The end of the Garden Route Adventure- Days 5-7.

Almost Tip of Africa

Welcome to the final installment in the Garden Route Series!  Congrats if you made it this far.  You can find Day 1, Day 2,  and Days 3/4 hyper linked here.    Day 5 brought the longest drive in our journey, but some of the most scenic views.   We woke early and left Mossel Bay and headed to Cape Point.   We passed many coastal towns and one of the largest and most famous townships in South Africa, Khayelistsha.  It is the second largest in South Africa, with a population of over 400,000 people.

Khayelitsha Township

Cape Point

The Cape of Good Hope is located in the Table Mountain National Park.   We made our way through the park, stopping at several points to take pictures, our ultimate goal was the Cape of Good Hope.   It was incredibly windy, it felt like we'd be blown into the ocean.   Luckily, we arrived right before 2 tour buses and didn't have to wait long to take picture in front of the sign.

Leaving the Cape of Good Hope, Phil decided to ignore Google and "take a short cut".   This short cut in fact was a pretty intense mountain pass.  Luckily for us, it was two lanes and tar.  It could have been worse.  The views of the bay from the pass were absolutely amazing.

We checked into the Vethos Villa in Camps Bay.   On a previous trip, I had stayed in the business district close to the wharf.    I guess it depends on what you are into, but I would definitely recommend Camps Bay over the business/wharf area.    There is more restaurants, a grocery store (and the beach!) within walking distance, there's a red bus stop right there and a short Uber to Table Mountain and the Wharf.     I felt that in Camps Bay we had more access to activities and night life and it felt safer:  there was just a whole lot more people around and shorter walks to points of interest. Vethos Villa is nice, more of a small hotel/lodge.  The hostess was nice, the rooms were clean and stocked with beach towels and a full bar.  The bathroom door was clear glass, which was a little strange, but fun to harass Phil when he was trying to have private bathroom time.  There was a large common room that always had coffee service and light snacks.  The only complaint was that there was supposed to be parking and we were told all the spots were taken.   There was ample street parking, so it really wasn't a problem.

The first night after check in, we walked down to the beach to play in the surf and watch the sunset. Dinner was on the promenade at The Raj.   The Raj had fantastic  service which we have found hard to find in South Africa as a whole.  There was a large and diverse selection of food (including a large vegetarian selection) and cocktails.

After dinner, it was an Uber ride over to Long Street to check out the night life and a DnB event.   The club had a balcony over Long street, which allowed for some great people watching.  There's a lot of opportunistic crime on Long street.   From our vantage point we could see all the pick pockets walking around... the are pretty obvious from above.  Almost all have backpacks and either walk back and forth or hang out in the shadows.   There was also a TON of police but it wasn't really clear what they were doing.   They seemed to be checking bars, but maybe not.

Our morning began fairly early, taking an Uber after breakfast to Table Mountain.   We had purchased our cable car tickets in advance, but there as a still approximately an hour wait, even though we arrived shortly after opening.  We had considered hiking up the mountain- but heard/read varying reports of time and difficulty  I think we still would of tried, but I wasn't feeling so great when we woke up.   There are some trails on top of the mountain, so we did hike around those... which offered some great views and picture ops, that I hadn't gotten to see the first time.  

After Table Mountain it was off to the V&A Waterfront, which is incredibly crowded and touristy.   We needed to do some souvenir shopping and the V&A Waterfront has a market with upscale Arts and Crafts.   I had eye'd a vendor the first time I was at the market and was happy when Phil also picked the same artist, without me pointing her out.   The vendor we chose sells art made in the townships from recycled materials.   When we can we try to support independent artists or groups supporting the community, rather than just buying something mass produced from a tourist shop.   We also bought some small gifts for our co-workers and some carved animals for our living room.

Dinner was at the sushi place on the strip, which was okay, followed by gelato and a walk on the boardwalk.

Our guide was a political prisoner in the '80s.

In the morning we were off to Robben Island by ferry.   We were treated to views of whales breaching and the African penguin colony that lives on the Island.  The island houses the prison that held political prisoners, including Mandela, during Apartheid. Our guide was an ex political prisoner who was imprisoned in the '80s.   I read the Long Walk to Freedom, so it was especially interesting to see the places that Mandela had described in such detail.   Having read the book, I was able to whisper- fill in details to Phil.   An aside, I highly highly recommend this book, especially if you are coming to South Africa.   I gained deeper understanding of South African culture and history. I think it allowed me to really connect on a deeper level and thus enhanced my experience here.  It also gave me a good jumping off point in beginning conversations on the Apartheid.

After Robben Island it was lunch at the Waterfront before heading off to the airport.

And this ends our trip on the Garden Route!

Stay tuned for my reviews of Chobe National Park (Botswana), Livingstone, Zambia and Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe.

And always feel free to leave comments or direct message me!

Weekend wrap up- Destroying Bathrooms and Dancin' it Out

Hi readers!

So, I'm pretty big on not having fears and facing fears that may pop up. My brother has a lot of weird fears, like a fear of cubed ham.   I do have one irrational fear, maybe just as strange as cubed ham- getting locked in a bathroom.  I've locked myself in a building once, over a holiday weekend, but never a bathroom stall... until this week.  The bathroom door at our plant has a weird skeleton key that you lock from the inside.   I have been wary about this lock from day one...sometimes i don't even lock it because I don't trust it.  This time I unfortunately did lock it and it broke leaving the dead bolt locked.    The way the bathrooms are there's a long hall way off the hallway of offices with two 1 stall bathrooms.
  Most people work from the main office and not the plant so there aren't too many people around.    When the key would not turn the bolt, I had a horrible fear that I wouldn't be found for hours.   I was shaking the door in hopes that the lock would miraculously open, when I heard a little voice way down the hallway-  "Are you okay in there?"  I was discovered!   I would not die in a bathroom!  It took a bit of effort to coax my male coworker into the bathroom, but once he was there he  did give it his best shot to free me.   We tried the key from the outside.   They handed me a screw driver from though a window and I tried to take the lock off.  Nothing was successful, so we had to call in the plant engineers.  By this time, I had  crowd.   I was kneeling on the toilet lid trying to talk to people in the courtyard though the window when... CRACK!   The lid shattered and I feel in the toilet.  Just when I thought the day couldn't possibly get any worse.  The engineers finally broke the door, freeing me.    Luckily, I don't get embarrassed easily.   I'm just going to say that incident report I had to fill out was hilarious. I laughed a lot that day.  Probably more than I have in years.

So it's been a pretty exciting week for me in South Africa.  Besides conquering my biggest fears,  I've been hustling and busting my ass to get everything done in the three weeks I have left in this amazing country.    Work-wise I've been busting my ass on what I'm now affectionately calling my "senior project".  One of my objectives was to design a prototype.  I had to review insights work, come up with an idea, develop recipes, produce samples in the pilot plant and then complete necessary analytical.  I spent several 12+ hour days this week in front of a deep fryer, leaving work smelling like a short order cook.

I got my hair did

By Friday I was ready for some fun.   Despite leaving work at nearly 8 pm after arriving before 7am and being on my feet in safety shoes all day, I grabbed my friend and dragged him to & for Toy Toy, this techno night that I love.  The club reminds me of an old Chicago club in the 90's/early 2000's- Crobar, but much smaller.   The vibe is similar though.    Luckily, my friend enjoyed it was well.   Although we didn't stay too late (relative), I only got about 2-3 hours of sleep before needed to rush to DNA Salon for my first (and only) haircut in SA.   The place was already packed at 8:30 am.   I absolutely loved my experience there.  I've been searching for this kind of treatment for years!    The stylist sat down with me before we started and showed me pictures and dye samples and looked at my pictures.   She gave some great input and suggestions.   Although sitting in a chair in a crowded salon while someone messes with you hair for 4 hours is not the most fun thing to do with no sleep and a slight hang over, it was well worth it.   I loved the end result.  I highly recommend DNA salon in Bedford Centre Mall.

After lunch I was hoping to sneak a nap in at home, but my friends dragged me off to Soweto for what was supposed to be a tour.  Soweto, one of the last touristy places I needed to check off my list.  Soweto is a bustling township outside of Johannesburg that was at the center of the Apartheid struggle as well as Nelson Mandela's official residence.   I uber'd over to Vilakazi Street street, wearing my sneakers, ready to tour.   She gives me a call and says, you are in front of the house, go take a look and meet us at the bar across the street.  We'll be drinking and waiting for you.  Perfect!  Pub crawl is more my thing.

The house is the original that Mandela owned with his first wife Evelyn in 1945.  Later his second wife, Winnie, and their children lived there while Nelson was in prison.  The house was restored in 2008, as it was destroyed by police during Apartheid.   The house now contains artifacts and awards pertaining to the struggle for freedom.    It was interesting, but only took about 20 minutes to read everything.


Then I was off to the Sakumzi.  Sakumzi is a tradition African bar/restaurant.  The original plan for my work farewell lunch was Sakumzi, but it was veto'd.  My friends still wanted me to check it out.The vibe was fun.  It's outside shared seating on picnic tables. There's both a buffet of traditional African food and an a la carte menu.    I found them sitting at a long table with a large group of new friends. The new friends were all in a motorcycle club  together and were touring around SA, with their next trip actually being Myrtle Beach next month.

 They ended up picking up the entire tab, which I was surprised and grateful, so I thanked them and then I thanked them some more when I realized none of my friends had acknowledged their generosity.  After they left, my friends were like "What are you doing??  Why did you thank them??"  And I was like "Why didn't you??"    Their response was "because they are men.  They were supposed to pick up the tab."  This started a long discussion.   Apparently, they don't believe in saying thank you, even to their significant other's... because it is expected, so why thank them for doing what they are expected to do.   I found this strange and then went on to thank pretty much everybody we encountered for everything, much to my friends' dismay.

I wanted to go to a shebeen next, which is a type of township bar that has political history.   My friends looked at me like I had lost my mind and took me to Chaf-Pozi a local bar underneath the Orlando Towers instead.  The towers are old cooling towers from a now defunct coal power plant.  The  have been painted all funky and re-purposed as an adventure center, where you can bungee and abseil and what not.  This was obviously not open that late, but I did get a few cool night shots of the towers and got to check out an almost shebeen, or at least the closest thing to a shebeen the girls would take me to without male escorts.  We met some people on the way out and all headed to a News Cafe in Woodmead.

News Cafes are a chain of bar/restaurants.   I have one near my place, but I don't understand how every News Cafe I've been to is substantially better than the one near me.  This one was particularly fun and our new new friends brought more new friends, whom were really really into Chicago hip hop and totally schooled me.   They wanted to drag me to some afters hip hop party, but I figured 48 hours was past  my no sleep limit and it was time for a nap.

Night cap at News Cafe

My happy this week, is my pet caterpillar, Bob.  Bob is getting so big (he's actually even bigger now).  He likes eating flowers and napping.  He dislikes being petted and picked up.  (I totally miss my fur babies, can you tell?)

Bob.