Dunes & Hoons

7/5/2019

Today we started out trying to creep up on flamingos in the wetlands before light. Failed.
Then we realised that we'd stuffed our dates up and were meant to be on a full day tour… oops. So rushed on over and began the rest of the day sans breakfast. Fortunately I had seasickness pills in my bag. A boat took us out onto the lagoon to see pelicans and seals. Clearly the wildlife understand exactly how these tours work; a seal kept following us and trying to climb in the back of the boat. So the captain just revved up the motors and burned him off. Johannes the deck hand had a big bucket of sardines and started whistling and before I knew it these 2 big pelicans arrived & plonked down onto the roof of the boat. One biffing me with a wing on the way in (I was up top). Johannes fed the pelicans by hand but was also trying to get them to fly alongside so we could photograph them. Partially successful. But it was a long morning, eventually they took us to a part of the land spit that had a big tent set up… we had the most beautiful picnic lunch that started with mimosas (what the Brits call Buck's Fizz) and oysters (passed on that) and there was copious wine. I had to start with a hot coffee though to warm up after the boat, and yes no breakfast & then mimosas. The inevitable happened! It was a great lunch. They also had a toilet tent (well 3 sided canvas shield away from the party tent) complete with a little tripod holding a leather basin hand wash. They'd thought of everything. I must admit when we passed the tent in the boat I thought it was being set up for a wedding.
Then we jumped into ATVs, OMG, it was soooo much fun. William & I climbed up the side of a dune early on - just to prove the old farts could do it. It also mitigated the wine consumed with lunch! We went hooning up and down dunes, brilliant. We rotated seats at one bit so I was in the front and I can tell you going down the drop side of a dune is just like being on top of a roller coaster drop. Not as fast though, coz you have to ease the truck slowly until the point you can safely take the brake off. It seemed impossibly steep but at one bit the 3 trucks lined up and went over the drop side by side so I was able to see that the angle actually isn't that great. Our driver said the maximum angle is 36 degrees (feels way bigger than that though.) The downside was that the wind was blowing by mid afternoon and it was rather difficult taking photos while you are eating sand. We had left the hotel at 6.15am and walked back in just after 6.30pm; there was sand in my pockets, boots, hair, ears, teeth - basically just everywhere. I opted for a long soak in the bath and room service.