stellenbosch University (our alma mater) on Sunday.
We stopped at the Faculty of Engineering, at Dagbreek Men’s Residence and at the Neelsie Student Centre.

A major remodeling of the main wing of the Faculty of Engineering is underway.

The buildings for the individual departments of the Faculty of Engineering look a little different from 40 years ago, with lettering and new windows. The engineering library is now called the ‘knowledge center’ (Afr. kennissentrum). Hmm.

A little house remodeled into offices, across from the Faculty of Engineering.

Here’s Victoria Street in summer time, with the trees a neon green, and the sky azure blue. The historic dormitories of Stellenbosch University as well as administrative buildings are found here.

The tennis courts where I had spent countless hours playing on as a student, are still there, as is **Helshoogte Men’s Residence**, and **Simonsberg mountain** in the distance.

The **Neelsie Student Centre** is quiet now, but will be abuzz with students come February when the new academic year gets underway.

**Red Square*** (Afr. Rooiplein) with its sun dial.
*Officially, it is the Jan Marais Square. A long time ago, though, students jokingly started calling the Administration Building nearby the ‘Kremlin’ because the notice boards (where exam results and class marks were pinned up) would declare their fate as a students. So this is a tongue-in-cheek reference to the main city square in Moscow that is the real Red Square.

January 12, 2025January 12, 2025

Saturday/ around Mossel Bay

It was time to drive back from Plettenberg Bay to Cape Town on Saturday.
I stopped at my uncle and aunt in Mossel Bay, and took a few pictures around downtown and the beaches.

The town of **Mossel Bay** lies on a outcrop called The Point, about 2 hours’ drive west from Plettenberg Bay. This is where Portuguese mariner and becoming the first European navigator to round the southern tip of Africa.
In recent years it has become a very popular destination for retirees and for younger people moving from South Africa’s northern provinces to the Western Cape province.

Here’s the sands and calm waters of **Santos Beach** that has just a hint of surf.

The boat and water sport enthusiasts hang out on the other end of the beach, where there is a **launch ramp** for fishing boats and other craft.

The ‘**Stone Church**‘ (Afr. Klipkerk) of the Dutch Reformed Church on Church St in downtown.
The cornerstone was laid in 1878 and the church was consecrated in 1880.

Further down on **Church Street** the blue water of the bay come into view.

The **Prince Vintcent Building** on Bland Street dates back to 1901. It hosts architects offices, cafes, bakeries and studios.

The St Blaize Terrace building from 1909 is on Marsh Street near The Point.

Nearby is this beautiful building for **the old The Point High School** (which now houses **Milkwood Primary School**).
Keating & Co did the construction, also in 1909. The stones were quarried in the hills and transported with cocopans on the rails to the school. Different stones were used: dark pink stones contrasts with the sandstone around the windows.

This tide pool is across from **The Point Caravan Park**.

January 10, 2025January 10, 2025

Friday/ Jukani wildlife sanctuary

These pictures are from our visit to Jukani wildlife sanctuary this morning.

The encampments are reasonably large, and in almost all cases the animals are from zoos or from situations where they will no longer survive in the wild.

Animals in the pictures: Burchell’s zebra, springbok, lion, mountain lion, Siberian tiger, caracal, brown hyena.

January 9, 2025January 10, 2025

Thursday

Here is a selection of photos du jour.

There was no palm tree at this beach house that belonged to my family thirty years ago. My dad sold it in 1996 and some time after that it was turned into a self-catering guest house.

The 6-story atrium inside the **Beacon Isle hotel**.

This is a **western cattle egret** (Bubulcus ibis).

A decorative mask from Ghana, for sale in the Global Village art store here in Plettenberg Bay for US $184.

January 8, 2025January 9, 2025

Wednesday/ the Knysna waterfront

Knysna is a town on the Garden Route and 33 km (20 miles) west of Plettenberg Bay on the N2 national route.

The pirate ship on the Knysna waterfront offers a bar and snacks, and trips around the Knysna estuary up to The Heads and then back again for sunset.

There are many other kinds of watercraft in the marina, of course.

This is a view from a restaurant called Drydock Co towards the Knysna Heads: the headlands of two peninsulas that enclose and form the Knysna River Estuary.

This public art installation of bronze with a chromed finish is called “Zephyr”, and the artist is Stephan Raubenheimer.

January 7, 2025January 14, 2025

Tuesday/ Robberg Beach

My friends and I went for a walk on Robberg beach this morning, and for a very pleasant swim in the Indian Ocean.

The peninsula called **Robberg** is 8 km (5 miles) south of Plettenberg Bay on the Garden Route. It is a nature reserve, and also a World Heritage Site.

This is **Robberg Beach No 5** (one of several beaches with lifeguards between the Beacon Island Hotel and Robberg).
The water temperature was very pleasant, all due to the warm Agulhas sea current coming down the coast from further up north.

January 6, 2025January 14, 2025

Monday/ Central Beach

There was no rain today here in Plettenberg Bay, but it was still cloudy and mild, with a high of only 23 °C (74 °F).
I went for a walk on Central Beach late this afternoon.

This picture is from early Sunday evening, of the iconic **Beacon Isle hotel**, with **Central Beach** in the foreground.
The site of the hotel has a distinctive history: it was a whaling station at the turn of the twentieth century, and became the location of a small hotel in 1940.
In 1972, this hotel was demolished and replaced with the six-story Beacon Isle Hotel.

Watch out for great white sharks!
Looking at that bar chart below the shark’s tail fin, it appears that it is less likely in January for sharks to appear in these waters.
Plettenberg Bay has experienced increased white shark activity in recent years and tragically suffered two fatal shark bite incidents in 2022, within three months of each other.

**Little egrets** (Egretta garzetta) roosting in a tree in the parking lot across from the Beacon Island hotel. They are herons, belonging to the family Ardeidae.

Here comes a fishing safari boat, hot and heavy, so that it can beach and then be winched further up onto the sand.

There is a rocky outcrop on the far end of Central Beach (away from the Beacon Isle Hotel).

January 5, 2025January 6, 2025

Sunday/ to Plettenberg Bay

It’s a 6-hour drive to Plettenberg Bay. We opted for the N1 national route through the Huguenot Tunnel to Swellendam, from where we took the N2 to Plettenberg Bay.

I could only take pictures of the first half of the drive, while I was the passenger and not the driver.

It’s a 6 hour drive from Cape Town to Plettenberg Bay.

Here is the entrance to the **Huguenot Tunnel**.
It is a toll road tunnel that runs through the Du Toitskloof Mountains, connecting Cape Town to the northern regions of the country.
The tunnel is 3.9 km (2.4 mi) long and it opened in March 1988.
The tunnel offers a route that is safer, faster (between 15 and 26 mins) and shorter (by 11 km/ 6.8 mi) than the old Du Toitskloof Pass over the mountain.

At the other side of the tunnel, there are beautiful scenes of the Du Toitskloof Mountains.

Soft cloud puffs and the jagged outcrops of the Du Toitskloof Mountains.

This is a railway station building in the town of **Robertson**.

The town of **Ashton** lies at the foot of the Langeberg mountain range.
This arch bridge is new (it opened in August 2021) and lies over the Cogmans Gorge River (Afr. Kogmanskloofrivier) in Ashton.

Here is **Swellendam**, the third oldest town in South Africa after Cape Town and Stellenbosch.

I found this hibiscus flower in **Riversdale**, as we made a stop to have some lunch.

This is the **N2 national highway** in the Riversdale area— even though it offers only one lane in each direction here.
We did not run into too much traffic going east, but we ran into lines of cars going in the opposite direction, heading back to Cape Town. The kids in school still have a week or two of summer recess, but maybe mom or dad will have to go back to work on Monday.

Lots of rolling hills and farmland in the **Riversdale** area.

We made it! We lost the blue skies and the sun along the way, but that’s OK. It’s just a rainy day in Plettenberg Bay and we will soon have the sun back.
This is the view from our Airbnb, of the **Keurbooms Estuary** and the beaches around **Plettenberg Bay**.

January 4, 2025January 5, 2025

Saturday/ checking out

It’s time to leave the Cape Town area, and the Airbnb that I have been staying in. My friend and I are driving up the coast to Plettenberg Bay in the morning.

I have been staying in an apartment in one of these buildings by the Tyger Waterfront in Bellville. The complex is built around an old quarry that has been transformed into a 4-hectare man-made lake with a promenade around it.

A **Cape wagtail** (Afr. Kaapse kwikstertjie, Motacilla capensis) sits on a handrail.

And this fella is a **rock hyrax** (Afr. Kaapse dassie, Procavia capensis). They are small, plump and tail-less guinea-pig-like animals, about as large as a big rabbit.

January 3, 2025January 3, 2025

Friday/ Father Time

Happy Friday, the first of 2025.
Here is one more cartoon from South African newspaper Die Burger (“The Citizen”) by cartoonist Dr Jack.

Father Time 2024 to Baby 2025: “Behave yourself”
Pop-up Party Hippopotamus: “A beautiful year to all of you”

January 2, 2025January 3, 2025

Thursday/ fishes from Mozambique

I am buying stamps from South Africa and southern Africa now that I am here, and saving a little money in the process. (Stamps from this part of the world are sent to the USA by express airmail or by international courier— which can be $40 or more for one shipment. Surface mail takes several months).

I love this 1951 definitive issue from Mozambique, part of a set of 24 stamps.
At the time, Mozambique was still a Portuguese colony, and the currency was the escudo.

The fishies are going to swim in freshwater when I get them home, so that I can separate them from the paper that they are pasted on.

January 1, 2025January 1, 2025

Wednesday/ Happy New Year

It’s 2025!
Happy New Year!
The cartoon is from the South African newspaper Die Burger (“The Citizen”) and by cartoonist Dr Jack.

“Good news, swarrie*! Even though your barbecuing leaves a lot to be desired, we have decided to stay until after New Years”
“You may have to run out to the store today, since the brannas** is AGAIN running a little low. “
#$!&
Side Comment by the little hippopotamus: “House guests are like fish— after three days they start to stink”

*old brother-in-law; **brandy/ supply of brandy

December 31, 2024January 1, 2025

Tuesday/ out goes 2024

Four of us had a great seafood dinner at the Century City mall outside of Cape Town.
As we walked outside, we caught this view of beautiful twilight colors over Table Mountain.

December 30, 2024December 31, 2024

Monday/ stopping and shopping, here and there

Here are a few pictures from today.

It’s great to see my home town as part of a store name— so far away from home. There are 54 Starbuckses in South Africa (but the first one opened only in 2016).
The **Seattle Coffee Co.** franchise has been around a lot longer. The first store opened its doors in Cavendish Square, Cape Town in November 1997.

I stopped at a branch of the beleaguered **South African Post Office**. It was supposed to have completely run out of money and options to stay open by the end of October 2024, and go into bankruptcy, but now it is unclear what the new ‘Day Zero’ is.
Do you have any postage stamps to sell to me? I inquired. I came away with this sheet of woodpeckers (issued 2020), one of the last sets of stamps issued by the South African Post Office. No new issues appeared after 2020.

Hey! We still have Toys “R” Us in South Africa. (On June 29, 2018, Toys “R” Us permanently closed all of its remaining U.S. locations, after 70 years of operations).

And here is what I acquired to add to my collection of African animals: **king cheetah** (distinctive coat pattern due to a recessive gene; there may only be 10 or so in the wild, with some 50 or so more in captivity); **black wildebeest**, **springbok** antelope, and **African penguin** (these are the ones found in the Boulders Penguin Colony in Simons Town, South Africa).

My quest for a six-pack of Beck’s Blue (Beck’s non-alcoholic beer) continues. This store did not have any.
Beer and hard liquor are only sold in dedicated liquor stores in South Africa. Wine may be sold at grocery stores as well as at liquor stores.
The “YOU HAVE REACHED THE SOUTH POLE” is just a little joke, indicating that the walk-in refrigerated room with chilled beers is right there below the sign.

December 29, 2024December 30, 2024

Sunday/ in the dry dock

I stopped briefly at the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront today, to use one of the parking garages there.

This is the Robinson Dry Dock in the so-called Alfred Basin in the Waterfront, and it is the oldest operating dry dock of its kind in the world. It dates back to 1882. The foundation stone for the dock was laid by Prince Alfred, second son of Queen Victoria. Named after Governor Sir Hercules Robinson, it was used to repair over 300 ships during World War II.

The **Robinson Dry Dock** is currently occupied by research vessel DR. FRIDTJOF NANSEN, sailing under the flag of Norway.
Ships are typically dry-docked every five years for a special survey, but may also be dry-docked for inspections, maintenance, and repairs, in between.

December 28, 2024December 31, 2024

Saturday/ at the mall

There is a little Christmas market in the Tyger Valley Shopping Centre, still open for a final few days.
It’s good that it is indoors: day-time highs here were 35°C and 34°C (95°F and 93°F) on Wednesday and Thursday, and 30°C (86°F today).

The Christmas market on the lower level of the food court in the Tyger Valley Shopping Centre. The jumbotron screen (top left corner) showed what was happening in the first of two cricket tests between South Africa and Pakistan .

And what happened today in the first of two cricket tests between South Africa and Pakistan that is underway in Centurion in Gauteng Province?
From espncricinfo.com:
“The first Test match at Centurion is tantalisingly poised after Pakistan took three wickets in nine overs to leave South Africa wobbling at 27 for 3, still 121 runs away from the 147-run target that seals a win, as well as a place in the 2023-25 World Test Championship [WTC] final.
After South Africa had bowled Pakistan out for 237, they needed a fairly comfortable 148 to secure victory, but an unerring spell of accurate medium-fast bowling from Mohammad Abbas and Khurram Shahzad was well rewarded. Aside from Aiden Markram, the South Africa batters were somewhat timid in their approach to the last few overs of the day, while Abbas and Shahzad targeted the pads. Abbas brought one to jag back in sharply into Tony de Zorzi for the first breakthrough.”
**Update Sun 12/29** [From espncricinfo.com] “**South Africa have qualified for the World Test Championship (WTC) final after beating Pakistan by two wickets in a high-drama encounter at SuperSport Park.** Set a modest but challenging target of 148 to win, they were 99 for 8 just before lunch and it was left to Kagiso Rabada and Marco Jansen to score the remaining 51 runs in a tense ninth-wicket stand against a Pakistan attack with their tails up.”

December 27, 2024January 1, 2025

Friday/ Pringle Bay beach

Happy Friday, the last one for 2024!

These photos are from yesterday, from a little trip I made with my family to Pringle Bay.
Pringle Bay is a small, coastal village in the Overberg region of the Western Cape, in South Africa. It is situated at the foot of Hangklip, on the opposite side of False Bay from Cape Point. The town and surrounds are part of the Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve, a UNESCO Heritage Site. [Wikipedia]