Struisbaai at Easter time becomes a hub of activity.  Our normally quiet little fishing village is suddenly alive with tourists and events.  On a normal weekend it’s busy enough for the peace-loving locals but at Easter the town explodes and there’s traffic on the normally car-empty roads.   The beach, which goes on for miles, is often empty of people on a normal day, but at on this weekend it’s the first place the visitors head to.

On Easter Saturday this is exactly what happened as it dawned bright and sunshiny after two days of cloud and rain.

The Earl, our grandson, Jay and friend, Ray were off to sea by 6:00 am.  They should have gone yesterday so we could have fish for Good Friday but the rain prevented that so we had to have our Good Friday on Saturday.

The rest of the household rose from their slumbers a lot later and we headed to The Shed for the Food Market.   There were lots of goodies to eat but all we bought were some fresh veggies from the farmer’s stall.  We decided it best to go for a proper brekkie at Shipwreck Coffee Shop instead.

Traffic on the main road was bumper to bumper.  The NSRI (National Sea Rescue Institute) were encouraging folk to part with R 10,00 to boost their coffers.  In return you got a marshmallow egg and a chance to photograph them and their vehicles.

Josh and I walked to the area where the Land Rover Rally was happening.  We spent some time admiring the landies both ancient and new.  There were time trials too which were fun to watch.

After taking some interesting photographs we went for a long walk on the beach – well, I walked and took photographs and Josh ran on for about 3km.  I thought I’d missed his return but soon after I turned around he caught up with me.

We continued our walk along the boardwalk and as we approached the harbour, Lisa and Laurie waved to show they were there with the former’s friends, Margaret and Frans.   Their kids were having fun on the beach.  Spencer invited Josh to go out with him on the paddle skis.  He dashed home to change into his costume while the adults went to Pelicans for a drink.

While we were there we heard the whirring of a helicopter and observed it doing a practice rescue.  That was fun too.

It was after three when we finally got back home and I started preparing for the fish supper.   I baked a lemon meringue for the first time in my life – and this was a Banting version that I got from a recipe book written by a local of the Overberg,  Madelè Burger.   Her book is called “Hier’s Die Toortsie Weer”  You can see her blog Here   Her posts are mainly in Afrikaans but there are some in English too.   I am pleased to report that it turned out pretty well.  Not a crumb was left after our dinner. I also used her recipes to make a creamy eggplant dish and a butternut salad.

The fishermen returned at 5 pm, sunburned, tired but happy after catching enough fish to feed eight of us for dinner.   There is nothing to beat eating fish fresh from the sea.