...is what my son had started saying to me recently - a bit too often, it seemed.  I wondered why - and then the daughter and the wife forced us into a holiday last week, and the familial blue bus took off into parts unknown....

To us, that is: I am sure the Karoo National Park, the N12 south from Beaufort West, the R328 and Swellendam are familar to many, but not to the family Rybicki-Williamson, and definitely not in winter.

Not that it was like winter, mind you: shorts and T-shirt weather most of the time - at least, until we had to drive into Cape Town yesterday, into the howling teeth of a gale-force north-wester, and lashing rain.

But I had chilled - big time; no work more complicated than quick emails (OK, I confess I took my phone), and nothing more intellectually taxing than Scrabble; the only things to worry about being whether or not we would see a rhino or a buffalo to round out our viewing.

It was quite ridiculous what constituted necessities for a week away, though: a Nintendo DS Lite, four cell phones, Nikon D-60 and CoolPix, Sony digital video camera, laptop for photo downloads - and chargers for all of them, with a breadmaker.

Ah, well.  Maybe next time we'll go tenting, with just gas.  And maybe an inverter for the breadmaker.  And solar chargers for the phones....