Getting to Cape Town was well worth it, but exhausting
none-the-less! What on a map looks like
it should be a relatively quick trip actually feels like our travels back to
The States. With a flight to Dubai, a 4
hour layover, and then a flight to Cape Town for a total travel time of 21
hours, we were definitely ready to get there and stretch our legs!
We arrived in Cape Town on Saturday, November 10 mid-afternoon. After picking up our rental car (which would
require driving on the opposite side of the road and operating a stick shift –
welp, looks like only Mark is driving this time!), we headed straight to our accommodation,
Cape Heritage Hotel, a cute, historic, boutique hotel situated in Heritage
Square.
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| Our first African sunset |
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| Our first hotel |
After settling in we walked around the hotel
area for an bit and then headed back for an early dinner as we were pretty
tired from all the travel and having heard about the crime in Cape Town I had a
pretty strict no walking about after dark rule in place! We had dinner our first dinner in CT at a restaurant
connected to the hotel called Headquarters.
The menu said you could order anything you wanted as long as it was
salad, free-range sirloin, and chips which made it pretty easy when it came to decision
time! The restaurant worked well for us
as it was so close but it was also recommended in a travel book we had bought in Singapore
and we can certainly understand why, it was delicious. More importantly, for two steak
dinners, a cocktail, and a beer it cost only $33USD! It was the first night and I already had a
feeling that we would not be disappointed by the food on this trip.
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| Our room at the Cape Heritage Hotel |
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| HQ menu |
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| Hotel local art |
Day 2 in Cape Town we took on the Victoria & Alfred
Waterfront. It was a perfect sunny day
with not a single cloud in the sky.
While at the waterfront we roamed about, rode the Wheel of Excellence
(ferris wheel), saw the City Bowl stadium where the 2010 World Cup was held,
heard local music (which I got a great video of but am for some reason currently unable to retrieve of my memory card), had a sushi lunch, walked through the craft market, visited the Two Oceans
Aquarium, and had a drink at the waterfront brewery. And, of course, we took
lots of pictures!
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| The Wheel of Excellence and some pretty bird |
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| The City Bowl Stadium |
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| View of Table Mountain for the V&A Waterfront |
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| Pretty far from home! |
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| NEMOS! |
We had planned to visit Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela spent 19 years imprisoned, on our third day but
crowded tour groups and packed buses/ferries changed our minds so we bought a book to read instead and spent a
little more time on the V&A Waterfront where we enjoyed a delicious seafood
lunch. Then we headed to Long Street which
was located about a 3 minute walk from our hotel in City Bowl section of Cape
Town. It is a famous street is lined with
stores, bars, backpack hotels, and restaurants.
After checking out what Long Street had to offer for a couple hours we
had what was by far our best meal in Cape Town and one of my favorite meals
EVER at a tapas restaurant called Fork. A
few of our favorite tapas were the Ravioli stuffed with beef, poached
egg, and topped with crispy pancetta and a garlic butter sauce (very rich!) and
the seared tuna with a tatsoi salad, Asian sun-dried tomato dressing, and
guacamole.
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| Seafood lunch on the waterfront |
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| Drinks on Long Street |
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| Seared tuna tapa |
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| Raviloi tapa |
On our 4
th day we woke up early to make the 2
hour drive north to the Aquila Safari Reserve.
While it was a beautiful drive, it was also almost the safari that didn’t
happen!
Although they (the hotel and the
safari company) said the drive would only take 2 hours, we left ourselves a
little over 3 just in case we would get lost or want to stop and take
pictures.
When we were what should have
been about 1 hour away from the reserve traveling outside the town of De
Doorns, we got stopped by a police barricade telling us that we could not pass
through because there was a riot (
News Article on riot)!
He
said the road could be blocked for a few hours or the whole day, he didn’t know.
When we explained we were trying to make it
to the safari and now didn't know how to get there, he somewhat impatiently (and understandably so) told us to follow
the truck in front of us.
Long story
shorter, we followed the truck through the gravel African back-roads for about
45 minutes not really knowing
exactly where
we were on a map when finally our GPS recalculated to lead us close to the
safari and I was able to navigate us the rest of the way using a map once I had my
barrings and we were on main roads.
We were about 45 minutes late,
but had only missed the breakfast so we were still able to go! Thank goodness
since we had already paid!
And the
safari was excellent, we saw water buffaloes, rhinos, a giraffe, zebras, elephants,
lions, and more!
After the much faster
drive back, we capped off the day with a visit to the Grand Daddy Long Legs Rooftop Airstream Bar.
It has the
distinction of being the only bar with airstream trailers on top. The trailers were crane
lifted there and can be rented if you overindulge and need a place to stay.
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| This is one of my favorite pictures from the trip. Its from when we were lost on the back-roads and I just think it is so picturesque. |
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| Mark getting a close-up view of the elephants |
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| Beautiful lion, Mark's favorite |
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| Me, a little too close for comfort to the lion! |
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| Safari Time! |
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| It is hard to tell from the picture but that is a wild pack of baboons in the road! |
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| One of the Grand Daddy Long Legs Airstream trailers |
The next day (day 5) we checked out of Cape Heritage, made a
quick drive through the colorful Muslim neighborhood of Bo-Kaap, and then
made our way towards our next accommodation in the Constantia wine region, The
Cellars-Hohenort Hotel. The Cellars is a
beautiful and quiet hotel. We were likely the youngest people staying
there. But, it boasts beautiful grounds
(which is an understatement), an award winning restaurant, and its own
vineyard. We actually spent most of the
day at the hotel napping by the pool and touring the grounds.
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| Bo-Kaap neighborhood |
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| Grounds at The Cellars |
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| The Cellars Hotel |
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| Lovely pool |
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| Just a small section of The Cellars rose gardens |
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| View of The Cellars through the vineyard |
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| My handsome husband :) |
We set out for a day on the road for day 6. From Constantia we drove to Hout Bay where we
took a few pictures and then headed on the Chapman’s Peak drive to Noordhoek
which is largely considered one of the most beautiful drives in the world. From Noordhoek we drove the west coast to
Kommetjie to view the light tower. We
caught a few clouds and a little sprinkle on the way there but that was the
only hint of bad weather the entire trip.
From Kommetjie we drove further south through the Cape of Good Hope
Nature Reserve to the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point. After some sightseeing and photo-ops we
headed back up the east coast to a place called Simon’s Town to see the Penguin
colony with was adorable but stinky (they smell almost as bad as seals). After a late lunch on the water
in Simon’s Town, we headed back to Constantia for Date Night (which is funny
because the whole vacation was kind of a date but this night got the
distinction because we dressed up)!
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| Standing in Hout Bay |
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| View of Hout Bay from the start of the Chapman's Peak Drive |
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| View from the actual Chapman's Peak |
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| Kommetjie Lighthouse, another one of my favorite pictures. |
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| Mark in front of the Kommetjie waterfront |
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| There were lots of Beware of the Baboons signs |
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| Cape of Good Hope Nature Reserve |
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| Simon's Town, march of the penguins |
On our seventh and last full day in Constantia we taxied out
to Groot winery for a wine tasting, lunch, and a beautiful walk! That night back at the hotel, we even had a
special visitor – Socks, The Cellars cat, who we let catch a little shut eye on
our couch.
Our last day in Cape Town we did the Table Mountain drive
and drove around the city one last time.
Cape Town, overall, was a great experience. And while Cape Town showed us a lot of fun
activities, beautiful views, and nice meals; it most importantly, showed us how much we have to
be thankful for.
