Eerie Oude Schip - Sandy Bay

This morning I drove to Hout Bay and walked along the Rocket Way, down to Oude schip and along the coast to Sandy Bay.
A nearly full moon was setting in the morning light. Slowly she is fading away.

A strong cool breeze made it difficult to take makro pictures.  It made the flower look like burning in short lived flames. 

On the way down I saw this flowers arranged in a bouquet like for a funeral.

A deadly spider is waiting for its catch.

It is low tide and I can cross over to the Oude Schip peninsula. The barge ran aground 20 years ago, now stuck and slowly rusting away.

The rocks belong to the oystercatcher.

This is an eerie place. The wreck of the "Harvest Capella" lies upside down on the rocks.

A stone hippo guards this end of the world. A stern warning "Don't go further".

This is a burial ground for seals.

I am glad to leave, crossing the isthmus towards safer ground.

After a while I reach beautiful Sandy Bay. A skinny dip in the icy crystal clear sea washes away the dark feelings.

  

Camps Bay Pipe Track

I got a bit sunburned yesterday and wanted to stay in the shade. So today I walked along the Camps Bay pipe track. The sun was still hiding behind Table Mountain.

Lions Head looks best in the morning sun.

The track follows one of the old cast iron water pipes.

The pipe is a nice piece of colonial engineering , it supplied the town with fresh mountain water.

I went up the Woody ravine for a short while. A mystical pocket of indigenous forest made me sit down and absorb the atmosphere.

This time of the year flowers are rare but some fight the heat and drought.

On my way back the birds are out and about in the sun.

Newlands Forest Summer Morning

It is real summer in Cape town. After a hot day the morning is foggy, but the forest is bone dry.

Seeds have fallen and shells are empty.

The pines are looking taller today, stretching themselves high into the sky.

Some beetles are feasting on the pods and ...

and in the last flowers.

At the stream a spider tries to catch the thirsty and careless.

The ruined shed is corroding, slowly letting the sun in to dry what has been wet, dark and damp so long.