And since it was a road trip, I had to quickly learn how to drive on the left side of the road, with the driver seat in the front right of the car, with the stick-shift in my left hand. Luckily, none of this proved as difficult as I had thought, or else Alex and I would never have made it through the trip.
We basically followed the Garden Route, a beautiful drive along the coast of South Africa. It starts in Cape Town, and heads east towards Port Elizabeth. Below is a brief summary of each stop along the way, with lots of links to click on and some pictures…
Cape Town
It’s an amazing place with Table Mountain rising 3,000 feet above the city, beautiful beaches facing west for amazing sunsets, and friendly people and delicious seafood. Unfortunately, we only had 1 sunny day while we were there, so on that day we took the cable car up Table Mountain and hit up the beach for a sunset dinner. The other days were spent visiting Robben Island, Kirstenbosch Gardens, and the waterfront. One of the best parts of the trip was seeing the name of the city’s Ferris wheel…it was called the Wheel of Excellence.
(if i had 1 word to describe that wheel, it would be excellent)
(Alex frolicking in Kirstenbosch Gardens)
Franschhoek
Franschhoek is one of the 3 main towns of the wine area of South Africa. It’s quaint, with lots of vineyards & wineries. We only had one night there, but did 2 tastings, bought way too much wine, and had an absolutely incredible dinner. We stayed on a vineyard that had 7 dogs running around and were fun to play with. Best quote of the night here was when we wanted to do our tasting outside, because it was during sunset and it was beautiful outside. The woman doing the tasting responded, “Why would you want to do that? It’s MISERABLE outside!” Mind you, it was about 60 degrees, and it’s winter here. I’d take South African winters over Boston winters any day of the year.
(the view during our "miserable" outdoor wine tasting)
(the wine really did flow like water in this town, as shown by our flights at dinner)
Boulders Beach
From Franschhoek we backtracked towards Cape Town so we could see the Cape of Good Hope, the southernmost point on the African continent. On the way we passed Boulders Beach, where hundreds of African penguins come to mate & raise their young. It was incredible to walk on a boardwalk with penguins just on the other side of the fence and right in front of you…you could touch them if you wanted to, but they bite and you also have to pay a hefty fine if you’re caught. It was one of the more surreal moments of my life, and absolutely incredible. Other than being surrounded by penguins, the best part of the drive was seeing a solitary stray penguin just off the side of the road on the putting green of a golf course.
(penguins!!!!!!!)
(and more penguins!!!!!!!)
Cape of Good Hope
We had to hustle to get to the Cape of Good Hope before it closed for the evening, but the 45 minutes we had in the park were well worth it. The tip is about a 20-minute drive from the entrance of the park, and the drive is incredible. It’s as if you’re driving on Mars or something like that…just completely different looking. Apparently the park contains baboons, zebras, penguins, ostriches, and a lot of other exotic animals, but we didn’t see any. It was a grey and drizzly afternoon, and we parked our car near the tip and ran up the path/stairway to get to the end…which was breathtaking. You can stand on lookout points that are at the top of a sheer cliff that drops probably 30 or 40 stories straight down to the ocean, with waves crashing against the rocks. If it was this beautiful on a grey & cloudy day, I can only imagine how beautiful it is on a sunny day.
(the Cape of Good Hope in the background)
(that red dot is me peering over the edge of the cliff)
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