Here are some of the videos I shot while in South Africa:
It was cuddle time as sunset neared on the Schotia game reserve outside Port Elizabeth, South Africa.
Gotta love those free-wheelin’ young elephants at Addo Elephant National Park outside Port Elizabeth, South Africa.
A look around at the spectacular setting of Camps Bay, South Africa, just outside of Cape Town.
Tours of the former prison are guided by former inmates, including this fellow. Here he describes why it’s important for people to know what happened here.
I’m back home in Seattle and wouldn’t you know it, it’s raining!
This post is a two-parter:
– Part one: A quick recap of my final days there. I had a longer post, but my iPad somehow neglected to save it. Either that or I only dreamed I’d written it.
– Part two: Some final thoughts about the whole experience.
The last three days: East London and Johannesburg
I spent about a day and a half visiting a fellow Web-geek friend in East London on the Eastern Cape. She and her grandmother were so kind during my visit, even putting me up in a spare mother-in-law apartment. I went to the beach, had a great lunch at game-reserve buffet and visited with Tegan’s coworkers at the Dispatch newspaper.
The highlight of the short visit, however, was a special experience Monday morning in the village of Mooiplass, outside of East London. Tegan and I spent a couple hours with the legendary “Mama Tofu,” a cultural ambassador of sorts for the Xhosa people.
The spry 91-year-old had the cutest little embarrassed laugh when I told her she looked much younger than that. She told us about the tribe’s cultural traditions, such as when a boy becomes a man, and how a cow is prepared for a ritual feast. The language employs clicks that couldn’t duplicate no matter how hard I tried.
Wouldn’t it be great if she and her little village could be boosted by even more tourism that would both help preserve the traditions and provide jobs. There are a couple of more pictures at the bottom of this post.
After East London, I flew up to Johannesburg for my final night before my flight home. I had hoped to go on a walking tour of Soweto this day, but there just wasn’t going to be enough time given that Soweto is on the other side of town from the airport. I’ll just add it to the list many things I need to do next time I’m here.
Final thoughts
While on safari I met a couple from Germany who had been to South Africa eight times. Obviously they love the place and I can see why. I don’t know if I’ll make that many trips, but I do hope to come back back because I know I merely scratched the surface in only 12 days.
My strongest impressions of the place:
– Natural scenic beauty in excess, sometimes tempered by scenes of poverty.
– A developed tourism infrastructure that really helps you plan and use your time well.
– A cultural melting pot that’s fascinating to watch as it continues to evolve.
There are some rough spots for sure in the country’s social fabric, but there are also moments of hope and optimism. A little sliver of my heart will always be back there, laughing and crying along with the people of South Africa.
In a few moments I’ll be heading to the airport here in Johannesburg to begin the trip home.
My two-stay stay in East London with a friend was great fun. I’ll be posting a full report upon my arrival in Seattle. I had an amazing visit with “Mama Tofu,” a cultural ambassador, if you will, of the Xhosa people.
I’ll also be posting a trip wrap-up and maybe a gallery of favorite photos.
Addo Elephant National Park is located 45 minutes outside of Port Elizabeth (more about friendly Port Elizabeth later). It is a completely fenced-in park that is home to some 450 elephants, in addition to other fascinating creatures. The nearby Schotia Game Park is a private reserve that is much smaller, but loaded with elephants.
The day began with pickup by out guide for the day, Malcom, would drive us out to Addo, take us through it around midday when the elephants would be seeking out waterholes, and then guide is through Schotia in the afternoon and evening.In between the wildlife viewing, Schotia served us lunch and dinner. When I say us, I’m referring to myself and, three other Americans and four Germans who made up our group. I got dropped off back in P.E. a little after 9:30 p.m., so it was a full day!
As you can tell by the pictures, I had a blast. THIS is what people come to Africa for. Gazing across a valley to see firaffes towering above the bushes and knowing there’s a black-maned lion lurking 100 yards ahead of them … well, it doesn’t get much better than that. Oh and then there are the dozens of other species seen, ranging from hippos to flightless dung beetles.
As I await my church-on-wheels trip to Port Elizabeth, I figure I can crank out another quick beer report:
Brewers & Union, Cape Town: I had high hopes for this place, based on write-ups I'd seen before I left Seattle. But it wasn't a *local* brewery at all. Instead, the pricy unfiltered brews, which were only available in 500ml bottles, come from "Collective San Gabriel" in Germany.
I tried the lager first and yes, it was pretty tasty. And then I tried a bottle of the "Steph Weiss," which was pretty much a Belgian-style wheat beer. Might have been good if you like that sort of thing, but I am not a fan of Belgian-style beers.
Knysna (pronounced Nighz-na) is considered the gateway to the Garden Route along the southern South African coast. It’s an old sawmill town turned into tourism Mecca.
A lot of people use this town as a jumping-off spot for day trips to caverns or ostrich farms. I decided to just mellow out and see what I could see by foot.
I set out walking this morning as intermittent raindrops were falling. Because it was still a little warm, it was quite muggy.
I wasn’t more than a half-mile or so out when I discovered an old cemetery that had obviously fallen on hard times. I’m fascinated by places like this, imagining the lives of people born back in the 1800s. At least a few had actually been buried at sea, probably while making a trip to or from Europe.
Several grave markers had been toppled over, while others were eroded away so badly by the passage of time and the elements that they were no longer readable. Peahens wandered around pecking at the ground.
From there it was a rather long slog past some marshes and out to the “Eastern head.” This was one half of the narrow inlet between the open ocean (the Indian Ocean now) and the lagoon on which the town of Kynsna sits.
From the rocks on the head I watched as a surf fisherman reeled in about a two-foot-long shark. “That’s not what I’m fishing for,” he said. He said a much larger one had broken off a while earlier. He reeled of a few species he was after, but I didn’t catch the names.
From there I trudged up to the top of the head for a view back toward Knysna. I was one tired puppy, having walked probably five miles by that time. I looked so ragged that a kind horse wrangler in a pickup pulled over to offer me a lift back into town. Yay!
Up next: I’ll wander around Knysna again in the morning before catching an early-afternoon bus over to Port Elizabeth. I probably won’t have any report tomorrow, except perhaps another beer-tasting roundup 🙂 . Then it’s safari time on Saturday.
The road trip portion of my vacation has now begun. As I write this, I’m four hours east of Cape Town, in Swellendam – which I shall now rechristen Swelteringham.
That nice weather I’ve been crowing about is now a full-on heat wave. Be careful what you wish for, I guess. A newspaper I saw hinted at rain in a couple of days. I’ll believe it when I see it.
The bus ride here on Intercape was, um, interesting. Anybody out there know what the deal is with all the Christian messages? It’s a private bus company, so I wonder if the owner has a higher calling beyond long-distance transportation. I guess it’s comforting that the hostess says a prayer for us as we’re pulling out of the station.
The Metrorail local transit system has at least one line that is safe own. enough for us tourists: the southern line that runs down the east side of Table Mountain down along the Cape Peninsula to the towns of Fishhoek and Simon’s Town. For about $4.50, you can get an all-day pass that allows you to get off and on the line as many times as you want. Continue reading “Cape Town Day 4: Swimming with the penguins”
Bob Payne, Digital Journalist 