Cape Town - February 24, 2014

We returned our rental car early this morning. We did our daily fast walk for exercise and came back to the apartment to clean out the fridge, begin to pack and plan how to spend the rest of our last day here. Something told us to look at our tickets once more. Our flight time is confusing since we leave only 25 minutes into the new day on Feb. 26, at 12:25 am. Holy cow!! We realized that our flight is just after midnight following Tuesday evening—and, today is only Monday!! We have a whole other day here we didn't mentally expect!! What a gift!!!!! We feel like school kids with an unexpected snow day!

You know, I have gone on and on about how beautiful, modern and friendly we find Cape Town. It is indeed. It contains a great deal of history as well. In the grand scheme of things, I know nothing of the history and would surely like to know more. From what I can gather with my limited exposure, however, Cape Town was founded by settlers from The Netherlands, Germany and Great Britain. Wars over trading rights, slaves and land ensued for a long time. It seems to have been a very rugged and rough place. There were forts, prisons, and gallows where prisoners and unruly slaves were executed. Hospitals and institutions were eventually built to take care of indigents, the aged and lunatics. A deadly wave of Bubonic Plague inspired the creation of hospitals for infectious disease. Some of these early hospital buildings still stand on the Waterfront today. It is hard to imagine how such an easy-going, tolerant population evolved from such danger and hate-filled times long ago.

Yes, there were early important leaders but today in Cape Town two names prevail, Queen Victoria and Nelson Mandela. Both names aare given dear respect. This is a very proud city too. The residents love their city and see themselves very fortunate to live here.

With a new day given to us, we would have enjoyed going to the beach. We saw several wonderful ones down south toward Camps Bay. However, the high winds from last still night were still raging. That is an understatement. I have can only imagine the velocity of the wind gusts, but it is almost unbearable. And it makes for a very unusual weather situation - the sun is hot and in shelter, the temperature is hot. You sweat! Then the hard and fast cold wind hits and it is frigid. I have heard that Cape Town can be quite windy, especially in winter, and it can come with rain. But it is still summer here and this unusual wind is horrendous! Since the beach was not an option, we decided to explore the Northern suburbs since we have not had the chance earlier.

The bus system here is fantastic. It is rather new, easy to understand, very efficient and cheap!!! We purchased bus passes when we arrived equal to about $20 for each of us. We have ridden numerous, numerous times, all over the city and still have about $14.00 left on each card. In some areas, the bus has roads dedicated to bus service only - talk about zoom-zoom, these busses cross town in a flash!!! They go all the way around the curve of the Cape, from far southern points on the bay to far northern points . It covers many, cross-city sites and to the airport as well. As much as we hoped it would, the service does not go to the Botanical Gardens though. Still, I think we should send MARTA executives here on a fact-finding mission to learn how to apply MyCiti Bus System ideas to our own bus/train service.

The trip to Big Bay on the north end of the bay required three different busses. We got there, by way of just one tiny screw-up. We somehow ended up on an almost right, but yet wrong bus and spent an hour not touring the coast line as planned but weaving through beach-side residential areas. We called it our house-hunting trip. We figured out how to correct our travels and got back on track for Big Bay, apparently a popular place for wind-surfing. The persistent ferocious wind provided a superb day for that sport today!! The sun was warm but the wind carried a chill. We nearly froze watching and having lunch but these athletes were having a ball, wetsuits and all. Please see the photos. At one point, we saw a combination of about 40 wind-surfers and guys on boards with rainbow-shaped kites. I don't know the correct name for the sport, but those guys on boards powered by only by wind kites could go fast enough to lift off the waves and fly, remaining airborne 40-50 feet. It was an amazing sight!!! It is probably a great thrill if you do it correctly and probably bone-crushing if you don't.

We had African food!! Finally!! We chose to eat at a cute restaurant called Moyo. The sun was simply brilliant so we sat outside. Little did we know that this restaurant specialized in dishes from all over the continent of Africa. Wow! Finally we got our first experience with African foods. First we had Tunisian fried coriander flat bread with Dukka spice and olive oil along with Calamari Dovi, cooked in molasses, hot and spicy harrisa sauce and ground nuts---shame on us, we have had calamari almost every day while in Cape Town!! All that was just our starter. Then Stan enjoyed Fried Agulahas Hake with harrisa mayo and French fries. I splurged and ordered the real deal . . . Chicken Tagine which is marinated chicken with preserved lemon, paprika and green olives. It came with pap (maize meal) and shiba with tomato and onion gravy -this is like soft polenta with a delicious sauce. I also ordered African spinach creamed with sweet potato and onion. Yum!! The meal was very spicy - just what I like, but I'm so glad I won't be on a plane tonight. I think this stuff is gonna stay with me for a while! Meanwhile, because we chose to sit outside in the sun, we got to watch the surfers, but we paid the price of getting chilled to the bone. That wind was just too much!!

Tonight we will simply grab a light something from some cafe in the area around the apartment. We have had enough adventure for today. And guess what, the wind is still raging, sounding like a freight train passing sometimes!! Maybe it will calm overnight so we can visit the beach tomorrow before we start our trip home tomorrow night . . . fat chance.