This morning, after struggling for ages to pack my tent away, I drove out of the village feeling warm and fuzzy and so happy that I’d stopped over instead of pushing through to De Rust. There was a sign saying “CBD, deli, coffee shop” which surprised me and gave me new-found respect for the hippiness of this little Karoo dorp. Of course, it might have meant coffee in the centre of town, but I like to keep my reality on the edge of fantasy.
I realised 5km out that I would need more than my quarter tank of petrol to get to the Cango Caves so I turned around and drove back, and that’s when all of my illusions were shattered into a thousand pieces. There was the sign, outside the local theatre: “Steve Hoffmeyer – Live”. I was so shocked. “Is he?” I thought. “Is he still alive, after all of the racist, bigoted, white privileged nonsense he so readily shares with the public?” Just goes to show what a tolerant and accepting society we have here in South Africa. If you don’t count Steve of course. And then I saw the sign for the local tannery and that sent me into an even worse tailspin. As a vegetarian with a bit of a leather fetish, I don’t need to see signs like that. It brings my hovering existential crisis to within touching distance of the void. And now I see the signs everywhere! I’m so excited. I’m so sad. I’m so confused. I love the Karoo. I’m not so sure.
Predictably today I took a wrong turn and instead of driving to Oudshoorn and on to the Cango Caves, I ended up going via De Rust after all. It was such a beautiful drive through the arid Karoo countryside that I didn’t regret it for a moment. I tried to take normal photos of the landscape, but every photo looked like a Pierneef painting, and I started to wonder what the fuss was all about. The colours of the Karoo are exactly those magical colours in his paintings. The contours of the hills and the way they overlay each other; it’s exactly what it looks like in his paintings. Realism. Who knew? So ok, I know nothing about art, you can probably tell, but the Karoo is certainly beautiful.
After hours of driving, I finally arrived at the Caves and was treated to a personal tour by Leslie, an extremely knowledgeable tour guide. Because of Covid-19 there are just no tourists anymore. Just me. He insisted on calling me Ma’am even after I told him my name. It’s the Karoo. Nobody for miles. I needed a buddy, but no, I was still ma’am. The caves are spectacular! This is nature, the artist, showing off! As a pan-psychic (possibly… haven’t decided yet. Does that make me agnostic? I’m not sure) I feel that I created this reality just by showing up, being here and witnessing this. Leslie said it’s been here for 1.5 million years, but perhaps it appeared for a second and then was gone again. Time does fly when you’re having fun. Oh, and to make it all doubly worthwhile Sydney, the car guard, washed my car while I was busy doing the tour. Amazing!
On my way back, towards what I assumed was my next camping spot, I stopped in Oudshoorn for supplies. Oudshoorn is a town only for supplies. Nothing exciting that I could see. Ostriches maybe? And my neighbour tells me that they sell amazing salted olives somewhere nearby. I think I saw a tannery sign. But I did have such a laugh in the Pick n Pay. So loud that one of the packers stopped packing to stare at this crazy woman. Only in Oudshoorn, and maybe every other small dorp in South Africa (I’ll let you know) would this happen. They were playing a song with lyrics about how sad this poor guy was… he didn’t know what to do… because his wife had left him for his girlfriend. That wasn’t the funny part. The funny part was the very butch looking coloured guy dancing like a sakkie sakkie queen to this boertjie boy song, down the hardware isle. Steve would have platzed doll! So there we have a very concentrated collection of stereotyped imagery. Karen’s freaking out now because I’m not on social media and she has no way to vent her controlling impulses. Wait. It’s only Day 2!
