** One note before I start this, the write-ups of the first two days of the trip have been quite lengthy, and I wouldn’t expect myself to be able to write that length about each day – especially when the scene shifts to Bangalore and the days becomes gloriously monotonous – but for now there is a lot to do each day so I probably could write that length. Then again, maybe it has nothing to do about what I did, because the day that was mostly flying was just as long as the day to Cape Point **
Day 4 – Getting to Know the Cape
I woke up with an e-mail telling me that my Robben Island ticket has been cancelled because of rough seas in the early morning, in which they don’t sail their ferries to Robben Island. Instead, I can go and sans fee change the ticket to another day. Luckily for me, the Friday noon ferry was available. Because of this change, I was left with a strange prospect: having to spend the entire day in Cape Town proper, without a 6:30 AM taxi ride the following morning – as I will have on Friday. So, like I will get to do far too infrequently during the trip, I decided to relax this day, take it slow, like any good Cape Towner would. It started with another walk to the waterfront. The early-morning wind and rains had passed, but Cape Town was still very much cloud-covered. Maybe it is a South African thing, but cloud cover in Cape Town, and Johannesburg previously, is really low. I could barely see halfway up the peak behind my hotel. As I walked towards the waterfront, the skies cleared up a bit, but I wanted the clouds back. Before the skies opened, it was perfect weather, with a slight breeze. Not too cold, not too hot. That paradise was lost as the skies returned to their natural blue state. Still, it isn’t too hot that I am sweating all day, and my alternative would have been 30 degrees in New Jersey, so it is hard to complain.
During my research, which encompassed mainly looking for restaurants, I only read about one place that was good for breakfast, and that was Vovo Telo, on the waterfront. It isn’t on the water, but still outdoors, with a great view of the Wharf, and the Ferris Wheel (which I have yet to see operated). There was just enough shade to be easily eat outdoors during the day, and since Cape Town is about the same temperature all day (and doesn’t drop much during the night) that is a necessity even for breakfast. The one problem, though, is I don’t really like breakfast outside of Waffles – something I can easily get at home – so even though their menu looked very good, not much seemed appealing to me. This isn’t a knock on Vovo Telo, as everyone’s food around me looked good, but a knock on my own strange eating habits – that’s what happens when you get up past 10 AM for four straight years. In the end, I chose a ‘Bruschetta Board’ with three different types of Bruschetta, and a local-made Ginger Ale. The Ginger Ale was excellent. The Bruschetta took forever to be made, but I won’t complain given I was in the opposite of a hurry. When the Bruschetta finally came, I had two immediate impressions. One was that it looked amazing, and the other was that I was surely going to make a mess. Both impressions were proven to be well-founded. Only one of the three bruschettas was vegetable based, and none featured tomato, which was a plus. Another winning meal in Cape Town.
After my late breakfast (it was around eleven when that finished) I decided to venture back into Cape Town Central, and so I took a taxi from the Waterfront Rake down to the District Six Museum. Going in, all I knew of the museum was that it was about Apartheid. When I entered, I was taken aback by how small it was (just one two-story small building), but it did contain a wealth of information. Apparently, District Six was (and still is) the area of Cape Town where the building is, and that area, before the Apartheid era, was dominantly black. After the dawn of the Apartheid era of South Africa, the blacks and “colored” – which is an important distinction in South Africa – were forced out of District Six for other, undeveloped areas of Cape Town, and the District was mostly bulldozed away to make room for white living. Eventually, the blacks were let back into District Six. The plight of the blacks is the calling card of the museum, but it also about the history of District Six in general. An interesting go.
After fulfilling my time indoors, I set out for a little walking tour of Cape Town Central. That area of Cape Town is very European. There is the perfect mix of modern shops and galleries with beautiful old architecture, but the gem of Cape Town is inside that, truly at the Center of the City. This area is a three by ten block garden that houses the parliament offices and five museums (Art Gallery, South African Museum, Planetarium, Holocaust Museum and some other one) on its perimeter. The inside is split into three. The west-most is a simple lawn. The central part is a large path down the middle, and the path you walk on is lined with giant canopy trees, providing total shade. The east-most is the real star, though, a simple, thin botanical garden. The garden has three little paths, but it is so slim that you can see pretty much everything from all of them. The ten block length has a little bit of everything, from gazebo’s to fountains, to statues, to a flower garden, to beautiful bannion trees. The best part of the botanical garden, though, is the stunning views it lends of Table Peak and Table Mountain. As I walked from North to South and looked left towards those twin peaks, each photo opportunity was better than the next. There may be a better photo spot for Table Mountain from the ground in Cape Town, but I don’t know it. The best part of the picture was the tight clouds covering the top of the peaks, even though by now this day the sky was almost totally clear of clouds, but those clouds hugged tightly to the peaks. As I have said already, and will probably continue to say throughout the next two days, Cape Town is just stunning.
I then went a little more East towards Long Street, and I entered at the bottom. My destination was a place for lunch was, unbeknownst to me as I started, was about 2 KM away on Long Street, but it gave me a first-hand view of the famed Long Street. I saw more of Long Street this day than I saw yesterday, and the street is at it claims. A ton of backpackers hotels. A ton of bars (not as many clubs as I thought, but the ones that were there were on side roads, so I may have missed them), including some that have the same off-beat type names that are so present in that pocket of NYC that I spent my college days, like The Slug & Lettuce, or The Black Arrow. The ‘fun’ stretch of Long Street lasted about halfway to my lunch spot, as the rest was more of a normal main street, with a slew of known shops, banks and hotels. I was worried that I may have missed Fork, where I was going for lunch, but I hadn’t. Sweating for the first time all day (it got hot and sunny, not a great combination when the day started cool and breezy), I reached Fork.
Cape Town, like many cities that aren’t New York, is a city where the top restaurants on TripAdvisor aren’t really expensive. Fork checks in at #4 (I plan on going to two of the other top three, one is expensive, the other isn’t, and looks from the picture like it wouldn’t be anywhere near the top-10). It is exclusively a ‘tapas’ place, but like most tapas restaurants outside of Spain, it serves small plates that they call tapas, but they don’t resemble traditional tapas. They had four categories, each grouped by price (40, 45, 50 and 60 rand), and since I wasn’t too hungry, I just went with two, one from each of the top two categories. I decided to try a couple more famed African meats. The first was Grilled African Tiger Prawns wrapped in Pancetta. I’m not sure what makes ‘African’ Tiger Prawns different than Tiger Prawns from different parts of the world. Nevertheless, they were still very good. Grilled just right so it was crunchy, but wasn’t too dry. Next was Kudu Filet, a more traditional African specialty (and one you can only get in Africa, unlike those prawns). The presentation again was terrific. The pieces of Kudu were small (then again, the dish was only 50 rand) but really tasty. I’m not sure how well it mixed with the sauce, but the sauce on its own was excellent. Another good meal, that was on the cheaper side. The place, like many small dish places, is probably best served for a large group, but even dining alone worked.
I wasn’t sure what to do next, it being 3 PM and having nothing much on my schedule this day without Robben Island. If it was clearer, I probably would have gotten Table Mountain out of the way today, but while there is a weird grace in being above the low clouds on top of Table Mountain, that is a bad rationalization used by people who were unlucky and never got a day without clouds. Instead of Table Mountain, I considered a trip to Kirstenbosch botanical gardens, but nothing came out of that as I was given various information about the relative cost of getting there (much of it incorrect). Intead, I made my way through some shops. In my few trips abroad alone (Madrid, Singapore, India) I have done little to no shopping. Part of it is I never have any good ideas of what to get my family, and the other is I hate shopping. It is hard to say which is more the reason. Anyway, just writing about shopping is boring me as much as the prospect of going shopping. I got some decent stuff; at least I think I did.
I went back to the Lodge for my daily siesta (really just a shower, watch an episode of some show, get ready to head back out), and left at 7:30 a new man. I decided to brave walking at that time. The sun is still up and there are enough people around that it isn’t the scary ‘Cape Town at Night’ scenario. Still, to ensure I would be able to at least know if people are immediately around me, I listened to my music in one ear. Twenty minutes down Somerset Street (the main street that is parallel to the Waterfront and the stadium) past some nice bars, nice restaurants (and nice women), I reached my destination: Sloppy Sam, a middetarranean restaurant. They had a 45 minute wait, which I had planned on, and since there was a nice Irish bar across the road, I knew where to go. There was a group of people there watching the Inter Milan – AC Milan match, and I got to chatting with them. Nothing allows me an opening into a conversation like sports, and since South Africa is an English Speaking country, that transition is rather easy. No lasting connections were made (they were all quite a bit older anyway), but it was nice to just have a beer and watch a game again.
I was seated at Sloppy Sam around 8:30, and the place is just adorable on the inside. It is a small two-level place that is decorated perfectly for the style of restaurant, with simple wooden tables, candle lights and nice, stylish rugs. I ordered Kufteh meatballs for a starter, and Lamb Chops for the main course, making this probably the first time I didn’t order anything truly ‘African’ but for that type of food you don’t come to this place. You come for the ambience and the great middle-eastern food. The owner and chef, Sam, came around to the tables and I had a short chat with him about my stay in South Africa so far, and how much I loved his restaurant. He had similar chats with the other tables, but they were all longer as many of the people seemed to know Sam. I like those types of places, where the patrons know the owner. It makes the place seem more familial. The Kufteh meatballs were cooked delicately, as they easily broke into small pieces, but didn’t powder. They had great spices and onion added, and the pita on the side created a great combination. It took forever for them to make the lamb, but I seemed to be the only one who had to wait, so maybe they were discriminating against the Table-for-One. When if finally came, it looked excellent, and it tasted even better. I have been a little hyperbolic about the food so far, but honestly, it might have been the best lamb chops I have ever had. The lamb was cooked perfectly, with a lot of meat on the bone. Better than that even was the potatoes. The sweet potatoes were soft as usual, but the normal potato (I have no better term for it) was just as soft. I have never had standard potato that tender, that melt-in-your-mouth god. It was another small restaurant, but another damn good one.
After, I walked to the Waterfront. There were enough cars and people walking on the road during this time of day (around 10:00) for it to be safe. Getting a cab is a whole process in Cape Town that I didn’t want any part of for that small distance, and the weather was brilliant. I reached, made my reservation for tomorrow, and found my place at Mitchell’s Brewery, and tried one of their local brews, the ‘Milk & Honey’ beer, which was as it is named. The honey was a little too strong, but by now I’m sick and tired of Castle and Jack Black and Hansam, and just wanted something local and this was it. A nice refreshing end to a long day of lazing around Cape Town, seeing the flowers and trees, the museum and the backpacking district, and finishing the day where one should finish the day, at the waterfront.
** Somehow, despite me not doing any tours today, it ended up being longer. Not sure how that happened. **
Day 4 – Getting to Know the Cape
I woke up with an e-mail telling me that my Robben Island ticket has been cancelled because of rough seas in the early morning, in which they don’t sail their ferries to Robben Island. Instead, I can go and sans fee change the ticket to another day. Luckily for me, the Friday noon ferry was available. Because of this change, I was left with a strange prospect: having to spend the entire day in Cape Town proper, without a 6:30 AM taxi ride the following morning – as I will have on Friday. So, like I will get to do far too infrequently during the trip, I decided to relax this day, take it slow, like any good Cape Towner would. It started with another walk to the waterfront. The early-morning wind and rains had passed, but Cape Town was still very much cloud-covered. Maybe it is a South African thing, but cloud cover in Cape Town, and Johannesburg previously, is really low. I could barely see halfway up the peak behind my hotel. As I walked towards the waterfront, the skies cleared up a bit, but I wanted the clouds back. Before the skies opened, it was perfect weather, with a slight breeze. Not too cold, not too hot. That paradise was lost as the skies returned to their natural blue state. Still, it isn’t too hot that I am sweating all day, and my alternative would have been 30 degrees in New Jersey, so it is hard to complain.
During my research, which encompassed mainly looking for restaurants, I only read about one place that was good for breakfast, and that was Vovo Telo, on the waterfront. It isn’t on the water, but still outdoors, with a great view of the Wharf, and the Ferris Wheel (which I have yet to see operated). There was just enough shade to be easily eat outdoors during the day, and since Cape Town is about the same temperature all day (and doesn’t drop much during the night) that is a necessity even for breakfast. The one problem, though, is I don’t really like breakfast outside of Waffles – something I can easily get at home – so even though their menu looked very good, not much seemed appealing to me. This isn’t a knock on Vovo Telo, as everyone’s food around me looked good, but a knock on my own strange eating habits – that’s what happens when you get up past 10 AM for four straight years. In the end, I chose a ‘Bruschetta Board’ with three different types of Bruschetta, and a local-made Ginger Ale. The Ginger Ale was excellent. The Bruschetta took forever to be made, but I won’t complain given I was in the opposite of a hurry. When the Bruschetta finally came, I had two immediate impressions. One was that it looked amazing, and the other was that I was surely going to make a mess. Both impressions were proven to be well-founded. Only one of the three bruschettas was vegetable based, and none featured tomato, which was a plus. Another winning meal in Cape Town.
I had to actually eat Breakfast sooner or later
After my late breakfast (it was around eleven when that finished) I decided to venture back into Cape Town Central, and so I took a taxi from the Waterfront Rake down to the District Six Museum. Going in, all I knew of the museum was that it was about Apartheid. When I entered, I was taken aback by how small it was (just one two-story small building), but it did contain a wealth of information. Apparently, District Six was (and still is) the area of Cape Town where the building is, and that area, before the Apartheid era, was dominantly black. After the dawn of the Apartheid era of South Africa, the blacks and “colored” – which is an important distinction in South Africa – were forced out of District Six for other, undeveloped areas of Cape Town, and the District was mostly bulldozed away to make room for white living. Eventually, the blacks were let back into District Six. The plight of the blacks is the calling card of the museum, but it also about the history of District Six in general. An interesting go.
After fulfilling my time indoors, I set out for a little walking tour of Cape Town Central. That area of Cape Town is very European. There is the perfect mix of modern shops and galleries with beautiful old architecture, but the gem of Cape Town is inside that, truly at the Center of the City. This area is a three by ten block garden that houses the parliament offices and five museums (Art Gallery, South African Museum, Planetarium, Holocaust Museum and some other one) on its perimeter. The inside is split into three. The west-most is a simple lawn. The central part is a large path down the middle, and the path you walk on is lined with giant canopy trees, providing total shade. The east-most is the real star, though, a simple, thin botanical garden. The garden has three little paths, but it is so slim that you can see pretty much everything from all of them. The ten block length has a little bit of everything, from gazebo’s to fountains, to statues, to a flower garden, to beautiful bannion trees. The best part of the botanical garden, though, is the stunning views it lends of Table Peak and Table Mountain. As I walked from North to South and looked left towards those twin peaks, each photo opportunity was better than the next. There may be a better photo spot for Table Mountain from the ground in Cape Town, but I don’t know it. The best part of the picture was the tight clouds covering the top of the peaks, even though by now this day the sky was almost totally clear of clouds, but those clouds hugged tightly to the peaks. As I have said already, and will probably continue to say throughout the next two days, Cape Town is just stunning.
I then went a little more East towards Long Street, and I entered at the bottom. My destination was a place for lunch was, unbeknownst to me as I started, was about 2 KM away on Long Street, but it gave me a first-hand view of the famed Long Street. I saw more of Long Street this day than I saw yesterday, and the street is at it claims. A ton of backpackers hotels. A ton of bars (not as many clubs as I thought, but the ones that were there were on side roads, so I may have missed them), including some that have the same off-beat type names that are so present in that pocket of NYC that I spent my college days, like The Slug & Lettuce, or The Black Arrow. The ‘fun’ stretch of Long Street lasted about halfway to my lunch spot, as the rest was more of a normal main street, with a slew of known shops, banks and hotels. I was worried that I may have missed Fork, where I was going for lunch, but I hadn’t. Sweating for the first time all day (it got hot and sunny, not a great combination when the day started cool and breezy), I reached Fork.
Cape Town, like many cities that aren’t New York, is a city where the top restaurants on TripAdvisor aren’t really expensive. Fork checks in at #4 (I plan on going to two of the other top three, one is expensive, the other isn’t, and looks from the picture like it wouldn’t be anywhere near the top-10). It is exclusively a ‘tapas’ place, but like most tapas restaurants outside of Spain, it serves small plates that they call tapas, but they don’t resemble traditional tapas. They had four categories, each grouped by price (40, 45, 50 and 60 rand), and since I wasn’t too hungry, I just went with two, one from each of the top two categories. I decided to try a couple more famed African meats. The first was Grilled African Tiger Prawns wrapped in Pancetta. I’m not sure what makes ‘African’ Tiger Prawns different than Tiger Prawns from different parts of the world. Nevertheless, they were still very good. Grilled just right so it was crunchy, but wasn’t too dry. Next was Kudu Filet, a more traditional African specialty (and one you can only get in Africa, unlike those prawns). The presentation again was terrific. The pieces of Kudu were small (then again, the dish was only 50 rand) but really tasty. I’m not sure how well it mixed with the sauce, but the sauce on its own was excellent. Another good meal, that was on the cheaper side. The place, like many small dish places, is probably best served for a large group, but even dining alone worked.
Yes, I did take a lot of pictures of food.
I wasn’t sure what to do next, it being 3 PM and having nothing much on my schedule this day without Robben Island. If it was clearer, I probably would have gotten Table Mountain out of the way today, but while there is a weird grace in being above the low clouds on top of Table Mountain, that is a bad rationalization used by people who were unlucky and never got a day without clouds. Instead of Table Mountain, I considered a trip to Kirstenbosch botanical gardens, but nothing came out of that as I was given various information about the relative cost of getting there (much of it incorrect). Intead, I made my way through some shops. In my few trips abroad alone (Madrid, Singapore, India) I have done little to no shopping. Part of it is I never have any good ideas of what to get my family, and the other is I hate shopping. It is hard to say which is more the reason. Anyway, just writing about shopping is boring me as much as the prospect of going shopping. I got some decent stuff; at least I think I did.
I went back to the Lodge for my daily siesta (really just a shower, watch an episode of some show, get ready to head back out), and left at 7:30 a new man. I decided to brave walking at that time. The sun is still up and there are enough people around that it isn’t the scary ‘Cape Town at Night’ scenario. Still, to ensure I would be able to at least know if people are immediately around me, I listened to my music in one ear. Twenty minutes down Somerset Street (the main street that is parallel to the Waterfront and the stadium) past some nice bars, nice restaurants (and nice women), I reached my destination: Sloppy Sam, a middetarranean restaurant. They had a 45 minute wait, which I had planned on, and since there was a nice Irish bar across the road, I knew where to go. There was a group of people there watching the Inter Milan – AC Milan match, and I got to chatting with them. Nothing allows me an opening into a conversation like sports, and since South Africa is an English Speaking country, that transition is rather easy. No lasting connections were made (they were all quite a bit older anyway), but it was nice to just have a beer and watch a game again.
I was seated at Sloppy Sam around 8:30, and the place is just adorable on the inside. It is a small two-level place that is decorated perfectly for the style of restaurant, with simple wooden tables, candle lights and nice, stylish rugs. I ordered Kufteh meatballs for a starter, and Lamb Chops for the main course, making this probably the first time I didn’t order anything truly ‘African’ but for that type of food you don’t come to this place. You come for the ambience and the great middle-eastern food. The owner and chef, Sam, came around to the tables and I had a short chat with him about my stay in South Africa so far, and how much I loved his restaurant. He had similar chats with the other tables, but they were all longer as many of the people seemed to know Sam. I like those types of places, where the patrons know the owner. It makes the place seem more familial. The Kufteh meatballs were cooked delicately, as they easily broke into small pieces, but didn’t powder. They had great spices and onion added, and the pita on the side created a great combination. It took forever for them to make the lamb, but I seemed to be the only one who had to wait, so maybe they were discriminating against the Table-for-One. When if finally came, it looked excellent, and it tasted even better. I have been a little hyperbolic about the food so far, but honestly, it might have been the best lamb chops I have ever had. The lamb was cooked perfectly, with a lot of meat on the bone. Better than that even was the potatoes. The sweet potatoes were soft as usual, but the normal potato (I have no better term for it) was just as soft. I have never had standard potato that tender, that melt-in-your-mouth god. It was another small restaurant, but another damn good one.
After, I walked to the Waterfront. There were enough cars and people walking on the road during this time of day (around 10:00) for it to be safe. Getting a cab is a whole process in Cape Town that I didn’t want any part of for that small distance, and the weather was brilliant. I reached, made my reservation for tomorrow, and found my place at Mitchell’s Brewery, and tried one of their local brews, the ‘Milk & Honey’ beer, which was as it is named. The honey was a little too strong, but by now I’m sick and tired of Castle and Jack Black and Hansam, and just wanted something local and this was it. A nice refreshing end to a long day of lazing around Cape Town, seeing the flowers and trees, the museum and the backpacking district, and finishing the day where one should finish the day, at the waterfront.
** Somehow, despite me not doing any tours today, it ended up being longer. Not sure how that happened. **
