Going Bosjes

My travel writer friend, Keith Bain, and I going on an adventure (actually, he does this kind of thing every five minutes, but I was pretty excited to get out of the house).

I hadn’t been on a press trip in years. Decades, even. Independent travel for stories, sure, but not the old school kind where you meet in a hotel for drinks and then get driven somewhere on a bus. In the old days (how did the nineties become the old days?) glamorous travel was part of the deal, and made up for the terrible wages we journalists got paid. There was so much money in print media it was nothing to fly to Joburg for lunch. You’d be back by 6pm to go to the next thing. I was sent on a luxury cruise to Australia when I was too young and green to know that my cabin, the size of a modest hotel suite, was huge by maritime standards. Once I stayed at a game lodge on the Zambezi where the bedroom had only three walls. From your bed, you looked out over the coffee-coloured river and fell asleep to the sound of hippos splashing in the shallows. The Victorian bath was outside on the deck, and when you went for breakfast under a giant Frangipani tree somebody walked behind you and raked away your footsteps. 

The Bosjes Kapel (or chapel) is one of the most recognisable architectural feats in SA. Inspired by a psalm, it was designed to create the impression of a bird floating on water. It’s breathtaking, inside and out.

‘When last were you at Bosjes?’ my friend, Keith, asks me as we cruise along the N1, and he’s surprised when I say never, but it’s not surprising. Over the past few years (thanks, in part, to Covid) I’ve discovered that it’s not actually necessary to ever leave my bedroom. Plus, I’ve always had a mental block about traveling beyond hospital bend. Nothing good ever comes of traveling beyond hospital bend (unless it’s to go to cafe Ohana or visit my friend, Philippa). This is especially true lately, with Hitler aka Putin blowing up gas lines all over the show and Europe entering a massive energy crisis. Late at night, just before I turn off the light, I scare the daylights out of myself by asking Google what the chances really are of a third world war. The answers I get are not reassuring. Who woulda thunk South Africa would end up the safer place to be? 

Our game drive up high up into the majestic Waaihoek and Slanghoek mountains. Just look at that light.

Earlier in the week I tried to find out exactly where Bosjes was, but all I could find was the Breedekloof Valley. I didn’t know there was such a thing, but I could see that it wasn’t far from Worcester (which I only just discovered, thanks to David Kramer, is pronounced ‘Worcester’ and not ‘Vorcester’) and I definitely know Worcester because my friend, Leslie, comes from there and there’s a road in that town called de la Bat which makes my other friend and I laugh because it reminds us of a trip we took together to Greece, the details of which can never be divulged. 

By the time we’ve arrived and done a tour of Bosjes’s extraordinary primary school (built by the Bosjes Trust for the children of the farm-workers and which is so modern and sustainable and lovely it makes the modern, lovely schools of Scandinavia look sad), we are veritably perishing of thirst and words. Our intuitive host clocks this and makes a quick itinerary change so that instead of a garden walk we are settled on comfy couches beside a pool David Hockney couldn’t have done better and plied with cold Bosjes rosé and tasty butternut wraps. Since I went freelance I rarely hang out with journalists and it’s a joy being with kin again; folk who understand why the word ‘nestle’ should be banned from every travel piece, ever. Also, journalists drink a lot of wine and anyone who does this is my friend.

So much space in our back garden. And, breathe.

Before dinner we are taken on a game drive up into the Waaihoek and Slanghoek Mountain ranges. The jeep climbs up and up a steep, bumpy road. A pair of giraffe startle at the sound of our vehicle. The sun is low on the horizon and the protea and fynbos have that otherworldly golden glow, like the world is steeped in syrup. Someone spots an albino springbok. It’s springtime, so babies abound. I wonder what animals roamed here before the people came. Probably elephants. Definitely lions. Higher and higher we climb, past pin-cushions and strange rock formations and dams that need replenishing but our rainy season has come and gone. It’s looking to be a dry summer and our guide explains that they’ll have to source water from the Breede river. In this new world we inhabit, water is a scarce resource. 

The guide informs us that a new species of plant was recently discovered right here on these slopes. Of course it was. This is Africa, the wild frontier. There is so much space in our back garden it almost blows your mind. So much sky, so much air, so much room to move. When I lived in Europe I used to feel sometimes like I couldn’t breathe. The sky was too low and the air had lost its sparkle. It’s dark and cold on the drive home and I’m happy I brought the puffer jacket I bought a hundred years ago for a ski trip where I got in such a rage I threw my skis down the slope and sulked for the duration (never let your husband teach you how to ski, it’s very bad for a marriage). Northern Europe is frigid but you never feel cold because you’re always dressed for the weather. In Africa you think it’s going to be hot all the time so you frequently freeze half to death. 

Happy for my puffer jacket. Sad it reminds me of the time I had a tantrum.

Bosje’s beautiful new rooms (the hotel has recently undergone a major renovation) look out into the darkness of the African night, plains and emptiness that curve upwards and become mountains, wild and untouched as they have ever been. They’re stylish, spacious and very inviting; you want to kick off your shoes and hang out; light an atmosfire, pour yourself a large glass of red and look out into that nothingness and wonder, what creatures lurk? What spirits of the veld and mountains roam these desolate stretches? I’m tempted to run a bubble bath in the huge and gorgeous bathroom (these rooms have a separate bathroom and loo which is always a nice touch), but I think of the water thing and also, I know the chef is eagerly waiting to feed us so I join my new friends in the dining room. 

I’ve already made a mess of the room. It was gorgeous before I got there.

There’s something about being in the country that makes me incapable of ordering anything other than lamb, and I even though we are not quite in the Karoo, we are close enough that the lamb chops on the dinner menu are likely to be excellent. They are. The fat is crisp and perfectly rendered, and they’re served simply – just as they should be – with perfect roast potatoes, green beans and warm calamata olives. The creme brulée dessert is topped with a yummy apple compote and some very nice crunchy things I forget to ask about. Back in my room, just as I am settling in to relax and admire its gorgeousness, the lights go out. Ah. Load-shedding, of course, even out here in the sticks. And then within about 5 seconds light is restored. It’s funny how generators have become such a thing. I know all of South Africa is furious, but if it’s any consolation, my friend Leslie (the one from Worcester with a ‘w’) just Whatsapped me a few days ago to say that load-shedding is a possibility for Sweden, too. She would know, she lives there. The world has gone quite mad. 

Karoo lamb. Just another reason not to move to Perth.

In true South African style (we do hospitality exceptionally well) everything at Bosjes is lovely: the pool is gently heated when I take a morning dip; the masseur has thoughtfully lit a fire beside the table because the morning air is chilly; the breakfast mushrooms have been fried in heaps of real butter. The garden walk towards Bosje’s famous chapel (even if you don’t know, the place, you’ll know the chapel) is a beautifully designed mosaic of succulents, Renosterveld, indigenous water plants and fiery coral trees. In the middle of nowhere, all this elegance; all this beauty. Such vision and creativity went into constructing this space. Down here we are good at making something out of nothing. It’s a spirit borne of surviving the harsh, wild bush. Eat or be eaten. Never rest on your laurels. The grand old homestead which dates back to 1790 is a reminder of the ‘can do’ spirit we South Africans are renowned for: let’s make a farm here in the middle of nowhere! Let’s transform this arrid land into a Garden of Eden! And then, let’s build a floating chapel so lovely and unlikely it will make people gasp when they see it. 

In travel writing ‘oasis’ (like ‘nestle’) is an inexcusable cliché, but Bosjes really is that. You step into another world and forget, for a while, that the whole planet has gone ‘bossies*.’ Not here at the foot of the mountains in the land of perpetual sunshine where, when you turn off your bedside light, the silences stretch to forever.

The beautiful, stately Bosjes homestead built in 1790.

Facts:

  • I love my job
  • I’m happy to be in South Africa while the world is imploding
  • Bosjes is the most perfect place imaginable for an intimate wedding/renewal of vows/big birthday celebration/romantic weekend away
  • for the setting, quality and service it’s very affordable
  • It has a well-stocked library, a couple of beautiful shops on the property selling bespoke items (you NEED their dressing-gown) and plenty of excellent Bosjes wine (I recommend drinking it beside the pool)
  • there’s a café in the grounds that serves delicious coffees, pastries, bubbly and lunch-y things so you’re sorted for meals
  • the spa is heavenly
  • the garden is a magical place; spend as much time in it as you can
  • even if you don’t get married there, the chapel will restore your faith in humankind and make you happy to be alive

*crazy

The Unbearable Lightness of Sweden

pic of sweden sea

One of the more interesting lessons I learned about living abroad is that, no matter what your experience of the country in question, it claims a portion of your soul and becomes a part of who you are so that, when I don’t make it back to northern Europe for a few years, I start longing for things I never knew I loved – the smell of snow moments before its dry flakes appear in the sky; a sun that’s too lazy to move from the horizon but instead waits distractedly for clouds to hide its face; forests so thickly green they retain centuries of rain. And as we cross the Öresund Bridge from Denmark into Southern Sweden it doesn’t feel like coming home, exactly, but the feeling is one of warmth and familiarity; kind of like putting on a favourite sweater or a thick, comfortable pair of socks. And driving through familiar suburbs I remember days and moments and feelings and a time where I was lost and had to look for myself in foreign-sounding parks and on streets and squares where my feet clocked endless miles as I walked in search of direction and meaning in a city I’d never heard of until, by chance, I found myself living there with a man who had somehow become my husband and children who – bizarrely – belonged to me.

And on this recent trip to midsummer Malmö I was made aware of something else, too – how lightly people live in this stylish, wealthy part of the planet. In a place where everybody has everything one is allowed the luxury of believing human beings to be inherently kind and inherently good. The world up there is gentle, and while it’s not without its problems, life makes sense and justice – for the most part – is a concrete, dependable concept. Behind triple-glazed windows its citizens are shielded from some of the harsher realities of the world; facts of life we South Africans are not at liberty to ignore because they knock on the windows of our cars while we wait for the lights to change and huddle under blankets in doorways through the wet Cape winter. And – especially as I grow older, less certain and more acutely aware of the contingency of life and how, at any moment, everything I love could be taken from me – I understand the seductiveness and the temptation of leaving this school of hard knocks with its illogicality and relentless sunshine to merge, instead, with the soft greyness of Europe or elsewhere; to live in a place which cares for its people; where you aren’t looking over your shoulder all the time and it’s not always a pleasant surprise that your car is where you left it.

I understand in a way I didn’t before why people make this choice, and in a way I envy their ability to leave and put Africa behind them because, God knows, there are places to spend your days that are easier on the psyche. Where not everything is political; where at any given moment you are not wondering when the house of cards will come crashing down; justifying your (obviously sado-masochistic) decision to return when you could have left for good. And as I swam in Sweden’s warm, clean ocean where the scariest thing I might encounter is a pair of beautifully groomed swans and cycled through greenly manicured parks where the flowers are changed along with the season I wondered to myself why I couldn’t find peace in the wonderful peacefulness of this place; why – like so many others have done – I couldn’t surrender to its beauty and grace but had to fight so hard to return to a country I have no right to love as much as I do, nor will ever love me back.

And – truth be told – I didn’t want to go back to South Africa this time. I loved the summer sun, hotter than I’ve ever felt it; not like the burning spear sun of Africa, but like a thick, warm blanket, both delicious and a little too heavy; I reveled in the long, sultry, champagne and salmon-filled evenings and the sophistication of the supermarkets and the cleanliness and how courteously people drive and how you can cycle everywhere and how good the water tastes and that soon it’ll be time for the annual round of crayfish parties and for picking mushrooms in the forest and the trees in the parks will be set alight with the colours of autumn. And yet I continued to experience a sense of mutedness; like swimming underwater or walking through thick fog. A feeling – for better or worse – of being somehow removed from reality. Like the ‘real’ world was happening elsewhere, on some other part of the globe. High Level Road as you drive towards Sea Point. And I suppose this is why – as much as those climes charm me – as I gazed out of the aeroplane window and saw the blue of the African sky and the ugly façade of Cape Town International Airport I felt unexpected tears prickling my eyes and, from nowhere, a sob rising in my chest. And for this reason, I guess, I am destined to stay here on this ship as it veers, off-course, into scarily unchartered waters and hope, like the rest of my kind, that somebody, somewhere will save us.