Antiques hunting: George and Mossel Bay

I just came back from the postcard-esque southern coast of South Africa. I would have been back earlier if the caravan’s right wheel didn’t decide to launch itself into some farmer’s field.

I can only be thankful that this was on a quiet country road and not the highway. The original plan was to sleep over two hours away from home, but my father felt that he had enough energy to continue. If we had stayed over, that wheel would have likely ended up taking someone’s life.

And the wheel came off half an hour from home; karma was really rubbing it in…

Anyway, I have always been averse to caravanning, because it no longer saves money like it used to. It’s great family bonding when you’re not fighting with each other whilst setting up the ten million tents and awnings.

I also have a big dislike for the sea. I don’t get the whole “sea breeze” twaddle that people go on about. If my house smelled like the sea I would eventually blast myself with enough radiation for my nose to fall off. It’s not refreshing either. Your trunks get full of sand and you linger around in the same water that every beachgoer and marine animal uses as their toilet. I stayed in the sand and read some Jeremy Clarkson. I am burnt to a crisp, but my inner cynic has awoken.

As you can tell, I wasn’t exactly excited about living in a fibreglass hut next door to a guy who looked like Post Malone (but more trailer park.) Neither was I looking forward to beach babes, because there weren’t any. I am not judging anyone by the state of their bodies, because if I was, I would be saying a lot more. Let’s just say my self esteem got a bit of a boost. The boost was shattered when I realised that I looked like my favourite author, but younger and acne-ridden. Somewhere on some horse riding or sock collecting forum, some woman is writing about how some fat, daft oaf gave her some more confidence on the beach. I am now a pillar of body positivity. We all look like s*** after all that fruitcake and chocolate.

To get to the point, what I was really looking forward to was bargain hunting in pawn and antique shops for vintage watches and, more importantly, visiting my paternal grandmother who suffers from dementia.

She’s in a care facility now and she’s doing well. I enjoyed our visit. She could recognise me, but forgot my name. I consider this a win knowing what dementia can do to a person. I hear she keeps active and goes for walks almost every day. The last time I saw her was 2020, although my memory may not be correct. When she’s a twelve hours’ drive away, visits aren’t frequent and years fade into each other. I say 2020, but it could have been 2019 or 2018. We used to drive down to the Cape every year for a holiday and visit with her, but the frequency dropped after some family disagreements and the passing of my paternal grandfather in 2016.

Holidays in the Cape were an awesome thing for a younger me, back when I loved the sea. They’re even more awesome to me now knowing that there is so much history hidden away there. My grandmother sold her house before moving into the care facility, so free accommodation dried up. Caravan parks were chock full. One place mandated a minimum stay of twenty-six days. Twenty-six m***********g days. When driving past, we saw that this place was so full; you slept on top of your neighbours’ children. If you were to turn over in your bed, you would have socked someone’s wife in the face. You would be hauled away in a police van before you get a chance to swim in the excrement-ridden sea.

Even worse was that some schools turned their rugby and football fields into caravan parks. I’d rather have hippie Post Malone as my neighbour than stumble into a rugby pole after a few too many brandies. Imagine that conversation: “Hey, son, we’re going on holiday. Take the tent in your school bag and meet me at the rugby field when the bell rings. The caravan will be parked right outside of Mr Davidson’s class.”

With all of that out of the way, here’s what I found browsing for antiques…

A Venus that I didn’t buy. An automatic Osco that I didn’t want to buy. A 9ct gold watch which I might buy. A shop with ten trillion clocks and not a single wristwatch.

The Venus was mildly interesting. It looked something like this one I found online.

Not a terrible looking watch, but I don’t have place for it in my collection. The one in the shop needed a new crystal, or a good buffing at least. The watch was as dirty as the parts of Reddit best left unexplored. It was so full of wrist gunk that I couldn’t get the caseback off. Even with the force of two men, we couldn’t get a good enough grip on the thing to open it. The even dirtier expansion band broke during our efforts. The dial had some minor blotches, which could mean rust. The watch ran, but I wasn’t looking to gamble, seeing as I had taken two big gambles in the space of two days.

I don’t have pictures of the Osco and I won’t bother finding any. It was a decent, but crude German thing with a movement decorated like a Somali hut that had just been the victim of a robbery. Their price upset me to the point that I almost wished that the shopkeeper’s favourite song would be subject to a remix by Lil Uzi Vert. I used to like Chop Suey and System of a Down, but I have decided to climb back into that closet again.

The gold watch was the highlight of this all.

The movement needs a service, but the price was good. If there’s more than 8,5g of gold in that case, buying it would net me a profit on the gold value alone. I would never be so cruel, but it makes the purchase easier to justify. I’m not asking any watch nerd if I should pick it up, because the response is invariably “buy it.” On second thought, maybe I should buy it. It’s complicated.

This antiques shop was also the home of many old pens. I love a good fountain pen, so I decided it would be time for a vintage one. I settled on a Parker 51, until the nib disintegrated in my hand. On an impulse, I got myself a Sheaffer Touchdown Sentinel Deluxe from the early ’50s. It has a 14ct gold nib and is a pain to service. It needs to soak in warm water for several days before I can unscrew the nib and feed and give it a clean. Cross your fingers and pray that I don’t break the fragile plastic body.

The clock place was interesting. It was a large antiques shop with everything except wristwatches in stock. A clock of every size, shape and type could be found. Do you want a clock made of myrrh and decorated with naked eunuchs feeding each other chocolate covered strawberries with their feet? It’s just past the uranium glass sex aid section. It was interesting and disappointing at the same time. There were two JLC Atmoses on display, but not so much as a single watch case anywhere.

The rest of the hunt was uneventful. A broken Buren with a price so high I was close to tying cinder blocks to the young lady at the counter’s ankles and dropping her into the sea. An Oris pocket watch that was so expensive it needed a built-in Victorian era bard to be a good deal. If I smoked, I would have lit up a few to ease my frustration. Because I don’t, I have resorted to being miserable for the foreseeable future.

So that’s it, 22 to 30 December in a nutshell. Despite seeing all manner of things pushing me closer and closer to insanity, violence and substance abuse, this holiday was a win. I got to visit my grandmother. I got to go over the Montagu pass once and visit to tollhouse museum. We did the Outeniqua pass almost every day, which is a strip of road better than a nymph with a penchant for cuddling and making you breakfast in bed. This might be the last time I get to see this part of the country due to emigration appealing more and more to me. Why study here for a degree that is not globally accepted while facing increasing crime rates and electricity vanishing into thin air? As much as I love this country and all of the people in it, blatant mismanagement and corruption leaves little room for people who want to build the Concorde again and engineer Bluetooth-controlled knees.

I will never be able to get the south Cape out of my mind. It is as beautiful as, well… the sun setting over the fynbos of the Outeniqua mountains. I wasn’t born or raised there, but it is my second home. While I didn’t buy a watch on likely one of my last pilgrimages there, I have that Sheaffer fountain pen, which I really hope to get going soon.

Take care and have a happy new year.