6000 recommends

Day 73 – Trap’t

A last minute postponement of the quiz last night left the evening open for activities, and so we headed (virtually) across the Big Pond to Stamford, Connecticut and, as a family, tackled the Project GOD Particle online escape room from Trap’t.

Lots of fun. 10/10 would recommend.

For $11.14 (it’s a tax thing), four of us played for about 2 hours: solving puzzles and getting codes using search engines, google translate, instagram, examining security camera footage, listening to soundbites about Lucky Dube(!) and even making a short phone call to the USA!
At R188, it’s a lot cheaper than even local equivalents, and everything was well-organised, cleverly devised and worked perfectly. There’s even support, should you require it (and yes, we needed a little hint on just one bit).

And we finished it. Look:

Did you read that? Yes: THEY NEED MORE AGENTS LIKE US!

It was an evening well-spent and you should give it a go. I’m even dropping it into the 6000 recommends category, and you know I don’t do that sort of thing lightly.

Wildlife photos

After our visit last week, I think we’d all thoroughly recommend a visit to the Nuwejaars Wetlands SMA. Their tours run morning and evening, and our guide – Eugene – was friendly, informative and chatty.

There are wild (but managed) populations of Eland, Black Wildebees and Cape Buffalo on the reserve, plus loads of other stuff – mongoose, springbok, a lot of birdlife – to see, and it’s just a nice few hours in nature.
When the rest of the world goes tits up in nuclear apocalypse, it’s nice to know that this will be one of the last places to succumb.

The experience was more about enjoying the moment than getting the perfect shot, but there’s time enough for everything and so here are a few photos from our morning.

Cold, wet… Charity

It’s about this time of year that I make my regular annual plea to help out people stuck out in the cold in our area. A couple of cold fronts have brought some very heavy rain and some alarmingly chilly temperatures to the Cape and this sort of weather obviously really exacerbates the difficulties for the homeless people in the city.

Last night, I was in my car, battling my way through floods, gales and torrential rain when I heard that my football match had been called off. I returned home (direct access from garage to house), got changed into some cosy warm clothes, lit the fire and got myself a coffee.

Nice life.

The Haven is a group of shelters which can help or local homeless people with – at the very least – a bed for the night. And they have very strict and well-enforced zero tolerance policy on drugs, alcohol, weapons etc.

If you can donate just R12 (that’s 64 pence or 82 US cents), then you can provide a bed for one person for one night.

And it’s really easy to do. Snapscan here, for you locals:

Or via this page if you don’t have Snapscan or if you’re overseas.

I’ll be making a donation and I’ll also be encouraging my kids to use their charity pocket money to help The Haven out this month too. Why don’t you make a difference as well. 12 bucks. De nada.

Thanks for reading.

Little Orchard Nursery

or: Hidden Gems of the Southern Suburbs (No. 1 in a series of n).
And: another post in the 6000 Recommends category.

Another gardening-related post? Two in week? What’s going on?

But yes. Let’s not beat around the bush (no pun intended) here. You want plants or garden stuff and you’re in the Southern Suburbs, you go to the yellow and green S place. But if you’re going to do that, you’re also going to get ripped off. So why not rather support a small, family business which gives great service and charges fair prices?

No, this isn’t a sponsored post.

I heard about the Little Orchard Nursery via the grapevine (no pun intended) and today, needing some garden stuff, I gave it a go. Diagonally opposite Bridge Cycles off De Waal Road in Diep River (map), it’s tucked away just where the railway bridge starts to rise and you could be excused for missing it as you fly by (at 59kph). But you shouldn’t do that.

Pop in and find a small cafe, a kids’ play area, and plenty of healthy looking plants. I didn’t need much, but I got everything I wanted, it cost me much less than it would have done at you know where, and I was served with a smile and a chat.

So, next time you’re about to do a bit of gardening, rather head to the Little Orchard instead of you know where.

Message ends.