Cape Town!

On November 1st, we left on the much anticipated part of our trip to the continent of Africa! My mom joined us for the first twelve days. It was a very special trip for her as well; 53 years ago, my parents left The Netherlands for a life in South Africa. They spent three wonderful years in Cape Town before returning to The Netherlands to start their family. My parents always kept on travelling and saw many different corners of the world. Going back to South Africa was always on their mind, it just never happened. After my dad passed away in 2012, I don't think my mom ever considered going to Cape Town on her own. But, when we asked her to join us somewhere in Europe or Africa for a while during our travels, she said Cape Town right away.

And here we are, at the airport, for a very special trip for all of us!

When you fly from Amsterdam to Cape Town, you fly straight from north to south over the whole continent of Africa. It was an 11-hour flight and we did have a great view for most of the time. The first picture is of the coastal town of Bethioua in Algeria, and the second picture is of the Sahara Desert in Niger.

KLM had cancelled our flight rather last minute, and rebooked us on a flight a day earlier. What was supposed to be a one night at the airport hotel in Cape Town became a two night stay, which in the end was not bad at all. But we were happy to move into the Airbnb we had booked for the next ten days. It had a beautiful back yard patio and we were very close to the beach.

The apartment we rented was in Sunset Beach, a few minutes away from this most amazing view. Cape Town might have changed a whole lot in the last 50 years, but the view of Table Mountain remained as stunning and special as then, according to my mom. We spent a lot of time on this beach. Most nights we walked down to see the sunset and to enjoy the acrobatic jumps of the kite surfers who came out.

Early in the week, we spent our first day downtown Cape Town. Table Mountain had 'a table cloth' but that did not spoil the perfect day we had. We enjoyed the views, had lunch at the waterfront, watched brown fur seals in the harbour, and learned about Nobel Square, which pays tribute to South Africa's four Nobel Peace Price Laureates: N.A. Luthuli, Desmond Tutu, FW de Klerk and Nelson Mandela.

We searched for the two places my parents lived in the 70's. It was not easy, as Cape Town has significantly changed over the years, but to my mom's delight we did find one of the two places. The apartment block got a new outside layer but otherwise had not changed much.

We made a day trip around the Cape Peninsula. The weather was lovely and the views were beautiful. We also saw the first wild life of South Africa!

We drove all the way to Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point. It is technically not the most southern point of Africa, Cape Agulhas is, but it did feel like the end of the world.

Our dream once was to drive from the North Cape in Norway to Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. Well, we drove to the North Cape this summer and we are now here. That is pretty close to the dream we had and a pretty amazing feeling!

We went to visit the African penguins at Boulders Beach. There was a whole waddle of penguins, but it is still an endangered species.

We thoroughly enjoyed watching penguins go about their day.

On our way back to Cape Town, driving along False Bay, I saw the spout of a whale! We could follow the Bryde's Whale for a long time and also saw a pod of dolphins. John and I spent ten years on the west coast of BC, and this scene here brought back lots of good memories.

We finished the day off with a visit to our 'own' beach. The sunset could not have been any better. What a perfect day we had!

We spent an other day driving inland to Stellenbosch and surroundings. In Stellenbosch we found a fun little museum called Stellenbosch Toy and Miniature Museum. There was something for everyone to enjoy.

Close by, there was the Stellenbosch University Botanical Garden. It is still spring here, but we did see some nice proteas, cacti and bonsai trees.

We finished off the day by visiting one of the oldest wine farms in Stellenbosch, Blaauwklippen. It was such a peaceful place to be and we enjoyed a cup of coffee while the kids played in the large wooden play structure. We took a nice bottle of wine home.

Another prefect day!

Load shedding...

It is something we really had to get used to when we arrived in South Africa. When the demand for electricity exceeds the available supply, planned supply interruptions are carried out by the national hydro company Eskom. It is a controlled way of rotating the available electricity between all customers....

Our Airbnb apartment was in an affluent neighbourhood and most of the load shedding (usually a two hour chunk) was done during the night. There is a schedule that Eskom adheres to, but it did take us by surprise a few times.

Our time in Cape Town was amazing. It is a city full of contrasts and there is still a lot we have to learn about the country it is in, but we thoroughly enjoyed the twelve days here with my mom. We were so happy she joined us!

It is time for more adventures!