Day 27 - Cape Town, South Africa (Day 3)

 

Date:  Feb 4, 2007

 

Location: Cape Town, South Africa 

 

Next Port:  Richards Bay, South Africa, Feb. 6-7

 

Quick Summary:  Using one of the ship’s tours, we drove through some of the beach communities to the stunning Chapman’s Peak Drive. Then we visited the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens. After returning to the ship, we enjoyed a beautiful sail-away with friends from the aft deck of La Veranda. A 4:00 p.m., we passed by Cape Point on the Cape of Good Hope, our furthest venture south on the World Cruise.

 

Report:  We decided to take a ship’s tour for our last day in Cape Town and are very glad we did. We had an excellent guide, Gerry Berry, and enjoyed the opportunity to see more of this beautiful area.

 

We boarded our bus at 8:00 a.m., for our 4-hour tour. We drove around Lion’s Head south along the Atlantic coast through the picturesque beach communities of Bantry Bay and Camps Bay Beach. We could see the towering peaks of the Twelve Apostles and went down to the fishing village of Hout Bay. We then climbed to the Chapman’s Peak Drive toll road. Built between 1915 and 1922 by convicts, it’s an engineering marvel, cutting through the sides of sheer cliffs. As we climbed, we enjoyed stunning views looking back down at Hout Bay, Sentinel Peak and the continuing coastline. No wonder it is recognized as one of the most magnificent mountain and marine drives in the world.

 

After leaving the toll road, we had a beautiful view of Longbeach and its wide sandy beach. Jerry pointed out the “shark watcher” on the cliffs who would signal folks down on the beach if a “Great White” or other shark was sighted. It was on this beautiful beach that much of “Ryan’s Daughter” was filmed.

 

We drove through some vineyard estates and then joined the Old Cape Road. We passed through Constantia where we saw some fine homes.  Many of them were of the Dutch Cape style with gables on each end. Many also had traditional thatched roofs.

 

From there, our bus climbed to the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden which has been named one of the Seven Magnificent Botanical Gardens of the World. These gardens were donated to the state by Cecil John Rhodes, the British colonist and statesman, who also was the benefactor for Rhodes Scholarships. (He made his money in diamonds [think De Beers diamond mines] and gold [think the Kimberly gold mines]. In fact, in this area he once owned most of the land from the mountain tops to the sea.  He also donated the land for the university and the hospital where Dr. Barnard did his heart transplant research.)

 

The 1,304-acre estate hosts gardens of 5,000 indigenous plants and trees. Gerry led us through the beautiful grounds on a leisurely 1-1/2 hour stroll. It was a wonderful way to spend our last sunny morning in Cape Town. We returned to the ship just after noon.

 

Captain Dag pulled us out of the tight harbor in very good form a few minutes past 1:00 p.m. As expected, we drew a great crowd of on-lookers all around the small harbor.

 

Around 4:00 p.m., we passed the Cape of Good Hope and the Cape Lighthouse. It was fun to see the spot we visited yesterday from the vantage point of the sea. This marks the southernmost point of our voyage as we continue eastward from the Atlantic to the Indian oceans. The expected swells where the seas meet were in fact quite mild.

 

At 6:00 p.m., we held our second “block party” to welcome the new neighbors to our corridor. Debbie and Norman from Michigan were the only newcomers and are joining us for our eastward trek to Singapore. The staff who came through mentioned that we had one of the livelier parties as many of the “long timers” also joined in.

 

We had dinner with Barbara and Jim in Compass Rose (Larry enjoyed local mussels and antelope loin) and then listened to our new vocalist, Amy Baker.

 

Karen is going to catch a few zzzz’s before our 1:00 a.m, live feed of the Super Bowl. We are aware the Bears are tremendous underdogs, but we will go down to the conference room to cheer them on. We are so grateful that Jamie, Capt. Dag and the Voyager team pulled out all the stops to give us live coverage. The game will also be broadcast on the TVs in the suites. That may cut down on the number of diehards who show up in the conference room. They also plan to rebroadcast the game twice tomorrow.

 

We are aware that the Bears are heavy underdogs, but: GO, BEARS!

 

We are also glad that we aren’t with all our friends in Chicago where the Yahoo forecast for today was +3 and -3 for the high and low!!!  Wow!

 

Karen and Larry

 

A reminder: Photos of our cruise are now available at the following web site:

 

picasaweb.google.com/larryworldcruise

 

Photos of our last day in Cape Town have been added.