Oh Sunday, blessed Sunday - the day of the week of melancholy and fractured smiles and "remember when'' conversations. Especially on this particular drive, and on this particular day.
Brandon and I leave the Glenridge Church International service refreshed and hopefully saved. It's the most fashionable holy gathering I've ever attended, filled with inked arms and Illy take-away cappuccinos poised at plumped lips and held in manicured hands. I thought I saw Nicole Richie hanging outside.
We're hungry - for food and the word of God, of course. As it happens, this church is so cool it has a deli coffee shop attached, so Cafe Bagel is where we decide to munch out. Okay, Brandon munches out - I'm feeling a bit insecure after the Richie clone encounter.
I slurp down (sorry, sip delicately, it being Sunday and church and all) two giant cups of black filter coffee, a mistake I always make before the Sunday drive (go figure).
However, this Sunday I am not driving and Brandon is at my command for as many "toilet'' stopovers as I deem necessary (read excuses for cigarettes and photographs).
The journey begins.
The weather this morning has been beautifully unpredictable. The skies clear and cloud intermittently and Smog's Rain on Lens plays darkly at the back of my mind. A wave of thunder rolls as we turn off to peep through the fence of Virginia Airport.
We cruise along the shady lane where an odd sign reading "Parks, Leisure and Cemeteries Department'' greets us. With not much happening behind it, we turn down a road that leads us to a dead end. Not as dead as we assumed, if the car count is anything to go by.
There's five of them. "What are they doing just parked here?'' I ask Brandon. I mean, come on, it's raining, they're all white or Indian and middle-aged, no fishing rods on their cars.
He tells me it's a gay pick-up beach and we leave hurriedly.
On the way out a group of Pokemon-type squirrel rats (no wildlife background here, obviously) shoot across the path into the bush, breaking our silence with a shower of giggles.
Change the CD, head on. The Hives, BlocParty, hard Fi, Le Tigre, Chemical Brothers, LCD Soundsystem and Underoath keep up the spirits until we reach Umdloti.
Umdloti has seriously become like Camps Bay, only uglier, with no supermodels or celebrities or Botox.
Development is on the up and up, and billboards advertising "unique'' and "a place to really live in'' line the roads.
"There's hardly any parking," comments Brandon. "What is it going to be like in season?''
"Who cares?'' I answer dejectedly. "It's all just too awful for words.''
I am vehement on this point for the rest of the drive.
We discuss and agree that with the magnitude of low-cost housing needed for the average South African, it seems irresponsible, or just plain stupid, that people continue to build these empires while the rest must lie wrapped in plastic on the beach.
As we drive further north, the trend becomes more and more apparent. Our social conscience is broken by a psychedelic incantation on the shoreline. Twenty or so pink, turquoise, green and yellow angels' wings float through the atmosphere. I'm transfixed. As we round the bend nearing Ballito, we see the base of these air dancers as men on boards on waves. Call them kite surfers or alchemists of the elements, it is a visually exceptional experience and my breath returns to normal. Not for long, however, as a rancid stench fills the air.
"Ha ha, check it out. One of the most expensive developments in South Africa on your right (Zimbali), and on your left, a poo farm,'' laughs Brandon.
It's true. Opposite this mecca for the rich and the richer is a massive sewage farm.
Yeah, moving on. Puleez!
I haven't been up to Ballito or beyond for more than a year and am shocked at the change. Every franchised furniture, food and frock shop is squashed into Ballito's Lifestyle Centre. It's packed and busy, busy, busy.
"Let's get out of here, I'm so over shopping centres," I complain.
We do, and somehow manage to miss - yes, once again - the turn off to Salt Rock, landing up - yes, once again - 30km away from where we were heading and after two toll roads.
Yes, once again, we are staring at a dead end sign. Actually, we think we're by the new car licensing test station, or a prison, or go-kart track.
"It's all good,'' smiles Brandon. "This is what the Sunday Drives are all about, man - getting lost, finding new places.''
Finally, after another lonely stretch of coast called Tinley Manor Beach, and two more dead ends, we're back on track. The parking lot of the grand mommy of rocking 70s hotels, The Salt Rock Hotel and Beach Resort, is filled with expensive rides and I eagerly hit the bar, while Brandon hits a big comfy wooden deck chair and a Sparberry.
The hotel is superb. I remember many holidays spent here a decade ago, in its rooms, swimming pool and snogging behind palm trees.
Before we head back to Durban there is a small personal pilgrimage I have to make - to Thompson's Beach, where lies the hole in the wall and a rock pool where we shot a suicide scene from a film I was involved in.
It evokes both professional and personal pain.
We head down the walkway, me filled with dread at having to face the space again, but knowing it's vital closure. We round the path and, to my deep gratitude, the place is wrecked. The floods have crippled the walls, the tide is out, the pool is empty. Red and white hazard tape crisscrosses the pool and giant clefts of cement lie drunken, uprooted by the angry ocean.
I squeal in delight, Brandon sighs and jumps through the hole in the wall while I hold back, pensive with a cigarette. A loud yell from him brings me to my senses and I look up to find him drenched by a massive wave. I grab and save his cellphone, but unfortunately we're both too wrapped up in our own worlds to think about the... immobiliser for the car.
Two hours later, one phone call, two pliers, one spanner, new immobiliser, heater, and friend Ray to the rescue, and all is once again good with the world.
Even up the North Coast, where an old memory had to be destroyed by new ones.