Day 363 / 128

Date: 10 April 2023
Sleeping location: Cornerway House, Plettenberg Bay, South Africa
Distance (km today/total/total Part 2): 40 / 22662 / 7825
Estimated climb (m today/total/total Part 2): 400 / 213700 / 95700
Wet legs: 8x
Day in three words: Nature and nurture

Before breakfast we went for a walk around the beach and lagoon, which was all very dramatic under moody skies and with some gusty winds (again). To get to a secret bit of the beach we had to wade across the little river flowing out of the lagoon, all good fun with water up to our knees and seemingly higher on the way back over. After breakfast (fairly simple bacon and eggs, fruit and cereal, enhanced by conversation with the owner Daniel and a beautiful white dog to pet: 7/10) I discovered my rear tyre was flat again. By this point I was getting rather nihilistic about the whole thing; clearly the tyre is compromised, and I’d have swapped it out for the spare that I’d been pointlessly carrying for 7,500km had I not posted it on to Cape Town. I pushed the problem down the road by pumping it up and committing to repairing it later in the day.

With everything packed up we cycled back to the previous evening’s restaurant and left the bikes there to go on a second, longer walk. The path climbed up a hill through low trees, up to a viewpoint which gave great views back over the town and its beautiful setting, then continued over the hill to another secret beach hidden in a cove with a river running into it. We were the only people out and it was lovely and peaceful. From here the official path was, according to a sign, way too dangerous but we took it anyway and it was absolutely fine. It ran along the cliff edge before dropping down to a section along the rocks which was only accessible close to low tide unless you were some kind of aquatic mammal. Thankfully it was close to low tide so we could take it, and it was very scenic with wild waves bashing onto the shore close to us and a sea of white foam amongst the rocks. My dad also got very excited by various butterflies that were being buffeted around by the winds, poor little creatures, although I suppose they do choose to live by the sea. 

Back at the bike we had some hot drinks whilst the wind picked up even more, then set off just as the rain came. After a quiet climb out of Nature's Valley the rest of the journey was fairly miserable - on the busy N2 with strong gusting winds and on and off showers. Thankfully we only had 20km or so to go, so we just got on with it as there was nothing else to do. Plettenberg Bay was in a beautiful natural setting, with a big beach under hills, but was very fancy and developed and a stark counterpoint to the few houses amongst the forest and empty beach that was Nature’s Valley. Out of the wind and showers we had a nice lunch close to our B&B and restored our satisfaction with life (or I did, anyway, dad always seems pretty satisfied). Here we also got chatting to a few people about our journeys, which hadn’t happened for a few days whilst we had been in tourist land. 

We rolled up to the very pretty and peaceful B&B mid afternoon and I had my by-now-daily bath, then relaxed for a couple of hours, did some blogging and redid my patch on Maggie’s rear tyre. If this one fails so might my sanity. In the evening we walked out to another brewery, which was surprisingly fancy and pretty tasty. The food and beer since PE has been consistently good, I am spending way over my budget but it's been worth it.