(Wednesday 13th April)
We landed safely, but tiredly, at 7.15am local time on the 13th of April and there was someone from the hotel waiting for us to arrive holding my name up on a board. Felt very special. We drove strait to the hotel under the impression that we would have to drop our bags and wait until 2pm to check in, however when we got there we were told the very nice news that our room was unoccupied and we could go straight up. Sweet.
We dropped our stuff and then went down to the 1st floor dining room where we had a big buffet breakfast. From there we went down to the ground floor tourism office and booked a Great White Shark Cage Diving tour for the next morning. We then went up to our room and slept for a few hour and had really long showers and then feeling a little bit more human we decided to walk to the V&A Waterfront, kind of like the docklands in Melbourne, all restaurants and shopping malls. We wondered around for a while before deciding on a South African restuarant called Karibu, which means 'Welcome'. Sitting there at the waterfront in the warmth of the afternoon sun, watching people and time go by with Table Mountain as a back drop was just magical. We ate Springbok steak, ostrich carpaccio and various braai'd (barbequed) meats, drank local beer, and finished it all off with a bottle of chocolate and coffe flavoured pinotage called Deimersfontain- a South African wine we discovered a few years ago at a food and wine festival that we hadn't been able to find again since. Finally we started to feel too tired to continue so we caught a taxi back to the hotel by about 8pm and fell into a deep deep deep sleep.
(Thursday 14th April)
Waking up at 4am was not as hard as I thought it would be. We were both so excited about going cage diving with the great white sharks that as soon as the alarm went off we were up and getting ready. We were picked up at 4.30am by a minibus also carrying two other aussies and one other person. The drive to Gansbaai (pronounced Hansbaai) took about 2.5 hours getting us there just after sunrise at about 7am. We were dropped at a little house on the beach from where the company ran its tours. We ate a quick brekky of toast, eggs, sausages and coffee before being led down to the jetty. There were 13 of us in total. The company we went with called Shark Diving Unlimited is owned by the most highly experience and well respected guy in the field, Michael Rutzen, known as The Shark Man.
We were however the only boat that went out that morning because of the massive swells, it was quite a trip, but noone got sea sick. It took the boat about 15mins to get to 'Shark Alley', a small-ish chanel of water in the ocean between seal rocks and a bird conservation rock. Great Whites travel from all over the place to feed on the seals in this area, and they have even tracked a few that have travelled all the way from Australia and back again.
We set anchor and were given the speech that although the company had great success rate with shark viewing (they claim 99%), they are wild animals and nothing could be guaranteed. Not too long after the speach was finished we saw our first Great White. It was straight into wetsuits and the first 7 people ready went straight into the cage.
We were not ready and so were in the second group to have a turn in the cage, but it was awesome enough watching the great whites from the surface. Seeing them swim past and dwarf the cage was so exciting. The first group of people had about 20mins in the cage before it was our turn. Alex went in first and was against the far left side of the cage. I was next to him. As soon as we were all in the cage another shark came past. While in the cage we had out heads above water, holding the bars on top of the cage with our knees resting on a yellow bar about a third of the way down the cage. When the boat hands said "Down Diver, Down" we held our breaths, grabbed onto the yellow bar that our knees were rested on and used that to push ourselves down into the cage so our feet or knees were on the bottom of the cage. It was so cold (9.4 degress celcius) that I intially found it really hard to hold my breath for any length of time, but after a while we got used to it and it got easier.
It was just exhilirating to see a great shite shark swim right past you, less than a meter away. They are such powerful and graceful animals. It was sad to find out that there are only about 300 left in the area, and only about 1000 remaining in total. It is just devestating to think that the next generation will never be able to see a live one, let alone in the wild.
When our time was up Alex and I were the last to get out of the cage and when I was just about to hop out we were told that we could stay in if we wanted... OK! So we shifted to the other end of the cage so that I was against the far right hand side and 5 of the original 7 people in the first group got back in. Only moments later we heard "DOWN DIVER DOWN" onyl to see the BIGGEST great white of the whole day. This massive male was about 4- 4.5 meters long and less than one meter away from our faces. Twice it did a sudden about-turn so that it faced us directly before going for the bait. It was just amazing to see. We were so pumped full of adrendaline I almost forgot to come up for air! As the shark swam away for the last time we were asked to get out of the cage and board the boat to go back ashore. The whole thing seemed to be over so quick, we would have stayed there all day if we could.
We were taken back to the house to get out of our wetsuits, have a warm shower if wanted and have a hot lunch of vegitable soup and bread. We were also able to watch the DVD of us that was filmed while our there while we ate lunch. We ended up buying a copy of the DVD that also comes with an extra DVD of a documentary made on the company and its owner The Shark Man. We also left our email address for a crazy canadian dude whos lifes mission is to travel the world diving with great whites. It was his 3rd day out with the company, going out twice a day and he hoped for a fe more days weather permitting. He had some amazing shots of the sharks we saw and said that he would email them to us. So fingers crossed.
We got back to CT at about 3pm, went straight to the pool area and had a few beers and ate a burger in the sun. This was the end of us. We were planning on walking back to the V&A Waterfront, but somehow ended up falling asleep in our room at about 4.30pm and not waking up again until midnight! Nothing else to do at that time so we wnet back to sleep. Woke up again at 4.30am- nothing else to do so went back to sleep...
(Friday 15th April)
After about 15 hours of sleep we finally got out of bed at about 7am, we went downstairs for our buffet brekky. Our plan for the day was to do the hop-on-hop-off bus tour of CT. A short walk down to the beach road from our hotel was one of the bus stops. We only had to wait about 20mins for the bus to come around and a whole day ticket was only R120 each (about $18), there are 17 stops all around CT and you can hop off at any one of them and hop back on when ever and where ever you want. The first stop for us was the Waterfront and the Two Oceans Aquarium. The aquarium was ok, a bit small and nothing amazing, but still worth the stop in. From there we decided to stay on the bus through the CBD and go straight to Table Mountain. We caught the cable car to the top just in time for lunch.
There are such magnificent views from the top, it really feels like you are standing at the top of an ancient world. The mountains are all so so big, meeting the oceans in a dramatic way. Simply stunning! After eating, walking around, viewing, talking and drinking we decided to make our way back to the hotel view a bus tour of the richer parts of CT, Camps Bay. This is where we couldn't afford to stay. Some of the mansions on the beach were on the side of the cliff and the cars were parked on the roofs of the houses. They were amazing houses. When we got back to the hotel Alex tried to organise meeting up with his friends that he went to highschool with in India. One of them was going out for dinner and said that we could meet up afterwards, so we went up to the 21st floor of our hotel that has South Africa's only revolving restaurant. It was a nice enough meal with really nice views, but the meals were so big that we were both really tired afterwards, and so were secretly grateful when Alex's friends said it was too late to meet up. So we went downstairs and booked a township tour for the next morning and then took the rest of night off and tried to get a good sleep.... tried.....
(Saturday 16th April)
The wind was so strong overnight that I barely got a few hours of sleep. The wind was howling outside and the windows of our 12th floor room were not sealed so they were banging, crashing and creaking all night long. It sounded like a tornado was outside! Finally giving up on the idea of sleep at about 6am I kept myself busy by tidying up the room a bit and when Al got up we headed down for brekky.
Our pickup was at 8.30m, we were the first of 4 other couples to be picked up. When we were all aboard the first stop was the District 6 Museum. We spent onyl about 20mins there looking at artifacts from when District 6 was declared a 'white only' area and all of the black, coloured, malay and indian local residents were forcably removed from thier homes and relocated to shanti townships outide the city walls, thier homes were then demolished and they lost everything. Such a beautiful country, such ugly history.
Feeling slightly more educated we left for our first township tour.
The first township we visited is called Langa and currently has over 200,000 people living in it. It has 5 primary schools, 4 highschools, a medical clinic, a day hospital, markets, businesses, traditions. Our driver, a Langa local, dropped us off for a 1 hour walking tour of Langa with another local as our guide. It felt so akward to begin with, walking around this shanti town taking pictures of peole doing normal things in thier every day life. I asked the guide if the locals found it insulting that they were a tourist attraction and intrusive that we came and took photos of them. He said that it was the opposite. That most people saw it as a positive thing, that we will take photos and then go home to our own communities and talk about what is happening here in Africa. That we will use social media to spread the knowledge like facebook and twitter, and that the more people that know about it and that talk about, the more thier governmnet will be forced into doing something for the people. He also explained that we bring in much needed money into the townships by spending money at thier markets on locally made products, we bought little hand carved wooden dolls from one.
For the next hour we stopped at a local stall, walked amongst the locals, saw inside different houses, played with local kids and were invited to try the locally brewed beer called Shebeen. It had a really sour, almost milky flavour. I wouldnt say it was nice, but it was different!
When the tour was over we met up again with the driver and were taken to the second township we were going to visit. This one is called Khayelitsha, South Africa's newest and fastest growing township with over 1 million people currently living there! We drove through some of it and made our way to Vicky's B&B, South Africa's smallest hotel right in the middle of the gigantic township. It was such a nicely set out, cozy place on the inside. Vicky, the owner spoke to us about her business and and how she uses it to help the local residents. Giving money to beggars is strongly discouraged as this leads them to rely on it. She did have a christmas 'fund', where she collected little things throughout the year to distribute amongst the kids at christmas time. We didnt have much on us but found a puzzle book and a small solar powered torch that we added to the christmas fund. Every small bit helps.
We got back to the hotel at about 1.30pm feeling educated, sad, grateful and a little bit wiser. We grabbed a quick lunch at Steers, a local fast food burger joint and then went to our room to organise a catch up with Alex's friends. We organised to meet them on Long Street at about 6pm so we used the time to upload our photos to facebook and then headed into Long Street. Long Street is in the CBD and is the nightlife hotspot. We met up with Katlego, one of Alex's highschool mates from India. He is a South African that has been living back here for over 8 years now. It was a really nice night meeting him and Alex catching up with him, we had a few more Castle beers )the local popular beer, and a staple food for us over the last week) and some food and organised to try and meet up again on tuesday.
(Sunday 17th April)
After a great nights sleep we headed down for our last buffet brekky at the Ritz Hotel. We then went back to our room for a 9am skype date with my mum. Feeling pumped up and happy from speakin to my mum we used the credit we had on skype to call a few more people. We spoke to my dad, Alex's mum and Alex's sister. It was so nice to speak to family and hear the surprise in thier voices when they answered the phone and it was us calling. It was a bit of an odd feeling caling someone from our laptop though! We then had the daunting task of re-packing our bags... **Shudder***
We are going to have to come up with a better system because it took me more than an hour and was a complete pain in the arse!
Then we had to say goodbye to Sea Point and caught a taxi to our next home, Ashanti Lodge, closer to the BD and about a 10minute walk to Long Street. When we arrived we were again really lucky that our room was unoccupied and we were able to go straight in. We immediatley liked Ashanti Lodge. It has a really nice, cool, sociable, cruisy atmosphere. We have a nice room in the pool quad, its pretty basic with a bed, a sink and a safe but it has a really nice feel to it and a super comfy bed. There is a big communal kitchen where you can cook yourself food and there is also a bar upstairs where you can buy food and drinks with the most amazing view of Table Mountain. Very happy here.
Within a few minutes of being here we started to meet people that are going to be on the overland with us. We spent some time meeting and chatting and then walked up the street to the supermarket to buy some supplies like cereal, milk, soy milk (yes, it exists here) and some drinks. Back at the lodge we got oursleves comfy and had an aftenoon siesta. Such a hard life. It felt really good to be having a day off from touring, and just taking it easy. When we woke up we went upstairs to the bar where we settled in for the rest of the night. Tonight was spag bol night so we grabbed a bowl of that for R30 (about $4.50) and hung our with James, a young pommy guy that is joining the group here aswell and going all the way up to Cairo.
I was a little bit apprehensive that we would have to 'proove' ourselfves to the seasoned African Trails travellers that have been on th overland since November 2010, but it appears that they are all looking forward to a shake-up and some 'fresh blood'. Lets see...
Also, a new development is that due to a new law passed by South Africa our truck cant enter Sth Africa without being registered for at least 6months, so now instead of driving due north into Botswana, we will be heading west on a charted bus into Namibia where we will meet up with our truck and then head into Botswana. It means that we will miss seeing northern Sth Africa, but we do get to see some of Namibia, which we werent going to be seeing originally, so thats pretty cool.
(Monday 18th April)
Today was the day we needed to sort out our local payment, which is the equivilant of 735pounds each but in American dollars. We really didnt want to have to pay atm fees to withdraw the cash in Rand and then have to pay commission to have it exchanged into american dollars, but after 4 hours of walking around the waterfront with poor James following us around and laughing at how hard we were making it look, there appeared to be no other way. We had to withdraw 17,000 rand in 4 seperate transactions from 3 different cards. Needless to say we felt brok afterwards just thinking about all of the bank fees we would be charged. But alas, we had our local payment sorted anyway.
After all that hard work we needed a hard earned drink (im starting to see a pattern here) so we headed to a brewery at the Waterfront and got a 1.7litre of Castle draught. After polishing that off with not too much difficulty, we caught a taxi hime, had a few more beers in the bar upstairs adn tehn walked to the local supermarket and bought more beer and a bottle of that Deimersfontain pinotage that we loved and also some ingedients for dinner. Alex cooked up a lovely chicken pasta in the comunal kitchen and we sat outside in the pool area and ate our yummy dinner and played some cards with James. We then headed upstairs to play some pool and, you guessed it, drink more beer.
(Tuesday 19th April)
I sit here now in the Long Street Cafe, using thier free wifi and updating the blog. Today has been all about organisation, not our strong suite!
So far we have done some banking, spoken to mum and dad on skype, found a music shop and got some spare strings for the guitar, got alex some passport photos, dropped our laundry into a laundry matt, and later today we need to pick up the laundry, hopefully get more US$, pack our bags and get ready to leave for Namibia tomorrow morning. We have an African Trails (AT) meeting tonight at 7pm and then we are hoping to catch up with Alexs friends again one more time before we leve South Africa. I dont know when we will next have internet, so until then.....
Guys, this blog rocks.... I am glad you decided to allow us all access and i am now looking forward to reading all your entries. It sounds like you have already had an amazing trip so far... Can't wait to read more
ReplyDeleteLove Cath xxoo