Advertisement
Published: December 8th 2007
Edit Blog Post
Wow, we are actually in South Africa!
Deplaning here was surreal - definitely a moment where we stood there staring at each other like "Holy shit, you're kidding me, we're in South Africa!!"
We don't even know where to start! We could express our extreme pleasure to be in a land where English is widely spoken again. :D Not that we didn't love the "Hola" and "Senor" of South America, but there is something to be said about the simple pleasure of not having to play charades 2,000 times a day. It feels good to be able to communicate freely again! First thoughts are that the government appears to really make an effort to conserve the environment and it seems to be really clean here - not sure in comparision to Canada, but to anywhere we traveled in South America, this city is spotless! Cape Town is absolutely beautiful. There are mountains and beaches, and even after a few days of being here, we're still giving each other the "Holy shit" look.
The first and most important thing on our South African "to do" list: Cage diving with
great white sharks!! Like Angel Falls in Venezuela, Trevor has
Our Chum Master
Mmmm fish guts! That big barrel was just one of several barrels of dead fish fun. dreamed of cage diving with the great whites since he was a kid, so in throwing around possible "must see" countries, South Africa was one of the first to make the cut. It was an experience to remember, that's for sure!
We were picked up bright and early at our hostel and driven a few hours to the town of Gaansbai where we loaded onto a boat that didn't seem nearly big enough to take on great white sharks (we've both seen Jaws; we knew how things could go)...
This is the thing: in our travels thus far, we've taken a few boat rides (including our cruise in the Galapagos), and never have either of us have even come close to sea sickness. South Africa was another story. The seas are particulary rough here because of the mixing of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. Throw in the smell of bloody fish guts (known as
chum, used to attract the sharks), big 'ole dead tuna heads, and the sight/sound/stench of seasick cage divers.. ones apparent iron stomach takes a turn for the worse. It was another one of those moments where I wondered what the hell Trevor's "childhood dream"
had gotten us into. Uh, much like five days. On a boat. Down the Amazon. O.O
We arrived at "Shark Alley" (a location renowned for its shark population) with our bellies barely intact, squeezed ourselves into wet suits (which smelled almost as good as the fish guts), and listened to a pep talk about not trying to pet the sharks (not kidding, apparently it's been done before), then jumped in to the 15 degree water to see some sharks! Right now is summer in South Africa, and the water temperatures are colder, so sharks weren't as abundant as they are in the winter months. This proved to be a challenge because in the hopes of seeing a shark, we had to stay in the water for longer periods of time than the winter divers do. Let's recap what was in the water: fish guts and vomit. Swallowing a gulp of sea water is nasty at the best of times, just imagine what it was like at this time. Are we painting a delightful picture for you? Are you
thisclose to booking a cage dive with great whites yourself? Thought so... :D
When we finally saw the sharks though,
OMG, worth every miserable moment of the lead up! They were so big and majestic! We were able to see three (which pales significantly in comparison to winter dives where people see 20 or 25 in the span of a few hours), and it was just
so awesome to see them so upclose. Close enough that if we wanted to, we could have reached our hands out of the cage and touched them (and
now that pre dive pep talk makes sense). Our dive master had hooked the tuna head onto a pole and was "playing" with the sharks, to get them to chase it. The first two we saw came attacking, and only stayed around for a minute or two, but the third shark... wow, we struck gold! Due to the nastiness and cold of the water, most of the other people on our dive chose to stay aboard rather than in the cage to wait for sharks. So when monstrous shark number three came flying around and circled the boat several times, it was just Trevor, myself, and a Mexican fellow in the cage. It couldn't have happened any better! Such an incredible experience! We weren't able to
get any great shots of Jaws or his buddies, but we did purchase the video of our dive. :D
The sharks have definitely been a highlight of our time here thus far, but we've also been up to a few other things as well. We spent a few days hanging out at the V & A Waterfront, a monstrous complex of docks, shops, restaurants, malls and touristy things galore. The mall kind of blew us away - it had
everything, all these "high end" stores like Jimmy Choo, Louis Vuitton, Christian Dior, Armani, Hugo Boss, and Gucci. We had fun wandering through them, pretending to be millionaires for a day. Ha ha, it's doubtful the bummy backpackers sold the story. Even better than the uber fancy shopping mall at the V & A Waterfront though, was the Nelson Mandela "Gateway to Robben Island" - a museum dedicated to apartheid. We'll post about it in our next blog.
We also did a day trip to Cape Point National Park... which is the most south-western point of South Africa! It also happens to be the windiest place on earth! We went to Boulders Beach, a beach that is crowded with
Crazy Winds!
We were enthralled with the fact that we could lean way back into it and not fall over! cute little African penquins. The coolest part of the day was just seeing so much of the South African country side ... the beaches here are unbelievable!!! Surfing is huge here, and though we could see why, both T and I have a pretty strict "steel cage only" rule when it comes to being in shark infested waters. We also checked out a craft market, which brought back sweet memories of Jamaica ... "You like??!! Make me an offer! I give good price!!!" Oy! Not one of our favorite things to do.
On our way from the penguins at Boulders Beach to windy Cape Point we had our first introduction to South African baboon culture. Our guide was in the middle of telling a story and suddenly screeched "SCRAP THAT - BABOONS!!" Just like with the earthquake in Ecuador, Trevor and I had no idea what was going on and couldn't figure out what the hell baboons had to do with his story! Haha, such Canadians we are. Turns out that a gang of 10-15 baboons had come down from the mountainside and were in the midst of crossing the highway, just hanging out, making cars stop and go
around them. We learned that South Africa has a "baboon crime problem" - say what?? Apparently baboons are dangerous and there have been incidents of them robbing people! They are very attracted to the smell of food and have been known to break into vehicles and houses to get at it. They know how to open car doors, and even more interesting is that they tend to be more aggressive towards women because they know that women carry purses ... which tend to have sweets ... so they actually "mug" women for their purses. We found it highly amusing (but that being said, guess who carried the backpack for our day in baboon land?)
To finish off the tour, we rode bikes for 13 kms back from the point back to the entrance of the national park. It turned out to be 13 kms of very big hills ... not the most pleasant experience of our lives ... and imagine our surprise/fear/panic when a few times we rode past mini gangs of baboons in little fields on the side of the road ... but when we made it to the top of the last hill, the feeling was incredible!!
Enjoy the pictures!
Trevor and Kristena
**** And For Other Travellers ****
Before our trip we researched the shark dive on the net and found an average price of about $400 US per person... however, we were able to book it through our hostel (Hostel Zebra Crossing - great place!) for 1000 Rand each (about $150 US). The trip was great, very well done, and the company's name is Ecoadventures/ Unreal Dives. Happy Travels!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.319s; Tpl: 0.023s; cc: 32; qc: 129; dbt: 0.149s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.5mb
anonymous
non-member comment
Hello Gorgeous!!!!!!!! i miss u soooooooooo much and i love u with all my heart. both of u. come home already. did u get my private message yet? write back. i love u!!!!!