“It is only 3 days”, I yelled when I saw my wife and daughter coming down the stairs looking like mules saddled up for a desert crossing. They could not care less about my sentiments; a woman needs to be prepared for any fashion eventuality. Only skill and years of practise allowed me to fit the luggage in the small boot of the car, and we were off.
It is about 2½ hours’ drive from Johannesburg to Sun City. Just enough time to mill through our problems with life, the world and everything else. I only had to slow down the last 40 minutes to fit all in, so we are actually quite good as things stand now. On prior occasions, a drive to Cape Town and about 12 hours in close quarters would only get our motors running.
We booked in and unpacked, well, my wife and I did that, my daughter decided she would live out of the bag. A more efficient option in her eyes as everything would stay in close proximity, easy to find. As the weekend progressed, she saw the error in her thinking as close proximity turned out to be a mining event every time she had to re-dress. My initial thoughts of her being unable to pack light evaporated as I saw outfit after outfit coming from and returning to the bag, she wore them all. On the second day, she wore them all again, and on the third day, the routine was quite well established. I cannot honestly say that have not seen this before. Obviously, the bag turned out to be more of a zone in the hotel room than a specific location, the boundaries of this zone continuously expanding as days passed. Her skill was best displayed in the final event of packing up. She only packs on the left side of the bag. As the clothes were pushed down and reached the bottom of the bag, it formed something resembling a Swiss roll, ever tightening. Watching the volume of clothes disappearing into the bag fascinated me; it was more of a magic show than a packing event.
It was 2pm and hot as hell. We made our way to the Valley of the Waves. Water sports is an excellent way to cool down. African sun, mommy came prepared. She applied sunscreen liberally until we looked like Alan Donald in his prime, and let loose on the slides. It does not get old to go down slides in a resort like this.
We did all of them, first up was the tube slides where you go one by one on a nice fat tube. Then the body slides where a higher velocity is achieved. They also have what they call a “Tower of Courage” where the brave show their steel. This is the only slide where people ask you to move forward in the queue. Also being a body slide, there is a drop from a phenomenal height in a straight line to the bottom. The stop in the end for incredible speed is why my wife refer to it as the daily enema. We also found a new addition where two people can go together on a double tube. Basically, the voyagers go into a covered tube tunnel to build some speed, and as they emerge, there is once again, a drop of several storeys to achieve magnificent speed. The travellers then go up an embankment, and the more efficient the prior acceleration was, the higher they go up this embankment. It took about 3 attempts for my daughter and I to perfect the technique and stand out from most other participants as high flyers. All these drops from significant height come at a cost; you have to drag yourself, and your tube, up a million stairs. After a while, the excitement is less than the invested effort and you retract to the wave pool.
On a previous occasion, we discovered a pool, in the style of a hug round Roman bath at the top terrace of this Valley of the Waves. The memory of good cocktails there drove us up more steps. To our surprise, this was now an optional clothing area - a titty pool. The gatekeeper pointed to my daughter and uttered the most derogatory words: “whose child is this?” I explained that she is 18, however to enter the titty pool, you have to be 21, and a new plan had to be hatched.
That was about what we got to before we were going to prepare for the evening dinner. After a brisk walk to our room, the girls were dressing up. Since I am sporting natural beauty, I had less to do and got a bit bored. Luckily, as a final act prior to leaving the house, I grabbed a couple of wine bottles, and one of them came in handy at this point. Drinks offered all round and preparations for the evening were concluded in a festive atmosphere.
In the Casino complex, we got a table at Legends, a good one, close to the stage. This is vacation so ordering the second bottle of wine with the first just made sense. The performer introduced herself, as Sadé, and her presentation of golden oldies were exceptional. She earned a drink on my account when she performed the old favourite “My Way” in Portuguese. A foreign tongue to me, where I know only to ask for the bathroom; do not ask how that knowledge became part of my repertoire. We were quite well fed, excellent food and huge portions too. An excellent evening. Those wines at the table as well as pre-evening drinks took its toll; we retired without frequenting the gambling tables. I think we took the bus.
I had a marvellous evening of rest. Unaware of nothing until I eventually woke up with the sun up high in the sky. Then came the report of the evening as observed by my lovely little wife. Her version have me talking non-stop for hours on end, hopping up and down the bed and taking up way more space than I should on the biggest bed I had to share in years. I had a splitting headache, cannot figure out why, but knew to take the bait when my wife instructed me to go for an early morning run. Early morning was a bit of an historic event. With the sun up high, and temperatures already at 28°C, that headache came in handy as punishment for the previous night’s escapades. What would be an otherwise warm up run turned out to be quite the challenge. I have no idea how far I progressed, I turned around at the statue of the elephant, and at least from there on it was downhill. I sweat like a criminal in front of the judge, but when I arrived back home, and after a quick swim, the headache was gone too.
I managed to get the crowd rallied for breakfast and went down to the buffet. They expected more people than what came with food stacked out for an army. The breakfast at Sun City has always been a favourite of mine. With a full spread of everything, and in endless volume. We stuffed ourselves with all the delights, and then retired for a bit of rest.
We walked up to the Cascades, through the gardens and made a booking at the restaurant at the pool. This is for me the best-kept secret in Sun City, dinner there at the pool. I booked a table at the pool. Hot as hell again, we made good use of every pool and cocktail bar on our way; however, we were going to the Valley of the Waves once more. On the way, we got distracted and entered a maize, lured by the prospect of cold beer on the other end. Easily fooled we were, in Sun City you are never more than 50 meters from the next bar. Into the maize, if you know how to get to the other side, it is a brisk 5-minute walk; we toll 35-minutes and that with not a single tree to cover this build up zone. The beer was great, at that time; a cold glass of piss would do too. Not distracted any further we reached our destination, hit the slides, and wave pool once more. Same procedure as the previous day, the suffering of the morning long forgotten.
We devised a cunning plan to get to the titty pool to have that cocktail. Mommy had to take the Child wristband, which left my daughter with an adult band. We would give her one room key, she would go to the one access gate of the titty pool, and we would go to the other. If all worked out well, we would meet at the pool to have that drink. All marshals fooled, we had our cocktails, and nobody bothered to show any more skin than any other area we visited. Back to the slides and we were getting better at all of them, killing several hours.
In the evening, the gardens are lit up with a dazzling light show, giving the most beautiful display of colour all round. We opted for a bit less drinking this time round with the morning still fresh in our memories. This restaurant at the Cascades’ pool is truly the gem less known at Sun City. We started outside, but a well-appreciated rainstorm led us inside. Our meal was self-constructed where we all shared round. A mild case of sunstroke equally distributed amongst us, motivated for an early evening after dinner.
Next morning I liked myself a bit more than the previous; the absence of a splitting headache might have had something to do with it. The early morning run was more pleasant and I made it all the way up to the lobby of the Palace this time round. I passed the elephant both ways and stopped for a brief appreciation. With that pleasantry completed, we were off the breakfast again. A real delight once more, however two days in a row of this much food is enough.
Time to pack up. It was during this bit of the weekend I observed my daughter’s special packing skill, described earlier. We would drop our stuff in the car and then head to the entertainment area again. To my amazement, my little girl, ran both mornings as well, and after packing she was very tired. I could not help laughing when I observed her with her luggage; like a migrating pack animal not at all enthusiastic about the journey.
We walked from pool to pool and cocktail to cocktail. Through the gardens, and all the way up to the Palace. Entered there, enjoyed the décor and especially the statues. The best elephant I have ever seen. The jumping trio of antelope, running from the leopard are all works from Dane de Jager, and excellent pieces. The Palace pool was the turn-around point, celebrated with another cocktail and loads of appreciation.
From here, we had to make a final stop at the valley of the Waves to ride the slides for a final time. Set a new standard for height at the double tube and got a thorough cleansing at the enema slide. That marked the end of our little break from the rat race.
We got to the car, and this time there were no more problems to discuss, only stories to exchange; life is very good now. I wonder how we will screw that up? Between my wife and me, we have this ability to take something perfect and turn it upside down, just to see if there is not something better to be found.
Tuesday, 20 November
2018
