Gansbaai – Overberg

It is a beautiful morning in Hermanus, and we are going to cage-dive with great white sharks…Who hasn’t seen the movies “JAW”? Listen to this http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=BE&v=ZvCI-gNK_y4&noredirect=1 it fills you with terror, right? It doesn’t stop us. What an adventure! What we discovered was amazing. These animals are not mean, as we might think, but they are very curious and like to taste with their jaws... One of them bite the cage right in front of me. Saying my heart did not beat twice as fast would be a lie, but I am quite confident that the steel in front of me will hold. No feeding they promised. This is not entirely true. To attract the sharks, they pour fish oil into the sea and to play with them a giant sardine head is thrown repeatedly into the water. After 20 minutes in the water I feel like an ice cube. Enjoying the sharks from above is also quite pleasant and certainly not as cold! We take a shuttle to our last destination in South Africa, Cape Town. For me it’s the last destination of my travel around the world…

photos Gansbaai

Oudtshoorn

The land of caves and Ostriches! Did you know that you can stand on an Ostrich egg without it breaking? Or that male ostriches also lay eggs? (the guide was so convincing, we even believed her for several minutes..). In one ostrich egg there are 24 eggs from a hen… time for omelet! Beautiful animals they are and not as ferocious as they say, I had four of them eating in a bucket in front of me and didn’t’ get a scratch. Another nice thing to see near Oudtshoorn are the Cango caves. We do the “adventure” tour where we crawl up a narrow chimney and slide through a “letter box”. The caves are beautiful and that is good because the weather outside could not be worse. The rain is pouring down and the clouds cover everything in grey.

photos Oudtshoorn

The Crags – Garden Route

Welcome to the Magic world of Khoinania… a mixture of the land of the Khoisan people, original inhabitants of South Africa, and Narnia, the magic world of C.S. Lewis we all know about. It is like entering another world where supernatural is normal. The cat from Alice in wonderland sleeps on the terrace, a 900 year old gigantic tree towers over the forest and the three dog pets of the hostel seem to know more than they want to share… As we descend into the Magic forest, we almost expect to see a gnome pop out from behind a tree, or a talking frog who shows us the way. It is pure magic and I love it! If you pass by this place you shouldn’t miss spending at least a few nights in the enchanted atmosphere of Wild Spirit : http://www.wildspiritlodge.co.za/ Let the pictures speak for themselves…

photos Khoinania

Port Elizabeth – Sun Coast

All friendships start somewhere. This one starts in Port Elizabeth. Leizel, Kurt, Niamh and Kay welcome Elodie and me into their family. Happy birthday Amir, what a beautiful birthday cake you have there. The day starts off with a children’s party and continues with a visit to Kurt’s parents, then to a family dinner with Leizel’s family. The food is delicious, and the company even better. To finish the day, we have tea with some friends. A busy day for us, but oh how good it is to feel the bonds that tie these family members together… Leizel has been to Belgium and she loved it. We share memories about places which used to be my home, tasting African liqueur, even better than Bailey’s.

The next day, they lend us their car so we can drive around a little.

Our first destination is the Daniell Cheetah breeding station, about half an hour’s drive inland. Lucky us, there is no one there so we get a private tour. The guide lets us enter many cages with wild cats, but the most impressive one is the cheetah itself. A female who has grown up in captivity is quite tame and we get to meet her, pet her and even play a little with her. Her name is Ola. If something goes wrong though, we have no chance of escaping as the cheetah is the fastest animal on earth, running as fast as 120km/h. She is beautiful! We see two lion adolescents playing with each other, a leopard in a cage, Caracals, Servals… this is Paradise for cat lovers!  

After that, we drive to the Red Location, a museum on Apartheid, situated in the township. Interesting building in the middle of the shantytown. Unfortunately I have no photos as I didn’t want to take out my camera. Inside the museum are various boxes showing how different groups of people fought against apartheid: workers, musicians, politicians…

To complete our experience, we drive to the South End museum. The South End suburb used to be a good place to live for all sorts of people, regardless of their color: whites, blacks, colored, Indians, Chinese… This vibrant, harmonious spirit was crushed when the Group Area’s Act came into force. All non-whites were forcefully removed from their homes, their lives and assigned to areas far away from the city centre of Port Elizabeth, far away from their homes. “The museum has been designed to provide an accurate picture of the life once enjoyed in this bustling and diverse neighbourhood. More than this, it exposes some of the injustices experienced by non-whites, and it honours the key figures who lived (and sometimes died) for their eternal determination for justice and racial equality.” (http://www.southendmuseum.co.za/) We say goodbye to our lovely host family and hop on the Bazbus to our next destination.

 

photos Port Elizabeth

Coffee Bay - Wild Coast

Wild Coast…the name suits the coast. The cliffs plunge into the sea, with waves covered in white because of the wind… In the distance we see a whale, they are migrating. Have you heard of the great Sardine run? It is comparable to the great migration in West Africa only it happens under water. The sardines migrate up the coast, followed by predators such as dolphins (they are the ones rounding up the sardines!), sharks, even birds who hope to feed on the huge amount of fish available. Trekking along the coast is a good way to explore the surroundings. The first day we walk West to some caves and a nice cliff where we can jump off into the water. The second day we walk in the other direction to the hole in the wall. Our guide explains about different plants, some are even deadly. Elodie cuts off a piece of an Aloe and I taste the bitterness of the juice. They use this juice to stop babies from breastfeeding. I understand why, the taste stays for more than an hour! After some swimming our guide makes toasts on a fire with a two-sided grill – delicious!

photos Coffee Bay

Durban

After a last night of sleeping in the car at a petrol station, we get up really early to get it cleaned. It sure deserves it! The two cleaners do an excellent job, even removing the glue on the windows after the plastic bags in the back. We can return car as new, only with some more kilometers on the counter. We spend a few hours in Durban and the city has potential, I can feel it. My father told me that when he was in Durban, he saw a guy being robbed of all his belongings right in front of him, in one of the more dangerous neighborhoods. We luckily see nothing of the sort and stroll on the beach and near the stadium before jumping on a bus to Coffee Bay.

photos Durban

Sainte Lucie - Imfolozi

After our adventure with the Zulus, we need some rest. We decide to spend a couple of days in Ste Lucie, notably to visit the natural park full of wild animals near Hluhluwe: Imfolozi. We set off as early as we manage to get up and drive in our Nissan Bakkie to the entrance of the park. It is always a surprise when going on a safari, you never know if you will see any animals at all… that’s the game! We are very optimistic as always, and after driving an hour or two (mostly in huge holes in the road or into trees on the side of the road) we start seeing them: a giraffe eating off a tree, impalas as far as the eye can see, zebras, wildebeests…  Some vultures circle over our heads. We don’t see the cadaver, but we know it must be somewhere close. To me the highlight is the white rhino. We see several of them, and not too far from the car. An elephant feels threatened by our car and waves his ears while she stamps her feet. We stay calm in the car and she leaves with her baby in the opposite direction. Phew!  

 photos safari

Sainte Lucie estuary is definitely worth a visit, especially when we discover that you can potentially meet hippos, sharks and crocodiles there… We unfortunately only see the latter. Fishermen on the beach tell us that they sometimes get a shark on their fishing line, but that they throw it out in the sea. Fishing shark is prohibited in South Africa. On our way back, we meet some friendly monkeys. Bye bye Sainte Lucie, we need to deliver the car in Durban tomorrow.

photos Sainte Lucie