Day 12 – Taking my Talents to South Africa
Just like my plan to squeeze in a dinner between Alexandria
and my flight to Luxor, I had a similar plan to ferry of to Fayruz Restaurant,
at the Intercontinental that is close to the airport. However, I messed up a
few things on the way that sadly laid that plan to rest.
First, I forgot that in Egypt, you have to go through
security screening prior to check-in, and that environment is somewhat sterile
in that it takes some convincing to be allowed to go back out. Then, when I
tried to do it, still in enough time to actually make it work, I was told that
the check-in for an Aeroflot flight would start soon and because of that, there
would be additional security checks. This properly scared me off, so I decided
just to swallow my trip planning pride and stayed in the airport.
Cairo is an interesting airport, where their terminal for
Egyptair is nowhere near as good as the terminal where Emirates (and Air
France, and Etihad, et. al.) was. There was a nice priority pass lounge that
had food very similar to the cruise food. Probably not as good as Fayruz, but
as I’ve learned through many different travel experiences, it is better
sometimes to leave some places unchecked; always have a to-do list for an
potential second trip.
The flight to Dubai was uneventful, a quick three hours. Of
course, Emirates nicely decides to serve a full dinner during the flight. Of
course, this means it is nigh impossible to sleep on the flight, but the meal
(lamb curry) was good. The movie selection on Emirates was good as always.
Their main new feature was Jurassic Park Fallen Kingdom, so they added all the
Jurassic Park movies. I decided to spin up the original movie for the first
time in a while – it’s as good as ever. Incredible really, being nearly 25
years old now.
My time in Dubai airport basically consisted of me sleeping
in their Priority Pass Lounge in their ‘B Gates’ area. So far, in my various
trips through DXB Airport, I’ve been to the ‘C’ and ‘D’ gates, and now ‘B’
gates, and I’ll criticize DXB by saying the level of food and drink options
vary greatly by area. Ironically, the food options are much better in the ‘D’
gates (including Shake Shack!), but the lounge there is average, while in the
‘B’ area, it was completely reversed.
The flight to Cape Town was very different than the
medium-haul flight to Dubai, or even my overnight flight to Dubai from Jo-Burg.
I didn’t realize it when I booked the flight,, but this was a fully day-time
flight, where I tried to get some sleep during the waking hours of my day. The
flight was about nine hours, and I was fully awake for maybe two, partially
awake four about three, and fully asleep four about three. I was able to watch
the original Iron Man (thrilling really to watch it knowing what the Marvel
series would become ten years later) in my fully awake hours, and Ocean’s 8 and
Solo during my partially awake hours (both fine, but not great), and then a
host of movies during my fully asleep hours.
Few things about Emirates. I really appreciate the quality
of their planes and movie selection that they have. The food is fine, but I
definitely think they’ve scaled back the quantity on their trays over the years
– though it may just be my comparison point is New York service where they may
play it up a bit. They still take too long to serve meals, but at least on
these flights it didn’t matter since the first flight was too short, and the
second was during the day. Anyway, I will never be an Emirates fanboy, but
they’ve well commoditized their above average level of service into an artform.
I landed in Cape Town at 6:15 local time, with the sun
starting to set (would reach fully dark around 7:30). I flew through
immigration and the rest, and before I knew it was waiting for my Uber in the
cold, but incredibly welcome, wind of Cape Town. My hotel is nicely placed near
the waterfront, but slightly too far to walk there given the uncertainty of
Cape Town at night (again, the city in and of itself is not too dangerous, but
don’t take risks when Ubers are $1 for that distance). I had dinner
reservations at Miller’s Thumb, the one restaurant to hold its great
tripadvisor ranking and overall great reviews from my first trip in 2013 (it
was #2 on Tripadvsior at that point) to now (#6), despite it not being some fancy
shmancy joint.
Prior to dinner, I settled down at Mitchell’s Ale House for
a pre-dinner Mile & Honey (my favorite non-US Craft beer since I first had
the brew in 2013). I’ve now been in this spot three times, across
five-and-a-half Years, and it never gets old.
This is my third trip to Cape Town, and in each of the past
two, I had Miller’s Thumb listed as a restaurant I wanted to go to. Somehow, I
had never made it. Either because I spent too long at Table Mountain and missed
their lunch window (happened in 2013), or because I didn’t realize they were
closed on Sundays (2016). This time, I decided to just get the damn place done
with for my first meal and not risk some scheduling issue coming into play.
Miller’s Thumb is a pure mom-and-pop place, with the mom
(co-owner) being essentially the maitre’d and giving a great explanation of all
the specials that were on order today. It is a fish place, with the mains being
the 4-6 fish that are available that day (today was Kingklip, Dorado,
Yellowtail, Tuna and Bluefin) in one of the five preparations, along with a few
apps and the rest, including four house G&Ts with craft gins.
I basically had the normal experience, a mussels starter
that was prepared ‘Greek’ style with feta cheese and nice sauce. The main I got
was Bluefin, which was grilled perfectly, with a Saffron aioli and roasted
vegatables – again cooked perfectly. For a dessert, I got one of their six
options (all sounded good), this being a blue-cheese ice cream with pear
poached in red wine. My expectations were super high for Miller’s Thumb, being
it a place that had kept its sterling reputation on a site so open to
sheninegans like Tripadvisor, in a major city like Cape Town. This isn’t some
backwards place. Cape Town has many top rates restaurants world-wide, including
one palce in the World’s Top 50 list (The Test Kitchen). The fact that humble
Miller’s Thumb has such a good reputation is meaningful, and it hit the mark.
After dinner, I took my talents to Long Street, Cape Town’s
late night nucleus, home to backpacker after backpacker, bar after bar and club
after club. Tonight was not going to be a ‘club’ night (read: very late) as I
had my biking tourof Stellenbosch Wineries tomorrow morning, which needs ample
not-being-hungover-ness to effectively experience, and I was still quite tired
after getting some thrown together composite of six hours of sleep across two
flights and a layover.
The first place was Beerhouse, a beer lovers paradise in the
heart of Long Street, which also serves as a great starting point to any
bar/club-crawl – which again, I wouldn’t be really doing. Their beer list is impressive,
and crowd more-so, a chill group of mostly locals and some touring backpackers.
