MEMORIES OF CHRISTMASES PAST

My first memory of Christmas was when my parents bought a poultry farm in Kuilsriver in the Cape in South Africa. They bought me a wind up gramophone with some records they must have picked up in a second hand shop. I remember the titles of two of the songs and have the tunes in my head but as I am tone deaf nobody else recognizes them. The one was called On the Sidewalks of New York and the other Has Any One Seen Kelly, Kelly of the Emerald Isle.

Subsequent Christmases always brought a book or two one of which was a Biggles book. I loved the adventures that Biggles got involved in. We then moved to Fish Hoek where my father built his own house. I remember the first Christmas there when my paternal grandfather came to lunch. Grandfather Goodwin was all of seven foot tall with no fat but a physique to match his height. My mother would cook a huge leg of Pork and a couple of chickens as Grandpa would devour a whole one himself!

Fish Hoek in 1958

Father had built a lounge dining room with a spring floor. The Fish Hoek Old Time Dance Club would dance there every Friday. One of the members had a son, Donald Rowley some five years older than me and the two of us learnt all the wonderful old time dances especially the Strauss waltzes. I last saw Donald when I was fifteen I think when he left for Northern Rhodesia to work in a bank. He subsequently left for Australia and we still correspond!

A special Christmas was in 1959 when I was an air hostess for British Airways based first in Manchester later at Heathrow. My colleague Sue invited me to her home for Christmas in Prestbury. We went to midnight mass and came out to a white Christmas.

The lunch was memorable especially the Christmas mince pies. Warm from the oven we would open them up, pour in a dash of whisky and add a slice of blue cheese, replace the top and oh how delicious! I make them every Christmas! The following day we went Beagling over the Yorkshire hills, walking miles following the hunting Beagles. Sue married a pilot, Doug Croll, while I went back to South Africa.

Years later Sue traced me through Personality magazine and we met here and a few times later in England but sadly have lost touch.

Fast forward to Varsfontein Farm in Paarl in the Cape. My daughter Susan had married Johan (Lofty) Loftus and they were under managers at this thoroughbred stud farm. The manager, Hennie de Jager lived in the main house, a Cape Dutch rambling building with an enormous kitchen. One year I cooked a whole suckling pig with the proverbial apple in its mouth! There were always lots of friends and relations and a Nativity play for the young ones.

One year we planned a family holiday in Mozambique and my youngest son TJ and I my grandson Shaun, now a teenager drove up in my one ton Nissan bakkie with no 4 x 4 capability. We were a week or two earlier than the planned departure and had booked a campsite at Pandane on the coast. The track from Inhambane was thick sand and although we let down the tyres, TJ had to drive like hell to avoid stopping or stalling while Shaun was flung around in the back dodging knives and pots and pans! As we got to the gate of the resort we sank into the sand! Fellow campers came and towed us out. Then we were stuck until we were due to leave. Christmas day saw us eating peas with mayonnaise out of tins and asparagus and mayonnaise! Thank Heavens the wine and beer had not run out!

We were due to meet my elder son Mick at the larny Cardosa Hotel in Maputo and arrived thoroughly disheveled with a large blag plastic bag of soiled clothes that the  stately Major Domo gingerly took straight to the laundry! Now Susan is notoriously late for everything but the following day when we were quaffing beer at the Casa do Sol she arrived dead on time at our one o,clock rendezvous! I will do the tale of Captain Ron and that holiday early in the New Year!

One year my dear friend Joy – and how we met deserves a blog of its own – brought her two sons Garry and Ryan to camp in my Garden in Langebaan. My other friend Joy Bianchi sent her grandson Ryan Pienke came and brought his Motswana friend Bakkie. Another tent went up. My grandsons, Jacques and Shaun were there. In next to no time the six youngsters had crossed the divides of not only race but diverge backgrounds and banded into a happy band of friends.

Now in Langebaan, a sleepy, largely Afrikaner community there was a dance hall called Flamingoes. The youngsters were keen to go but I had reservations as although Apartheid was gone there remained in these small communities a very shall we say reserved outlook on mixed race relations. Jacques pleaded with me and said. “Don’t worry GranMols we will not allow anything to happen to Bakkies!” The next day, all safely tumbling out of their tents I heard from someone that they had virtually formed a posse around Bakkies to make sure that he was safe from any unpleasantness!

My Christmas present from Ryan and Bakkies was a hard cover book – Jamie’s Kitchen that introduced me to Jamie and his down to earth cooking. Ryan is now an accountant in London and I have sent the book back to him. Bakkies is  an Aeronautical engineer in Canada. Garry lives and works in Cape Town and has a son called Baden, Ryan lives and works in Johannesburg and Jacques lives in Cape Town, is due to get married to Danielle in January and move to Johannesburg. Shaun has become a wind farm engineer and works in Europe and South Africa.

TJ married Maud on 23^rd December one year and Maud brought her Afrikaans family to Langebaan for Christmas! I was living in a small corrugated iron cottage while Susan was in the small main house. My kitchen was tiny! I had decided to make this a traditional English Christmas and cook roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. In the end there were thirty five guests with Tiaan and Sabine having arrived from Botswana.

We started with oysters from the Lagoon and then with the help of Sabine we fed the guests who tucked in with much gusto still on a high from the wedding! Every Christmas I insist upon a toast to The Queen and my roast beef was so well received from the Afrikaner guests that they happily stood and lifted their glasses to her!

Finally Christmases in Tofo in Mozambique. One year it rained and rained. Grandchildren were there from Botswana with Ryan and his brother Glen. They were sitting around drinking coffee early in the morning when there was a loud squealing heard coming from below our cashew nut tree! There Nic (my neighbour and owner of Turtle Cove) was supervising the killing of one of his pigs for that night’s Christmas feast! He was obliged to offer us a free dinner!

Tofo Beach, Ihambane Province, Mozambique

Another year I met Graham and Cheryl when they were camping at Turtle Cove, our neighbouring lodge. As they were alone I asked them to join us for Christmas. At first light that morning Graham went down to Tofo Beach and bought a kilo of fresh swordfish which he turned into sashimi accompanied by much beer that was unbelievable! My ham emerged from the Dutch oven looking as if it could grace any cookbook once bedecked with fresh pineapple and a wonderful Christmas ended with a sauce made of Tipo Tinto, the local rum bought in the Tofo market over the pudding!

Jose’ with his family, without whom our stays would not be the same.

I will end with some pictures of the last time we had Christmas at Tofo with TJ and Maud’s children Greg and Neve and Jose our loyal caretaker having done the traditional decorations!

Happy Christmas all!

 

 

THE FIRST SAFARI

We set off from Robertson, Cape Province, South Africa in Susan’s Opel sedan. Two women and four children, Jacques, Shaun, Michele and Ryan. I can’t remember their exact ages but the youngest was two and the oldest around nine. Our destination was the Northern Cape some 574 kilometres north set in the vastness of the Kalahari desert.

Nowadays it is called the Kgaligadi desert and is not a desert in the strictest sense of the word as it receives too much rain; some 5 to 10 inches annually. Early settlers called it the thirstland.

This desert is part of the 970,000 square mile Kalahari Basin that encompasses nearly all of Botswana and more than half of Namibia reaching southwards into the Northern Cape and Namaqualand. The Kalahari sand dunes are the largest expanse of sand on earth. This desert is home to the famous black maned lions and many other species such as the Gemsbok or Oryx an antelope ideally suited to the dry conditions. The Gemsbok has a carotid rete that acts much like a radiator and keeps its temperature down in this hot environment.

Our route took us across the karoo, a semi desert, on gravel roads through Calvinia where these days they have an annual festival at the end of August celebrating farming with livestock. August is the beginning of spring when the veld bursts into a kaleidoscope of colour. Food stalls abound with their specialty, sheep heads on the menu!

Onwards to Kenhardt. Along the road the rocks were black from the heat and Kokerbooms were silhouetted against the horizon. The San used to make their arrows from these strange trees. Here we stayed in a municipal flat and that evening the stars were like diamonds in the sky.

The following early morning in the bitter cold we took the children to see the famous Verneuk Pan (the word means trickery) where Donald Campbell attempted to break the land speed record on his famous Napier-Campbell Blue Bird.

Donald had a stressful journey to the pan as he lost his briefcase with important papers in it. Then he crash landed his aeroplane into a tree near Calvinia. Willem Louw was charged with the task of clearing the pan where puffadders and scorpions abounded. The temperature could rise to 42C in the shade. The track was supposed to be 16 miles long directly east to west and looked straight into the rising sun.

On the day of the Flash in the Pan attempt as it was named, was planned a tortoise was removed from the strip and named Blue Bird! After a few attempts with only one set of tyres left Donald took on the 5 kilometre (3 miles) record reaching 203 miles per hour (325 km). Donald eventually became the first man to exceed 300 miles per hour in Utah on land.

I can’t find the picture but well I remember the four children bundled up in winter woolies stand with the vast deserted pan behind them.

We then headed north to cross the Orange River. The River is called the Gariep these days, being the San name for it. It rises in Lesotho where it is called the Senqu and travels 193 kilometres to its mouth between the towns of Oranjemund and Alexander bay on the west coast of South Africa forming a border between Namibia and South Africa.

The river has many islands, some inhabited most irrigated and planted with vines. The canals that irrigate the lands wander in and out leading into Upington, the town that is the centre of this area. Upington harks back to 1870 when a chieftain from the Hottentot clan wanted his people to learn how to read and write. He appealed to the Cape Government for a mission station at Olyfenhoutsdrift and the Rev. Christiaan Schroder was sent to teach the people.

Rev. Schroder realized the potential of the river for irrigation and together with Japie Lutz lay building foundations and hand dug irrigation canals some of which are still there today. Later AD Lewis was the brains behind the canal system that supports this area along which grow vines for raisins and wine.

We took a photo of the kids standing on one of the bridges of the river, then climbed up to the Tier mountain, meaning leopard mountain with a view of the canal system and its vineyards. We stayed in an old farmhouse on Kanoneiland the largest river island in South Africa, a patchwork of vineyards and winding roads. We stayed in an old farmhouse with a communal kitchen and let the children lose to run wild while Susan and I had a sundowner or two.

The following day we took the children to Keimoes where we stopped to see the still working Persian water wheel used to keep the water moving along the canals in the old days. Onwards west to the Aurabies Falls in the Augrabies National Park on the Orange River where the water tumbles down steep rocky chasms to fall around 56 metres. The original Khoi name was Ankoerebis, meaning place of great noise.

Pofadder was our next stop and from there we visited Pella.

Pella is a mission station that has the most amazing Catholic Cathedral  built in the mid 1880’s by French missionaries, J.M. Simon and Leo Wolf whose graves lie in the grounds. These Fathers knew nothing of building and consulted their enclyclopedie des Arts et Metiers which contained details of how to construct a building.

Within two years they finished it. It took more than 200 loads of sand, 400 wagon loads of stones, 200 000 bricks that they made themselves, 350 bags of slaked lime and hundreds of wagonloads of willow wood. Today this elegant sandy-toned Cathedral still stands as a tribute to the men of the order of St. Francis de la Sales.

When we arrived a nun welcomed us and took us into the wonderful building telling the story to the children. The mission grows dates and we left with a packet of these juicy fruits.

On impulse we decided to go to Onseepkans. This little settlement on the Orange River serves as a border post between Namibia and South Africa with traffic moving between Keetmanshoop and Pofadder.

Not a wise decision with a low slung sedan! The gravel road was rough, and taking a side track to see if we could get near the river we ended up in a of cul de sac, the sand too thick to reverse. Ahead lay a huge boulder and there was nothing for it but to drive onto this boulder in order to turn around! Full marks to the Opel although the undercarriage took some hammering as well as my nerves! The kids of course thought it very exciting! This called for a stop and a gin and tonic for Susan and a vodka for me!

So ended our first journey that left us with a taste and enthusiasm for more such adventures that did indeed follow over the years.

OF LIONS AND LIFE

At lunch time one day in my favourite pub, The Buck and Hog, chatting to my favourite Mine Hostess and bar lady with a lecturer, one of my favourite men, part of our magic circle. Mine Hostess sits at the head of this minature round table and favoured patrons join her from time to time.

 

Conversation reaches the heights of intellect and descends very quickly to the nether regions with risqué humour! This day we were joined by our favourite retired advocate now building contractor. His magnificent Land Rover was parked just outside the window and I could see the roof top tent. That triggered my memory.

 

The subject we were discussing was dangerous pets. I now chipped in as I had been watching the Lion series on DSTV set in South Luangwa Park in Zambia, a park that I know well and have wonderful memories of. The combination of the tent, the subject, and these memories had me off, telling the others one of my stories.

 

When in the Luangwa  I was often the guest of Derek Shenton of Shenton Safaris and I was staying at their Mwamba bush camp. On one memorable night drive we were near a lovely lioness, champagne coat gleaming in the spotlight.

 

We heard a faint mewing noise that I thought were cubs but Derek, as I remember, reckoned it was a call for the pride to come together for the hunt. I never forgot that sound and one year Susan, my daughter and I were in Khutse reserve in Botswana with a couple of tour guides having a holiday.

 

The mood was jolly around the early evening fire, looking forward to the braai (barbecue), Cape wine flowing, when I heard that very same noise.

 

“Lion! They are near!” Susan reacted immediately and we made our way to our vehicle together moving slowly whilst entreating the others to do the same. We reached the safety of the double cab with our drinks, prepared to watch. The others pooh poohed until the first lion came to within the edge of the circle of gas lamp light and they quickly retreated to their vehicle.

 

We were surprised at how unafraid the animals were as they walked nonchalantly through our camp. A couple of lionesses with young cubs and two sub adult males. They sniffed at our tyres, strolled around and the cubs treated us to their cute antics. The pride stayed for a long time so dinner was delayed, the fire falling into ashes until the lions tired of our camp and left. More wood was tossed on and all the while we kept a good watch out for the lions, speculating on their lack of hesitation of invading our camp. Normally the smell of humans would head them in the opposite direction.

 

My next experience was in Mabuasehube Reserve which is part of the Kgaligadi Transfrontier park that straddles South Africa and Botswana. Our route lay through Mebua to Nossop Camp on the South African side.

 

It was bitter cold that winter just after dawn in this desert and Susan and I stood warming our hands on our coffee mugs watching a Gemsbok (Oryx) on the salt pan below the ridge on which we were camped. The Gemsbok was watching something to our left and I turned to try and spy what had caught his attention. Creeping up on us were two young lionesses! We backed up to our vehicle calling others of our party to do the same.

 

Everyone sought the safety of the vehicles while the kettle sputtered away on the fire. Enter the lionesses. They frolicked around, half climbed a tree, bored with that, they knocked the boiling kettle off the trivet, jumping back in alarm at the splashed hot water! For about half an hour they examined everything. Thank heavens we had all zipped up our tents when we woke up that morning. The lionesses finally left the scene but found a vantage point further up the ridge and watched us packing up while keeping a good eye open for them!

 

Later I learned that Wild Life authorities had warned anyone wanting to visit Khutse to use roof top tents.

 

One year we were in the Okavango delta when the flood was exceptional. All night long we could hear the male lions roaring as they tried to defend their ever decreasing territory due to the encroaching flood. In the morning you could find the males sleeping exhausted beneath a tree with injuries and scratches all over! One had to feel sorry for them, it was almost embarrassing to see them so dejected!

 

And now it is we, the patrons of the Buck & Hog who are defected for our dear local pub is to close to make way for the building to be revamped and sold. It is goodbye to our fellow patrons who will no doubt find another watering hole and take their vibrant and amusing conversation with them. More importantly it is goodbye to our favourite Mine Hostess and our favourite bar lady. But these are strong women and the sadness will pass and their lives will move on as mine has, with new doors to open.

YELLOW SUBMARINE AND A HUGE UPSIDE DOWN PUDDING!

In the early hours of one morning as I lay wakeful the radio played that catchy track Yellow Submarine and I was once more in the Kgaligadi in Botswana. Each year the Watson family who have a Toyota dealership in the town of Serowe in Botswana invite British university students to spend three months teaching in the local schools. The family owned at that time a beautiful lodge, Le Roo La Tau – the place of the lion, near Kumaga on the edge of the Magadigadi pans.

Serowe is an interesting village that sprawls over the hillsides. King Khama 111 made it his capital in 1902.The Thathaganyana Hill is the resting place of the Khama dynasty. On King Khama’s grave stands a statue of a duiker, a dainty small antelope. It is believed that this small creature saved the King’s life from his enemies by alerting him to approaching danger. Seretse Khama and his wife Ruth are buried here. This is a sacred place and permission should be sought from the tribal police to visit it.

Just outside Serowe is the Khama rhino sanctuary, dear to my heart. There are chalets and ablutions and campsites beneath large trees and  braai (barbecue) facilities. Birdlife is prolific with very tame visitors like yellow billed hornbills and glossy backed starlings. The park is sanctuary to white rhinos and is guarded by the Botswana Defence Force.

When the students’ time of teaching ends Norma Watson treats the students to a safari into the Okavango Delta. Celebrating the end of their teaching period and the beginning of a safari, they quaffed beer at the bar near their camping ground. Full of youthful spirits, chatting about their experience, they left just before dark to navigate down the sand track that led to their camp. In the middle of the track lay a large male lion! The sight of the dangerous animal brought them to an abrupt halt knowing full well that it was out of the question to turn tail and run as that would instantly turn them into prey. Spontaneously they burst into a rendition of We are a Yellow Submarine! The amazed male lion got up, shook his magnificent mane and retreated from these obviously mad humans.

Steve, the manager of Le Roo la Tau was to be their guide into the delta and he asked me along. I was at the time working on the guide book Discovering Botswana with my dauthter, Susan Loftus and we thought the safari would make a good article. Our time went well through Moremi with plenty of sightings. This is my all time favourite reserve with varied habitat and one camps without any fences so the wild animals can walk through the camp at any time. Well I remember taking a friend, Andrew de Jager on a safari there and while we were seated having a leisurely lunch a male elephant strolled past only a yard or so from us. Andrew was amazed to say the least and reached for his beer when the elephant had passed!

We stopped at Khwai village before attempting the long trek to Kasane. The village is home to quite a few little spaza shops, little corrugated iron buildings stocking basics. The students crowded in, their sparten budget diet had obviously developed a craving for sweets! Noticing this I decided to cook them a pudding.

Our family favourite pudding is upside down cake which never has the time to be turned upside down before it is devoured. The base of the cake is melted butter and cinnamon and sugar and if that does not give enough goo to the bottom of the cake I am in trouble. On this is laid fruit with my family insisting on guavas but anything else can be used. On top is a basic hot milk sponge mix and baked in the oven.

Well no guavas were to be had in the spaza shops, but a couple of tins of peaches. Flour now, but no cake flour so I bought bread flour. No cinnamon or butter so I bought golden syrup and yes there was baking powder.

That evening Steve dug a hole and lined it with coals and my huge cake in a large cast iron black pot was settled on these with some more coals scattered on its lid. I was anxious that the heavy bread flour would not rise and be doughy and heavy but no! When the lid was lifted the smell was wonderful and I have never seen such a large cake disappear so quickly!

RECIPE FOR UPSIDE DOWN PUDDING.

¼ cup butter

½ cup brown sugar

2 teaspoons cinnamon

Put these well mixed into a deep baking dish either metal or ovenproof  dish. Place in the oven until all is melted together. Sugar will still be grainy. Remove from oven and put a layer of fruit. Bananas, tinned peaches or fresh, tinned guavas or pineapple either tinned or fresh and you can add some cherries to the latter.

Hot milk sponge.

2 extra large eggs

1 cup sugar

1 cup flour

½ tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla essence

½ cup hot milk

1 tablespoon of butter.

Beat eggs. Add sugar beat again. Add dry ingredients. Add vanilla. Heat the milk and add the butter until just before boiling. Fold into the rest gently. The mixture will be thin. Pour over the fruit. Bake in 180 for 40 minutes or so. A skewer inserted should come out dry when ready.

Enjoy!