Day 293 May 25 2015 Port St. Johns South Africa

gym class

our four legged guides

the trail to the next beach

a stop to watch the waves

I just had to go past!

the ladder into the gap

Day 293  May 25 2015  Port St. Johns  South Africa

We went for a hike from our hotel to a beach in a nature reserve.  The entire walk was along the ocean and was very picturesque.  The dogs from the hotel accompanied us on our walk. They also showed up on our deck every time we started preparing food.  In the afternoon we went to a place called “The Gap and the Blow Hole”.  It is a place where the water has worn a hole in the rocks and shoots up like a geyser with the waves.  We were expecting an easy walk to see it.  When we arrived there was a warning sign saying do not go past this point which I promptly ignored.  We followed the path to the edge of a cliff where we found an old pipe imbedded in the ground with a steel cable attached to it.  The cable was rusted through where it had one wrapped around the pipe and was now attached to the pipe with some very questionable ropes tied with even more questionable knots.  Evy forbade David from proceeding any further and told me not to go.  I kept going and climbed down the rocks until I came to an old ladder and then climbed down the ladder.  I could not see the blow hole but did see a ruined ladder going up a rock formation on the other side.  The ladder was not usable and the trail to the ladder seemed unused so I did not try to proceed as it was definitely not safe.  I returned up the ladder that I had just descended only to discover that the top rung had been “repaired” with some very small plastic ties.   I was happy that David did not come with me as it was a lot harder getting back up the rocks than it was getting down them.   When I did arrive back at the top Evy was mad at me for not listening to her as she thought what I had done was not safe (she might have been right).  In the evening we had another candle light dinner as the power went out just as we were getting ready to cook supper.  We ended up cooking the entire meal on the grill, it was fantastic.