The Cape and beyond
My crew had begun to clear out on Tuesday. By Wednesday night, James and I were the longest serving residents of Ashanti Lodge, sitting up at the bar, remising on the departed backpackers of days gone by.
On Tuesday night I went dinner down at the waterfront with a group of five who had all arrived in Cape Town that day. Syd from England put his video camera in my face, commentating “We are lucky to have Courtney with us, Cape Town Veteran, taking us for dinner tonight, and showing us the sites of the city”. It was time to go.
The weather had cleared up over the weekend, and they reopened the Mountain tracks. I meet Steffi at the hostel, and convinced her that walking up the Mountain was how she should spend the next day.
Plattiklip Gorge is not the prettiest way up the mountain, but it’s the most common climb. We were told it was “steps”. Not so! It was rock and some of them were huge. It was so steep you could use your hand a lot of the time to crawl up. It was relentless, I was thinking perhaps just past my point of sight perhaps there is just a little bit of walking track, but there never was. It was by far the most grueling walk I have ever done in my life. But and hour and a half later we reached the top of the Mountain.
At first the view wasn’t so great. But after a while I recovered and was able to get up off the ground I was lying face down in and it was beautiful. You could see Cape Town in one direction, the seaside suburbs spotted down the coast behind you, the Mountains that stretched all the way down to Cape Point to the left. It was worth the effort.
There was still a lot more I wanted to do in Cape Town, but there was also a lot more of Africa I wanted to see. James booked a ticket to Namibia, and I chose Wilderness, a town about 8 hours out of Cape Town. I wanted to go somewhere quiet.
The drive was spectacular. South Africa has more mountains than you can possibly imagine, appearing though every window of the bus. The fields are so green, and every so often an old style English village would appear in one of the valleys.
In Wilderness, Chris met me out the front of the 200 year old homestead he had converted into a hostel. I told him I was from Melbourne. “So were in relation to Tasmania is Melbourne?” he asked.
“Just across the water” I replied, a little surprised. “I use to live in Tasmania, have you been?”
“No” he said “But I think ill move there. It sounds like the sort of place I would like to live”.
The grounds of the hostel were amazing. There were trees and watering holes, gardens and little spots to hide in, where a huge big old tree and a flower bushes created a little corner enough to hide a solitary chair. I spent the afternoon lying around reading, writing and sleeping.
There were about 5 others staying at the hostel, they wandered home in the evening and we chatted as the sun set from the patio overlooking the river. It was a beautiful place, but everyone was leaving the next day, and there was no booking for the hostel over the weekend. A bus would come past at 4pm, and I decided to move on as well.
The bus driver, Sam, was crazy. 15 mins away at Knysna, he ran the bus into the footpath. He got out, ran to about 20 meters away and just looked at the bus for a few minutes. There were about 5 passengers and we were all quiet when he came back.
“Can somebody else drive the bus now” asked Sam “I don’t want to do it anymore”.
Back on the road, a few hours later we heard a fire truck coming up behind us. As everyone else pulled over Sam though it the perfect opportunity to tailgate the fire truck, avoiding all that pesky overtaking we would only have to do later on anyway. A bit further down the road, he simply overtook the fire truck as well. Its not done in South Africa by anyone, but at this point I put my seatbelt on.
Some how we made it to Jeffery’s bay in one piece. At Storms River we were joined by a few guys I knew from Cape Town and a girl I knew from the bus the previous day who were all heading to the same hostel as me for the weekend. They had been skydiving and bungee jumping so we spent the night watching all the videos. It’s the same thing over again most of the time, expect for one Canadian chick that passed out at the end of her sky dive, just as they were landing. As she was lying on the ground coming to, someone passed her a coke and said, “Drink this”. She looked at it and passed it back.
“Its not diet.” She said.
On Tuesday night I went dinner down at the waterfront with a group of five who had all arrived in Cape Town that day. Syd from England put his video camera in my face, commentating “We are lucky to have Courtney with us, Cape Town Veteran, taking us for dinner tonight, and showing us the sites of the city”. It was time to go.
The weather had cleared up over the weekend, and they reopened the Mountain tracks. I meet Steffi at the hostel, and convinced her that walking up the Mountain was how she should spend the next day.
Plattiklip Gorge is not the prettiest way up the mountain, but it’s the most common climb. We were told it was “steps”. Not so! It was rock and some of them were huge. It was so steep you could use your hand a lot of the time to crawl up. It was relentless, I was thinking perhaps just past my point of sight perhaps there is just a little bit of walking track, but there never was. It was by far the most grueling walk I have ever done in my life. But and hour and a half later we reached the top of the Mountain.
At first the view wasn’t so great. But after a while I recovered and was able to get up off the ground I was lying face down in and it was beautiful. You could see Cape Town in one direction, the seaside suburbs spotted down the coast behind you, the Mountains that stretched all the way down to Cape Point to the left. It was worth the effort.
There was still a lot more I wanted to do in Cape Town, but there was also a lot more of Africa I wanted to see. James booked a ticket to Namibia, and I chose Wilderness, a town about 8 hours out of Cape Town. I wanted to go somewhere quiet.
The drive was spectacular. South Africa has more mountains than you can possibly imagine, appearing though every window of the bus. The fields are so green, and every so often an old style English village would appear in one of the valleys.
In Wilderness, Chris met me out the front of the 200 year old homestead he had converted into a hostel. I told him I was from Melbourne. “So were in relation to Tasmania is Melbourne?” he asked.
“Just across the water” I replied, a little surprised. “I use to live in Tasmania, have you been?”
“No” he said “But I think ill move there. It sounds like the sort of place I would like to live”.
The grounds of the hostel were amazing. There were trees and watering holes, gardens and little spots to hide in, where a huge big old tree and a flower bushes created a little corner enough to hide a solitary chair. I spent the afternoon lying around reading, writing and sleeping.
There were about 5 others staying at the hostel, they wandered home in the evening and we chatted as the sun set from the patio overlooking the river. It was a beautiful place, but everyone was leaving the next day, and there was no booking for the hostel over the weekend. A bus would come past at 4pm, and I decided to move on as well.
The bus driver, Sam, was crazy. 15 mins away at Knysna, he ran the bus into the footpath. He got out, ran to about 20 meters away and just looked at the bus for a few minutes. There were about 5 passengers and we were all quiet when he came back.
“Can somebody else drive the bus now” asked Sam “I don’t want to do it anymore”.
Back on the road, a few hours later we heard a fire truck coming up behind us. As everyone else pulled over Sam though it the perfect opportunity to tailgate the fire truck, avoiding all that pesky overtaking we would only have to do later on anyway. A bit further down the road, he simply overtook the fire truck as well. Its not done in South Africa by anyone, but at this point I put my seatbelt on.
Some how we made it to Jeffery’s bay in one piece. At Storms River we were joined by a few guys I knew from Cape Town and a girl I knew from the bus the previous day who were all heading to the same hostel as me for the weekend. They had been skydiving and bungee jumping so we spent the night watching all the videos. It’s the same thing over again most of the time, expect for one Canadian chick that passed out at the end of her sky dive, just as they were landing. As she was lying on the ground coming to, someone passed her a coke and said, “Drink this”. She looked at it and passed it back.
“Its not diet.” She said.
posted by Courtney | 12:48 AM
3 Comments:
Most of the transport doesn't even have seatbelts!!
Did you think i was wearing a seatbelt on the trams in Melbourne every day?? or ANY bus in Australia?
hey courtney did you tell anyone over there it was your birthday or did you just keep your little secret to yourself?
also what is African beer like? and does it cost 20 cents like Caragh said?
Yep - they don't know nothing about seatbelts in Russia or Romania either... or driving rules for that matter. Love your blog! Keep having a ball and looking forward to catching up here in Berlin!
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