A grand day out!

Now that the children are at school but David still works over the weekends (as that is when people are available to attend workshops and study groups), it has been hard to get a day off together as a family. But now it is the school holidays and, armed with a friend's GPS, we set off yesterday on an adventure.

We drove North for nearly 2 hours, along the desert/coast road which is made of sand and salt. We stopped at one point to look at a ship wreck, and another place to look at rose quartz (see the children's blog).

"Keep an eye open for a road to the East", says David.

Then the GPS arrow points East, into NOTHING! But there are a few tyre tracks (which may constitute a road if you are very imaginative!) so we head out into the desert and hope we won't have a breakdown!

We career along the sandy wilderness, trusting the GPS which assures us we are nearly there.

In the middle of nowhere, we are informed by the GPS that we have arrived! We climb out of the car and there, torn out of the barren landscape is an abandoned open mine. In its depths lies green water.

A number of people have told us about Die Sout Gat (the Salt Hole) but no one has been able to tell us where it is. We so wanted to go there and experience the Dead Sea sensation of lying ON the water!

"There are no sign posts", we were told. This proved to be true.

"It is in the middle of nowhere", we were told. This also proved to be true.

"Take stacks of water. You will need to rinse yourselves off afterwards", we were told. This proved to be very true.

"It is worth the trip!" Indeed it was.

The vast desert.

The silence.

The lack of mobile/cell reception.

The presence of good company - we also had Aune with us.

What a great way for me to celebrate my birthday with my family.

Étienne was especially enamoured with the feeling of a sort of weightlessness.

David fell asleep, floating on his back - though he assures us he WAS awake!

So, a good time was had by all.