False start on road to a new life

Salt-brined kalamata olives marinated in olive oil, lemon juice, lemon zest, garlic and minced rosemary.

Salt-brined kalamata olives marinated in olive oil, lemon juice, lemon zest, garlic and minced rosemary.

Published Nov 26, 2014

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Cradock - There would be olives. I, the Supreme Ruler of the Schreiner’s kitchen-to-be, had decided. It seemed to make sense, in a bad pun sort of way.

The restaurant we were taking over in Cradock’s Market Street was named in honour of my literary hero, Olive Schreiner, a serendipitous marriage of my passion for food and for her writing, activism and free-thinking. There had to be Olive’s Olives on the menu, and to hell with the anti-alliterati.

My good mate Henri, who writes about cars and is a thoroughly splendid fellow, had put me in touch with his wife’s brother’s colleague, Sam, who works at an olive farm near Montagu managed by said brother-in-law. Or maybe McGregor. Something with an M and in easy reach of Worcester. She would deliver a 30kg barrel of kalamatas to the petrol station on the N1 in Worcester, where I would pick them up. This is the way we country types roll.

As I’m leaving Cape Town on the Tuesday morning, the two cats in a large wooden box on the front seat given to us by my good buddy Helen, who writes columns and books and is an ace dude, the cell rings and Sam tells me there’s been a change of plan, as happens frequently to us country types. The unmentionable t**t at the petrol station in Worcester is obviously a city type with a no-can-do attitude, so she would deliver them instead to the resort hotel a few klicks past the Huguenot Tunnel, where I should ask the lady at reception for them.

I pull in, leaving a window slightly open for the cats. A fat, green barrel stands just inside the doorway. I touch it. It does not give a millimetre. This is one heavy dude. We eye each other out for a minute, the green barrel blinks, and I trudge with sham victory to the lady at the counter.

She sends for two bulky okes who hoist it with great difficulty on to a trolley and wheel it to the car. They winch it on to the back seat to squash the piles of clothes on hangers, I thank them, climb in, and start the motor. Dead. Dashboard, no lights. Nada. No no no.

This isn’t happening. Two cats in the car, precious cargo, got to do the eight-hour journey to Cradock before nightfall. The road ahead looms forbidding now. Touwsrivier, Matjiesfontein, Laingsburg and on via Prince Albert Road to Beaufort East. Then, a right turn to sadly neglected Aberdeen and burgeoning Graaff-Reinet, before turning off some way after the Nieu Bethesda turn-off to Cradock via the Wapadsberg pass.

A great gloom descends on me, and a giant worry about Sean and Chai mewing in their wooden prison.

The heavies call the boss, who comes out with tools and stuff. I manage to open the bonnet and he peers in in the way those sort of men do. I am not one of those. What lies beneath the shiny front of the car is as much of a mystery to me as the meaning of life and whether anything follows after death. He shakes his head sadly, produces a sort of car thermometer thingy (stop chuckling, Henri), checks the car’s blood pressure, and tells me the battery is extinct. I try the engine a few times more in some mad hope that it will swing back to life, and of course it doesn’t.

The man wanders off to fetch jumper cables. As he’s trudging back with them I idly turn the ignition key again. The engine starts. The man starts, raising his eyebrows. A quizzical frown sweeps the group a face at a time. The battery preens. I shrug my shoulders, thank them for their trouble, and hit the road. De Doorns passes, and Touwsrivier, and Matjiesfontein. At Laingsburg I pull in for a Steers breakfast. Replete, I climb in and you know what comes next. This time, it’s dead for good.

Two hours later – take note, all AA Plus members, for this is Laingsburg, one of the key towns on the N1 – two hours later, I am back on the road again after a very nice man has replaced the battery. But now it’s 2.20pm, and I have to be in Cradock by 6.30pm, because I hate night driving, having terrible night vision. And Cradock is five hours’ drive away.

I drive madly, rashly, but with desperate concentration, because I have to make it on time and safely. I have never been more focused behind the wheel. I push speeds 20km/h faster than I have ever done. Best I don’t name the speeds. The day slips by in a welter of tension and fretting, scenes of endless Karoo veld, eerie koppies with devil chimneys, aloe-clad hillsides and occasional sheep, cattle and stray vervet monkeys whipping past me on fast-forward.

Wapadsberg behind me, the sun dipping low, I pass the 20km sign as I can see the mountains near Cradock. As I read the sign, I remind myself that it is in the last stretch of a long journey that most accidents happen, as you start to relax and push through the last few kilometres. I relax a little, the road curves, and the car is off the road. Screeching, gravel churning. Cats yowling. I manage to find the tar again but now the car is careering wildly left and right as I try to regain control. The cat box turns on its side, things are falling on top of me out of the back seat, and I’m steering desperately with one hand while slowing and uprighting the cat box with the other, making soothing noises to the terrified felines.

Then calm returns, I call the cats each by name, listening for their distinctive voices, I hear both voices in reply, and soon Cradock arrives.

The olives, like the cats and their stupid, rash owner, survive to tell the tale. This tale. Within days, some of the olives will be marinating in lemon zest and juice, olive oil, rosemary and garlic. For now, they’re just home. And so are we.

Weekend Argus

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