Back up to the room for the usual post-breakfast relax and "letting food go down" as SS puts it. Not sure where the food is going down to - probably best not to think about it. We ended up watching a fascinating program on Al Jazeera about the plight of the Marsh Arabs in Iraq, and what happened under Saddam and subsequently. Scary hand to mouth existence where their best option is to join the Army, but because of their religion and history it s usually not allowed.
We collected ourselves together, and headed out the door at about midday.
First stop was supposed to be the Rhodes Memorial, but I missed the turnoff, so instead we took the Constantia exit and hoped to find some signs to Groot Constantia so I could see another site of family holidays. Luckily Groot Constantia does want to be found, and there were signs so that we got there easily. We drove up to the main house and I had some photos taken - very surreal again seeing somewhere I remembered from that age.
I took a few of SS as well, he was wearing his hat all day as we both had the nasty sunburn from the day before - mine along my parting and him all over the top of his head. Quite painful actually.
We had a quick walk around the vineyards, and then headed back to the wine sales. SS did a tasting, was unimpressed so we scuttled back out the door without buying anything. Back up the road and back to the M3.
We headed south, and reached False Bay, taking the Boyes Drive option which was beautiful. Couple of stops on the side of the road to take photographs and take in the view on the way down. It was so windy, the car was getting pushed around the road...
Next main stop was Simonstown - SS refused pointblank to have his photo taken with the town sign, and we passed straight by the penguins at Boulder's Beach as well.
We did stop off a bit further down the beautiful coast to take some photos - I loved the baboon signs altho we never saw any on this drive.
We reached the Cape National Reserve (R75 each entrance!) and then continued down to Cape Point. We parked the car along with 100 of our closest friends, and headed down the road to climb up to the lighthouse. It was SO hot, really baking down, and I felt a bit dizzy for some reason that day. SS on the other hand was very keen for some exercise so I told him to run ahead and I would see him at the top. Off he ran...
I slowly made my way up the stairs - it was a long climb.
Finally got to the top where he was all fresh and happy, and I felt like I was going to faint with the heat.
We wandered around up the top and the suddenly a whole funicular full of Chinese tourists arrived, in all their glory. They acted like they always do, pushing you out of the way for photos, clustering and shouting to each other and generally making the site unbearable for everyone else. Luckily they never stay long and soon were crowding in the terminus again to go down.
There was also an Arabic couple in full dress - no wonder she was sheltering under a tree - she must have been dying!
Lovely views from the lighthouse,
and then we descended a bit again and went to the gift shoppe (very disappointing stuff). Then the long walk back down and back to the car.
We headed straight out of the park, and headed west to drive up the other coastline.
Through Scarborough and its giant statues for sale, past other small dorpies, and then to Kommetjie where SS decided he needed more water. We stopped at a corner store next to the British Bulldog pub in Kommetjie. Got the water (I looked again in vain for the dark chocolate Bar Ones my sister had asked for), and then we made our way out past the pub which was heaving with nasty backpackers and locals, and with terrible music blaring out (John Mellencamp I think).
We quickly got back in the car was went through some other nasty places before making our way to the Chapman's Peak tollroad which was supposed to be beautiful. It was a marvel of engineering but not the most beautiful road we went along on our holiday.
At R28 toll, not sure I would recommend it really - there was nowhere to stop and take photos for a start. We emerged at Hout Bay and then over to Bakoven, where we hit the traffic. Basically we crawled along for 40 minutes to Camps Bay, with me hot and grumpy and SS catching up on his sleep. Did not put me in a good mood for dinner.
We slowly slowly slowly crawled along in the traffic, finally getting to the main drag of Camps Bay. I was not that impressed with it - reminded me of the Gold Coast in Australia with overpriced restaurants, lowlifes and the beach supposed to make up for it all. Hmmm. I found a parking space as we got to the far end, and a car guard type helped me back in. I was quite happy to give him a tip there and then as he had been helpful with my edging around in very busy traffic to get into the spot. He saw us as tourists to rip off, and looked at my proffered R5 and said "how long are you staying?". We said 3 hours or so, and he said "R5 is only for 2 hours, it's R10 for 3 hours". SS got very manly and said "fine, we'll be back in two hours". And we walked off. You do get tired of these car guards - generally you only pay when you return to the car, but often if they are going to knock off shortly they get pushy about payment then and there, when you know they are just going to walk off and their replacement will try to charge you return to the car as well. Here, we knew he would be gone when we got back, and the R5 was already generous.
Oh well, we walked along the beach checking out the look of the cafes. SS had seen one at the other end he liked (Panzoro), and we got the menu from there. It looked very expensive to me, and I had seen a pizza place back at the other end that looked nice and easy and quiet. So I suggested going back there. SS also saw an old car (Volvo P1800) on the street which got him excited - very like the one he used to own, so we took some photos of this as well.
Got to Col'Cacchios,
and we settled in happily at a table near the window looking west over the beach as the sun came down. It was basically like a Pizza Express but with many more options.
I had a Windhoek Light, and SS a spicy tomato juice.
We started with salad - I had a large spinach salad with parmesan, and then a huge Toscana pizza (anchovies, olives, onion, artichoke) which was nice but too salty. SS had a greek salad to start with lettuce and then a Carne (chorizo, salami, onion, mushrooms). The salads were HUGE, as were the pizzas, so we each took half of our pizza home in a doggy box for snacking on the next day.
We decided to head up to Signal Hill as I had heard that the sunset was lovely from there. SS directed me with a couple of unintended diversions, and we got up there - the place was PACKED with cars and people, very hard to get around and get parked. But I found a spot to shove the Sombrero into, and we walked along the top to see the views and take some photos.
Lovely view down at the Mount Nelson hotel, and to Table Mountain.
We got back to the car, and then queued in the little car park to get out again. As the road up to the car park is so narrow, with people parked along one side it was really only a one lane road to get down, and some cars were heading up to turn around. Terrible. One large BMW nearly ended up in the very deep ditch on one side, but eventually we all wormed our way through tiny gaps and got back to the guesthouse for 8:30pm.
I made some tea whilst SS checked the news on the internet downstairs, then we watched trashy movies and drank the wine we took from the plane.
Busy day tomorrow, with me needing to go out early to get cash to check out (10% discount for cash on the balance!), pack, and head off. Was a very long day with lots of driving, but some beautiful scenery.
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