Our last day in CapeTown was a bit rough. We maaaaayyy have overdone it on the wine at dinner last night, so having to wake up at 7:30 this morning to catch a boat was… not fun. Not only were we tired af, but spending an hour sitting on a rocky boat wasn’t a good time either. We took the boat out to Robben island, South Africa’s equivalent to Alcatraz, except that in addition to regular prisoners, this prison was used for political prisoners including Nelson Mandela. The history of the island is pretty horrific, and hearing about it was made so much more intense because the tours are given by people who were actually prisoners there. It was just insane to hear from our guide how he was treated during his time spent on the island. Such a fucked up part of history
One of the restaurants that had been recommended all over the place was Fyn, a restaurant serving Japanese inspired South African cuisine. It was an eight course tasting menu and the food was so damn good. Unique things like wild mushroom crème brûlée and also Springbok (a type of antelope).
First stop was to check out the penguins. Penguins are my favorite animals, so this was such an amazing stop for me. Tons of little penguins waddling around, swimming in the water, and laying around. There were even a bunch of (teenage?) chicks.
We continued farther south, eventually getting to the most south western point of the continent, the Cape of Good Hope. The views were totally stunning, though it was windy af so our hair looks crazy in all the photos, lol.
Afterwards, we drove through Constantia, one of the wine regions down here. Really beautiful area and we finished off with some wine tasting.
One of the most defining features of Capetown is Table Mountain. You can see it from pretty much anywhere you are in town and it’s a huge mountain that looks like…well.. a table, obviously. It looks like it someone was building a giant mountain and got distracted part way through and never built the peak.
Our goal was to hike/climb this thing. In the blog post that we read, the people wrote that the hike was incredibly exhausting despite them being marathon runners. Wondering if this was an exaggeration, we asked the person working our hotel desk if she’s ever done the hike. “Oh definitely not. Never. I recommend just taking the cable car”. Hmmm.
Undeterred, we got an Uber to the base of the mountain. When we told our driver, he started laughing hysterically while shaking his head. Finally, when he had a chance to gasp for air, he said “These guys are climbing… *THAT THING*?!?”, And then proceeded to continue laughing. Finally he said that maybe if we are experienced hikers, we might be ok. Well, we haven’t hiked in *checks memory banks* like a half a year or so.. soooo.. we should be in good shape? When dropping us off, he gave us an orange and wished us good luck.
The hike ended up being amazing. Absolutely stunning views up the mountain and down to the coast. It was definitely tiring.. all steps (and not really steps but big 1.5 to 2 foot rocks that you had to hoist up on) and no flat parts at all. We were definitely sweating bullets. But wow, so worth it. Fantastic hike!
Afterwards, we had a great lunch at Hemelhuijs. The two soups we had here were incredibly good.
It was like 6pm and jetlag was hitting super hard. Just wanted to crash, but forced ourselves to go out to dinner. We ate at an African restaurant where we chomped on worms, ate crocodile, had two types of goat, and several other unique dishes. Weren’t super into the food, but glad we tried it.
Day 1, landed in Capetown after a looooong 26 hours of flying. As usual, the airline lost Yana’s suitcase, so hopefully we will recover it tomorrow?.
Wow, everyone is so friendly here. So many peeps chatted with us and were recommending all the fun stuff for us to check out while here.
Staying at this amazing hotel right off of Capetown’s most happening street, Kloof St. Super tired, but we still hit up a super fun bar just steps from we were staying. Super great vibe, great music, and delicious cocktails.
