Wednesday, July 16th, Kylemore B, Cape Town, South Africa

Greetings!

It's Ken's birthday!  Pat's brother and wife Dianne are staying at our house in Santa Rosa, and we sure hope they are celebrating his birthday in great style.  We toasted him at breakfast this morning from South Africa, and then moved out of the Breakwater, and traveled by tour bus about 300 hundred yards to the high rise apartments directly across the waterfront lagoon from the One and Only Hotel (which spent $26 million on its opening night gala).

We're delighted with the apartment, which is only a short walk from all of the restaurants and stores.  After getting a full tour of the apartment, and an orientation to the security and entertainment equipment, we unloaded our laundry and are doing a big wash.

We'll let you know what we're doing next when we figure it out.

To see the photos we took yesterday on our trip to the Cape of Good Hope, click on Tuesday, July 15th, Kylemore B, Cape Town, South Africa.  Or to see today's photos, click on: Wednesday, July 16th, Kylemore B, Cape Town, South Africa.

Monday, July 14th, Protea Breakwater Lodge, Cape Town, South Africa

Greetings!

What a beautiful day!  On the road early to make the long drive between Knysna and Cape Town, we got to see the south coast of the country.  Several clear views of beach breaks from the top of hills helped make my day, when we weren’t passing sheep, canola oil seed fields, and a variety of high income communities built in the 1950’s once this coast had a decent road to it.  It is truly amazing how this country can support such a disparity between the housing of its people.  While I understand that apartheid was ended, segregation of residences has not.

When we reached the top of the valley overlooking Cape Town, the views were spectacular.  Four million people wrapped around a large bay with a point extending all the way out to one of the southern most points in Africa.

Descending into town, we topped that view off by driving up to the mountain gondola taking visitors to the top of Table Mountain. 

A distinct floral environment, and one of the oldest rocks on the earth, it proclaims itself one of the seven natural wonders of the world. 

To see the photos we took today, click on Monday, ProteaBreakwater Lodge, Cape Town, South Africa.

Sunday, July 13th, Knsyna Hollow, South Cape, South Africa

Greetings!

Well, three days have past since the last post.  I could blame the night of vomiting, hiccuping, and sneezing that kept me out of several meals and much sleep.  Pat's been a real support through it all, and I'm okay now.

I could also blame really consistently lousy wifi, and there's been plenty of that too.  Slow, and confusing to enroll in, it really hasn't been the kind of environment in which to upload photos and create posts.

But what's inspired me to look forward through it all is the excellent experiences we've had.  More things to see, and great fun with our group.  I'm in the bar on Sunday evening, watching the end of the day's UCI Mountain Bike World Championships in Austria on TV (go Santa Cruz).  Pat's relaxing in the room.  In an hour, we'll meet for dinner, and plan tomorrow's activities.  We're headed to Cape Town for our last two days together in this tour.  On Wednesday, Pat and I leave this tour and spend four days by ourselves in Capetown.  We'll join another tour afterwards, which heads north up the west coast of South Africa and then into Namibia and Botswana, and finally ends at Victoria Falls on August 9th.

To see the three days of photos, click on:
Friday, July 11th, Zuurberg Mountain Inn, East Cape, South Africa
Saturday, July 12th, Knsyna Hollow, South Cape, South Africa
Sunday, July 13th, Knsyna Hollow, South Cape, South Africa

And if you always wanted to see me jump off a bridge, click on Blaukrans Bridge Bungy Jump

Thursday, July 10th, Zuurberg Village Inn, Eastern Cape, South Africa

Greetings!
Since we spend a lot of time on the road, I should probably share with you some thoughts about the roads of South Africa.  They seem like a work in progress.  The roads inside the parks, even when they are dirt roads, are much better than outside the parks. Almost every road has a work crew upgrading the surfaces.  We are told that some road improvement projects have gone on for years because contractors were charged with corruption, and the road completion was held up while the court trials continued.  

The smart move would have been to invest in the company making the black and yellow caution signs placed every 100 feet on the sections being improved.  Or the company that makes the bright green or orange clothing worn by the workers.  And would someone please tell each town there’s a limit to how many speed bumps they can install.

We awoke at a reasonable time today (7:15), packed up, and went to have breakfast in the hotel restaurant.  Eggs, sausage, cereal, coffee (Pat says it’s pretty good) and orange juice, and fruit.  We were on the road by a little after 8am, and made it to Ado Elephant National Park by 11:30am.  A quick lunch, and browsing of the gift shop led to the game drive for the rest of the day.

This is the last park we’ll visit on this tour, even though we’ve got a week left on it.  We’ll be back here tomorrow for another six-hour game hunt, and leave the next day for the drive south to near the coast.  This park was established to protect the last remaining elephant herd in this area, lowered to 15 at one point by the eradication efforts of the farmers whose orange groves were being decimated annually.  

Otis elevator and the railroad company pitched in and created the original preserve, and it’s been expanded to stretch all the way to include a marine sanctuary on the coast.  Soon, we’ll be going on a whale-watching cruise.

Shortly before dinner, we drove out of the park and up to the top of the perennial escarpment to the Zuurberg Mountain Inn.  Great rooms with indoor and outdoor showers overlooking the edge of the escarpment, with tennis courts and pool, horseback-riding, and hiking trails.  And separate men’s and ladies bars that are 150 years old.  I’m sure glad we didn’t choose the tent-camping level of this tour.

To see the rest of the photos we took today, click on Thursday, July 10th, Zuurberg Mountain Inn, Eastern Cape, SouthAfrica.  

Tuesday & Wednesday, July 8-9th, Gariep & Cradock, Eastern Cape, South Africa

Greetings!

It took two long days of driving, but my hopes to see a lion came true today.  Leaving the Cavern yesterday morning, we drove all day to get to the Gariep Dam Resort.  

Early this morning, we were given a tour of the Gariep Dam.  Quinton arranged for two members of the security and maintenance staff at the dam to give us a personal tour.  Following them deep into the cold recesses of the concrete monolith, we saw how such a huge project actually works.  The Gariep Dam is a key link in a project which transports river water almost the length of South Africa.  It diverts water via a tunnel through the mountains south of here and connects two long river valleys to irrigate the southern half of South Africa. 

After our visit to the Dam, we drove for several hours to the town of Cradock in the Eastern Cape.  Checking into the Die Tuishuise & Victoria Manor, we had tea and sandwiches in a small diner across the street, and headed off to the MountainZebra National Park a few miles away. 

The Mountain Zebra has slightly different marking than the zebras most see on visits to Africa.  The head looks more like a donkey, the stripes are thinner and they end at the belly, which is white.  

We also saw elands, blesboks, wildebeests, ostriches, and kudus. 

The park contains, but we did not see, black rhinos, cheetahs, hartebeests, bat-eared fox, and hyenas. 

But clearly the peak of our viewing experience was the two young male lions we found asleep near the road, and who provided us with an hour’s worth of entertainment as they woke, yawned, stretched, and then made their way down the mountain on a casual walk together.

They didn’t seem to be hunting, as they passed several lone wildebeests on their journey.  We followed them down past a watering hole, to a favorite bush they marked, and on across a large expanse of high grasses.  The park’s closing time finally forced us to say goodbye to them, and drive back to the gate. 

I’ll apologize before you wade though the 221 photos I took today.  It’s just impossible to narrow the volume of photos to less than that when you are dealing with cute lion shots, coupled with several species of antelope, and rare mountain zebra.  To see the photos, click on Wednesday,July 9th, Craddock, Eastern Cape, South Africa.

Monday, July 7th, The Cavern, Drakensberg, South Africa

Greetings!

Today was one of those infrequent days when no group activity is planned.  Except for meals, we’re on our own at the Resort.  Speaking of meals, the fare includes some local game, and lamb, beef, and fish.  Fruit and vegetables are plentiful, and I’m looking forward to the pineapples I see ripening in the fields around us.

Pat and I decided to two-hour hike on a Nature Trail leading out of the Resort, up through a dense forest, to a waterfall just past a protea garden. 

The views there of the basalt mountain escarpment covering a layer of sandstone were spectacular. Some of the log stairs were a bit difficult to climb, both up and down, but we took it slowly, and were surprised to finish in less than the time described in the guide.  The unique ferns and trees which have survived in this protected high valley were very special.

It was pretty cold this morning due to a storm which crept up from Cape Town, but it warmed up later and we spent most of the middle of the day on comfy couches in the Library reading and working on our computers in the sunshine. Quinton and I worked together to better prepare him to market his tours (www.africaschild.co.za), and to use a Google Blog and Google+ to organize an effort to develop internet content on South Africa’s important natural resources.

I have come to believe that tour guides are the richest resource a country has.  We tourists depend on them, not only for helping us experience the country, but to see it from a perspective few others have.  Anything I can do to help Quinton inform us is time well spent.  And I admire especially his passion for assisting South Africans to visit the places we tourists see.  I’m interested in helping him develop some ways to allow more self-guided tours with richly-delivered content through smart phones at targeted GPS locations similar to what I’m doing for California’s coast and parks.

To see the rest of the photos we took today, click on Monday, July 7^th, The Caverns, Drakensberg, South Africa.  And check out where we’re going next on our Google Engine Map.  

Sunday, July 6th, The Cavern, Drakensberg, South Africa

Greetings!

We drove 560 kilometers (336 miles for us yanks) today across some great-looking farmlands and residential areas.  Tan grasses, green bushes, yellow-barked acacia and brown wattle trees provide a feast for the eyes.  

To make the scene more dramatic, today’s weather brought the edge of a serious storm coming up from the Cape, which was dropping its moisture and snow on the other side of the mountains we are headed toward for tonight’s two-day stay (Drakensberg).

I have only one problem with the landscape, however.  Seems the government decided long ago that their land reform distribution program design was to homestead all the blacks to a patchwork of farmlands. 

We’d drive past white-owned, beautiful sugarcane farms covering all the eye could see, and then the next hill over would begin a valley of distressed homes with no infrastructure.  The next hilltop would begin another vast expanse of green farmland, followed by another valley and hillside urban sprawl.   It’s been said that this intentionally made it much more difficult for the new housing residents to organize, and to create coherent communities.

The Cavern is an amazing resort, high up in a secluded valley in the Drakensberg Mountains.  To make our entrance even more awesome, those storm clouds I mentioned provided a light show that had us all scrambling to get shots of it.   I swear we all expected either the alien craft from Close Encounters to descend, or the one from Independence Day.

Finally, a beam of light pointed the way to a single tree marking the entrance road to the resort.

To see the photos we took on the way here today, click on Sunday, The Caverns, Drakensberg, South Africa.  To read the itinerary for the stay here, or to figure out where we are going next, check out the Google Engine Map.