The tour started early with breakfast at 6am at On the Beach Hotel, North Durban before the 10 of us piled onto out bus with our trusted driver/tour guide Coenie. Our group was made up of 5 friends from Berlin in their late 60's who spoke very limited english, a family of 4 from Melbourne and me.
Our first day was a big driving day covering about 700km, the majority of which was made up of small villages and farmlands predominately of Xhosa people.
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| One of the local villages we passed on our 700km day |
After what seemed like hours we arrived at a town called Umtata which was the birthplace of Nelson Mandela. We visited the Mandela museum, saw some of the areas he grew up in and then as we left the area drove past his family home where he is now buried. Tourists are not aloud onto the property or aloud to stop out the front so we had to drive past super slow and take photos hanging out the windows.
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| The Family home and resting place of Nelson Mandela |
After almost 10 hours of driving we arrived at the coastal town of Chintsa, our home for the next 2 nights. We stayed at Buccaneers Beach Resort and Backpackers which was located on a lagoon right next to the beach with a very lush tropical feel. I was lucky to get my own room for the whole trip (as the other single traveller requested a single supplement) and the room i got at Buccaneers was by far the best all trip. I was given a private suite called 'Tutu' and had magnificent 270 ° views across the lagoon and beach. Our first night together included a traditional Xhosa dinner of beans, rice, beef casserole and salad follow by ice-cream for dessert. It was then onto the bar and being a Saturday night was quite busy.
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| The view from my room 'Tutu' at Buccaneers Beach Resort. |
The following day i took a village tour with a local guide (and our barman from the previous night). It was so interesting to see how the local people live, they are a very self sufficient community growing foods, raising farm animals and tapping water from the local catchment. All the children cam running to us when they saw us and the adults were very welcoming also. The village has a few hundred people, 1 Catholic church and a primary school.
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| The local Xhosa Village. The Xhosa people traditionally speak in clicks which is impossible for foreigners to understand. |
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| St Johns Catholic Church. We were unable to go in as a service was taking place. |
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| The village primary school for ages 5 to 12 years. |
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| One of the local kids wanting us to play rugby with him. Very cute! |
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| One of the more Traditional style houses. |
Before we knew it, it was Monday and time to head to Addo, home to Addo Elephant Park and apparently an abundance of wildlife. On the way to Addo we stopped of in Grahamstown, the national university town for arts and culture. It was another quaint little town with lots of old architecture and unless there is a big event taking place there is little to do other than visit a museum. I finally got to see some Zebra on the way also however they were off in the distance as we drove past so unable to get any photos.
Addo Elephant Park sounded promising to see Elephants, Lions, Hyena, Buffalo, Rhino and much more, unfortunately we arrived in heavy rain and lightning and I'm fairly sure all the animals went into hiding. We did a huge bull Elephant right next to the gates as we entered, saw some antelope, judo, bush pigs, wild dogs, and abundance of bird life including ostrich and also cute little meercats. Everyone that i have since spoken to were surprised we didn't see more elephants and are now saying that i am cursed. That night we stayed at an orchard in Addo and experienced my first real South African sunsets
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| The gorgeous bull elephant we saw at the gates |
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| A couple of Antelope |
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| A wild pig |
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| Amazing Sunsets at Avoca River Cabins, Addo. |
The next day saw us back on the road and headed for yet another beachside town called Knysna. Along the way we stopped at Tsitsikamma National Park where i finally got to go for a bit of a hike again, i crossed 3 suspensions bridges, the longest being 77 meters then hiked for about 45 mins up to a look out, it was a good walk and nice to be doing some exercise again after being on a bus for almost a week. The national park was quite spectacular as it met the coast line where huge waves crashed against the rock causing the spray to go meters into the air. In the right season you can see whales, dolphins and see otters here.
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| Suspension Bridges at Tsitsikamma National Park. |
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| The spectacular view from the lookout. |
Next stop Bloukans Bridge, home to the highest bridge bungee jump in the world and trust me it was high. The number of crazy people that jumped of that bridge was amazing. There is no way on earth i would do it. As it turned out none of our tour did the jump so we just watched the others groups for a while before jumping back on the bus and heading for Knysna.
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| Bloukrans Bridge, Highest Bridge Bungee in the World! |
Knysna is another beautiful town set around a giant lagoon. The majority of houses around the lagoon are holiday homes and as it is off season were all empty. I decided to do a whale and dolphin boat safari, knowing it was the wrong time for whales i thought id have a decent chance of seeing dolphin - the curse repeated itself and there were no dolphins. We did see a few fur seals so all was not wasted. The rest of the day was spent at the beach and walking around town. If i had to move to anywhere else in the world I would probably choose Knysna.
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| Knysna Town - Main Street |
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| Dolphin searching - Indian Ocean |
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| A couple of fur seals lounging in the sun before heading off to catch some lunch |
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| Not a bad beach to waste an afternoon on. |
We stopped at Cape Agulhas for lunch and could have stayed the whole day, the waters were pristine and scattered with manta rays that came right up to you, one of the local ladies was feeding them so they just stayed right up next to the beach, they were huge spanning over 1.5 meters in diameter.
A little down the road (10km or so) we went to the most southern point of Africa where the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Oceans meet, as you can imagine the seas were rough, the coast line rocky and apparently there are dozens of ship wreck out of the coast which make a scuba divers paradise. There is a gigantic lighthouse there also however it was closed for renovations so we couldn't go in.
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| One of the giant Manta Rays |
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| 2 Places at one time - Where the Oceans Meet |
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| Amazing coastlines |
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| The heavily replied upon Lighthouse |
We travelled further west to the the town of Hermanus, during whale season this is the perfect place to watch the whales and there can be up to 70 whales breeding at any given time in the bay. Again Hermanus is another seaside town, relying heavily on tourism and very much catering for the tourist with coastal paths, an abundance of restaurants and cafes and the locals all selling there trinkets and curios. As this was out last night together we had a traditional Braii (BBQ) cooked by our driver/tour guide. The food was delicious and the chicken tender, the only problem was it took hours to cook.
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| Hermanus - The Bay that the Whales like to breed in. |
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| One of the Main Roads |
Our last day together saw us head into cape Town with a little wine tasting at Spier on the way. Spier is a massive winery and wouldn't look out of place in the Margaret River. The wines were quite nice and could have easily bought a case if only i didn't have so many flights ahead of me. Adjacent to the winery is a bird sanctuary housing many birds of prey and owls. You can pat most of the birds and can even hold the Owls and giant black eagle. About 60% of the birds at the sanctuary are nursed back to full health before being release back into the wild, those that won't make it in the wild go to zoos and animal parks where they can continue to get the care they need.
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| Spier Winery |
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| Spier Tasting Room |
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| With Woody the Owl. |
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| Playing with a couple of Chameleons. |
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| Mike the Black Eagle |
Finally we made it to Cape Town where the tour ended. I spent the after noon walking through the Green Point area, there was not enough time to do any big sights so will save them for when i am back in Cape Town in April.
Tomorrow i head back over to Durban where i will start my Photography Volunteer placement at Ulwezi - Thanda Game Reserve.
Stay tuned for more updates and hopefully more animal encounters.
Love to All xx
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