The blue tides at De Mond

The mouth of the Heuningnes (honey nest) River lay a few hundred metres from the cottage where we spent our strandveld nights, last week.

The place is called De Mond, the mouth - and towards the beach it turns wide and blue.

We visited first at low tide, walking far out onto the flats.

Three hours southeast of Cape Town and a few kilometres from Agulhas, the true southern tip of Africa, it is an empty place. 

...except for birds. Thousands of terns resettled as we walked.

The river arcs out and the tides push in through wide channels where fish jump.

On the white walls of the dunes that separate estuary from sea kelp gulls nest.

The Indian Ocean beyond falls onto the beach with surf we heard every night in our little cottage.

We walked far down the beach. 

We were met regularly by plastic water bottles blowing towards us from the south. Don't get me started on bottled water. 

By the time we had circled back a trickle of salt water was creeping back over the sand flats.

I turned from watching the sea to find our flipflops beginning to drift away.

We could have stayed longer.

But we headed back to the bench above our veld cottage to watch the estuary from a different vantage point.

...and to sip sundowners and eat nostalgic South African junkfood (I had no idea chipnicks still existed, but they do in Bredasdorp).

Plant, bird and road posts to follow.