The land is the gold at the end of the rainbow

So much to tell you all about!

Ok so for our “holiday”, as the South Africans say. My four friends and I took a road trip to Cape Town. Mary and I made friends in the beginning of September with three other student teachers from Minnesota. Meg, Nicole, and Laura are special education teachers who are also finishing their student teaching in Port Elizabeth. We met them on our safari and we decided on that very trip that we would make our way to Cape Town some way, some how, as soon as possible. So we decided to rent a car, the foxy lady as she became known as. She’s a 90’s model hunter green Volkswagen Fox, a real beaut. During the week of September 24-October 4th all schools were closed for Spring Break, so we decided to take off.

Meg, who really is a great driver, started our trip with a few missed exits on the freeway as we made our way out of town, but we laughed and had a good time along the way. I remembered to bring my ipod charger as well as my ipod tape player from America and low and behold the Fox did in fact have a tape player. We jammed out to all our favorite road trippy songs as we headed along the N60 to our first stop, Tsitsikamma.

We checked into our hostel, Dijembe, about 4pm and decided to do a quick hike through the woods near where we were staying. Dijembe was a nice clean hostel but somewhat expensive. I actually ended up having my glasses stolen which was strange because they are prescription glasses, but oh well. Our second day was one of the most beautiful hiking days we had the pleasure to enjoy. We got up early that morning and ate a quick breakfast with black coffee and Nicole and I hit the trails. Meg, Mary, and Laura decided they wanted to do the zip-line through the forest so they dropped Nicole and I off at the Tsitsikamma National Park, the second most visited park in South Africa. Since it’s the beginning of spring here the park had very little visitors and Nicole and I had the entire trail to ourselves. This hike was by far the most beautiful hike I have ever done. It took us along the Indian ocean, over huge boulders and ended at a picture perfect waterfall. So perfect that Nicole and I decided to do a little bit of yoga, just to set ourselves in with the scenery. We then hiked back and met up with the other girls for a picnic lunch by the ocean. We decided to do another hike, up a mountain this time, and we ended up encountering two baboons along the trail. So cool!
After our hikes we headed back to the hostel for dinner and drinks around the campfire. My favorite drink here is called a Savannah Dry. It’s a cider beer and it’s usually served with a lemon, really nice.

The next day was bungee day. We woke up early to the sound of a Japanese guy falling of the bunk bed above me, he was fine, and we laughed about it for the rest of the trip. Sorry little Japanese guy your pain became our pleasure. We then pumped ourselves up in the car to a song with the lyrics “shock me like and electric eel” some of you may know this tune. It’s quite a good one. We arrived at our bungee location, strapped on our gear, and decided to take the long walk through wire caging to get to the jumping spot, Bloukrans River Bridge. Bloukrans River Bridge is the highest bridge to bungee jump from in the entire world. It’s a 709 foot jump from the bridge to where you hang upside down for about 2 minutes until they come and fetch you and pull you back up to the top. I was a little frightened that I might die but you really do only live once and when you’re in South Africa with great friends and you’re feeling like you can take on the world, then ya just got to do the bungee. So we did, and it was unbelievable. I really can’t describe to you what it felt like. I remember the initial falling feeling, where your stomach feels like it’s going above your head but then after that my mind just kind of went blank. The free fall really only lasted about 5 seconds. You are attached to the bungee cord at your ankles, so once you stop bouncing you just swing back and forth with an amazing view all around you. The scariest part about the entire thing was that as I was hanging upside down, it felt like I could just wiggle my feet out from the harness. But I just tried to focus on how quiet it was to be hanging upside down in a breathtakingly beautiful valley, very surreal and spiritual. Then they pulled me back up to the top and all is well. I have a DVD of the entire jump, just come over when I get home and we’ll watch it.

After we all had jumped we got back in the car and continued on our way. That afternoon we decided to just kick it on one of the beaches in Plettenburg Bay. We laid out in the sun and ate some lunch once again by the ocean. Bungee jumping and ocean picnics became just normal day activity for us. Yes, you should be jealous. South Africa is the most awesome place to travel and discover. I hope you all get a chance to come here someday and see how wonderful this country is.

That evening we checked into our second hostel “Island Vibes” in Knsyna. Cute place with so many activities to do and just a little bit of time to enjoy it all. I do hope Mary and I can make it back to Knsyna sometime soon. That night we walked around the downtown area and lucked up on a really cool art sale. I took some neat pictures of a hippie kid lighting candles around this old tree in the city center. We later went dancing in what we think might have been a gay bar and had blast. We requested oldies and they played songs from Grease over and over again.
The next day Mary and I went on a tour of the township in Knsyna. Townships are basically the slums of South Africa. During the Apartheid era millions of black and mixed racial South Africans were forced out of their homes to live in these segregated areas called townships. It wasn’t until 1994 that desegregation occurred and all people became free to live and go as they please. It’s really a sad situation because every average size town in South Africa has a township and they are all, for the most part, very poor. But just as it is in Nicaragua, the poorest part of town is often where people really do understand how important family is and it truly means something to call someone your neighbor. As soon as we arrived the kids came running up to us wanting to hold our hands and play with our hair. They loved our cameras and wanted us to take their pictures and pictures of their families. We stopped along the way and bought some candy from one of the local township grocery stores and we handed out little candies to all the children. I couldn’t help myself from the tears that started to run down my face. It reminded me so much of the little ones in Nicaragua. When the girl I was holding in my arms wouldn’t let me put her down, she began wiping the tears from my face with her t-shirt. Children are so special. We then walked along until we eventually came to the part of the township where the largest group of Rastafarians live in all of Africa. I didn’t know much about the Rastafarian belief’s until we were given a tour by this middle aged man who gave us great information about their way of life and how they see the world. So interesting. We also got to see where they have huge reggae parties every Saturday night with everyone in dread locks, even the little kids. I want so badly to go back and join them sometime. It would be a blast I’m sure.

From Knysna we then drove to Mossel Bay. It rained along the way, but the countryside in that areas is just beautiful. I really enjoyed the backpackers we stayed in that night. We hadn’t had a really nice shower since we left so to have a warm shower was such a delight. We went to dinner and watched a little rugby. When we got back to the backpackers we met up with some of the coolest people who were also staying there. One guy, Calvin, from England drove his motorcycle from Great Britain down through Spain into Africa and all the way down to South Africa via the Eastern Coast. I loved hearing his traveling stories and it really made me want to try this little trip someday. I’m thinking sweet honeymoon adventure. We had a Savannah Dry on the house and chatted with some guys from Estonia too. I love staying in hostels. You get to meet people from all over the world who also love to travel and can share such fascinating stories about living and seeing life for what it is. The good and the bad is all meaningful if you’re willing to reflect on everything you’ve experienced.

Our fifth day, it was quite rainy and cold but my four friends were determined to go shark diving. Don’t get me wrong I do love an adventure, but any of you that know me know that by day 5 of being with people all day long I really needed some independent alone time. So I dropped my friends off at the dock where they went diving, and I took the car for a little coffee run and caught up on writing postcards while the rain fell. I watched the ocean for a while and once the rain had stopped I went walking into town. It was Sunday so most of the shops were closed but it was so nice just to be by myself and to walk around and people watch for a bit. I picked the girls back up about four hours later and they went back to the hostel for showers and a bite to eat. We then headed on our way for our last day of traveling before reaching Cape Town that evening.

That night we checked into our hostel, Long Street Backpackers. It’s a fun happening place but I wouldn’t recommend it. There are much nicer, quieter, cleaner hostels to say in while in Cape Town if you’re ever thinking of going. And it had turned really cold from the rain so we froze to death that night. I kept waking up from my whole body shivering until finally it was day light enough to get up and get ready. Every night the girls said I would talk in my sleep. They said it sounded like a mix of Spanish and English gibberish. I must have been so tired. I’ve read you sleep talk when you’re really really tired. The next morning we had to fix a little problem that had occurred the day before. One of the little back window’s of our Foxy Lady had busted right as we got into Cape Town, so Laura and Meg took the car to get the window fixed. Mary, Nicole, and I walked around Long Street, which is very similar to Bourbon Street in New Orleans. The good news is that from our little broken window ordeal, Meg and Laura made a huge discovery. They found the most delicious bakery and café I have ever had the pleasure to set foot in. With endless coffee!!! I must confess, South African food is much better than our American stuff but they haven’t got it right when it comes to coffee. Most South Africans drink instant coffee, which seams so crazy to me because just like Nicaragua, they grow coffee here in their mountains. But I guess since they export so much of it, no one here drinks much “real” coffee. So I greatly miss my shade grown, bird friendly, 100% organically grown Earth Fare coffee. But all this to say that this café had the right idea, not only did they have “real” coffee they also had FREE refills. So we each had about 5 cups. Seriously.
But all this happened the next day that we hiked Table Mountain, so let me back up a bit. Ok so the day that we got the car fixed we did a lot of walking around and shopping for gifts and souvenirs. Cape Town is huge and I don’t think from our three days staying there that we got to see even half of it. That night we heard that there was a comedy club right down the way from our hostel so we went in later to check it out. It was a really good show and after a few drinks Mary blew our cover and we were called out in the club as being the Americans. So they picked on us a little bit and it was all good fun. Finally the comedian quite picking us American’s and started in on the South African people. And as funny as this may sound I learned the most about South African cultural stereotypes that night. There are so many different groups of people here in South Africa and I always feel that I might offend someone by using the wrong term or asking an inappropriate question that I usually just don’t ask, but my friends and I all agreed that we learned more about the South African culture from that stand-up comedian than any travel book could offer. The room wasn’t as cold that night but we decided that tomorrow we were going to find a better hostel than the Long Street deep freezer.

And boy did we! We really lucked up and found the best hostel we had seen yet. Warm clean showers, nice beds, super hottie roommates, and free internet. We really hit the jackpot with Big Blue Backpackers. After checking into the hostel we headed over to the café I was just telling you about. Once we had our caffeine fix for all the lost time we’ve had since we left America, we decided to hike Table Mountain. I was a gorgeous blue sky day and we hoofed it up that mountain. Meg and Nicole are real overachievers so that went on ahead while the three of us stayed at a nice steady semi-slow pace. The hike was tough but we had great conversation on the way up and the weather was really perfect. Once we were at the top it was extremely windy and really cold. We took a few pictures and decided to head down the quickest way possible, the cable cars. On the way up Meg and Nicole met a group of people from Israel. They were super nice and once of the guys is actually a tour guide to several of the famous sites in and around Jerusalem. Hopefully I have found a free tour guide and couch to sleep on in Israel. Anyone else want to go?

The next morning we got up and decided to see a few museums. We visited a terribly biased South African military museums that sucked for the most part, except for the coffee and muffins we woofed down in the little cafe. We decided to ditch that place and head toward the District 6 museum, which was fantastic. District 6 is the area where a large group of black South Africans were forcefully removed from their homes and placed into the townships. It was as gloomy as Ann Frank’s home in Amsterdam. You get the feeling that an immense amount of dark sadness is surrounding you as you walk through the museum halls and see all the faces of so many people who have been struggling their entire lives to gain freedom. I do feel that I learned a great deal that day about freedom and what a powerful message Nelson Mandela sent to the world through his efforts and trials. We as American citizens take freedom for granted every single day, and most of the time you have no idea that your are even doing it.

To lift our spirits we decided to drive out to Boulder’s Beach, where there are said to be tons of penguin sightings and then on to the Cape of Good Hope, the southern most tip of Africa. The day was very windy but the penguins were just too cute not to get out and enjoy. We snapped and few pictures and kept on truckin’. On the way to the Cape of Good Hope we saw a whole family of Baboons by the side of the road. They were the cutest wild animals I have ever seen in my whole life. There was even a baby baboon. I immediately thought of the all the kids I babysit back home. First off because I do believe children and baboons are very similar but mostly because I know the kids would have so much enjoyed seeing these little guys. Especially my sweet animal lover Gabrielle! Once we got to the Cape it was so windy that we decided to eat our picnic inside the car due to the fact that food would have literally blown out of our hands if we had tried to sit down and eat. The Cape of Good Hope was one of the most beautiful places we visited on our trip. Standing on the edge of the land with the wind blowing off the ocean, you really do get the feeling that you are standing on the end of the earth. It was wild. We encountered, with much serendipity, our Israeli friends again and decided that we would have some drinks at a jazz bar later that evening. We had great conversation with them and we all promised to reunite in Israel sometime soon.

The next day we had to say goodbye to our lovely hostel, loaded our car, and headed to Stellenbosch for an all-day wine tour. The wine tour started at 11am and at our first winery we tasted nine glasses of wine. I felt great but I really didn’t know if I was going to make it through to the last winery still sitting straight up in my chair. I did manage, but by the last winery I started to get a terrible headache. Mary called me a Wino. That evening we had a fantastic dinner at a traditional African restaurant that included face painting and an awesome performance with dancers and drums and Malva pudding. So fun. I had a pretty bad headache that night and I swore that next time that I go on a wine tour I will only drink the wines that I really like and the rest, no matter how expensive they are, I am going to spit out!

The last full day of our trip we spent going to a little town called Calitzdorp in the mountains. I drove almost four of the six hours of the trip and I now feel very confident in my South African driving abilities. We stayed in these beautiful rustic chalets in the mountains. There were also several natural hot spring pools around where we staying so we definitely enjoyed ourselves the rest of the evening in the “hot tubs”. We had such a good time. It was bittersweet to see our holiday come to an end. The saddest part of the trip was that it was our Minnesota friends last few days in South Africa. I really hated to see them go. We sat out under the stars with the bright southern hemisphere stars and a full moon. We had gotten chocolate cake to-go from the café we had dinner in, so we ate cake and re-told all our funny stories and memories from our week of traveling. I really miss those girls and I can’t wait to make my way up to Minnesota hopefully sometime this coming winter to enjoy the snow with them.

That’s all for now. We started back school this week, so I have been teaching my 10th grade classes about diseases stemming from nutrient deficiencies (goiter, rickets, anemia, etc) and my 11th graders about managing the stock rooms in a restaurant. I do love my life.