Mountains

This is what we spent the weekend doing - soaking up the last summer rays in the best possible way.

Swimming in mountain pools, hiking, lazing about in the sun and eating good food.

Spiced Chocolate and Figs

Another birthday called for another cake...

This one was a spiced chocolate cake (pimento allspice, cinnamon and a touch of nutmeg) with a cream cheese icing and fresh figs to top it all off!

What better food than a food synonymous with romance (that's figs) for my love's birthday!

The cake recipe was from here and the icing is simple: 250g of good quality cream cheese, 2,5 cups of icing sugar and about 2 tbsp of butter all whisked together until light and ceamy.

Whisked Away on the Rails

On Monday, Curtis 'gave' me my birthday present - a trip on an old steam engine from the 1930's! 

The organisation Friends of the Rail restores old steam trains and every so often they do a trip for the public. It was so much fun, we explored the old station, watched the huge fire where they shovel in the coal to keep it all going and enjoyed the 'choo-choooo' at every passing station (yes - it really went 'choo chooo'!  We spent the day in Cullinan -a sweet little town with just enough to explore for a few hours. Plenty of quaint restaurants and some lovely green spaces! A picnic under a tree, a coffee and a stroll later, we were back on the train en route home.

It was the perfect day!

A Field of Wild Flowers

After one of the best birthday weekends (I am now the ripe old age of 23) - Curtis and I ended it off with a walk through Delta. The wild cosmos was out in full (and very high) bloom!

 Winter is on its way, which is fine by me most of the time, but when you can spend a lazy afternoon walking in the sun, through head high cosmos fields - you kind of wish it would hold out a bit longer...

Wedding Fever

This last weekend was the second wedding of the month for Curtis and I...

The first was a full on two day African celebration with 300 people, Curtis was (as always) a charmer as the best man; wedding was complete with 'pre-drinks' for day two at a Soweto shebeen.

The second was a delightful and small Afrikaans affair with sokkie'ing galore; 70 people at the perfectly simple Imperfect Perfection in Pretoria.

What would the month of love be without a double-whammy of weddings eh?!?
Mzi & Lydia and JP & Melissa - it was so special to celebrate with you!

Boys and a Bubble Machine

I couldn't resist putting up these photo's Curtis took of his nephew and brother...
Yes 25yr old Curtis has a 3yr old brother: thats giving laatlammetjie a whole new meaning!

A moody photo for a moody mood...

My beautifully handsome love...

A girls gotta do what a girls gotta do! And in this case its showing off my Curtis.
Ok and in truth the moody mood I am in and the moody mood of this photo are very different but alas, I like this photo!

Exploring

I think it was the Getaway Photographer that I read a brilliant article in a while ago about urban photography and Curt and I have always thought trying out our urban photography skills would be fun... both being nature lovers (for lack of a better/less cliche phrase), up until now all our ''photo expeditions had been centered around the outdoors. So we decided to start small and spent a few hours one weekend exploring Wits, here is the result...

Wits is somewhere I spend my entire week but it somehow becomes completely new when you are not working up a sweat speed-walking up "the hill" (Witsies you'll know what Im talking about!) to get to an 8am lecture on time or some other very banal varsity past time.

Hiking in Mondeor... yes you heard me!

Induced by nature cravings I stumbled upon this handy site, footprint.co.za, and boy is it awesome! While the site itself is far from the forefront of design ingenious, it is very handy! It has lists of hikes, from day trails to long overnighters, al with good reviews, and is even organised into provinces...

So when we were sitting at home craving the outdoors, cravings that exceeded the likes of the picnic-enthused occupants of Emmarentia dam or the dog-loving crews of Delta Park [don't get me wrong, I frequently fall into both of those categories] we went a-searching and found out that we have over 600 hectares of conserved beauty just around the corner. Opting to not do the 2 hour drive to Magaliesberg we hopped onto the highway and in no time found ourselves at the surprisingly beautiful Klipriviersberg. 

Here is a little bit of  our day:

Bushfire 2011 - Maksimam Respect

This post is long long overdue but always better late then never...
Had one of the best weekends in a long time at the end of May in none other than the beautiful country within a country of Swaziland!

Abi, Thabs, the Lover and I all headed out in Big Blue (affectionate name we have for my moms - how should I say - "tired" looking Toyota Condor) and after a picnic on the lawn of a house in 'Random Small Town Name That I Cant Remember', a very smooth border crossing (and for the record - best southern african border toilets I have ever used) and a bumpy potholed drive (whats any road trip in Africa without that thrown in the mix?!) we arrived at the venue of the Bushfire festival - House on Fire!

Words cannot describe the total and utter radness of the venue, the music!!! and the non-stop vibe... picture a perpetual carpet of Swazi Gold, only brief moments between making new friends, smells and sounds and incredible artists; highlights definitely go to local flavour: Tidal Waves - big up big up, Zimbabwean legend: Oliver Mtukudzi and the breath of fresh air: Tonik (another post on Tonik to follow)!

In conclusion: 25 - 27 May, 2012 anyone??

A Delightful Day

On Sunday (Mothers Day), we went for a Dawson-Cosser style (i.e. a giant pasta salad taken to the park in a huge wooden serving bowl, with a couple jugs of ice tea and the relevant crockery in a cardboard box) picnic at Delta Park...  aka my happy place.

Taking a stroll around the dam.

Gliding in the glisten.

Beautiful weather reflected.

My love, Duncan, Me, Abi, Mike.

"Don't all puppies have a skew ear?"

Perfection.

Shot for the gorgeous weather Big Guy!

Inspired

Curtis and I spent an afternoon soaking up the late afternoon sun and taking some "Max Wanger inspired/with a newbie photography twist' photos:

aka they worked out well (in my opinion at least) with only some 'starting out' knowledge, a lot of 'winging' it and some delightful help from good old mother nature...