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The Cape Tour
An early-ish start for our Tour around Cape point this morning. Sandy was our guide – a Capetonian but also fluent in German. We were picked up from our hotel and took the coastal road from the hotel around to Camps Bay. From here we headed over to Hout Bay where you could catch a boat to Seal Island but none of our group was really wanting to do this (and with hind sight a good job, as we wouldn’t have had enough time down at the Cape). You could see the weather coming in off the coast so Sandy adjusted the order of stops to ensure we had the best of weather at the Cape. It was also very breezy.
From here, we took the Chapman’s Peak drive – a road cut into the side of the rock and hugged the coast. Again, a stop part way round had fab views but wind just seemed to be getting stronger and stronger. We thought we would need to hang onto Callum!
From Chapmans Peak we drove across the cape and headed to Simon’s Town. A stop in the square to see the statue of Able Seaman Just Nuisance and a purchase of two zebras from the markets – a beaded one and a wooden one.
Next stop, Boulders Beach and the Penguins!! It was a 5 minute walk to reach the walkways to viewpoint for the penguins. There were two but Sandy made sure we took the walkway so we wouldn’t be taking photos into the sun. On the walk there, you could see the odd penguin hiding in the grass or in their shelters., but the main area was at the end of the walk with the view of the penguins on the beach and the sea – they were just fantastic to watch. These were the native African Penguins (Jackass Penguins) and were small and very cute.
After Boulders Beach, we headed down to the Cape and first stop was the Cape of Good Hope and the infamous sign – most South Westerly point in Africa! So windy!! Whilst we were there, a convoy of blue flashing lights and police and officials suddenly pulled up. Someone famous? No, a delegation of tourism officials from Vietnam!
From here, we drove up to Cape Point and took the Flying Dutchman Funicular train up the hill. The views were pretty stunning and we climbed up to the old lighthouse. A shame we didn’t have more time to explore as there were a couple of walks that would have been good but we needed to head back and also grab some lunch. We grabbed lunch from the takeaway bar – sandwiches made up to order and we took them outside to eat. The birds had their eyes on everyone’s food and kept launching themselves at our rolls – Callum thought it was very funny … until one tried to take off with his roll! Just as well the baboons weren’t around as well.
Disappointingly, we didn’t see any baboons or Cape Mountain Zebra (winds obviously putting them off!) on our drive through the Cape but we did see wild Ostrich, Bontebok and Eland.
We now had a 90 minute drive back to Cape Town and Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens. It was starting to look a little grey but Sandy was adamant that it wasn’t going to rain. Only Jon believed her (the rest of us donned coats!). We didn’t have long in the gardens and alas there wasn’t an awful lot in bloom (as it was winter!) but the Treetops walk was pretty cool and you had great views over the local area. You could see the weather coming in rather quickly.
After Kirstenbosch, we headed home to our hotel and had a well earned drink in the bar whilst we decided where to go to eat. Seafood was the decision and caught the shuttle to the Waterfront and headed to Baia – it had some very good reviews and this would be our “splash out” meal for the holiday.
We opted to sit outside – well, the outside was undercover and had screens to protect you from the winds. We were absolutely fine with our jumpers on and lots of others appeared to have the same idea.
Jon and I had a glass of sparkling wine whilst we decided what to eat. There were so many choices, and everything sounded good so this was surprisingly for Jon and I – Callum decided within two minutes! Callum chose Calamari, cubed Squid and baby octopus for his starters followed by a Fish Platter (two langoustine, three giant prawns, line caught fish and calamari). Jon chose the sauteed prawns followed by the shellfish platter (lobster, three lagoustine and three prawns). I had the Lobster Tail with Calamari for starters followed by Kingklip with Langoustine Thermidor. Everything was stunning but Callum’s starter was the stand out dish of the meal.
To accompany the meal, we had a bottle of the Ken Forrester Chenin Blanc “Petit” – not as full on as the FMC, but very subtle with our meal. That must have been one of the best meals we had ever had – it was expensive by South African standards, but at £100 for a meal of that quality, we thought it very good value for money.
Absolutely no room for pudding (although Callum squeezed a sorbet in somehow!), just the bill and the walk back to catch the shuttle and a final drink of the evening in the bar.
