Celebrations at the Cape of Good Hope

28th August. Cape Town

28^th August. Cape Town.

It was to be a day of finishing off the shopping, but during the night the wind increased and the rain became incessant. Just like the forecasters’ said it would. What better type of weather to visit the Cape of Good Hope National Park. A place where countless ships have faltered because of such weather. Some of the wrecks are still on the beach though many have gone to a watery grave.

The wind was gale force. We took the funicular from the car park to the top lighthouse where we had trouble standing upright. At least the sun shone intermittently. This lighthouse is some 240 odd metres above the ocean, when built in the 1800s it seemed to be the logical place to build it. What they forgot was the regular low cloud that hangs around this range and when that happens the beam from the lighthouse wouldn’t travel 100 metres. It needed a major catastrophe for the powers that be to realize their mistake and the sinking of the Lusitania in the early 1900s was the catalyst. There is now a second lighthouse a lot lower down the cliff face.

The lighthouse is actually built on Cape Point which is further south by a 100 metres or so than the Cape of Good hope but the second cape is the most famou of course. Originally called the Cape of Storms by Bartholomew Dias in 1487 after almost being wrecked when he came back around it, His sponsor, King John of Portugal decided a more suitable name would be the Cape of Good Hope.

On the drive out to the Cape Joan got me to pull up in a hurry, she had spotted a Southern Right Whale and its calf swimming close to shore in False Bay the bay to the east of the peninsula. We spent 20 minutes watching this massive creature appear to just potter around in a small area. A local walking by acted very hum harrish as though such a site was an every day occurrence.

Cape of Good Hope from Cape Point

At the Cape

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

Atlantic NP

Bat Eared Fox