It's another beautiful warm day on this winter solstice in June, albeit the shortest day of the year for us in sunny South Africa. I feel like one of the luckiest souls alive right now. I'm already in paradise, with miles of beautiful white clean empty beach, in this region known as the Garden Route.
Solstice brings a late sunrise and early sunset, but the time in between is like any other pleasant day at the beach in this part of the world, known to have the mildest climate with the least temperature difference between hottest and coldest days annually. Only Hawaii can match this minimal temperature difference apparently.
This is like Christmas time in the south. Except there's no snow, and no worries. No war, no genocide, no crimes against humanity, all that stuff the north is dealing with now. What a time to be alive!
Here is just another day in paradise on the beach, with calm waves and a gentle breeze. It's a perfect place for the real business of life, namely meditation, contemplation and self-realization. The solstice may be a moment in time of extremes, but here they're moderate extremes.
Life is not meant to be a hard struggle for existence. It's meant for simple living and high thinking. Good health and an enlightened mindset are available here because the climate facilitates it, among other things. The gentle environment with vast open space, filled with pure nature, is highly conducive to good health and a good state of mind.
Now this place is no longer the best kept secret in the land because other folks are finding out about it and flocking here like migrating birds from their troubled homes up north. Locals as well as foreigners from other countries in Africa and further abroad are seeking these shores to take shelter now during this stormy period of history.
My walks along the beach are the best medicine for a troubled heart or mind. Lately I've been finding some interesting bits and pieces washing up. These look like starfish legs of some sort.
I even came across a yellow life jacket recently. It may have fallen off a speed boat. Tourists and nature lovers are able to take trips into the bay on the local speed boats to see the marine life, like seals, at the protected sanctuary, or whales in season which is starting soon.
There is a large seal colony just offshore and they can be seen frolicking in the bay all year long. Sometimes their bodies wash up onto the beach after a storm, or if they were bitten by sharks, who see them as food.
The municipality then quickly sends a digger vehicle to come pick up the seal carcasses before they start to decompose and smell to much.
Even paradise, here in the material world, is temporary and we only have so many summers before our time is up and we leave our bodies behind, human and seal alike.
So let's make the most of every day. We can't buy them back with any amount of money once they're gone.
Photos my own. Written and published via my mobile device onto the Hive blockchain from the beach.