During our February weekend away in Jacobsbaai, while the rest of the crowd were enjoying their trips on the festival wagons, I thought it a good idea to drive out with the girls to go and have a look at the Cape Columbine Lighthouse in the Cape Columbine nature reserve next to Paternoster.
The drive to Paternoster through Vredenburg went smoothly enough, and amazingly I found the road to the Cape Columbine nature reserve easily enough – unfortunately for me and the Hyundai Accent though, no one had bothered to mention that it was a rutted sand road to get there!
The road was bumpy as heck, so much so that Emily was crying pretty much the whole way, and more than a few times I considered stopping to turn around and head back, but with the lighthouse teasing us on in the distance, Jessica and I opted to push on and endure both the bumpy dusty ride and Emily’s incessant crying.
After a slow and lengthy drive, we made it to the entrance of the nature reserve, where it was pointed out that one needed to pay a small entrance fee to go inside (for interest sake, Tietiesbaai, a popular fishing spot, also lies inside the park).
Problem. It turned out that my wallet was completely devoid of cash! The ranger at the gate laughed when I asked if they accept credit cards, but agreed to let me slip in after I explained to him that I just wanted to show off the lighthouse to the girls. (The crutches next to me and lack of fishing gear helped I think!)
A lot more gravel and sand road travelled, we eventually reached our destination and turned into the lighthouse complex, only to be stopped by a closed gate – and a sign that very clearly pointed out that the lighthouse was only open to visitors during the week!
Oops.
Needless to say, Jessica was not impressed!
We drove around the nature reserve a little more, I took some photos, and Emily stopped caring and started snoring instead.
So we made the long sand road trek back to Paternoster, drove around a bit, and then headed back to Vredenburg where I treated the girls to some play time and pizza at the great Panarottis restaurant in the West Coast Mall.
They seemed to enjoy that much more than our lighthouse expedition anyway.
Related Link: Cape Columbine Lighthouse