Blogs from Eastern Cape, South Africa, Africa - page 70

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » East London January 18th 2006

January 12, 2006 On monday we spent the entire day on the Baz Bus, traveling from Cape Town to Storms River. The entire drive was amazing, with beautiful scenery all along the Garden Route. It was really interesting seeing all the stops along the way, getting a feel for each town. Before stopping at Storms River, our driver took us to the highest bungee jump in the world. It’s 216 meters high, over a huge gorge. We drove over the bridge, and that was enough excitement for me. I would seriously have to consider it, even if they were going to pay me. I couldn’t believe how much people would pay to jump off that platform. We arrived in a sleepy Storms River. It was beautiful, with mountain views at our doorstep. It was tiny though. ... read more

Damn those Hobbits

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » East London January 8th 2006

Sunset behind Table Mountain

Willski

Hope you are all well….A very belated Happy Christmas and Happy 2006!!! Christmas and New Year were spent further up the coast in the Eastern Cape. It was just getting to the point when I was craving a swim in the sea, the sea around Cape Town is the Atlantic Ocean and is FREEZING. Now we were heading up towards the Indian Ocean, at last some warm water. The journey up there was, to say the least adventurous. Luke and I had decided to take the coach there. A simple 12-14 hour journey. Or so we thought. In the end it took us 20 hours, we should have known really. The bus station was a complete give away…I have never seen 10 coaches (with trailers) compete for 5 spaces, maneuvering about in a space a VW ... read more

AMazing Mountain ranges and Coffee..

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » Chintsa June 27th 2005

The Drakensberg

Frenger on Tour

Greetings Peeps, I have commenced my travelling with a short stay in Johannesburg, which I found to be a little daunting for a traveller on ones own… and this because I met a guy from Manchester in my Dorm, soon after I arrived, and he told me how he had just been mugged on his way to the hostel (a road near the main train station)!! That hardly made me want to venture into the centre of the city. But cities are cities hey and girls will be girls or something like that! My first planned stop was at the Drakensberg region between Jo’berg and Durban and good gravy Marie that took my breath away. The mountain range of Drakensberg, which I’d not heard of before researching South Africa (look it up if you’re bored!) is ... read more

On our own again

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » Port Elizabeth July 8th 2003

Lions Head and Robben Island from Table Mountain

thetravelbugtribe

As you can see we have reached the other end of Africa now. South Africa has been great (so far), we are really enjoying all we are seeing and doing. Its weird not being with the truck and all our "new" friends anymore though. We crossed from Namibia into SA and headed down to Stellenbosch. A lovely town, full of well looked after Cape Dutch style buildings, and of course vineyards. We did a tour round four wineries, sampling well at each. All the wines were good, some were just better than others. We did get a couple of bottles, but of course we have drunk them already! From there it was a short drive down to Cape Town, in the rain! Table Mountain could barely be seen, and we certainly couldnt see the top. We ... read more

Transkeii

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » Chintsa April 23rd 2003

Schoolkids

DMac

From Hogsback we travelled to Cintsa to a huge hostel called Buccaneers of which we had heard great things. It was the gateway to the Wild Coast or Transkeii part of South Africa which was from what I understood pretty much an independant state during Aparteid and run by the non white native people - like Zululand. Upon arrival we promptly went on a tour to a local school where they put on one of their weekly concerts for the backpackers who by donating after the concerts pretty much fund the school with the help of volunteers from a German school. The kids from the school ranged from 4 to 15 by the looks of it and sang their hearts out for about 2 1/2 hours. It was amazing. They were all very enthusiatic and fun. ... read more

Away with the Faeries

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » Hogsback April 21st 2003

DMac

Away with the Faeries was in Hogsback - a tiny village set on a ridge about 3 hours inland from East London. We had heard great things about the place from previous hostel runners and guests. It was a lovely place where we got a great little room in a small cottage - there was a large main house and lots of campers too. We were sharing the cottage with a South African girl and her American boyfriend from Seattle and they turned out to be going to a meditation session nearby and invited us. We had just sat around the fire for most of the day since it was raining - a lovely day, and decided to go along. Neither of us had really done any meditating since doing Vipassana - it quite put us ... read more

Sugarshack

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » East London April 19th 2003

DMac

From Strormsriver we booked a bus to East London. We had to catch the bus at the shell station at 3 in the morning. It turned out that the shall station was pretty happening at the time - especially when a minivan - which are the minibus taxis over here and the cheapest form of transport - stopped and the entire contents jumped out and danced so some local beats for a while before jumping back in a driving off. A good way to stretch the legs on a long journey I think. This was practically the first time we had seen black people in South Africa having fun, although a few nights before we had heard some beautiful singing coming from a town near to Stormsriver. I think the town where to quote a local ... read more

Biggest Bungee in the world

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » Storms River April 18th 2003

Biggest bungee in the world...

DMac

So far South Africa was too western for our travelling tastes, especially after our time in Asia. We enjoyed doing stuff but it was also a little too expensive and the seperation between the whites and the blacks seemed large to us - naturally enough given the country's history I guess. As we would progress further north this seperation would decrease and we found ourselves enjoying things more. I guess I didn't come to Africa to hang out in isolated white settlements with Gap year students from the UK - not that there is anything wrong with that. In Stormsriver we did the largest bungee jump in the world - couldn't pass that without the jump. It was 216m high and the freefall was quite amazing. We also took a walk around an indigenous forest and ... read more

ENTRY 48 — SOUTH AFRICA: The Transitioning to Democracy 1990—1994

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » Butterworth May 5th 1994

Nairobi, Kenya

Bryan

ENTRY 48 — May 5th 1994 SOUTH AFRICA: The Transitioning to Democracy With the exception of the url=http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:RIDPnDQeE5AJ:countrystudies.us/south-africa/84.htm+%22In+July+1991,+United+States+President+George+Bush%22+Cuba,+Libya,+Iran,+%22President+Mandela+was+critical+of+the+United+States%22&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=caUnited States and Israel, most of the world had imposed sanctions against South Africa, and was opposed to white minority rule. In 1976 when the Transkei became independent, the practice of restricting black South Africans legal place of residence to homelands or reserves was already entrenched in the apartheid system. Although these homelands appeared to be run by the black people, in reali... read more

And so the dreams began.......

Africa » South Africa » Eastern Cape » Port Elizabeth December 15th 1977

roamingfox

No travel plans at the moment, so let's start from the beginning. How did my passion for travelling start? My first memories of travel stories? Spending evenings with my god parents showing us slides of their travels and then showing us all the treasures they bought along the way. How I drooled and wished that one day I would be fortunate to do the same. Slides of exotic places that they had been to, being projected on walls. This was in the days when it was more common practice and probably more economical to show slides rather than photographs. With almost life size images, at least to my young eyes, looking so enticing and interesting, I started dreaming of going on my own travels. I still had a long way to go though, as I had ... read more

Brief history of South Africa

After the British seized the Cape of Good Hope area in 1806, many of the Dutch settlers (the Boers) trekked north to found their own republics. The discovery of diamonds (1867) and gold (1886) spurred wealth and immigration and intensified the subjug...more history

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