Road Trip Day 50. On the Road to Knysna

Before we left Storms River Mouth this morning, I had to repair some torn sections of our gazebo. Hope it lasts till the end of the trip!

We went into Storms River Village for breakfast. It reminded me a lot of Nieu Bethesda. The place where we had breakfast was a restaurant called Cafe Bacchus which is part of Tsitsikamma Village Inn.
Lovely peaceful place with a themed water feature and excellent food.

We took a stroll down the block and came across a mini distillery.....

...and a '50's Diner  where we were encouraged to dress up a bit.

Across the road were all sorts of adventure tours, canopy zip line tours, blackwater tubing, Segway tours and a bike hiring shop.

Back at the entrance to the village we explored an art and craft shop.

I was very impressed by the art of Susan Kemp.
She was commissioned to paint a reproduction of The Duchess of Portsmith by Peter Lely, circa 1671.
It is a work in progress.

She is a very versatile artist.

Running Over in mixed media, also by Susan Kemp.

On the road again we passed signs to "Radical Raptors" a birds of prey rehabilitation and awareness centre.
Unfortunately there were no flying displays today because Dennis Robson, the falconer owner, had taken a juvenile Black Eagle to Cape Town for an operation. A raptor specialist from the UK was in South Africa for a week. The eagle had a broken leg from being kicked out of the nest by its stronger sibling. They call it The Runt. We spoke to Tania who was minding the Owl Shop while her husband was away. While we were browsing we heard a story book "Hoo Hoo." It turned out to be a Spotted Eagle Owl, Spots, in the enclosure adjoining the shop. Tania kindly allowed us to see him and took a photo for me. Apparently one can tell the sex of these owls by the hoot. Males have two syllables, females three.

We were sorry to miss the show but it was a very interesting visit.

We continued along the N2 towards Knysna and were very surprised to see a group of cattle standing on the highway. A car coming in the opposite direction hooted at them and they trotted off onto the side. Not what one would expect on a major highway.

We've set up camp at a caravan park called "Monks" on the Knysna lagoon. tomorrow we'll start exploring.