Liana has a thing for "padstalle", which I don't always get, but since we so our first stop was Peet se Padstal where Liana wanted to browse a little. That done, we continued a few hundred metres down the road to our first dive of the day. Jakkalsgat. What a dive it was - they don't get much better than this... Goats, ducks, geese and cats have the run of the place. The place stinks of goat urine as you enter from the road. The pub itself is filthy. And full of bric-a-brac. From old ZA flags hanging from the ceiling, to a gazillion of those little pieces of wood that people write on to put up behind the bar. The dust is probably a few metres deep in places. And there is no way I would ever eat anything prepared in that place. I'd not even use a glass - if I ordered anything to drink I would want it in its own glass or aluminum receptacle and I would want it opened before me... Anyways, it has a sort of rustic pub type attraction that appeals. I can imagine that one could get stuck there quite badly after a few Jaegermeisters. From the inscriptions on various little boards stuck behind the bar, I guess that happens often... After finishing our beer without contracting Hepatitis, we headed further West and checked in at Mabalingwe.
It was faaaar too early to set up camp, so we decided to go for a game drive first. However, with the dense undergrowth, game viewing was not successful. After driving around the park for a while, we found ourselves at dive number two. The Kalahari Oasis. It was quieter here than it was the last time I was at Mabalingwe. I approve of the fact that the bar is made out of the bodywork of some Landrover Defender. I am glad somebody decided to put the poor thing out of its misery so that it would stop pissing oil all over the planet. But the fact that they have a Toyotaholics-branded fridge behind the pub speaks volumes about the type of people who frequent the place.
The Kalahari Oasis is an anethema for me - for several reasons.
1: It's a massive kuier plek in the middle of a game park with big game.
2: It's not in the Kalahari.
3: It's signature drink is Rum and Raspberry. But it's not Moz.
After having a beer or two (I did - Liana opted for the RnR), we headed back to the caravan park and set up camp. We built the braai fire, had a few beers and chilled to the sound of Kurt Darren pumping from one of the many Toyotaholics vehicles strewn around the camp site. Despite Kurt, we were still visited by one of the camp-site's local antelope. The poor thing - being subjected to Kurt on a pretty much permanent basis... We also watched the monkeys raid the provisions from people camping across from us. I originally tried to chase them away, but after the 30th time, it got too much for me. What was I to do ? Lock all their stuff up in my car ? There are warning signs of the monkeys all over the place - I have very little sympathy... I did warn the folk about the broken glass lying all over their groundsheet (the monkeys) when they got back from the pub.
This was the last evening away. We braaied late-ish, and then turned in.
