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Published: August 22nd 2012
Cape Town
Cape Town taken from return trip from Robben IslandOur Winter Break Vacation to Cape Town, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Botswana
More pictures than shown on this blog are available for viewing at:
https://picasaweb.google.com/116573555722516782467 Greetings everyone,
We had such a great time on our trip to South Africa, Zimbabwe and Botswana; we are devoting our entire blog to it. We want to share with you what wonderful places there are to visit in Africa while at the same time record our travels for our own pleasure in future.
CAPE TOWN AND AREA
We began by flying from Dodoma to Dar es Salaam on Thursday, two days before our scheduled flight to Cape Town. It was fortunate that we had an extra day in Dar as Rob hadn’t been feeling well for the last couple of days before we left and we decided to find a doctor. After some inquiries, we opted to try the Shree Hindu Nadal Hospital which was fairly close to where we were staying and we could walk there. We were very impressed with this modern clean hospital. They very efficiently arranged to test Rob for Malaria and Typhoid and provided the results
Bantry Bay Guest House
Wonderful accommodation within a couple of hours so that we could fly out the next day. It usually takes a day. We were happy that both tests were negative, however the results showed signs of some kind of an infection and he was prescribed a general antibiotic which they were also able to fill for him. The prescription was for 5 days, but he was feeling better the next day for our flight and steadily improved after that. We still aren’t sure what the infection was.
In Cape Town we had booked a very nice en suite room at the Bantry Bay Guesthouse just a couple blocks from the ocean. Our host, Ed, took very good care of us doing our laundry, booking a rental car for us, giving us touring suggestions and just being a very friendly, helpful person. However, our room was quite small and as there was so much to see we were out exploring the city and surrounding area every day. Cape Town is a beautiful city and a must for any bucket list.
Table Mountain is the backdrop for the city. Angled slightly at the south end of Table Mountain is a smaller mountain with
Kirstenbosch Gardens
Beautiful gardens at back of Table Mountain a head sloping to what looks like a tail. The head is called Lion Head and the tail, Signal Hill. Our guesthouse is directly below Lion Head. Signal Hill is a landmark from the olden days where a cannon, halfway up the hill, went off every day at precisely noon to give ocean-going vessels the exact time of day; and still does. One of our excursions was to climb to the top of Signal Hill and watch the hang gliders take off and land way down on the oceanfront. We made it to the cannons, just as the shot went off, so missed the ritual. At the top, it was a good windy day to watch the professionals take tourists and lift off the mountain side and ride the winds. It looked wonderful and Jeannie was very tempted, but time was a factor. Cape Town is one of four cities in the world where this tradition is carried on; another is Halifax. We forget the other two.
On our first day, it was raining, so we decided to take a city bus to the Victoria Wharf Shopping Plaza where we explored the huge mall with all its modern shops.
Lion Head
View from our guesthouse We checked out all the restaurants and walked the waterfront itself. On our second day, we bought a two-day ticket for the Red Bus Tour – a hop-on-off double decker open top bus with audio tour guide - to get acclimatized to the whole area. These tours are excellent as they not only take you around the city but into the surrounding areas as well. There are about 20 or so scheduled tourist stops, one of which was a 10-minute walk from our guesthouse. The city tour took us through the city and up to the base of Table Top Mountain on the ocean side and then through the valley between Table Top and Lion Head and back along the ocean drive into the city again, while the other tour took us through the city to the north and around the back of Table Top Mountain into the wine country, which is a much more tropical area, finishing again along the ocean drive and back into the city. We took both tours the first day ending up at the tropical Kirstenbosch Gardens behind Table Top Mountain. It was like being in a rainforest.
On our third day – second
Cable to Table Mt.
Great view of Cape Town on the Red Bus - we jumped off the bus and took the cable car to the top of Table Mountain. This gave us a wonderful view of not only Cape Town but the mountain ranges heading down to the Cape of Good Hope. And not only that, the top is a park within itself and we spent nearly two hours exploring all the different lookouts. We then got back on and connected with the second bus touring the back of Table Top finishing at the famous Groot Constantia Winery. We were late getting there so we missed out on touring the winery, but did manage to get in on the wine tasting. This included five very healthy samplings of excellent wine. It was the best wine we tasted on our travels. As you can imagine, we were feeling no pain when we left and were glad we were taking the bus back. It is the oldest winery in South Africa dating back to 1892.
On our fourth day we decided that we had had enough of buses, so Ed, our host, kindly offered to arrange a rental car for us. The car was delivered to us about noon
and we immediately headed off to the Cape of Good Hope. The drive along the coast was awesome with different views around every mountain and bay, and it was exciting to be visiting a place we’d heard so much about in elementary school history classes and from others who have travelled this route. When we arrived at Cape of Good Hope, there were magnificent lookouts to view how the Indian Ocean and Atlantic Ocean come together, one flowing in from the east the one from the west. It was a pretty calm day so the meeting of the waves was rather calm, but one could imagine the fierceness of these waves on a windy day. You could imagine why this cape was so dangerous to sailors. We climbed to the top of the point where we could see a higher view of the oceans colliding – breathtaking. Then we continued on to Cape Point where we took the tram to the top lookout for a view from both sides, the oceans and False Bay, and you could almost see up to Table Mountain in Cape Town. On our way home we stopped at Hout Bay, a fishing port we had
Wharfside Restaurant
Great sea food in Hout Bay at end of day visiting the Cape. spotted on our bus tours, and walked around the docks before eating at the fabulous Wharfside Restaurant. This was a good full day and we didn’t get home till very late.
During the next couple days while we had the car, we visited several places including a very touristy sea-side town called Hermanus on the east side of False Bay. There we took a long winding stone walk along the coast ending up at a fishing port where we chartered a boat to go whale watching. Our whale-watching guide located a group of 5 southern right whales – 4 males and 1 female - here in this calm bay where they come from Antarctica for mating. We remained still, at a distance, until curiosity got the better of them and they came right up alongside and under our boat to investigate. Here we were able to see and photograph these magnificent creatures up close and personal. Awesome!
On Sunday we attended a local beautiful stone church, St. James-the-Great Anglican Church, for an inspiring service and sermon from a visiting priest. After the service we headed off to wine country. Again, this is a totally different environment with
Southern-Right Whale
Whale watching in Hout Bay beautiful rolling hills behind and slightly north of Table Top. We visited two towns, Stellenbosch and Franschoek, both famous wine producing areas. Franschoek was the more impressive with the countryside looking like a scene from PEI. We did some wine tasting at a winery called Cabriere. The wine was not so good, but the lunch was excellent and the restaurant itself was very unique and beautiful, fashioned like an old wine cellar. I think this is what we enjoyed so much about our Cape Town experience; everything is so different and interesting.
Another adventure we had with the car was visiting Long Street where the locals go to listen to typical South-African music. The street is filled with a variety of bars and night clubs. We chose a place called African Mama’s, where the food and entertainment was great. The black band consisted of 3 Xylophone players, 1 drummer, and two singers. They did amazing pop and opera, if you can believe it, and mixed the two. We bought a CD as evidence of this talented group. The street reminded Rob of George Street in St. John’s, Nfld.
We are now becoming quite comfortable and acclimatized to
Long Street
The happening place in Cape Town Cape Town and are ready to give up the car. The bus service is so good and we would do more walking that way. Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela was incarcerated for 17 of his 29 years in prison, was one of the places we felt we had to visit. It was a half hour boat ride which provided a great view of Cape Town from the ocean. We arrived to thousands of black birds sunning on the man-made rock piles in the water forming an arch or protection around the dock. We first had a guided bus tour giving us a history of the island and how Apartheid evolved and died in South Africa. Many lepers were housed here as well and there was a large leper cemetery here. A former inmate of Robben Island also gave us a guided tour inside the prison, where we visited Mandela’s actual cell. He recounted how it was run and how many others were there because of Apartheid and how they all influenced its demise. It was frightening and enlightening.
We didn’t visit one, but there are still areas around Cape Town called townships where the poor live in corrugated tin-roofed
The Bikers are ready
Pumping Legs for Water Bike adventure houses crowded into very large neighbourhoods. There is definitely a program in place to move people out of these neighbourhoods into better housing, but when one family moves up another moves in from the poorer rural areas. It will be a long progress to eliminate such areas. The rest of our time in Cape Town was spent visiting the local malls, eating, walking and exploring. This was made easy by the fact that we could use ATM machines to get the SA Rand we needed from time to time. On our last evening we took our host Ed to Primi’s – our favourite breakfast place, but also good for pizzas too. He helped to make our stay in Cape Town even better.
ZIMBABWE
From Cape Town we headed off to the airport and onto our next adventure in Zimbabwe. We were a little nervous visiting here because of all we had heard about Mugabe; however, we were pleasantly surprised at how welcoming the people were, from the customs officers at the airport to all those we met. It is also quite a prosperous country, not like it was before Mugabe, but still doing well and continuing
Biker's Rest Stop
Rob, John and Jeannie at end of first day's biking. to improve.
The best part of our welcoming was being picked up by our friend from home, John Curtin, who took us to a quaint local restaurant called La Piatza, to meet his friend Cheryl. After lunch we went to Cheryl’s house, a beautiful home in Bulawayo which was our base for the rest of our Zimbabwe/Botswana visit.
We didn’t have much time to rest though, as the next day we were off early to Hwange National Park where John and Rob were scheduled to participate the following day in the, Pumping Legs for Water charity two-day (50 km per day) bike ride through the park. There were eighty riders split into four groups and of course Rob was placed in the first group with John, with a little pressure to keep well ahead of the other three.
It was the toughest ride Rob’s ever done - over rocks and through sand (easy for John as he is used to this kind of fun), but it was a real accomplishment for Rob to finish, and exciting to ride with the animals at close range. As each day progressed Rob seemed to fall behind the
At Safari Lodge
Down by the pan observing the animals before dinner pack just in front of the rear escort vehicle with Cheryl driving and Jeannie accompanying. Of course there was also an escort vehicle at the front with an armed guard.
We saw lots of animals on the ride, but none that were threatening to our team. We always grouped together to pass the elephants or buffalo that were close to the road. However, the third group of riders was charged by an elephant until the guard shot over its head to divert it. It was a tense moment for all of them. As you can imagine we partied pretty good at the end of each day’s ride. I guess that made it all worthwhile along with raising money to build and maintain pumps to keep water in the pans for the animals in a very dry park. Maintenance is a big problem here as the elephants are like bulls in a China shop and often trample them unwittingly.
While in Hwange we stayed at the Safari Lodge where all our dinners were served beside fire pits in the dark on the front lawn (to keep us warm). Just beyond the lawn and slightly downhill was a very large
At Safari Lodge
Down by the pan observing the animals before dinner pan so there was a deep trough and an electric fence to separate us from the many grazing animals that come here to drink (elephants, baboons, guinea fowl, impala, and buffalo). The impala are quite agile and a few jumped over the trough and electric fence in one graceful bounce to graze on the lush-green watered lawns of the lodge. But they stayed their distance from us. The baboons however were a problem for the lodge staff – always close by and ready to enter a door or window open a crack. You never get over being so close to these magnificent wild animals in their natural habitat.
After this adventure it was time to relax a little as we visited Victoria Falls. We stayed in a beautiful round two-bedroom condo with full kitchen, which from our cement deck overlooked the surrounding park below. Here we could view with our binoculars, animals gathering at a distant pan. Throughout the lodge there were a number of wart hogs roaming around the area feeding on the grasses and more than willing to share a meal with us if we weren’t careful.
Upon our arrival we went to have lunch in
Avoiding the Sand
Bikers off the main road to avoid the sand the beautiful lodge restaurant where we were fortunate enough to be in time, and to be the only ones to observe, an employee doing his daily 1pm ritual of feeding of the local vultures. It was quite a spectacle to see the frenzy of these birds fighting over the scraps of meat with little regard for one another and no manners at all.
After lunch we headed off to the falls where we were awed by the length and height of these magnificent falls, quite different from Niagara Falls, with only a few logged man-made barriers. A paved pathway meanders along the edge of the chasm for about 2 km getting different views of the different parts of the falls across from us which were often blurred by the amount of mist being created by the rapid and deep plunder of the water. Victoria Falls is formed by the Zambezi River falling over a long high gorge where the river continues and forms the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe. Viewing the place where Stanley met Livingstone and seeing the falls makes you wonder how these early explorers managed in their time. Seeing Victoria Falls was definitely a highlight for
Wart Hogs Praying
Wart Hogs enjoying a meal at lodge at Vic Falls us.
BOTSWANA
We only spent one night at the falls and headed out early next morning to the Zimbabwe/Botswana border to beat the tour buses and transports. Fortunately we made good time and got through the border checks in about one hour on each side. Our destination was Lasoma Lodge just past Kasane. Here we were heartily welcomed by Lincoln, the owner, and checked into our round spacious cabins and promptly headed out to grab lunch at another beautiful lodge on the river in Kasane before meeting up with another friend of John’s, Father Merrick. Merrick is quite a character, who doubles as a Catholic priest and a safari guide. He had kindly booked us on a boat tour in Chobe Park and we just made our appointment for 3pm. The boat safari along the Chobe River which runs the length of the park is a meeting place of four different borders, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana and Namibia. So from the Botswana side we could see Zambia and then Namibia across the river. Seeing the animals from the river gave us a real close-up that you can’t always get from land. We pulled up right beside
Victoria Falls
Beautiful rainbow a very large and scary-looking crocodile who was scrutinizing us from his yellow eyes. We got great picture of it with its mouth closed on the way out and then with its mouth wide open on the way back. Our ride went the complete length of the park and we were afloat for about 3 ½ hours watching elephants, water buffalo, migrating zebra, hippos, giraffes, impalas, sables, kudu, water buck, crocodiles, and a large variety of African birds. It was an experience we were glad we didn’t miss.
One interesting bird we saw up close on the boat was the Snake Bird. This large bird is black, has no oil on its feathers and can dive and swim for fish. With its long neck, it looks just like a snake when it surfaces. Then it comes out of the water and has to spread its wings to dry them out. We have some good pictures of it, in the water and out. Another interesting bird we saw was the spoon-billed heron or egret. Its beak is very long, and wide and flat at the outer end and it waves it back and forth in the water looking for delicacies.
At the Falls
John and Cheryl getting wet at the Falls After our cruise, the four of us, unfortunately Merrick had guests to attend to, went to dinner in one of the spectacular lodges situated along the river bank. These lodges are built into the landscape of the local terrain and are all an architectural wonder, built with huge logs creating very high impressive structures. They fit perfectly into the environment and are built mainly with local wood that has a well-finished sheen to create a luxuriously spacious atmosphere. After dinner it was back to our lodging for a good night’s sleep before our all-day safari by land vehicle the next day.
With the number of safaris we’ve been on here in Africa, you’d think we would get tired of them. Not so. Each one is different, displays different landscape and animals in different situations. The animals are so magnificent in the wild and it is especially exciting to see them interact with their young. On our land safari with Merrick as our guide, we went pretty much the same route as in the boat, but from two different levels: one close to the shore of the Chobe River mostly on our way out, and higher up mostly
Snake Bird
Snake bird in Chobe National Park on the way back as the animals were coming in to the river for water. From this higher viewpoint we got an incredible vision of the miles and miles of zebras migrating along the river. It’s quite interesting how they are interspersed with impala, buffalo, elephant, and many others. They stayed away from the crocodiles though and the hippos pretty much stayed by themselves too.
At the beginning of our safari, Merrick had told us not to say the ‘L’ word. It has been his experience that if you are looking for lions, you won’t find them. Though we saw thousands of buffalo and zebra, hundreds of elephants, tons of giraffe and maybe 10 hippos, we never saw one lion. We got wind of one from another guide at the end of the day and raced back to that spot, but alas, he or she was gone. So we did not get to see a lion on this trip at all. However we saw so many other animals that it really didn’t matter. After this side jaunt we barely made it out of the park by 6:30 and back to the lodge by 8pm late, for our dinner reservation.
Smile
Crocodile on the Chobe River That was a long day after having a yummy breakfast at Lasoma Lodge at 7:30am and leaving there by 8. Still, we enjoyed a lovely steak and chips dinner prepared especially for us at Lasoma by Lincoln’s wife.
BACK TO ZIMBABWE
It was now time to return to our Zimbabwe base in Bulawayo, Cheryl’s home. We were looking forward to putting our feet up for a couple days before we flew back home via Johannesburg. We arrived late in the day and went to dinner at a wonderful restaurant called the Kraal that Cheryl recommended and where we met many of her and John’s friends. After dinner we returned to Cheryl’s and went straight to bed. We were tired after so many days of non-stop touring. The next day was one of R&R in the morning where Jeannie and I watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics that Margaret, Cheryl’s mom, had taped for us. Later we went out to visit Cheryl’s custom teak window and door company, Timberland, and met her business partner, Terrence. Bernard, whose mother was taken as a slave and married the slave trader, his step-father, gave us a very good tour
African Buffalo
Good looking fellow isn't he of the plant. Very impressive! They create not only beautiful windows and doors, but exquisite custom indoor and outdoor furniture. After our tour we went to a lovely place called 26 on the Park where we enjoyed an excellent lunch on the front lawn. In Africa eating outside is most common. We returned home to engage in a rousing game of bocce ball with Judd and Quinn, Cheryl’s brother and sister-in-law, Colin and Nicki’s, two boys. That evening we enjoyed a wonderful meal of beef stroganoff and all the fixins, prepared by Margaret herself and as the whole family are great sports enthusiasts we then watched some of the Olympics together.
The next day we said our sad goodbyes. John left for Botswana and Cheryl and Margaret drove us to the airport. On our flight to Johannesburg, we couldn’t believe what a wonderful holiday John and Cheryl had organized for us. It was truly spectacular and we can’t thank them enough for their care and the time and effort they spent on making sure we had a great time. John, as per his contract, took very good care of Rob and the bike ride.
Our flight arrangements necessitated
a layover in Joburg before going on to Dar, and another one in Dar before going back home to Dodoma. During our stop in Joburg we stayed at a very lovely B&B called Sunflowers Guest House. Our host Pam, picked us up at the airport, drove us to the guesthouse to unload our bags and then kindly drove us to the largest mall in the city because we just didn’t have enough time to do a city tour. This was perfect because we got exercise scouring the mall and then had time for an afternoon movie, Dark Knight Rises, before having dinner at one of our favourite SA restaurants, Ocean Basket. Not to give anything away, but it was a very good movie and Batman again saved the day. Afterwards we called Pam who sent a driver to pick us up and take us back to the guesthouse. Next morning, Pam provided a quick and tasty breakfast for our early departure and again arranged our transfer. It was a short stay but a memorable one because of Pam’s lovely guesthouse and generous hospitality.
Arriving back in Dar the next afternoon, we were met by our usual taxi driver, Frank,
Cheryl's Home
Cheryl's home in Bulawayo who took us to our hostel, where we spent the afternoon resting. Our final dinner out was at a new discovery - the restaurant on the 9
th floor of the New Africa Hotel overlooking the Dar harbour and within walking distance of our accommodation. The Thai cuisine was among the best we have eaten and the service great. Again we had to get up for an early flight the next morning - but Frank is used to these early fares. All in all, we took 8 different flights throughout our holiday. And as great as our holiday was - one of our best - it was good to get back to Dodoma and back into more regular routines – until next time…. Our consensus: Africa is truly amazing!
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Corie
non-member comment
Another Great Tour with J.C.
How wonderful that you travelled with Father Merrick....I should say "Tour Guide Merrick" the priesthood may be second for him. Tom really enjoyed him and Simon got to meet him for dinner in May. Isn't Cheryl grand! And her family. No doubt "Precious" still requires service and may never recover from her "swim". No doubt you heard the story with John's version....you should hear Tom's :) :) Glad to share your travels. Take care and see you in less than 1 year!