30 COLUMN Nick Dall liked to think of himself as a seasoned traveller. Then he tried going away with a baby and two dogs…
Ihave survived a battle with a flesh-eating Amazonian parasite and I’ve traversed bandit country in northern Kenya. I’ve diced with death astride a scooter on Hanoi’s claustrophobic streets and I’ve swallowed (but failed to keep down) a piece of barbecued cow’s udder in Bolivia. None of these misadventures, however, carries anywhere near the emotion, the heartache or the angst of the quotidian tale I will now relate… It was Christmas a few years ago, and like every other Christmas before, I was about to make the annual family pilgrimage to Betty’s Bay about 90 km from Cape Town. Every year since 1976, my entire extended family from both sides has descended on this sleepy holiday village for a couple of weeks of sun, sand and siestas; a much needed battery recharge for the year ahead. Except this time it was different. I now had a family of my own and just leaving Cape Town was going to be a challenge. Our brood comprised mom, dad and baby daughter, plus Basil and Ruby – needy Africanis rescue dogs – and a colony of 523 earthworms. (The worms may have been part of
the family, but they’d be staying behind.) I tried to force down the panic by telling myself that it was only a 90-minute drive to a place I’d been to a hundred times before. We’d pack the Christmas presents the night before and the rest of the stuff in the morning and we’d still be there by lunch, maybe just after. My wife had wrapped, labelled and boxed the prezzies well in advance, so all I had to do was pop them in the car’s roof box before I went to bed. I did that, and slept well knowing that everything was under control.
It wasn’t. I got up at 5 am to feed the dogs, hoping that they’d have digested their breakfast by the time we reached the serpentine curves of Clarence Drive along False Bay. For good measure, they’d both also get anti-nausea pills just before we left. Basil was prone to carsickness; I wasn’t going to see if Ruby was, too. Then for the main event: Packing for the baby. It’s a well-documented scientific fact that the total weight and volume of an infant’s luggage is inversely proportional to the child’s body weight and size. Yes, we were in for a few tonnes of clobber. Packing for babies, I learnt that morning (and some of that afternoon), isn’t as simple as throwing a few T-shirts and shorts into your trusty Karrimor. I packed high chairs, rubber bath mats, bum balm and teething gel, four forms of infant transportation, three variations of sunscreen and two different umbrellas. But it wasn’t just the sheer amount of stuff to be packed that was getting me down. The environment in which the packing took place was not conducive to orderly or logical thought. Months of sleep-deprived nights and days trying to keep the dogs from licking the baby and vice versa had taken their toll. The missus and I took it in turns to pack and watch baby, the end result being that we took enough Babygros for an entire month but not a single pair of socks for Her Highness. We packed straight through the morning nap, which we’d hoped she’d have in the car. And once her packing was finally done, we had to think about our own bags. For the first time in my life I didn’t take a single fishing rod with me on Christmas holiday. Hell, I didn’t even remember my toothbrush! We gave ourselves lunch and the dogs got their pills. We were just heading for the door when I remembered the worms. Luckily they’re not quite as demanding as the other members of the family, but I still had to feed them leftover salad and cover them with a soggy Sunday Times. Finally we hit the road. Our obliging daughter fell asleep before we’d even reached the airport, and Ruby and Basil settled into a calming chorus of howling at passing trucks and scratching at the bucket of dog food that I’d stupidly put in the back with them. I pumped the volume on baby’s Cuban Lullaby CD and tried to teleport myself from the N2 by dreaming of cigars and palm-fringed beaches. It almost worked. The vendors at the robots in Somerset West were a hit with the dogs: Ruby tried to decapitate the guy wearing a King Kong mask while Basil cowered in the corner. But still baby slept. Officially known as Clarence Drive, the coast road from Gordon’s Bay to Rooiels is one of the most picturesque routes anywhere in the world: A sinuous stripe of tarmac clinging to the cliffs of the Kogelberg, teetering above the water of False Bay. We’d barely rounded the first curve when Basil started to retch. So much for the anti-emetic. Before I could find a place to pull off, my tog bag had been splattered with Hill’s Science Diet, the most expensive form of vomit known to man. I eventually pulled over, put Baz on his lead and took him out for some fresh sea air. He lifted his leg against a Shark Spotters sign and I knew he was feeling okay. Back in the car now, Basil had found a new lease of life, but baby hadn’t taken kindly to the stench, nor to the fact that mama was strapped into a different seat a metre away. I cranked the volume on another CD – this one featuring the Aboriginal version of “Waltzing Matilda” – and tried to sing and clap her tears away. It didn’t work, but I did learn the Pitjantjatjara word for “waltz”…
When we finally arrived, I felt like I’d just done an Ironman. I took a deep breath and told myself that at least I’d be able to rest for a few days while grannies, aunties and cousins doted over the baby, and Basil and Ruby tired themselves out stealing ostrich bones from their pedigreed canine relatives. Unfortunately this picture of peace and relaxation was pure delusion on my part. There was no way any family member of mine was going to forego an afternoon nap or mid-morning trip to the beach in favour of looking after a baby. We were on our own, and we didn’t even have routine on our side. Baby’s sleep patterns went berserk and even armed with those four different modes of transport – pram, buggy, papoose and backpack – we were never able to keep Her Highness happy for longer than eight-and-a-half minutes. We spent our days keeping her away from lethal cast-iron guineafowls in the garden and tipsy great-uncles who kept offering her peri peri biltong, and our nights alternating between trying to stop her from screaming and spitefully encouraging her to scream even louder. As a child, I used to think that my parents were a bit boring. But now I realise that they were downright hard core. In a business where just leaving the house is an achievement, they managed to show me and my three siblings most of South Africa and a bit of the world, too. But then I do remember my gran dog-sitting quite a lot…
Before I could find a place to pull off, my tog bag had been splattered with Hill’s Science Diet, the most expensive form of vomit known to man.