South Africa

After we crossed the border into South Africa, we saw a huge troop of baboons and it felt prescient to future visual treats. We stayed at the Hollywood lodge, a 100 year-old house with no signage, locked gate, and an extremely generous 7.0 rating on booking.com. The room door wouldn’t open from the inside so we had to bang on door for someone to open from outside. Someone (guest? worker?) hammered the door jam flat so the door would open. The room was freezing cold and even with a floor heater, I slept in long underwear and wool socks. By morning, the heater was throwing sparks and I’m surprised it didn’t start a fire. The Proprietor said the place belonged to grandfather and because the building was heritage listed, she wasn’t allowed to make any structural changes to it.

We drove to another town for breakfast in a funky shop, bar, restaurant. The barman was an old Dutchman with interesting stories that I barely understood due to his accent and we bought a book about spices. Driving through wildflower displays of yellow, orange, and the occasional purple was a treat. Through the rolling scrub drive to cape Town, we saw Ostriches and the bridge from The Fall.

We stayed at the Cape Heritage Hotel and had Asian fusion food at Silk on the first night. Omg it was so good. My tummy upset next day was probably from the dubious “chicken” pie from a gas station so I soldiered on to enjoy the tourist attractions.

Penguins!!! OMG there were so many penguins: on the beach, on nests, swimming, preening interacting with each other, fighting sea gulls, and just hanging out. So much joy. At the Cape of Good Hope, we hiked to the overlook and took requisite photos of the location. We saw an Elan which is the largest species in the Antelope family. We had Indian tapas that Brian recommended.

Dropping off the rental car was a circus. Where we were told to drop it off, they wanted nothing to do with us. It took several phone calls and another road trip to find where we could actually drop the car. The Contemporary Art Museum closed on Monday so decided to hike Table Mountain and go to Natural History Museum but because it was cold we decided to go to the museum first. But when we arrived at the NH museum, we were informed that there was load shedding in effect so they wouldn’t be open until afternoon. Ok, to the mountain instead with the plan to ride the tram except the tram was closed the day before for annual maintenance. Sigh. We hiked half way and met 2 groups of interesting people and unfortunately hurt my knee in last 100 meters of the hike. Our garden view lunch was a slow-food toastie with a weird buchu drink. After lunch we visited the NH Museum and found it rather eclectic. We saw a travel show that featured Gold restaurant and enjoyed traditional African food and entertainment. Very fun

On the last day, we took a Township and Robben Island tour, both of which were powerful. Apartheid SUCKS and is so wrong, I’m appalled by the justifications that the oppressors gave and saddened by the existing effects on the indigenous people. Our tour guide for the jail portion of the Robben Island tour was a previous inmate who had been held for being a student organizer and protester. Seeing Nelson Mandela’s cell and where he spent 27 years was overwhelming. I cried on the ferry back to Cape Town.