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Published: August 28th 2008
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View of Hermanus
There is a whale fin in there somewhere Sunnier in Hermanus
After a cold night we awoke to bluer skies and the sight, from our bedroom window, of a whale just offshore. Today Mark had got his dive with great white sharks booked so he prepared himself for a chilly trip on a boat and a probably even chillier dive. The sea is not warm at this time of year on this part of the coast. Mark left to wait at reception for his lift to Gansbaii from where the boat was departing only to reappear a few minutes later having been informed that the trip had been cancelled due to bad weather. This was a real shame as now Annabel is going to have to think of something else to buy him for his birthday!
After ringing a Whale Cruise company and ascertaining that they too were great wusses and were also not venturing out to sea today we gave up and headed out of the hotel for an internet cafe (preferably one with breakfast) for a bit of blogging. We came to one that purported to be a bistro as well as having internet, only to find that not only did they now not serve
Waving whale
view from the seashore food but their internet connection was worse than useless. After 20 minutes we gave up and decided that the need for food was greater than the need to blog so stopped at the Zebra Crossing cafe for brunch.
We wandered back to an internet cafe near the hotel and stopped, spending the next hour and a half blogging, whilst the kids had their own terminals, playing Club Penguin. Blogging done we went back to the hotel to get the car so that we could drive down the coast a little in search of whales.
A short drive later we parked up and headed along the cliff path. We soon found a path leading down onto the rocks, onto which we clambered and started our blubber watch. Within minutes we had sighted 5 whales, one of which we think was a calf, it was definitely smaller than the other whale it was with anyway. All the whales are southern right whales which can be distinguished mainly by their V-shaped spray emerging from their blow-holes.
Mark is having a little bit of a problem with these whales as they seem to be taunting him. Every time he has
the camcorder ready all they do is swim about but as soon as his back is turned or the camcorder has been put down, turned off or put away they start swinging their tales in the air or waving their fins about. Annabel and the kids were having a
whale of a time ribbing Mark about this to the point that it has now become a personal quest of his to get video of a whale performing.
We followed the whales along the coast, traversing the rocks, some of which had a sort of man-made path on them until we’d have enough and then headed off in the car to investigate the new harbour at the other end of town. The new harbour was lacking in any kind of vibe and only had one whale passing by so we went back to drop the car off at the hotel and head into Hermanus in search of a snack. After a fair bit of moseying about the town and after snacks and tomorrow’s breakfast had been purchased we made our way back along the seafront, this time catching sight of some other wildlife, a small furry, brown, creature snuffling about in some grass below the road. This furry creature decided that it liked the look of us peering down over the wall to it and made its way towards us as far as it could before it ran out of land to climb up and was left only with the vertical wall. We then discovered that it really liked ginger biscuits - odd!
Once we were back outside the hotel, yet another cetacean was to be seen frolicking offshore, fins and flukes, blowholes and all. As Mark set up the camera, it decided that it was much better to just float about in a serene manner. Flippin flip!
For dinner this evening we to decided to go African and turned up at the unlikely named Annie se Kombuis restaurant. Here we were treated to the likes of Oryx, Kudu, Springbok and Ostrich neck. Springbok won the title being almost melt in the mouth. The restaurant was quite charming with mismatched cutlery and individual crockery, whilst surrounding us in black and white and sepia family photographs. Three courses each, a bottle of wine for the adults and drinks for the kids, all for £50 - bargain!
Wine in South Africa is so cheap; in a restaurant we are paying the same price as if we were buying it from a supermarket at home. It helps too the wine is very good.
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