Market Friday - Ballito Farmer's Market

Today is #MarketFriday, a project initiated by @dswigle, and this post is my contribution to this project for this week.

To learn more about this project and participate, visit today's post by @dswigle.

Last weekend was a long weekend here in South Africa. Friday, June 16, was a public holiday. We decided to head out to Ballito for the weekend. Ballito is situated on the Northcoast of Kwazulu Natal, South Africa, about 52 KM north of Durban.

We arrived on Friday and enjoyed a casual day, going for a stroll or two.

During our walk in the late afternoon, as the sun was going down, we walked along the walkway just above the beach.

We came across this friendly guy who was serving coffee to his customers with a big, friendly smile on his face! Even though we were just passing by, he was keen to give us that same friendly smile.

There were nice tables with chairs neatly set out where people got served coffee. Some people preferred taking their coffee along on their walk or sitting down on one of the benches close by to sit in peace while enjoying the view over the ocean.

I didn't want to intrude on people's privacy by taking photos of them while they were enjoying their coffee, looking out over the ocean, and having a peaceful moment while the day was coming to an end. It was a beautiful view looking out over the ocean to the east, with the sun setting behind you in the west.

So I found these three vacant benches, a typical example of the benches that can be found all along the walkway.

A little further down, we found the AL Pescatore Restaurant, looking out over the beach.

Their entrance is quite impressive and is located on the far side of the building. You walk up the stairway to get to the entrance.

Then, about 500m further down, was the Ocean Basket, also looking out over the beach.

There was lots of activity, but it was a relaxed atmosphere. The previous weekend, the Comrades Marathon took place, ending in Durban. So, there were many holiday-makers who came down the week before to attend the marathon and made it a holiday, staying over until this weekend, being a long weekend.

On Saturday, June 17, we decided to explore a bit more and we decided to go to the Ballito Farmer's Market (to get some photos for #MarketFriday of course).

But first, we went for our early morning walk along the beach again. Looking up one of the roads leading to the main road, we saw some vendors busy setting up shop for the day. Clearly, holiday-makers make up the market they are targeting.

We went back to the house we were staying in to have breakfast before going to the Farmer's Market.

Going to the market was a 15-minute drive of about 11 KM.

Arriving at the market, we parked the car and entered the market area where they have a nice playing area for the little ones.

We passed various stalls, and passing this lady's stall, she was keen to have her photo taken.

She told me that she is a designer by profession. She is designing her own clothes and then provides work for some local ladies, working in a factory where they do all the sewing to get the end product "on the shelf" for her. Apparently, all the clothing on display here are her own designs.

Walking around, just behind these displays, we saw this scene...some fun horseback rides for the kiddies.

To the far side of these stalls, I found this sculpture on display. Maybe the warrior has gone shopping, but he forgot his shopping basket...lol.

Getting a view from the front...

And then we found these beautiful Proteas

To the far end of the market was this area where people were just casually sitting around and relaxing...

Looking back over the market area...

To my left, I saw this guy who is running his brewery from this van.

Front view? Side view...? I suppose it depends on what you are looking at...the business or the vehicle?

He enjoyed a constant flow of new customers during the time we were in that area.

After this, we went back to our weekend accommodation to watch the rugby match on tv.

Late afternoon, it was of tho the beach again. We walked up to where we saw the vendors setting up shop in the morning to see what it looked like.

I took this photo in the afternoon, looking down toward the beach area.

Further down, on the beachfront, AL Pescatore is also visible again. This scene created a really nice "holiday vibe" for me.

Okay, time to admit...I didn't mention any amounts in this post. In all honesty, any form of shopping was the last thing on my mind. My wife felt the same. We just wanted to take the weekend to relax and chill. I still had #MarketFriday on my mind though...lol. So I thought I would still publish this as I do consider it to be "market-related".

The whole idea was to get some nice photos over the course of the weekend, but other than that, we just wanted to leave everything behind and relax.

And that's all for today, folks.

Thank you for reading my post! I do appreciate it!