Whatever You Do...

We left Cape Town this morning. Our rental car was scheduled to be delivered to our hotel at 8 am. We went down to the lobby restaurant to order breakfast and wait. Our food, our rental car and a representative of our travel agency all arrived at the same time. Our food grew cold while we signed the papers for our Hyundai rental car. When the guy from Eurocar left We turned out attention to what Elsabe, our rep from the travel agency, wanted. We were so glad to meet her. She was the woman we called when Gayle left her wallet in the car back in Johannesburg at the beginning of our trip. She moved some mountains...well at least some foothills....to get Gayle's wallet back into her hands. Elsabe brought us each a gift.  She said she came to make sure we had what we needed before we left on our own. She gave us some advice on routes, what to see and where to eat. We told her we were nervous. She said you will be fine but "whatever you do don't go into the townships outside of Strand. Be sure not to stop your car near there."

We took off by 9:30 am. The plan was for Gayle to start off driving and for me to navigate. I was also supposed to always remind her to drive on the left.  We headed out of Cape Town and down the Cape Peninsula. Our first stop was the Karbonkelberg Beach, a recommendation of Elsabe. The GPS suggested we drive out into the ocean but we thought better of it.

It was a beautiful coastal area...

...with lovely flowers.

Then we paid the toll to drive the road around Chapman's Peak.

It was a pretty intense drive for people who are used to driving on a different side of the road. Plus it rained intermittently all day.

We entered Table Mountain National Park so we could visit the Cape of Good Hope.

We skipped the scenic hike up the rocks.

Then we went to Cape Point where we rode the funicular.

It takes you part way up to the lighthouse.

Then we did part of the cliff walk so we could see Cape Point in the distance.

There are signs all over the place warning people about the dangers of baboons. So of course we saw this family the moment we got out of the car.

By the time we were ready to leave the national park it was 2:30 pm and we hadn't eaten lunch. We were dangerously close to getting "hangry" so we stopped in their little shop for some snacks just to hold us over. Our next stop was Boulder Beach to see African penguins. We were not disappointed.

We could tell that everything was taking longer than we planned so we decided not to stop for fish and chips like we had originally planned. We drove on.  Two different people had suggested a place in Kalk Bay called Cape to Cairo. We thought we might get something to snack on there but we had a terrible time locating the place. It turns out it is called Cape to Cuba. It was just okay. We ordered dessert and sat next to the railway to eat it.

I took over driving at this point. I wanted to get a feel for driving on the left. Our next stop was the brightly colored houses of Muizenberg. Gayle teased me for wanting to see them just because I'd done a jigsaw puzzle of this photogenic location.

After we left Muizenberg we saw the townships on our left that Elsabe mentioned. We reminded each other that we were not to stop there.

That is when we came upon a police barricade. There had been an "action" and there was still a fire on the road. The police made us turn into the township. We found ourselves in stop and go traffic through the heart of the township.  We inched along for 45 minutes with Elsabe's words ringing in our ears..."Whatever you do don't stop in the townships"....which is exactly what we were doing. The night before we had a FaceTime conversation with Matt and he told us that a friend had shared that there has been protests in Cape Town. When we got back out onto a main road we saw even more police and were directed around multiple fires on the road. When I took over the driving I hadn't imagined myself navigating that kind of traffic and situation. 

Once we got onto the expressway we headed for our destination, Hermanus. We decided that we were done sightseeing. We arrived just after 7:30 pm. Our hotel is located directly across the street from the ocean, which we couldn't see because of the late hour. We had a hard time figuring out how to get into it because it is completely gated. We were meet by Sandisa who offered us wine and seats by the fire while he checked us in. The incongruity of life in a township and this opulence was not lost on us.

While we were checking in three German women we had met while having dinner at Reverie Social Table in Cape Town walked in. We hugged like we were long list friends from elementary school. 

Our room faces the ocean and has every eminity, including a cell phone and iPad you can use while staying here. But mostly we were hungry. We started walking in search of food. We got turned away due to the late hour. We passed by a couple restaurants because Gayle thought the sounded too "meaty". She doesn't enjoy eating meat that looks like meat. I think it probably comes from growing up in Nigeria where the meat market had big slabs of red meat covered in flies.

Eventually our pickiness ceased and I went into the next restaurant and started with: "We are very hungry. We promise to eat quickly and order no drinks." They gave us a table. When the waitress came to take our order she brought a tray with large cuts of raw red meat on it. She said, "I would like to talk to you about the cuts of meat we are offering tonight." She instantly registered our horror and had another waitress whisk the bloody meat away from our table. After she took our order and left I got the giggles about it and had to lay down on the booth bench. It was funny but I think it was also the stress of the day. 

I had the best pulled pork sandwich of my life at theirs restaurant named Chard. Gayle got sides. One of them was corn on the cob dipped in tempura batter and deep fried. It was served with kale chips. It turns out that is delicious! 

By then we were too exhausted to walk back to our hotel in the dark. We got an Uber. Glad to be back in our room we fell into bed.