It has been a tradition aboard the MV in recent years to wake up for the sunrise coming into the port of Cape Town, so I dragged myself out of bed before dawn, fought my way through the wind and braved the freezing temperatures to witness what was, it turned out to be, one of the better sunrises of my life. Maybe it was just because it illuminated the object of our desires (I would say land, but land at this point was a giant cloud). As we neared, as if by magic, the clouds went their separate ways and what I imagine heaven looks like was revealed. Table mountain sat illuminated by the still-rising sun, flanked on the left by skyscrapers with glinting windows and on the right by Lion’s Head and Signal Hill (more about that in a minute). As the air started to warm, we maneuvered closer to the entrance of the port, which was actually only slightly wider than the ship. We noticed something very strange as the ropes tightened and the engines ceased to roar…where were the street vendors? Why were we not afraid to leave the ship? Why hadn’t I prepared my usual story of Canadian, broke, no thank you? It was almost like we had pulled into San Francisco. Everything was so…normal. As we debarked the ship and walked down the street, some people said (not shouted) “helicopter tour? Shark dive?” We responded with a polite “no thank you,” and then…..nothing happened. We kept walking. They didn’t try again, they didn’t follow up with a “only for you, my friend!” What is this strange land upon which we have landed? What was this paradise that some people called “South Africa?”
The first part of the first day was spent getting our land legs and exploring the city. It quickly became clear that even photos of the most boring things (buildings, boats) immediately became the most beautiful pictures ever taken with Table Mountain in the background. Everyone instantly felt like a professional photographer. I had to be back for a presentation at 2:30, so I got back a little early and spent an hour sitting in the sun on the boat, but facing the mountain. Let me tell you, it was way better than sunbathing on any beach. After the speech, I went on a sunset hike up Signal Hill. Actually, let me correct myself. I went on a sunset mountain climb up Signal Hill. It was a magical mountain climb though…the trail wrapped 360 degrees around the hill, giving us views of Table Mountain, then the bay, the open ocean, the city center, and then back to Table Mountain. The “Panoramic Picture” button on my camera was smoking by the time we summated, with about 15 minutes to spare. We watched the sun that I woke up so early to greet disappear over the ocean, leaving a breathtaking display of oranges, reds, yellows and pinks behind it. The city lights began to twinkle in the darkness, outlining the city of Cape Town in the darkness. Truly an experience I will remember for the rest of my life.
On day two, I woke up at 4:45 to leave for my safari to Pilanesberg National Park, outside of Johannesburg. Our flight was uneventful except for the two Spanish ladies I was sitting next to, whose conversation was mostly a mystery save the references to the tall boy next to them (I know SOME Spanish. Come on.) Upon landing we met our guide, Gys Oosthuizen. I’ll let you guess on the pronunciation. A three hour busride took us to the Bakubung Bush Lodge, a mostly open-air lodge quite literally on the edge of the park. There was an electric fence separating us from a watering hole popular with elephants of the park. My room was decorated roof to floor in animal print, like a New York City socialite’s wardrobe gone bad, but in this case it was so, so good. The only critique I have is that the bathroom was more or less entirely open and not soundproof…not bad for a romantic getaway, not so good for two dudes rooming together. We didn’t have time for that, though, as we departed on the first safari of the trip. Our vehicle was a 20-seat open-air bush truck, driven by our guide Marnus (but make sure you roll the R or he gets upset.) He told us point-blank, Pilanesberg has lions but is not known for its felines. It is the prettiest park, has the most rhinos and elephants and is malaria-free, but DO NOT expect to see lions. So what did we do? We drove out and saw some lions. Suck it, kids who paid more to go to Kruger to see lions and get malaria. We saw three lion cubs (yes, cubs. If you ever go on a safari, go in spring. Baby season!) playing on a cliff. No sign of the mother…nobody seemed too concerned either. We also saw hippos, elephants, zebras, giraffes, and even black rhinos, one of the rarest animals in any park. The day was concluded with a “braai,” or traditional South African barbeque in the wilderness, where we were greeted by an overly curious jackal who begged for bones.
On the second day, I woke up again at 4:45 for our second game drive under the watchful eye of the rising sun. First thing we saw? A lion. Other exciting things of note: hippos and a civet, which our guide has only seen three times. We had pretty much seen it all at this point, but wait folks! There’s more! We began meandering around when suddenly our guide got on the radio, pulled an e-brake turn and floored it in the opposite direction. Word on the street was male lion, but again we were told not to get too hopeful. As we pulled up, there were about 20 cars on a roadway about 500 meters from ours. This would be a good time to tell you why we called our guide the Animal Whisperer. We asked him why he didn’t go over towards the cars where the lion was. He responded bluntly, “he’ll come over here.” Less than a minute later, a gorgeous male lion comes parading through the grass towards us. Seeing our truck, he took a detour, causing our guide to drive to a road about a minute farther away. He parked in the middle of the road and said “he’s going to come right here.” “Whaaaaaa?” was the consensus response. He’s 1000 meters away and he’s going to come right where the people are? I don’t need to tell you what happened next. He walked right past our truck. We could hear his paws hitting the ground. He could hear him panting. And since we were the first ones, we blocked the road for everybody else. Suck it, people who just drove into the park so they didn’t have to pay for a guide. Needless to say, ours got plenty of tips that day.
We saw plenty more animals that morning, but the afternoon drive was the game-changer. We started off by driving right up to a herd of elephants, where we were the only truck. I’m talking 15 or 20 full-grown elephants here. And they had a baby to protect. What could possibly go wrong? As if that wasn’t sketchy enough, our guide warned us to turn off the flashes on our cameras because the momma elephant charged the last truck where a flash went off. We were dead silent and just enjoyed the sights and sounds of an entire herd of elephants walking right by us. Unbelievable. A little farther out, we saw the “herd” of baboons. Apparently to catch a baboon, you cut a hole in a pumpkin and spread some seeds out. The baboon will come stick his hand in the pumpkin, after which we will not unclench his fist for ANYTHING. Baboons are not so bright. They’ll try to run but won’t let go. Once you’ve caught your baboon, if you want to get the herd to go away, you paint your caught baboon white and let him go. The whole herd will be scared of him and run from him, solving your baboon problem! This guy was quite the storyteller. A few hours went by and we enjoyed the setting African sun when suddenly, our guide absolutely stomped on it. 80 km/hr over dirt roads stomped it. I was in the back and was too far to hear the radio, but the rumor of leopard worked its way back. Off in the distance were about 10 pairs of headlights, which our guide flew past and parked in the middle of. I’m really not sure he’s the most-liked by the other guides, but hey, we loved him! Off the road about 100 m was a beautiful leopard, who was promptly joined by another leopard. They hung out for us for a little while before meandering into the brush…the importance of this encounter is that after being told we might not see anything, we saw everything. Lesson #...I forgot what lesson we were on. Anyway, the lesson in life is to have extremely low expectations so that no matter what happens, it will be better than you thought! Take that one to the bank.
The next day we drove back to Johannesburg and checked into one of the nicest hotels I’ve ever seen. Joburg is not the best part of town (read: highest murder rate in the world) so we didn’t venture far until the next morning, when we visited the Apartheid museum as well as Nelson Mandela’s house. The museum was extremely well-done and was very informative to someone knowing very little about it. It was definitely very heavy though and did well to illuminate the atrocities of that regime. After a short flight that afternoon, we landed back in Cape Town. On day six I went on a walking tour that visited the Jewish museum, St. George’s cathedral (the first church to ignore Apartheid rules regarding religious practice) and a mosque in the Bo-Kaap neighborhood. It was nice to see the city since I had been gone for so long and hearing the respective leaders of each spiritual center was enlightening. Each basically had the same message: Cape Town is one of the few places where every religion still gets along. It really was remarkable how little everyone cared about everyone else’s religion. Our guide at the mosque, Mohammad, even mentioned that after Ramadan, all his Christian friends come to the feast and he goes to their dinners on Christmas Eve. That’s a message we can all take to heart.
I definitely was not ready to leave Cape Town. After the Islamic culture of Morocco and the true spirit of Africa we found in Ghana, I think a Western-style city was what a lot of people needed to get excited about traveling again. Nobody was ready to leave, but we are all ready to explore Asia next (after Mauritius, of course.)
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