I’m getting worse and worse at putting out these weekend in review posts you know. I’ve still got to talk a bit about the karate camp I attended at the beginning of the month as well as our weekend away at Warmwaterberg Spa, but I guess I’ll get to those when I get to those. Now apart from clocking Batman: Arkham Asylum the past weekend, the other highlights now doubt have to include the multitude of hours visiting with almost all our friends over the course of just about the entire weekend!
So let’s get started then. Despite being invited to attend the bubbly karateka Finja’s farewell party on Friday night (she’s finally returned to her home in Germany), Chantelle and I were forced to unfortunately cancel thanks to the utter exhaustion that had claimed us following a hard week that had just gone by. Most of Saturday too was spent in recovery mode and thanks to the discovery that Avatar is just too damn popular to be able to watch willy nilly, we ended up only making our way through to Bellville far, far later than originally planned. A quick stop to pick up our meat and drink, Ryan’s birthday present and have a quick look about for our four-slice toaster at both Willowbridge and Tygervalley, was followed by our triumphant appearance at Ryan’s first ever house-warming/birthday braai at his Oakdale pad – attended by the Stapelbergs, Mr. Brown, Dr. Storbeck, the Carpenters, Michelle and kid, Adam and his wife as well as some other former colleagues of Ryan.
With Riley tending to the Weber (where he managed to dip my boerewors in the coals), the rest of us got to drink, eat snacks and gently poke fun at Ryan who seems to be suffering with a bout of bladder infection (read kidney stones), and in the end, all enjoy a great social night out. It was good to see Riley and Claire in particular again, having not seen them in absolute ages: Apparently Riley’s kung fu is still going strong, making him the perfect candidate to join us when the Shaolin Monks show eventually rolls into town… (hint hint, nudge nudge).
Crashing at Mom and Dad’s place, Chantelle and I woke up to Mom and Pops returning from church, and after a freezing wake up dip in the pool (well, only I was brave enough apparently), we all headed out to Willowbridge where we enjoyed a great breakfast (sans croissants) at the Primi Corse cafe under a beautiful summer’s day sky. Just a note, those big cups that Primi boast about on their menu really are that ginormous in real life – and virtually indestructible it would seem following our waiter dropping one during the course of the morning!
From Mom and Dad it was then time to meet up with the next group of friends and so Chantelle and I found ourselves travelling through to the Nitida wine farm on the Durbanville Wine Route where we met up with Andri, Malcolm and little Corban for a delicious lunch in a very open, tented, family-friendly environment. Another note though: Keith’s famous curry chicken is pretty damn hot! (And by hot I mean lots of drinking water hot!).
Oh, and the Nitida Sauvignon Blanc is actually pretty damn flavoursome to boot!
Bidding our farewells after a fantastic visit with the Jacks, it was then off to the Montgomery Clan Stronghold for yet another visitation and the dropping off of Monty’s freshly populated newly purchased photo frame – the last one didn’t last too long in the end thanks to blown internal memory! Coffee and gossip were as always the focus of the visit, and once again we enjoyed a thoroughly entertaining stop-over with the Montgomeries. However, we still weren’t done and with the last legs of the day now in full swing, Chantelle and I headed down to Mugg & Bean at Tygervalley in order to visit with… the Smiths of all people!
Triumphant in snagging an audience with these usually elusive friends of ours, we ended up spending a good hour or two catching up and drinking copious amounts of coffee with Wayne and Candice – and tucking into Mugg & Bean’s famous giant muffins of course! ;)
Anyway, Sunday finally closed off with the long drive back home, but as per usual Chantelle and I were more than a little pleased with our work rate for the weekend – 5 audiences in a day and a half isn’t bad at all, wouldn’t you say? (And like I mentioned, I STILL managed to squeeze in clocking Batman as well! Salute! :P)
Master Jack certainly enjoyed making friends and running around the family friendly Nitida tented eatery... (Note Malcolm's hand desperately trying to keep him in one place long enough so that a photo could be snapped!)
Meanwhile on the other side of the table... a month's worth of gossip to catch up on turns out to be quite a bit! ;)
The food did eventually arrive just by the way.
The famous chicken curry. It. was. hot.