Old Mac Daddy Had A Farm (And We Went To It)

Since our last family holiday was such an epic fail, we thought we would give it another go.  We were prompted to do so because Seth’s parents were going away for a long weekend and taking the girls with them to Houw Hoek Inn from the Thursday to the Friday (YES! for all-night date-night… as in we could sleep ALL NIGHT!!!) and we had to fetch them all the way out there – so why not just spend the weekend there and make the most of it.  Seeing as we had already done the Houw Hoek Inn thing and wanted to try something different we checked in to the Old Mac Daddy because of all of it’s awesomeness.  We were not disappointed!  What an amazing place! HEY Y’ALL! It’s been a while since I’ve added some green to the blogs. The last holiday sucked because the girls and I had Gastro and high fevers. This time I had a cold but refused to let it own me! I was determined to enjoy this holiday. It couldn’t have come at a better time. Work is manic, and we literally just got our new bond registered. Yippeee, so this was a holiday to relax, celebrate and spend much needed time with the girls. 

(Quick warning – this post has a bajillion pictures…  Ok maybe not literally but there are quite a few pics so beware)

When we went to fetch the girls from Ga and Papa, Kyla was so overjoyed to see us!  She kept hugging us and bursting into big smiles that she just couldn’t stop – it was so lovely to know we were actually missed!

This is the road to get to Old Mac Daddy – it’s bumpy – so we had lots of fun going “aaaaaaaaaaaaah” and hearing our voices shake.  (Riya actually fell asleep doing it when we headed out to Hermanus the next day – so funny)

These pics are a combination of the view as you drive up to the venue and the view from our trailer…  Oh yes…  Did I mention that Old Mac Daddy is a luxury TRAILER park…  There are something like 12 or 14 trailers and each one is individually decorated with unique ideas – totes awesome! I heard about this place from Kirsty, some other friends and I think it was on Top Billing. They all raved about the architecture, detailing and how green it was. So I was super excited and was not disappointed. There were some things I would have done differently –  the front elevation below for one. However, the side view of it the restaurant was epic. Cindy didn’t add a picture of that though – Some people just don’t appreciate the good architectural angles 🙂 So I slotted one in below from their website.

As per our usual M.O. we left the booking till the last minute, so our room was called “The Dream”…  Um…  To me it’s not so much of a dream, but after being educated about it’s origin – we found out that it is based on a painting (and not the Garden of Eden as I assumed by the pictures of the “Eve” lying there).  Each and every bit of the trailer is hand painted in fine art.  When you actually lie on the bed it actually felt calming – also a shock cos it seemed so hectic with all the colour.

The girls acclimatising to our new home away from home before going to sleep.  They converted the built in lounge section into the girls beds, but we all ended up sleeping there.  We ordered in pizza (which is not normally done but they willingly accommodated us which is great!) and pretty much as soon as we finished it, we joined the girls in dudu land.

All the furniture, floor and walls are made from recyled wood mixed with corrugated sheeting. Check the detailing of the circular insert. What also awesmatic is that the lights and chairs are made from metal buckets!  The room is a timber frame structure with full height windows and sliding folding doors. Allowing you to open up the entire bedroom to the awesome view. Can you tell I loved it? I added more pictures of the room.  <- NERD!  

The next morning Riya was up at the crack of dawn, so we read books together and watched the sprinklers going off outside the window.

Once Kyla woke up we all sat and chatted until Seth made an appearance too.  As you can tell by the bottom right pic of Kyla, she loves telling stories.

Once we got dressed we headed down to the restaurant for our breakfast.  What a stunning place it is!!!

Enjoying the continental breakfast on the deck.

Then we went downstairs to check out the play room…  Yes there is a fully equipped play room!  Right up the girls alley!

We took a walk down to the dam and played on the grass…

We took a trip out to Hermanus for lunch cos Grabouw looked manic.  Bust Saturday was so hot that we had to come back and spend the afternoon by the pool.  Kyla put her feet in, but Riya wanted nothing to do with any of it and howled when Seth jumped in.

I only have 2 concerns about the place…  One is the lack of fences around the dams (but you should be watching your kids so that is not such a big deal.  My real concern is the amount of bugs…  When I got into the shower on Sunday there were 5 daddy long leg spiders (yes I counted and recounted every2 seconds to make sure none of them escaped my view) on the ceiling and wall.  This set my nerves on edge…  So when I saw this in the corner of the shower I totally freaked out!  (I don’t know how big this looks to you, but I would say it was about the size of the palm of my hand).  Then what’s worse is that half way through the morning he just disappeared!!!  Thank goodness we were already packing and I am almost sure he didn’t make it into one of our bags!

All of our luggage had to be packed into the car and with all the steps it took Seth a while.  We made up for the time by taking random pictures.  This is about as much of a kiss as I get from Kyla…

All so fun-ed out by the weekend, this was us on the way home! We had an awesome time. It feels like I built stronger bonds with the girls. The fact that there was no TV and no computers probably played a huge roll. It was a special time and I can’t wait for the next one.

I just missed a great one of Cindy drooling! I was killing myself laughing.