Tag: antiques

Clarens is Sort of Like the Southwest in South Africa

M's Adventures
Golden Gate Park has lots of hiking trails.

Do you love the Southwest of the USA? But wish it was in South Africa? Then you are in luck! Here are some of the things to do in Clarens, South Africa. The Golden Gate National Park is right there, and this town is near Lesotho, so it makes for a good stopping point. The area has a frontier, southwest USA, feel to it. It’s about fours from Pretoria.

Golden Gate Park.

Cheese tasting at Baris: This farm cheese shop is so fun. Go for lunch and order a cheese tasting.

Cheese tasting platter at Baris.

Hiking: This is the real reason many people visit this area.

Gorgeous sunset in Golden Gate Park.

Gin tasting: At Clarens Brewery, they have a gin store, Junipers Craft Gin Bar, and they do tastings (plus they have some yummy food including their ‘chips’ or fries and they have Bunny Chow, a curry-in-a-loaf-of-bread specialty of South Africa.

View over my Bunny Chow.

Shopping: Lots of artwork, souvenirs, cards, clothes, and gin. I almost bought paintings by this local artist, Johan Smith. There are other cute shops including the Purple Onion. Make sure to check them all out. They are all next to each other. Everything from art, fudge, cards, shoes, clothes, and antiques.

Clarens has a Southwest wild west feel.

Entertainment: This town has live entertainment including a local guy who is famous in this local town.

Old timey feel at Purple Onion.

Eating: Surprisingly good restaurants for such a small town. The Italian one, Bocca di Lupo, run by a guy from Bologna, is divine. Excellent pizza and pasta.

Spicy spaghetti.

Sleeping: You can stay in a castle. I stayed at the Protea, a Marriott hotel because it was about four minutes downhill by food from the Clarens square with the shops and restaurants. Made for an easy commute after shopping or eating.

The shop at Highland Brew.

Outside of the town of Clarens, there are other things to do and see. Other than the cheese place, there is also a dinosaur center. If you want another cafe with views of the mountains and hiking areas, check out Highland Brew. It has food and drink, plus a shop selling jam and coffee.

Annapolis Tourist and a Time Traveler

M's Adventures

Annapolis is the capital of Maryland and makes for an easy tourist outing from Washington, located just 30 miles to the east. One day, we went. It was a perfect day with blue skies and light breezes.

The downtown is adorable. Parking is not. One of the main attractions is the Naval Academy.

Lots of shops and antiques to gasp at.

There are boat tours and water taxis.

We ate on the south side and while it was quieter, we did not think the food was anything special.

We did stop at a cafe, Curated, and that was lovely. A young golden haired youth was sitting at the next table reading a Torah, a copy of Milton’s works, and a notebook in which he was taking concise notes with an old fashioned ink pen. No cell phone in sight. I wondered if he was a wraith, a time traveler, dropped into our world by the fumes of my coffee… it turned out that he was studying the connection between Milton’s assertions about the role of poetry in the Torah. He was going to do a doctoral thesis on this. We talked briefly about poetry. Then he left us to our breakfast. A bit later, a very modern young woman, cell phone attached to hand, sat down next to him. She asked what he was doing. He told her. At the blank look on her face, he asked if she had heard of Milton’s Paradise Lost. She said that she thought she had. Clearly no spark there. She got up and left quickly after that.

I remarked to my friend that artsy young men like that one were so unusual in the greater Washington area but probably not so out of place in New York City.

From inside Curate cafe.

If you visit Annapolis, you might not meet any interesting scholars, but you can absorb the history anyway.