16.1.2007!! Cape Town, Stellenbosch, Gansbaai, Arniston, and Cape Town again (S. Africa) Hello All! A very warm welcome to the first blog of the new year! We hope you all had a great time over Christmas and New Year, and hopefully it doesn’t feel like a distant memory just yet! Jas, Tor and I had a fantastic festive time, although probably just like yours, it felt as if the time went by way too quickly and we ate and drank way too much! Now that you are getting over the shock of having another blog to read so soon, I’ll crack straight on with the news. We were waiting for Tor to arrive and remembering past experiences with previous visiting friends and their flight problems, we were also waiting for the news that the ‘curse of Kate and Jas’ had reared its ugly head again! Surely the chance of delays happening again were not really statistically possible, but Jas and I have learnt always to ‘be prepared’ and so we had found a nice campsite which we were happy to stay in for a few extra days if it was so required! It was only when we had a text from Tor saying that there was really bad fog around and many internal flights were being cancelled that we really did want to stuff the phrase ‘third time lucky’ down the toilet! Getting ready to pay for some extra nights and then put our feet up, we were very relieved to get another text to say she was on her way, no delays! Well that was music to our ears and once Tor was here and we discovered that other international flights after hers were cancelled, there were great sighs of relief that the curse had been broken this time!. We had already put together a plan of what to do whilst Tor was here and the first visit was to Stellenbosch wine region for a few days to stock up on some seriously tasty tiples for us to enjoy during her stay. We weren’t really in a rush to get there as it’s only about an hour from CT. So we were perfectly happy to stop off in a place called Strand first to spend the afternoon on the beach and warm Tor up a bit, knowing what temperatures she had been enduring only hours before! Nothing like sun, sea and sand to get you in to the holiday spirit, and that’s precisely where we were headed! Now Stellenbosch is definitely a more salubrious place than some we have seen. It is the second oldest European town in SA, and has many beautiful houses, lots of gorgeous estates where the wineries are, delicious restaurants, bars and boutique style shops. All this and it still manages to maintain its ‘quaint’ feel and has fast become one of my favourite places in SA. Obviously the main draw to St. is the numerous (and I mean that!) wineries/vineyards (which ever you prefer) that grace the land in and around it. You can literally be tripping over the different estates, which are found from merely a few kms from the town centre, to all the way in to the next district. Each one offers and comprehensive selection of wines, champagnes and some ports to taste from their collection, for the smallest of fees; I don’t think we paid more than £2.00 in any of them. I offered my services as appointed driver for the visits, as any of you who know me well, are well aware of my aversion to wine. I hate to admit it, but my wine appreciation extends only to cheap white wine that I can mix with lemonade to enjoy the odd white wine spritzer. I apologise now for such appalling taste, and my only justification of this uncouth behaviour is that I’m the perfect pal to have around when you are in the mood for wine tasting escapades; for a small fee, I’ll happily drive you anywhere! The next couple of days were spent selecting a range of wineries to cruise round and then deciding which were good enough to purchase from. I’m sure you can imagine, it wasn’t at all difficult for Jas and Tor to find several tasty whites and reds, which at their pleasingly low prices meant that on several occasions, two or three of them made their way in to the landy! I did have a little sip of a couple of roses and Bruts along the way, and amazingly enough I found that after a while even I was beginning to appreciate the subtly different flavours! All hope is not lost! So with a good selection of reds, whites and sparkling, we felt very content. Some of the estates have incorporated a few other things in to their repertoire to add to their lure. Quite a few have craft shops, farm shops, art work, and even offer beautiful settings for weddings. One we went to was particularly in touch with the ‘more the better’ concept providing all sorts of entertainment and aiming to appeal as a complete family day out. There were several craft shops, a deli shop, picnic grounds, the usual wine tasting, cheese tasting, market stalls for locally made handcrafts, pony rides for the kids, and to top it all off a cheetah park! Well you can immediately see the attraction for us. Tor enjoys the wildlife as much as we do, unfortunately on this trip we didn’t have enough time to drive to a national park, so this was the next best thing. They had several adult cheetahs each in their own enclosure, and by the main viewing area was an enclosure with 4 cheetah cubs in. For only 50p you could walk around and easily see the cheetahs, but if you were prepared to pay just over £5, you would be taken inside the enclosures for a totally ‘up close and personal’ treat where you could actually stroke and pet the cats! How’s about that! We were happy just to view from the outside, and although it was lovely to see them all, we each have to admit that it’s much nicer to have had the chance to see them in the wild and much prefer to see them that way. Another winery had its own selection of antelope; wildebeest, eland, springbok, oryx, and zebra, which we found were kept by the owner purely for his pleasure, not for the local restaurants! So Tor did have a bit of a safari after all. As I said, St. is a very up market place and it seems that this had influenced many things including the backpackers that we were staying at. We were staying right in the heart of the town, in a very nice flat with a TV, kitchen area and private bathroom! Much more classy than some of the backpackers we have stayed in I can tell you! It was only a short walk from there to some very nice restaurants which we felt duty bound to investigate! One evening we had a very nice Indian meal; it was quite an experience as it was apparent that Indian cuisine is a new thing to SA. The waitress took a great deal of care in explaining what the different types of food were, in particular what a poppa Dom was! We went along with it, not wanting to put her off by letting her know that Indian food is pretty much the staple diet of us English these days! Another place we went to was offering different types of ‘bush’ meat which we had been wanting to try for a while. On the menu was warthog, kudu, springbok and wildebeest as well as the usual steak. Jas settled for a conventional steak when we were told there was no warthog that night (we had been reliably informed that warthog is excellent meat), but Tor and I had the game meat platter that consisted of kebabs of springbok, kudu and wildebeest. Initially we were put off by eating the meat of stunning animals that we have loved to watch in the wild, but all too quickly our interest of finding out what they tasted like took over and the orders were made. The food was really tasty and excellently cooked, even Jas was disappointed that he hadn’t plumped for the platter as well. We savoured each of the meats and came to conclusion that of the three, wildebeest came in at number one, followed by a draw between kudu and springbok. From then on I think we were always looking out for more wildebeest on the menus! From St. we went back towards CT to spend Christmas on the beach in an area called Simon’s Town. This is an area just close to where the penguins are and we took Tor to see them. Even second time around for us it was still strange to see them hanging around the beaches and swimming in the sea. When we came to see them before, in SA’s winter, there weren’t many people around, but now with the beaches full of holiday-makers. So to see penguins sharing the beaches and sea with humans was very entertaining. They were happily moving around without any worries of all the people that were there, it reminded me of the ‘ppppick up a penguin’ adverts (and old one I know, not sure how many of you will remember it). We were staying in another backpackers here, in a room for the 3 of us, another nice place. Down the road we found a good old English style pub and needless to say we spent a few nights there. One night we were treated to live music (a guy with a guitar) which was very good, we were singing along to all sorts of things, even making requests! We spent sometime lapping up the sun on one of the lovely little bays round the coast, and we checked out which beach was going to win the vote for ‘Christmas Beach 2006’! Yep, the trauma of having to lie on the beach and swim in the sea on Christmas day was deeply ingrained. It was a constant worry, this beach, or that one? We chose a spot and as it was now Christmas eve, all that was left to do was get the food for the day organised. By now it was becoming quite clear to us that SA’s don’t work up to Christmas with nearly as much enthusiasm as the Brits do. It is a very casual affair and if we were worried that everything was going to be shut on the day and difficult to do things, we couldn’t have been further from the truth. It’s almost treated just like any other day of the year. That suited us fine as a key concern of ours was being able to keep the wine and bubbly cold on the beach throughout the day, and knowing that the garage on the corner was ‘open all hours’ selling ice was a real winner! So we were all set; lots of lovely food and drink, a nice beach to plonk ourselves on, a few presents to open (courtesy of Tor and Mum and Dad) and all we had to do was hope the sun shined! It did and I can say that we had a really fantastic Christmas Day! After a suitable lie in we started off with a little breakfast bubbly and Danish pastries to put us in the mood for present opening. Just before lunch we gathered up all the food and drinks, popped to get some ice to keep it all cool, and jumped in to landy to get to the beach. It was still a bit of a mystery as to how SA’s spend their Christmas Day, but it was soon apparent that they were planning exactly what we were. Luckily due to the vast amount of beachy coastline they have on their door steps, there was no need for fighting for a spot once we got there. There was just the right ratio of people to beach and we found a good spot in the sun and set ourselves up for the rest of the day….. lovely! In the evening we went pack to the pub, as we had been told it would be a busy night there. Jas, I have to say, had enjoyed rather a lot of red wine during the day and politely retired early, but Tor and I went for a couple more drinks and actually ended up staying until the early hours of the morning! It was a great day! On boxing day, again there was not much sign of it being Christmas, only the banks were shut. We came to the conclusion that as this is their summer holidays, the fact that Christmas and New Year fall occur during them, is almost coincidental. They treat them like any other day in the commercial sense because it is the holidays and no one wants to shut anything down and lose any money. We weren’t complaining! Now we had a couple of days where we hadn’t booked anywhere to stay and were going to play it by ear if Tor had anything she particularly wanted to do. You might or might not know that this area of coastline is excellent for whale watching and that another big draw is ‘Shark Diving’. This is where you go on a boat out in to the bay area, anchor up, chuck lots of mashed up fish’s guts and stuff, called chum, to make a ‘chum slick’ and wait with excitement for great white sharks to show up. There’s a good chance they will and when they do, you can put on a wet suit and mask, then get in to the cage that’s attached to the side of the boat and have a very close encounter with them! Tor told us about this crazy caper, saying she’d heard about it and fancied having a go and we were more than happy to oblige. So we found out where to go, a place called Gansbaai, which is not far from CT, and took a leisurely drive along the coast to check it out. Whale watching and shark diving is big business in that area, in fact it seemed to be the only business! The little town was totally geared up for that and not a lot else, but that was no problem, we knew why we were here! It didn’t take long to get us booked on a boat for the next day, and they reassuringly told us that there was no obligation to actually get in the water with the sharks, we could admire them from the boat if we wanted to. That was nice to know! I already knew that I was not at all entertaining the idea of getting in the cage, call me a wimp, but seeing the sharks from the boat was definitely going to be more than enough for me. Tor and Jas were more tempted by the idea, but each were leaving their final decision until we were on the boat and they could see exactly what it involved. That night at the campsite we were all quite excited about the prospects of seeing big, scary sharks, it’s not your every day kind of thing! Next morning we arrived for breakfast, courtesy of the trip, had a briefing about sharks and what we would be doing and seeing, got our life jackets and headed to the quay and our boat. The weather was sunny and clear, if a little windy as we set off, and there was about 20 of us, plus 5 people from the company on board. We only had to go about 5km from the coast and there we dropped anchor and the ‘chum slick’ was started. It took about 20 minutes to get there and in that short time the wind had really begun to pick up. The boat was rocking all over the place in the swells and suddenly I began to feel a little as though I would be seeing the scrambled egg I’d had for breakfast again, oh dear! I’ve not been seasick before, but I was having first hand experience of it now! Fortunately, embarrassing as it was, I wasn’t the only one and several other people were feeling a bit ropey, but we tried to not let it distract us from the reason we were here. The guys from the company did emphasize the point that as with all wildlife, they couldn’t guarantee the sharks would come, or if they did, how long it would take. So we had to just sit back and wait. They did catch a couple of smaller sharks for us to look at; the marine biologist who was with us, would hold these and tell us a bit about them before returning them to the sea, which was cool. However, there was no two ways about it, the big sharks were not coming out to play……. so far! Jas and Tor was happily messing about on the deck, enjoying themselves, but I was in a considerably less jolly state, sitting quietly on the very front of the boat, out of everyone’s way, trying very hard not to be sick (again, no other details will be given, I have my pride!). By now nearly half the tourists on the boat were reeling with seasickness, which had resulted in the crew radioing back to shore for a rescue boat to come and take those who’d had enough back to dry land. After a couple of hours there were still no sign of any sharks and many of the passengers just wanted to get back to dry land. I was determined that although I didn’t feel good, I wasn’t so bad that I needed to be ‘medivac’d’ off the boat, and I was stubborn enough to say that I had paid the money and was going to stay the distance. There was no way I would leave the boat early and then have Tor and Jas come back saying, ‘wow you missed some great sharks!’ Then out of nowhere, someone shouted ‘shark!’ and everyone moved to the side of the boat to see a great white chewing on some of the bait. It was an amazing sight and really took our breath away to see it so close. There were three of them swimming around, two were about 3 metres long and one was about 4! Well that set off a whole series of actions on board the boat. Some people already in wet suits and masks started to get in to the cage, Jas got his camera ready, Tor and I positioned ourselves in a perfect shark spotting spot on the side of the boat, carefully holding on as it was still really rocking, and the crew were making it their mission to keep the sharks around us. Oh it was all very exciting, and all thoughts of me being ‘green around the gills’ were gone in a second; nothing like great white sharks to the focus of your thoughts! It was at this time that the rescue boat turned up and about 10 people go off ours and on to it, which was no mean feat in itself considering how choppy it was. Not even the fact that the sharks had now turned up was enough to stop them going. I remained on board, my spirits totally lifted by the possibility of more sharks turning up! The people in the cage were having a real show, whenever the sharks got close the crew shouted ‘dive’ and they took a deep breath and went down under the surface to see the sharks get right up to the cage. It looked really amazing from on the boat, so I can imagine it was absolutely fantastic from in the water! Tor and Jas had already decided that they were more than happy with the ‘out of water’ shark experience, so the three of us were avidly watching and enjoying the show from where we were. Unfortunately it was so rocky on the boat that it wasn’t easy for anyone to get any photos of the sharks, so we can’t show you what we saw, you’ll have to use your imagination. We watched them for about half an hour and then, sadly it was time for us to return, other tours were booked for the afternoon run. It was fantastic to see them and we were all very happy that our long wait had been rewarded, me especially! From Gansbaai we made our way to another spot on the coastline called Arniston, which Tor had also heard was a particularly nice place, where we could have a relaxing day on the beach. On the way were stopped at Cape Agulhas, which is the actual, really really, no kidding, most southern point of SA, not the Cape of Good Hope, as we previously thought. So we had a look at where they indicate that the Indian ocean meets the Atlantic ocean, and where many ships have meet their rocky end. We had a look but couldn’t quite see Antarctica! We made our way to Bredasdrop about 20km from Arniston, where we found a campsite with space, and used that as a base. Arniston proved to be as lovely as the reports we had heard and we had no trouble spending the day there soaking up the sun on the beach, popping in to a very nice hotel for a couple of cocktails before enjoying a great meal in a little restaurant run by a ‘Londoner’! On the subject of food, we had planned to do a bit of cooking ourselves when we were camping. But we couldn’t drag ourselves away from all the nice restaurants we kept coming across; they were such good value that it actually seemed criminal to make the effort to cook our own food! Suffice as to say we enjoyed eating out throughout Tor’s stay; steaks, seafood, bush meat, we had it all and our gas hot plate never made it out in to the open once! After our little jaunt up the coast, we headed back towards CT to have a few days in the big city and get ready to celebrate the new year. We stayed in another campsite that jas and I had been to before when we first got to CT, called Ou Skip in Melkbos. The idea was to do a bit of the touristy bits in CT and also lounge around on the beach as well. Typically, the weather put pay to some of our plans! And you thought that was only an English problem! The skies became cloudy and rain reared its ugly head, bad news for us! This was the start of a short period of ‘things not quite working out our way’ beginning with us deciding to go to Robben Island, then getting to the ticket office to be told that it’s fully booked up until 9th Jan! OK not great but no problem we’ll go on the cable car up to Table Mountain, that’s a good idea. Not so! We get to the cable car station and I ask an official if they are shut any time over the Christmas period, and she confidently replies ‘No ma’am, we don’t shut for anything’. Excellent, we’re in luck here, and although it is a bit cloudy, showing true British grit and determination, we go to get tickets. We walk up to the same official I have just talked to and are about to move towards the ticket office when she stops us and says ‘Sorry, we’re shutting the cable car today because it’s too windy to run it’, I grimace, so much for not shutting for anything!! Feeling slightly dejected, and not sure what to do now, the beach option out of the window for that day, we ended up going out for more food and then going to the cinema to see ‘The Departed’ (Scorese film with Leo Di Caprio and Jack Nicholson), which we found to be very good, and so the day was not a wash out after all! New Years eve began with more of the same cloud and bits of rain, but thankfully it cleared up in the afternoon and whilst Jas did some photo editing, Tor and I wasted no time in getting beside the campsite pool and catching some rays. We were taking it easy before we headed in to the heart of CT for the evenings celebrations. To see in the New Year we were going to go to the ‘Waterfront, Victoria and Albert Quay’, where there are quite a few bars and lots of people go, with fireworks etc. Just 15 minutes walk away is the Big Blue Backpackers where we were staying at for the next two nights, so we checked in there and got ourselves glammed up the night. We made our way to a pub called the Ferryman’s, one of the few establishments that serve the kind of ales that Jas really likes, got ourselves a table and got ourselves a drink. It was only about 7pm and we set up for the evening. The quay got steadily busier, but the atmosphere started to really lift quite late on towards midnight. Again we got the distinct impression that SA’s are just as casual about NY as they are Christmas. There was not a huge buzz about, like in England, no large numbers of merry people wishing each and everyone a Happy NY and no ceremonious count down to midnight. At midnight everyone rushed out on to the quay to see the fireworks, which were really good, but only lasted about 10 minutes! The three of us wished each other a very good 2007, and then we back in to the pub! Well little did we know that soon we would be having a fantastic time and rubbing shoulders with a particular British rugby star that I hear through the grapevine has been entertaining you all with his fancy foot work! Shall I go on? ‘Please, please…’ I hear you cry, ‘don’t keep us in suspense!’ OK, calm down, here’s the lowdown. From the pub, by now it being about 1am, we decided to walk back up to the Big Blue. Tor remembered that someone in the backpackers had said they were going to go to a Cuban bar around the corner from there that evening. It’s quite an out of the way place, but Jas and I knew where she meant because we had eaten there a couple of times, and so we thought, hey lets go and see what’s happening there on the way home. That was ultimately one of the best decisions of the whole holiday! We went up to the entrance and casually walked in to find the whole place really buzzing with cool Cuban music, everyone dancing and the atmosphere was brilliant. A guy stopped us and said ‘Do you have tickets?’, but we didn’t really have time to answer before he said, ‘Ah go on in, no worries’ and without any hesitation we were at the bar! We think that it had been a private party type thing, with tickets only, but as it was so late on in the night they were happy just to have more people buying beer in there. It didn’t take us long to get in to the swing of things and we’re having a look round, enjoying the music, when I see someone across from me who looks remarkably like Matt Dawson a.k.a. England Rugby player and more recently star of Strictly Come Dancing! Right, remember I’ve had a couple of drinks and have only seen Matt myself on an occasional, ‘A Question of Sport’, (we’ve been away whilst Strictly has been on) and at this point I’m not convinced it’s not just my imagination. Knowing that Tor has far more knowledge in this field than I, I quickly inform her of my suspicions, and leave her to confirm or deny the identity whilst I go to the bar again. Well it doesn’t take a detective to see from the look on her face as I return, that I have indeed spotted The Matt Dawson, partying on with the rest of us! What a result! Obviously we (Tor and I that is, Jas is not at all fussed about some guy he doesn’t know of, but is also feeling the effect of more than enough ales and a double whiskey!) spend the next half and hour or more trying to get more of a view of him without acting like complete groupies (well me more than Tor!). The place is not very big and it’s easy for us to dance not too far from where him and his friends are sitting and dancing. Cool eh! We were amazed that a spur of the moment choice to go there, means we end up sharing the rest of the evening with a celeb! I did notice that although his friends and girlfriend were happily salsa’ing the night away, he was more interested in the drinking side and I put that down to the fact that he had probably had enough dancing for awhile considering his TV success! Anyway, Jas stayed for a while before his bed beckoned him home, but Tor and I stayed til the end and even then found it hard to drag ourselves away from the MD experience! I am very sorry to say that although we tried we had very limited success trying to capture the proof on camera. Tor did manage a picture, but aside from a funny looking Jas, it is very difficult to make Matt out in the background, however, I’m sure that employing the powers of police surveillance technology, we can enhance the picture to good effect! Watch this space! On NY’s day we again enjoyed a champagne start with pastries, and then whilst Jas was recovering from the night before, Tor and I went for a stroll around one of the hip’n’happening streets in CT. We were expecting shops and cafes etc to be open as usual, as has been the case so far, but this time we were caught out and not much was open at all. Typical! There was a very nice café that we found to have some lunch at, but not much else to see. As it was Tor’s last evening we went back down to the waterfront and had a meal in a really great restaurant that Tor’s Mum recommended to us, which she had been to when she holidayed in SA. So it was a treat for the end of the holiday and completely lived up to its reputation, and we had a very nice last night. Sadly it had already come around to being time to take Tor to the airport. Fortunately her flight wasn’t until later in the afternoon so we squeezed in a last spot of sunbathing and sea-swimming before her flight, a great way to finish the holiday off. It’s always sad to see people off home after we have had such a good time with them. Tor had a great time and we really enjoyed having her (thanks Tor we had a fantastic time, we’ll see you soon!). Having got in to the last month of our trip, we are now in the process of getting the landy serviced and in good order for selling it. We’ve stayed in CT for a few days to organise putting adverts up and around. Then we went up towards Durban for a bit to meet up with some friends we met in Tanz. and do some last minute touring around that way. We followed the coast along the Garden Route, which was very lovely, particularly Knysna and Plettenburg Bay. We've stayed at a couple of lovely backpackers which are right on the beach, we have been watching dolphins from the shore and also watching another couple of spectacular thunder storms. So that’s all for now, I’m sure this last few weeks is really going to fly by and we’ll be packing our stuff to come home before we know it! Obviously there’ll be a final African Adventure blog to come, but for now, cheerio, hope you are all well and it won’t be long before we’ll be seeing you in person! Bye bye, love Kate and Jas xxx