Cape Town, South Aftrica

I landed in Cape Town in the late afternoon and was pretty tired but as most travelers will tell you, you can not take a nap and you have to push on until the evening so that you don’t get jet lagged, and so that is what I did. I checked into my accommodations at Abbey Manor Guest house, cleaned up and got refreshed then headed out for my first adventure.

The first stop that I made was to the Bokaap neighborhood of Cape Town. This part of town is known for their very colorful houses. These houses are made of limestone and therefore were naturally white, and once slavery had ended, the residents of the neighborhood wanted to celebrate and did so by painting their houses bright and colorful and that has kept up to this day. The neighborhood is not the best and it still is considered pretty low class.

After a quick stop for photos, I left the neighborhood and went to a Camps Bay. This was a beach town where there was a strip of local restaurants and shops on one side of the street and the beach on the other. I only stopped in briefly because of the strong gusts of wind. The rest of the time I was hiding in one of the restaurants I found on the strip. The wind was so strong that day, that the beaches were empty and sand was being kicked up and knocked into my face.

The following day, the wind had subsided and we went up to the top of Table Mountain to enjoy the view of Cape Town, and walked around the top to see the different viewpoints of the city. The left photo below shows the view of Cape Town and puts in perspective how small the city actually is. From the water to the base of the mountain, it would only take 15 min to drive through. (maybe 25 if there was traffic). The right photo, pictures Camps Bay.

After the morning hike and aerial views, I went to the famous Victoria Waterfront for lunch. I dined at the food hall, and was pretty surprised to see that there were no "African" spots for me to try. They had stalls from all over the world from Japanese Ramen, Wood Fired Pizza, Sushi Hand rolls, Indian Curry, Asian Bao buns and Dumplings but they didn't have any "local" South African delicacies or food for me to try. I ended up getting a pizza and it was pretty good but not the culinary adventure I was looking for. After lunch, I explored the water front with all the shops with both international and local brand stores.

For dinner, I went back to Camp Bay and went to a restaurant called “Codfather”. This restaurant is basically a fish market. There was no set menu and they only served fresh fish and shellfish. When you are ready to order, the waiter would escort you to the amazing display case and describe/show you what they had available for the day. At that point, you put in your order of what you would like and the amount as well. The chef would cut each of the fish you select to your desired size. Once you have placed your order you head back to the table, while the chef will cook up your meal. Everything was so fresh and allowed me to try a bit of everything since I could just get small samples of all the seafood. I ended up getting some Oysters, crawfish, langoustine, and 3 different kinds of fish. To say I was stuffed after was an under statement.

The last day I had in Cape Town was to explore the peninsula side of the cape. We first drove down to Simon’s beach to see the penguins from the boardwalk. While it was nothing amazing since it was just like a zoo exhibit, the next stop was. We went to a little beach just to the right of the boardwalk and climbed under a big boulder, over some smaller ones, and waded through some water to get through to the other side where we were with the penguins. Although there weren’t many in the area, it was great to see them up close and be able to wade in the waters with them.

After this amazing encounter, we were on our way to the Cape of Good Hope. This is the most southwestern point of Africa. 

At the cape, which is defined as a mountain range that leads directly to the sea, there was a lighthouse that was built 300m above sea level but after a while the settlers decided to could longer use it because it would be hard to see the light when the fog rolled in so they build a 2nd one down 200m the first below that allowed ships to see it. One of the Cape's unique features is that there are a lot of rocks right under the surface of the water and so if you were a ship and could see land you were too close to shore and need to back away otherwise you are running the risk of hitting one of the rocks and sinking your ship.  There is a huge maritime graveyard as so many ships have gone down because they run into it. 

After this we drove back to Cape Town along a highway that was very similar to the PCH. There are a lot of small towns along the way; they are so small that they don’t even have grocery stores. They might have a restaurant or 2 but no grocery stores and stop lights. It was a small town that was just built to have some houses with amazing view. There were not too many locals that lived in these towns but mostly made up of vacation homes or AirBnb homes. There are a lot of Brits who vacation in Cape Town due to the cheap cost of living.

This ended my tour of the coastal town of Cape Town. I saw and my tour guide mentioned that a lot of people compared Cape Town to San Francisco. The cool coastal weather, different neighborhoods, and waterfront made it almost a 1:1 comparison.

Next stop, my first safari experience at Notten's Bush Camp within the Sabi Sands Private Game Reserve

Read my first safari experience HERE

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