Things Got Good at the Cape and more…
I think I finished yesterday’s post with a note about the weather, but something happened after I posted it that I want to mention before we start day two. We are on a tour with other people. Imagine that. Although we only have a five-day, four-night river cruise, this entire trip is part of an AmaWaterways tour. So, in the evening on our first full day, after we had checked into the Cape Grace Hotel and noted the weather, we had a very nice group meeting to hear from our tour coordinator, Delia, all about what would be happening in the coming 15 days. We also had the opportunity to meet 20 of our fellow travelers. The Zambezi Queen (our riverboat) accommodates 28 people, and eight others will be joining us for just the cruise. We won’t meet them until we arrive on board on Monday night.
We did have a great time meeting the group and have already made some good friends. It’s a fun group, mostly in our age range, and all American except for two Canadians from British Columbia. It’s funny how we always seem to end up with two Canadians on our trips. I will have more about some of them later on, as they are all really great folks.
Spiced Eggs with Feta at the Cape Grace Hotel
Yesterday started with breakfast at the hotel at 6:30. Here at the Cape Grace, the food is excellent. For breakfast, there is an entire room dedicated to the cold buffet and baked goods, and you can also order from the menu for your breakfast entrée. Who would have thought that my breakfast entrée was and will be again today and tomorrow, the best thing I have eaten on this trip? Not me. But it is! It’s called Spiced Eggs with Feta, but it was so much more than that. OMG! Can’t wait for breakfast again today (I am typing this at 5:17 am, so I am getting close!!!)
Once finished with breakfast, we were off on our first excursion at 7:30. We were in a very nice “luxury motor coach” that was closer to an Airporter-type bus than a Greyhound bus. Since there were only 20 of us, there was lots of room. Our first stop was Boulders Beach, the home of the largest colony of African penguins in Africa. They used to be called Jackass Penguins because of the sound they make. When Delia told us this on the way down, we laughed, but she asked us to wait until we heard them before making a judgment on how they sounded. She was right. I should have done a video so you could hear the sound, but none of them would make the sound when they were visible (not in some bushes), so you’ll just have to take my word for it until you come down here yourself.
So here are the photos from Boulders Beach. If you are interested in knowing more about this colony of penguins, you have to see *Penguin Town* on Netflix. It’s an eight-part series of 30-minute shows narrated by Patton Oswalt, all about this colony of penguins. Don’t forget: if you click the first shot, you can scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping. And PLEASE… don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…
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- As the sign says
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- First one we saw. A mom building a nest.
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- And then it was penguins everywhere…
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- …all over.
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- A this finch that was singing such a sweet song, I had to take her picture.
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- I took more than 600 photos. Aren’t you glad I cut them down to this?
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- There is a story here.
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- Mom and young teenager…
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- who is almost as big as Mom.
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- You know how Mom’s can be, always pick, pick, pick ?
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- But doesn’t he look better now?
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- Up close and personal.
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- The actual Boulder Beach.
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- A large group in the water off the beach
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- A series of penguin antics going on below the boardwalk.
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- This poor guy looked like he was wanting attention and not getting it.
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- This one had found a hat that someone had dropped off the board walk. He was defending it from the others. It was HIS HAT!
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- Just another I liked.
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- And another closeup.
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- The lone penguin. Just sitting out on a big rock, all my himself.
Besides the penguins at Boulders Beach, I also took pictures of a few other things that I wanted to include. Here they are with all the usual warnings and such.
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- Boulders Beach is within a naval base and there are still some old cannons set up. I just was hoping these guys would not fire on us.
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- My one stab at black and white yesterday.
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- As you can see, the weather is improving. This rock out in the bay drew my eye.
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- And these are Rock Hyrax. They are about the size of a large groundhog and their DNA is closest to that of an elephant. Seriously.
As you can see from the photos, the weather has improved. Now it’s more like what we’re used to at home in the late spring and fall: rain at times, followed by beautiful blue skies. It stayed this way the rest of the day, and we are hoping for even better weather today with a little less rain and wind. One of the things we really want to do is take a cable car to the top of Table Mountain, but so far, the winds have not cooperated, and the cable car has been closed since we got here.
Speaking of things that are closed, on our first day here (before we joined the tour), I had planned to visit Robben Island, which is the site of the prison where Nelson Mandela was held for many years. Half our group was supposed to tour it today, while the rest of us would tour the Winelands. Sadly, Delia had to inform us that Robben Island has been closed for over a month and is not scheduled to reopen until the results of a corruption investigation are made public. So everyone will be going to the Winelands today.
Back to our day on Saturday. After we left Boulder Beach, we headed further south to the Cape of Good Hope (which is not the southernmost point of Africa, it is the most southwestern point). It was a beautiful drive, and on the way we got to see ostriches, baboons and one lonely eland. Here are my shots from the Cape, including some incredible views, a cool lighthouse and a few of the animals. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping. And PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…
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- An intersting rock formation in the Atlantic that I took from the bus.
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- Kathleen letting me climb the stairs to the lighthouse.
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- What a view! So worth the climb.
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- Just as I got there, this happened.
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- And it got better.
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- I love taking a photo of people having their pics taken. The subjects are two of our new friends, Diane and AJ.
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- The lighthouse and blue skies.
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- And some amazing scenery.
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- Here’s the eland.
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- And a male ostrich.
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- And baboons
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- And a female ostrich. I had to put this in or Delia (our tour guide) would NOT be happy.
After our stop at the Cape (where we also took the photo at the top of this page), we headed back towards Cape Town, but first we stopped for a huge and very filling lunch. There was so much food and it was so good, that we ended up cancelling our dinner reservations because we were stuffed. They had black sesame ice cream for dessert, served with a small cake and panna cotta. Very interesting…and delicious.
When we returned to the hotel (around 4:00), Kathleen was exhausted, so she took a nap, and I went out to take photos around the area. There is a huge shopping and tourist complex, and I thought it would be a great place for street photography; I was right. At least I think so. Hope you agree. You know the thing about looking at my pics on a phone that I mentioned before…stick with that ?. And click the first picture and go through them like a slideshow. That way, you can see my captions as well.
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- Just a quick landscape shot to set the scene.
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- This is group of women had just taken a selfie and they were just laughing their heads off about it.
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- A small band was playing. This guy was terrific.
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- This busker was performing in a large open area with a crowd around him.
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- He has an AMAZINGLY photogenic face.
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- Every shot I took of him was better than the one before.
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- What a delight.
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- His act is balancing things on his head or in his mouth.
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- He is damn good at it too.
And that brings us to the end of yesterday. I worked on photos, and Kathleen napped until we went downstairs to the hotel’s pub for a snack and a drink. However, as I mentioned, the weather did improve, as you can see in the photo below, which I took of our hotel (in the foreground) and Table Mountain behind it. More tomorrow.
Perhaps it was history that ordained that it be here, at the Cape of Good Hope, that we should lay the foundation stone of our new nation. For it was here at this Cape, over three centuries ago, that there began the fateful convergence of the peoples of Africa, Europe and Asia on these shores. —Nelson Mandela
It’s 5:00 a.m. on Sunday, and it has been a very long and bumpy night. We have been skirting the edge of Hurricane Phillipe since we left Portland yesterday afternoon, rocking and rolling like Elvis in his prime. We are still moving a lot, but not as much as last night. Walking down to Martinis, where I write in the mornings, I didn’t see any damage, but they do have fans out to dry carpets…which is interesting. The only thing we personally had happen in the night was the tongs falling off our ice bucket. It made a lot of noise, but that was about it. Happily, our stop today (Martha’s Vineyard) is supposed to be sunny and in the 60s. We shall see.
