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Published: October 15th 2008
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After saying our tearful, emotional goodbyes to the Acacia folk who were splitting up themselves and heading onto Cape Town or Jo'Burg via Botswana and Namibia on the gestapo truck, we landed in Jo'Burg via the luxury of British Airways from an airport that resembled nothing more than a small council building with a bit of a road attached that planes used as a runway every so often. We were met my my cousins Peter and Andrew (who was getting married and I'd not seen for 16 years. It was emotional) and Andrew's wife to be Christel, who's wedding we were in town for. We headed out for a meal that evening with the wedding party and then on for a few drinks at Jolly Roger. 4 doubles with mixers, a single and a beer all for about a tenner. Lush. Anyway, after the lads kindly sorted out some unwanted animosity from some lary folk in the bar (one of which looked inexplicably like Mr. Chokria from Clinovia in desperate need of a shave), we headed back and the following day went to the Apartheid Museum.
The Aprtheid museum was interesting, showing us how ignorant we were with world affairs
and the forced racial segregation that was imposed on South Africa from 1948 until as recently as 1990, with pictures of Nelson Mandela (who popped up at the wedding, see below) and all about his treason trial, prison sentence and release. After another meal out later on it was the wedding the following day, with Andrew and Christel showing us British how a first dance should be done by tearing up the dancefloor gracefully with something worthy of a Brucie Bonus in the final of Strictly Come Dancing. Mr Ramprakash would have been impressed. Luckily, I'd saved a few moves from my dance off in Livingstone and wooed the South African crowd although Lizzie stole the show when she joined in seamlessly with an African line dance later on! After a Hand Grenade (tequila followed by Jagerbomb) and plying whoever was closest with black sambuccas (including a couple for the groom. Sorry.) it was off home with Jason, a family friend, who Lizzie said was the scariest driver she'd ever come across. I wasn't aware of this as I'd adopted the foetal position on the back seat and was sleeping soundly until we safely arrived.
On the Monday we
headed to Cape Town after seeing a few of Uncle Jeff's old houses in Jo'Burg, one of which was bought from him by the founder of McDonalds in South Africa and he was nice enough to show us round. No free McNuggets or McFlurries though, would've been the icing on the cake. Anyway, we landed in Cape Town and after everyone chuckling saying the weather wasn't that great in Cape Town, the weather was ok......until we stepped into the car park. We had probably an entire month of Norfolk rainfall in an hour or 2. First up that week was a trip to the coastal town of Hermanus where Southern Rights Whales come into calf at this time of year. Although you can maybe get a lot closer to the huge mammals when whale watching in Great Yarmouth's finest bars on a saturday night, we still got a lot closer than expected as these huge creatures came to within 50 metres of us standing on the coastline, there were about 15 in total and to see them was amazing.
On the agenda for the week was also a spot of wine tasting at a few of the many famous
vineyards in the Franschhoek Valley, where we were staying in standard, luxurious backpacking accommodation!!! We spent a day going to Vineyards like Boschendal and Haute Cabriere (they meant nothing to me to be honest but are very well known) and we opened our eyes to a selection of wines, including an after dinner wine that is mixed with Brandy. It wasn't very nice, but would have an effect after a couple. We headed into Cape Town to see Table Mountain the following day and were informed by the ticket seller that conditions on the mountain were poor with limited visibility high winds and that it'd be quite cold up there. We looked at each other and I could sense we were both thinking "What would Bear Grylls do?"and with that we thrust our Rand into the sellers face and headed towards the cable car. Not really got a lot to say about the cable car itself other than it had a remarkably effective revolving floor. Anyway, the guy at the bottom obviously knew what he was talking about cos after about 5 minutes, my Ipswich Town wind jacket stolen from the depths of Sammy's cupboard was now found to be
not as warm as I'd hoped and my face nearly fell off in the cold wind. Lizzie coped well while I whinged like a girl but I could tell she had icicles on her breasticles. The view was great as expected and we could see Robben Island where Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners were held after their trial during the apartheid. We were planning to go there but all trips were cancelled due to the ferry crossing being too choppy, which turns out was a good thing considering Uncle Jeff's experience at the shark diving on calm waters!
We popped into the waterfront area of Cape Town that afternoon and as well as street performers Gum Boot Dancing and others singing Afrika Bambaataa stylee, we were lucky enough to catch a glimpse of Charlton Athletic, Bolton Wanderers and South Africa legend Mark Fish. Great Stuff! We also stopped for fish and chips, which we thought we wouldn't get til we got back to Blighty, but of the Fried Snoek I had, I think it was 95% bonage, so the others picked me up 2 days later when I'd finished eating! The last thing on the to do list,
was come face to face with Great White sharks of the coast of Cape Town from the safety of a (hopefully sturdy and shark proof) steel cage.
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