Cape Town at Last

26^th August. Yzerfontein, Atlantic Coast.

It will be quite sad reaching Cape Town tomorrow. It has been quite a trip and now we are at this beach town less then 100kms from Kaapstaad we can’t put off the inevitable any longer. There will still be 1700 kms to travel up the east coast to Durban but CT has always meant the end of a Cairo to Cape Town trip and we feel a little lost.

The last couple of days have again been very eventful. From Nieuwouldville we travelled across the Cederburg Wilderness Area, a wild and woolly plateau enhanced by the freezing weather and intermittent rain for most of the trip then descended by way of a spectacular road to the valley floor before once more ascending over another pass where the sandstone rocks and cliffs surrounded us in a foreboding very trogilydic attitude.

After reaching Clanwilliam we headed back out to the Atlantic Coast and followed the road down to Eland Bay where we spent the night on the edge of the sea with the roaring of the rough seas drowning out all other noise. This was the type of place we really enjoy: unpretentious, laid back and very small.

Today we travelled further south and spent most of the day in the West Coast National Park where the wild flowers in places were as spectacular as those further north. As well as the flowers we saw a couple of animals we hadn’t seen before: mountain zebras and bat eared foxes. There were also springbok, gembok, kudu and many sea birds.

27^th August. Cape Town!!

Finally made it. Cape Town at last. It was a clear day today, barely a breeze. But the forecast for the next few days is for a cold front coming off the Atlantic. We spent the day at the waterfront, a tourist haven but still a working port with many big ships and fishing boats in the harbour. We had lunch overlooking the water with Table Mountain towering imposingly above us. It should have been a champagne lunch to celebrate but that may wait until we go down to the Cape of Good Hope, a few kms south of here.

We are staying at the Lighthouse Backpackers, part of an old hospital complex and only a few kilometres from the centre of town.

We are booked to fly back to AU on the 14^th Sept while the van is booked on a boat sails that sails on the 12^th Sept. It all seems so final.

Last time we were asked ‘what were the highlights of our trip?’ I think we said the polo at the Shandur Pass in Pakistan. This time I think we will find it hard to pick any one highlight. The trip has been such an amazing experience. We have only covered a minuscule part of the continent but what we have seen has opened ourselves up to a while new set of feelings, experiences and encounters. The fellow travellers we have met are perhaps one of the highlights. Such an amazing lot of people who make our travels seem pretty ordinary