Boschkloof, Citrusdal: Short bike ride to ruin.

Yay, we're on holiday. The Rentals Cape Town personnel (all two of them) are renting a house on a citrus farm just outside Citrusdal.

No appointments, no violin practice, no Pick 'n Pay. Rosemary spent her whole first day under a fig tree reading a book about good places to stay in the country in South Africa and drinking her home made lemonade.

Me and my two new friends, Tessa and Alfonso, dogs both of them, went on a bike ride through the farm on the mountain bike trail. It is a circuit of about 26 km and I rode a trial distance of 4 km out along the sandy and rocky farm road to see if I was up to the full distance in a day or two.

The crouching orange trees, the coarse and heated landscape, the smallness of the bottle of water I had taken with me were all stark reminders of my suburban fragility. Had I applied enough sunscreen to my protruding ears? Why had I not brought along my SAS survival manual and kit with the fish hooks and flexible saw and scalpel blades? Were the local leopards really shy and retiring or would they come and taunt and nip me, sensing my weakness? Why had the two dogs deserted me?

I got a grip on myself and banished from my mind the image of my desiccated remains lying in the fynbos like a well-done rasher of streaky bacon. Time for some exploration. Look, there’s an old clay brick cottage, roofless and derelict. Perhaps the shelter of a woodcutter making his living from the timber in the nearby bluegum plantation. Outside was a heavy plough blade manufactured by a company called Ransomes, Sims & Jefferies of Ipswich, England. It would look nice and ornamental in our herbal kitchen garden at home but was a bit too unwieldy to be transported back by bicycle. Another time.

I mounted my Raleigh Platinum that was resting in the shade, mentally switched on Nick Cave’s “Wanted Man” and rolled boldly homeward down the stony track.