Alicia

11th March - Cape Town - Day 1 post Zambezi.

Classic moving hostels to Penthouse on Long. Late leaving then had a lush lunch at a little cafe called Zula and had dinner at a Thai Restaurant on Long Street - 55 rand (£4) for curry and a cider!

12th March - Table Mountain

Tried to get up early to climb Table Mountain, but in classic Mike and Leece fashion, we were faffing didn't take enough water. Got to the start at Plettenkip Gorge trail at 11am. Was soooooooo hot - I struggled a lot as we didn't take much water. We had to stop and drink a bottle of cider in the shade. Not bad though - we met an 86 year old man and his son who'd both done the Cape Cycle ride the day before and then were climbing Table Mountain for the upteenth time. two hours was optimistic - made it to McClear's Beacon in about 2.5-3 hours. Took in the sights at the top - looking out at the islands with another well earned Savanna (definitely the taste of Africa). We took someone's advice and took the cable car down and saw a crazy guys climbing the sheer cliff face down with no ropes!

In the evening we skipped dinner to visit the Planetarium. We had a 10 minute presentation on what we should be seeing from the Southern Hemisphere, the a longer presentation on land and sky exploration which was interesting. Got back to the hostel and tucked into our bargain Miss Millie's burgers and chips.

13th March - Shark Cage dving/ Cape Town Markets

Mike was up early for his Shark Cage diving with Dee and Sheldon. I had the laziest day wandering around the markets for giraffes and souveniers.

14th March - Cape Town sights

Mike was worried we hadn't seen enough of Cape Town so we went to the gardens, visited the District 6 museum, the Castle of Good Hope and down to the Victoria and Albert Waterfront. Met up with Heather and Rob for dinner, then Annina and Kyle for drinks. Was sad to see the bye to our Acacia team.

15th March - Cape Point and Boulder's Beach Penguins

Early set off from our hostel to pick up the rental car, then collect Heather and Rob who were joining us for the first part of our Garden route road trip.

We really wanted to go to the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point, the southern most tip of South Africa. On the way there we past Boulder's Beach - a penguin colony. Of course when we were driving through we saw a penguin waiting at a bus stop. As we pulled up they dove into someone's front garden hedge. We drove to Cape Point, then stopped off to see the African penguins at Boulder's Beach on the way back. Turns out penguins are quite frisky and lots of baby penguin making going on. Final stop Stellenbosch.

16th March - Stellenbosch

We should've guessed this would be messy given we were staying at the "Stumble Inn". We'd booked on to a hop on/off wine tour bus starting at 11am. The itinerary was that we would be taken to one place, be offered up to 6 wines for tasting at each place, and then get on to another bus to taken us to a different place, and we would continue til 6pm. It's fair to say we didn't use the wine spitoon bucket at the first few stops and were all very merry before lunchtime. I can't remember much other than singing Spice Girls with Heather, getting hiccups and being fed water from a glass whilst stood on a chair with my arms out away from my sides. I crashed out back at the hotel after and woke up in darkness a few hours later then eventually found Mike and Rob in a pub watching the rugby. Mike was holding a random blue hippo - George, a gift for Lottie's little girl Ruby. We then went out for dinner. Was a brilliant day despite the worst hangover afterwards.

17th March - Knysna

We said goodbye to Rob and Heather in Hermanus and travelled on to Knysna further along the Garden Route. The hostel we were staying in were putting on a Braii (South African BBQ) so headed out swiftly for meat and cider.

18th March - Knysna Heads

Chilled walk around Knysna to see the Knysna Heads and look out to see. Beautiful views and a lovely town. Not much to do other than the walks so had a chill out at the hostel. Getting pretty tired from the travel at this point.

19th+ 20th March - Jeffrey's Bay

Travelled to Jeffrey's Bay for some sun, sea and surfing. Was pretty windy and cold. Not exactly what I had imagined for South Africa but I guess it was winter and the Atlantic is pretty cold! Spent two lazy days recovering from some pretty busy few weeks and the recent driving.

21st +22nd March - Elephant Addo National Park

Back on the road refreshed and ready for our last spot of safari and animal spotting but this time driving around the reserves in our little rental. Realised how lucky we were having a tour guide and being able to see from the height of the jeep. We had a little map and list of animals to tick off but pretty much saw mostly warthogs! That was the animal of the day. Was a lovely day despite the lack of variety of animals. As we were leaving though in the gift shop we heard loud elephant sounds. They sounded so close so we had a wander around and saw a group of people saw in a viewing area. We asked what we were looking for and they said there was a herd of elehpants close by, so we walked to the barriers to get a closer look. Turned out through the gaps there were a herd of female elephants circling round and kicking up dust, and just visible was a "male" elephant. Except it wasn't - it was a female giving birth to a baby with its trunk sticking out! We eventually saw the baby elephant being born and the herd kicking dust onto the baby to dry them out before they stood up. Was the most amazing experience. Can't believe we got to see that before we left. The perfect end to our year adventure :)

23rd - 26th March - Homeward bound

The next few days are a blur of travel. Car drop off in Port Elizabeth, then flight to Jo'Burg for one last night at the B+B by the pool drinking the last savannas. Then a flight 24th March to Mumbai via Nairobi. We thought by this point we were travel hardened and could just get a taxi to our airport hotel from the rank outside Mumbai Airport, but turns out every says they know where they're going but they don't. After a ropey taxi ride to the hotel, we ended up staying there from arrival at 2am to 8pm ordering room service and watching tv until we had to leave in the evening for our flight back to London. After the last airport queue at immigration (who knew we'd be excited for actual queues), we got our British Airways flight home to London Heathrow.

We arrived back in London 26th March early doors. John, Lisa, Russ, Pat and Charlie were waiting at arrivals for us. In classic Fernandez fashion, we had to wait for Ma, Pa and Tris to arrive a bit later. Mike compared tans and was so excited that he was actually darker than Tris at this point! (In Tris' defence it had been snowing at home, but still - it happened!) We said goodbye and went our separate ways - Mike to Bristol and me back to Leicester. Was strange being apart after the year together, but super exhausted after the multiple flights it took to get home from South Africa. Keen to catch up on sleep and share our adventures with everyone at home :)