Cape Town - Friday

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We discovered that being on a night flight and arriving at Cape Town for 8.00am means you're the only flight in the terminal and security and baggage reclaim gets over and done with in 10 minutes - if only all airports were like this ! After navigating the car rentals and the Cape Town rush hour we arrived safely at 52 De Wet Road Bantry Bay. If you wish for opulence in your life look no further than here and if your particularly prescient spouse also arranges a massage on arrival after the 11 hour flight then this is the place.

A frustrating low cloud and cold wind meant that we couldn't make it further up Table Mountain than the hotel itself. So instead we drove to the spectacular Hout Bay and Chapmans Peak Drive - simply fantastic - you get a real sense that you are truly at the end of the world. The bays stretch for miles and the wind crushes you as you stand against the Atlantic blasts.

Further down into Chapmans Bay you get the juxtaposition of wild, windswept bays and white sand dunes and what appears to be a cottage from the set of the Hobbit. Over the mountains and through Simons Town gets you to Boulder Bay - living up to its name. The first thing that strikes you as you drive through the village is the Watch Penguins Crossing - not your average road sign in Kent. Home to a colony of African Penguins it needs to be a 90% + decline over the last century makes them severely endangered. Now protected by the SA National Parks they still suffer from the effects of over fishing and loss of habitat. At the current rate of decline they could be extinct in 20 or 30 years. A salutary lessons for us in managing our world.

Finally a drive back through the mountains into Cape Town proper for a Mozambican Prawn Curry - hopefully the weather holds tomorrow and sobering reflections of Robben Island beckon.

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