Gauteng Guides Association

Good people make a trip so easy and a pleasure to guide! And it doesn’t take much, just plain old good manners and an understanding and experience base that comes from much travelling around. And being English also helps!

My last trip took us from the lowveld through Swaziland to the ever lovely Ghost Mountain Inn; through beautiful KZN with its patchwork of swish green and alternating dirt brown drought areas to another perennial favourite of mine – Goble Palms in Durban. A surprising highlight was a tour of the newly built stadium in Durban named after a previous secretary general of the communist party no less (Moses Mabhida)! Very impressive and a wonderfully atmospheric place. Strange that they should have only 10 jacuzzis in the teams changerooms (thought soccer teams had 11 players?). Perhaps the goalie doesn’t deserve one.

The architecture is absolutely breathtaking and the open spaces are beautifully planned. Pity we couldn’t get up on the huge arch to see the view but the wind was pummelling the stadium. Do they do tours of Soccer City in Joburg? Then on to uShaka in the pouring rain and impressed yet again by the ingenuity of the design and huge diversity of strange fishes etc.

The Wild Coast at Mbotyi is really a masterpiece of scenic beauty and the rolling hills just bounce one’s emotions around. Did you know that the largest tea plantation in South Africa is on 1 400 ha around the coastal area of Mbotyi? Did a tour of the factory and was stunned at how naïve I was regarding the drying and processing of the tea leaves and was equally interested to find out that teabags are made from the sweepings and lower grade tea! Always go for the loose tea leaves!

By the way, the Nelson Mandela Museum in Mthatha has been upgraded and now looks a lot better (not as tatty as before) and is well worth a visit. More than I can say for the Qunu part of the museum, just no substance! Then on to my birthplace with it’s unique architecture that I never appreciated as a boy growing up and running around in my Selborne blazer. Such a different way of life as well with the beach and open spaces never far from where you are. Quarry Lake Inn is still a great place to stay!

What an absolutely amazing place Grahamstown is and a late afternoon jog around town revealed the plethora of beautiful architectural gems on almost every street. Stayed at 7 on Worcester which is a huge stone guesthouse dating back to about 1840 which is really luxurious but oddly with no fans or air conditioning. Very strange when you have butlers and all sorts of ultra luxurious fittings. A highlight and something that is a tremendous privilege, is to do a tour with Alan Weyer who is a fantastic storyteller in the vein of the late David Rattray and is so passionate and knowledgeable about the Eastern Cape that it is infectious and I now want to start reading more about this area. It is worth going down there just for his day excursion or even better, 2 day excursions concentrating on the 9 Frontier Wars!

Port Elizabeth is also much maligned place but has a great waterfront/beachfront area with kilometres of wide jogging/cycling paths and also a really beautiful series of wide roads with impressive houses. The city centre really needs attention as the buildings are in a shocking state and are very dilapidated and almost in ruins. Shame on the city fathers for letting that happen. They should take a leaf out of Grahamstown’s book! By the way, try the 5th Avenue Beach House (their new rooms are really a cut above the rest).

So many places, so little time!