So clearly thanks to the current COVID-19 global pandemic and South Africa’s quickly (and rightfully) imposed lockdown, there hasn’t been much traipsing outside at all, never mind actually getting to properly celebrate the big 40 that rolled in for me on the 11th of May. A few morning strolls during our mandated exercise hours here and there, but for the most part it has just been us and the walls of our tiny (but thankfully larger than an apartment) house.
So in looking forward to the day when things somewhat return to normal (which is probably a very, very long way off), cue a bunch of photos that I snapped while ambling about the beaches of Gordon’s Bay in 2019. (Yes, this is another one of those “attempt to clear out my far too large Unposted Photos desktop folder” entries. Sorry.)
As you might recall, our diminutive little home town named after the Dutch explorer (of Scottish descent) Robert Jacob Gordon with its emblem of a giant anchor and the letters “GB” emblazoned on the side of the mountain (which coincidentally stands for General Botha, the earlier name of the small naval training base that resides in the town) is the proud owner of two small harbours, two small beaches, and thus more than one or two pretty views.
So with the 2016, 2017 and 2018 image dump posts of all the photos which aren’t linked to a blog post now sitting all safe and sound with my web host, I guess that I need to add the 2019 batch as well, seeing as we are now well and truly into 2020. (Also, sorry for not doing one of my annual Goodbye Hello posts at the start of this year – honestly they’ve become a little too routine to continue for now).
This particular selection features first days, sport, concerts and voting at Gordon’s Bay Primary School, Mark Haze at Die Boer in Durbanville, a turn at Home Affairs in Somerset West, the view from my office in Westlake, Ocean Basket’s Harbour Island View in Gordon’s Bay, the solar panel parking and delicious green curry from Wang Thai at The Sanctuary in Somerset West, wine and cheese tasting at Steenberg Vineyards, planes at the Stellenbosch Flying Club airstrip, views from Somerset Mall and the Helderberg Shopping Centre of all places, a Somerset West night time Christmas market, walks along the Lourens River, strolls along the Strand beach promenade, and of course scenes from our home here in beautiful little Gordon’s Bay.
Plus Belgian waffles – because those things are of course delightful.
With 2016 and 2017’s photo dumps already up, I now continue making a dent into the large “Unposted Photos” folder on my desktop with 2018’s batch. These are all (well mostly) photos snapped as we go about life in the Helderberg basin (Somerset West, Strand and our home town Gordon’s Bay) which simply didn’t have enough of a set to collect into (or warrant) a blog post of their own.
That said, these random life event photos are all important to me and a keepsake of a life well lived (and enjoyed), and as such posting them here is a way to safeguard their existence – after all, my laptop and its hard drive is now very old, and my ADSL isn’t nearly good enough to upload the full sized files to the cloud.
Anyway, as you can see for yourself, the Helderberg (and for that part the Western Cape itself) really isn’t a bad place to be able to call home:
So here I am, slowly but surely whittling down my very large Unposted Photos folder with another ‘A Year of’ picture dump. I rather enjoy living in a small harbour town and very much doubt that I will ever willingly elect to live far from the sea again – primarily because it makes for such picturesque living space!
Although reasonably diminutive, Gordon’s Bay is surprisingly home to two harbours and two beaches (Main and Bikini), and with a mountain overlooking it all, there is no excuse to not wander about and enjoy the scenery. Of course, working remotely like I do, there really isn’t any excuse at all!
So here are a bunch photos that I snapped while ambling about the beaches of Gordon’s Bay in 2018:
Another entry in the “slowly clear all the unposted images out of my very large Unposted Photos folder” series. I enjoy living in a small harbour town and very much doubt that I will ever willingly choose to live far from the sea again – primarily because it makes for such great (picturesque) walking routes.
Gordon’s Bay is home to two harbours and two beaches (main and bikini), with a mountain overlooking it all – so in other words scenically perfect. With me working from home, this translates into plenty of opportunity to head out for a stroll – which I invariably do.
So here is a bunch photos from 2017 documenting some of these walks along my home town beaches.
2016’s bundle of random life event photos rescued from my “Unposted Photos” folder on my laptop is already up, which means then that I’m making steady progress in making that irritating folder smaller and smaller.
Again, these photos are all important reminders of my very happy life and as such are memories that I very much want to safeguard (and share) – and posting them to my site is one way of doing this.
This then is 2017’s collection of life in the Helderberg photos that didn’t do enough to earn or simply weren’t selected for their own blog posts on this site:
I generate a lot of photos. Pretty much entirely because of this blog. As such, I have a massive trove of unposted photos which are all important reminders of my very happy life and as such are memories that I very much want to safeguard (and share). Posting it to my site is one way of doing this.
Unfortunately, not every outing and every little life event generates enough photos to make it worth posting as its own blog entry and so these little lost picture souls generally just languish for years and years in my unposted photo folder.
As you might imagine then, this folder has gotten a bit too large, and as such I’ve decided to sort through the images, split everything up into years, and do a big batch post for each one just to get the files up on the web.
I had a bit of an unexpected expense happen this year which wasn’t the most lekker of things. Back in June, after a good day behind the keyboard for Touchwork, I wrapped things up and headed off to pick the girls up from school aftercare – only to have a certain Umar Thomas in his big heavy Chevrolet Trailblazer SUV stupidly pull an illegal u-turn in front of me, floor the accelerator to get out of the way of the peak hour traffic turning our way, and then wildly careen into me, pushing me up against the sidewalk.
Seriously, he basically did a horseshoe and just took me out with him. His large Trailblazer struck me on the driver’s side, just behind the wheel arch, and shoved me up against the sidewalk wall. Luckily the accident didn’t happen at a higher speed, and luckily he didn’t hit me a few inches further past the wheel – had either of those been the case then I probably wouldn’t have walked out the car with nary a scratch like I did!
The traffic department (which is just down the road) didn’t show up, nor did the local police (they were short-staffed, I know because I phoned), but as always the amazing network of local security and emergency service companies stepped in and did their job for them.
I got Chantelle on the line (because although not hurt, the adrenaline/shock really wasn’t making me think 100% straight), asked her to phone the insurance and organize a tow truck to come out (and obviously race off to fetch the girls), swapped details with the now very remorseful Umar, and after a bit of a wait and then going through the process of actually having the car driven away by En Route Towing, drove to the police station (well obviously Chantelle did the actual driving) to fill out the necessary forms.
Sigh.
This was a little 2010 Hyundai Getz that I had the pleasure of driving new off the showroom floor, and so given its age, value, and extent of damage, it didn’t exactly come as a surprise when the insurance (DialDirect) came back with the decision to scrap.
Luckily it wasn’t all bad news though. With some unexpected monetary assistance from my boss added to the insultingly small insurance payout, I was able to replace the Getz with a very nice 2012 Hyundai i20 (sourced from Somerset Car Sales for R109,900) and so this entire misadventure ended up not putting us out of pocket (except for the natural jump in insurance premium) plus a slightly newer car out in front of the house.
That said, of the six cars that I have now owned, this is the fourth car that I’ve written off – not really a record that I’m particularly proud of!
This year we were at last able to join in the annual BP/Gordon’s Bay Primary School Family Fun Walk fundraiser, something Jessica has been keen to take part in for quite some time now. (Last year she missed out at the last minute, thanks to a cold that swooped in literally the day before!)
Our local BP petrol station does a lot of great work in support of our primary school, and this annual fun walk sees parents and kids (and anyone else that wants to join in the fun) walk a 5 km route out into the suburbs and then back to the school again.
Last year the route was apparently a bit of a nasty one in that it was all up in the steep roads behind the school (which sits at the foot of our mountain), so this year it was relief to see that the organizers had taken the commentary to heart and switched to a much more friendly flat and fast route – i.e. accessible to everyone regardless of fitness level!
Jessica and I arrived super early (expecting a massive crowd), but unfortunately the newly opened Strand Park Run (on the beach) together with the long running Somerset West Park Run (which is strangely run in rural Gordon’s Bay) ensured that this wasn’t going to be a particularly big Saturday morning event – a pity considering that this is a bit of a fundraiser for the school.
(Also, this was meant to be a colour run, but disappointingly the organizers didn’t organize very many paint packets – so most of us just had to do without. That said, a lot of people did take the yellow and green dress-up brief seriously, so that was pretty nice to see.)
Still, the crowd was big enough to make it sociable, and as for the walk itself, Jessica got a mini heart-attack when she was briefly separated from me when the crowd set off, we saw plenty of our neighbourhood friends along the route, and Jess got to walk the whole way with one of her best friends, Shaelyn.
