Walk to Peer's Cave

I find it very satisfying to go for a walk from home without having to drive first. On a windy Wednesday, late afternoon, we set off from a suburb in Fish Hoek and headed off towards Clovelly. Lovely dune vegetation: shrubs and grasses - and some big stumps and piles of brushwood indicating a successful alien clearing job done a few years ago.


Metalasia muricata (Blombos) in the foreground


Pretty balloon seeds on Lessertia frutescens, the Cancer Bush. On another bush nearby the seed pods were papery dry and made a rustling sound. As I stepped through the long grass I yelped! - thought it was a snake. Further along there were a few pretty Moraeas - flowering rather late in the season.

After walking through dry vegetation where every plant is adapted to conserve water - leaves are minimised, grey or the margins are rolled under - the emerald green Clovelly golf course looked so alien - was I hallucinating?


The reality is that in this wind-swept, sandy, dry environment, a few acres of water-guzzling kikuyu grass are meticulously fertilised, watered and mowed. A large amount of resources are used (squandered?) for the pleasure of a handful of people. Cape Town is facing serious water shortages and yet golf courses are still allowed to use potable water. It seems crazy. It feels wrong.


Anyway after crossing the Silvermyn stream we headed up the valley on a gravel road towards Ou Kaapseweg. Lovely views towards False Bay.


After a few hundred meters on Ou Kaapseweg we turned off towards Peers Cave.

Got to leave - back on january. More later!

We stepped over a beautiful old Wild Camphor - usually a bush, here a magnificent tree with a proper trunk.