Day 580 – About Sunday lunch

The Restaurant at Clos Malverne was our choice. Fancy, without being too avant garde; keeping a family-friendly feel, but still with some amazing food.

And if you book early, you can get a terrace table.
Here’s why that’s a good idea

[Oops. I’ve just realised that I’m trying to upload a 61MP pano. Let me sort that out with my new resize option. Then you can enjoy the view like we did. There’s it.]

Cajun soft-shelled crab for starters: amazing flavours and textures, followed by their fillet: good quality, simple food done really well. (But also medium rare, obviously.) A bottle of their really good Auret to go with it.
And Mrs 6000 got some extra treats for her birthday. Perfect.

This one drops neatly into the 6000 Recommends… category.

Day 511 – Animal pics

I promised a while back to get some more photos edited and uploaded and lawd bless ma soul, I have done it.

Here they are! Yes, mainly animal pics because we were very much there (which was here) to look at animals.
Some animal pics are better than others; some really good, some not so good, but these are the ones that I liked.

Inverdoorn is a private game reserve in the Karoo. It’s not deepest, darkest, wildest Africa. But it does offer the opportunity to see – and get close to – some really amazing animals that you might see in DDWA. They also do a lot of rehabilitation work, especially with their cheetahs, and with really good deals for locals (no, this isn’t a sponsored post) at the moment, it’s a whole lot cheaper (and a whole lot less hassle) than heading up north.

But of course, up north has its benefits too and personally, I think it’s unfair to compare this with a Kruger trip (and they probably shouldn’t try to on their website), but as a really easy standalone weekend away from Cape Town, with good food, good drink, great accommodation and the chance to see some big animals, I’d totally recommend it. Covid protocols were really well-observed, too.

But you weren’t here for my thoughts on the place. You just wanted to see the animal photos, right?

Right.

Day 401 – About last night

Last night, we went out for a meal together for the first time in ages. And what a meal.

Treated by the owners of The Black Sheep in town to an amazing, special, one-off tasting menu. 8 courses, and literally some of the best dishes that we have ever tasted. Truly incredible food, which Jonny was coming up with on the fly: finding and combining ingredients in the kitchen like some sort of grey-bearded Harry Potter.
It really was magical stuff, and a wonderful way to celebrate 16 (sixteen) years of marriage.

10/10 would recommend. I’m already planning our next trip to the City Bowl.

Day 399 – Taskmaster update

Taskmaster is probably – or maybe even definitely – the best show on TV at the moment, and quite possibly for the last n years. I’m really enjoying the latest series (S11). Literal tears of laughter. This is in no small part to the presence of comedian and actor Mike Wozniak (he’s not the short one out of Monsters Inc., no), who is genuinely hilarious. We’re talking Bob Mortimer levels of comedy here. And that’s a pretty amazing complement.

If you haven’t seen the programme, it’s basically a competition between 5 celebs per series, trying to outdo each other each week, in performing (generally very silly) tasks. Also, if you haven’t seen the programme, you need to head to their Youtube channel and start your catching up right now. Right now.

And while it’s far from all toilet humour, there’s always going to be a bit of that, obviously.

“Oh, it’s an absolute casserole down there”.

Brilliant.

Day 344 – Wise move

The new house continues to be made better (IMHO, at least) bit by bit.
Fridge plumbed in yesterday. Electrics and plumbing being sorted on Monday. Pool on Tuesday.

But better costs money and so whenever you can save a bit, you do your best to save a bit.
Sometimes you have to spend a bit to save a bit (more) and that’s exactly what I did today, by getting a Geyserwise installed.

Here’s their website.

We had one of these at our last place and it paid for itself inside 6 weeks.

A quick explanation. Your geyser is your water heater and generally in South African houses, it’s in your loft and it’s on 24/7. This is great for when you want a quick shower at unusual o’clock, but it does cost an awful lot to repeatedly heat a couple of hundred litres of water that you’re probably never going to use.

Sure, you have a thermostat on the geyser, but that’s often very awkward to get to if you want to change it, and sure you can put a timer on your electrical distribution board, but that’s often very awkward to get to if you want to change it.

Geyserwise is simply both those things on a handy digital panel tucked in a cupboard on the landing. So our water is now heated for 2 hours each day instead of 24, and to 55ºC instead of 75. And if we ever need to change those times, that temperature, or simply override it because the beagle has rolled in some more mud and we need a quick blast of hot water for an unplanned bath, it’s a simple press of a button.

Absolute no-brainer.

Our Geyserwise was installed by Kozanai from Mudi Plumbing Services: 078 999 1893. He was quick, friendly and efficient. Thoroughly recommended.

R1550 all done. We’ll have recouped that and be saving money before the end of April.