Dust off the old ‘binocs’… the whales are coming to town.
Now, just in case anyone takes offence, this is no indication of the size of tourists who will be seen lazing on sagging deck chairs on our Blue Flag beaches this mid-year break.
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We’re talking pukka leviathans here (the Hebrew word for ‘sea monsters’ in the Book of Job).
Thankfully, the numbers of humpbacks and southern right whales in particular seem to grow every year after a lot of slapping and tickling in the cold waters further south.
No such thing as a male whale getting ‘the cold shoulder’.
Then they cruise north at this time of year for the cows to have their calves in the warmer water off Mozambique.
Humans would probably do it the other way round…. and don’t dare call the mom a ‘cow’.
Nature can be strange.
It’s difficult to think that not so long ago man was still hunting these beautiful giants of the sea.
Now, just a sighting is infinitely more rewarding than barrels of oil and buckets of blood.
What about the sardines? Well, it’s anyone’s guess whether they will show up, even though there is the ‘sure-fire’ sign of aloes blooming.
The late John Tack, who was the South Coast’s Tourism boss at the time, coined the phrase ‘The Greatest Shoal on Earth’ decades ago… when it really was exactly that.
Alas, something really fishy has happened in subsequent years. Sightings and shoals beaching have scaled down considerably and Tourism might soon have to re-brand the phenomenon to ‘The Rarest Shoal on Earth’.
Whales are more of a sure thing and viewing decks are dotted all along the coast.
At the height of one rare sardine beaching some years ago, my young son proudly came home with two shopping packets full of sardines that he had harvested himself off Shelly Beach.
And so the search began to find a way to cook them.
“Just braai them,” someone suggested. Even with a generous dose of chilli, they were bloody awful … too fishy, too oily, too bony.
“Deep fry them,” someone else suggested. Too messy, still too fishy and still bloody awful.
“Curry them,” said another. Nothing beats mutton knuckle… certainly not sardines.
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So the two packets of sardines ended up being buried in the garden at a hilltop house in Tweni. In centuries to come, archaeologists will probably put it down to global warming.
No! Apart from anglers using the fish as bait, most of us prefer sardines from a tin.
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