Chapter 1: The Cape | Day 3, Gold and the Cape

​It’s Saturday morning. I left you about this time yesterday. I’m finding that a land adventure consumes much more time than a slow slog across the ocean. In short, I’m finding it hard to make journal entries. Tara is out for a walk, and I just saw Scott walk in from the gym. I’ve been up since before 6. This was our second morning in Cape Town, and my body clock is still somewhere west of here. After a jog along the waterfront as the sun rose, and a light workout at the outdoor gym on the promenade (very Venice-Beach-like), I showered and thought to catch up on my writing in the lobby.

As I was conversing with Corin, the girl who seems to be the ever-present, smiley manager on duty, I look up to see a guy about my age let her know he’s checking out and does he need to do anything? With a laugh she says yes, pay your bill. He’s gone into the other room and she turns to me and lets me know his group is in from Denver. I ask what their name is, thinking I recognized him.

“Strother” she tells me. I’m out of my seat and around the corner in an instant.

“Chris!” I shout. He turns, processes, and smiles. Chris and I aren’t close, but we know each other from our golf club back in Denver. Halfway across the world, and I run into a friend from the neighborhood. I can’t wait to tell Tara when she’s back - she’s always accusing me of finding someone I know wherever we are on this planet.

‘That’s the price you pay, dear, when you marry someone this popular.’ I’ll remind her.

‘And humble’ she’ll remind me. This is why we work.

When I left you, I was walking into the hotel for the first time on Thursday night. Aside from runny eggs, and something the flight attendant served me at 2am on the plane, which will wreak havoc later, I hadn’t eaten in hours. Days even. The hotel staff jumped into action serving us drinks, while calling in favors to get us a reservation at a famous South African restaurant.

30 minutes later, freshly showered, the four of us are dropped off by Hamid at the entrance of a place called Gold. The bright colors of South Africa, which have earned her the nickname “rainbow nation”, surround us. There is African art on the walls, and various artifacts from ancient society everywhere. We walk up two flights of stairs, and are shocked to find a mass of people, faces painted, enjoying their meals at various-sized tables in front of a stage. Our hostess, one of many waitresses in African headdress, escorts us up another flight of stairs onto a balcony, surrounding the room and overlooking the stage. She seats us at a table that can peer down onto the raised platform. When does the magic show start, I wonder.

Over the next two hours, we are treated to a medley of native dishes, drumming, singing, cocktails and local wine. There is traditional dancing on the stage, next to our table, various instruments played, and smiley waitstaff running about. I’ll let the pictures tell the story, but the experience was an African shower of the senses. Had we not just arrived from a day’s long journey, and I had not consumed some mystery sandwich in the dark on our flight, we would have partied all night. We Ubered home, happy with our choice of restaurant, but eager to get horizontal in our new accommodations.

Before leaving, our waitress Paddy told us to visit her favorite restaurant “Boma” when we are in Victoria Falls.

“My sister lives in Zimbabwe.” She smiles. I’m learning we’re all family here.

—--

The following morning, Tara and I bundled up and headed down to the waterfront around 7:30. Godfrey and Raymond, who pulled strings, and the beer tap, the previous night are ready to be of service the minute we were downstairs. Handing us coffees, they sent us on our way. A few blocks down the hill, across a couple streets, we are standing on a cobblestoned path, running the length of the seashore. A mile down the promenade, we stumble across an outdoor public swimming pool along the ocean. We snap some photos to show Avery, and then head back. We have a busy day of sightseeing ahead.

—--

“I’m Gary.” Says a round faced, bald, colored man as he extends a hand in greeting. “I’ll be taking you around the Cape today.”

Scott hops up front, which appears to be in the driver’s seat back home.

“You’re on the wrong side, Gary.” I alert him as he climbs behind the wheel. My first joke of the day lands flat. Stupid jet lag and language barrier. I’m so much funnier back home.

As we head out of Cape Town, past the low hung government housing and the corrugated shanty’s, Gary lays out the day.

“We’ll make stops along the route, so we can break up the drive down to the Cape.” He remarks.

“How long is the drive?” Scott asks.

“About an hour, depending on stops.” Gary answers. Then adds “Where does a sheep go for a haircut?” Blank stairs all around. “At a Baa Baa shop.” He says with a laugh.

There is a groan in unison from all of us, but a happy appreciation as well. Gary 1, Royce 0. I’m not sure that I like this guy, but Scott is smitten, and the two launch into conversation, as I watch the kilometers of land slip away.

But then we’re at the ocean again. Gary pulls over, and the wind nearly takes my breath with it as the sliding door opens and we spill out of the van. I take in the scene before us, my breath leaves again, this time from the view. The rugged mountains drop thousands of feet down to the houses hugging the shoreline and disappear into a glimmering sea. Back home, we have the occasional lake that swallows the base of a mountain, but nothing like this. We snap a few photos and are back in the van moving along.

“What’s the difference between bird flu and swine flu?” Gary asks us when we’re settled in. “One requires tweetment, the other, oinkment.”

I swallow a laugh. I need to remember some of these. We make another stop. Another moment of overwhelming beauty. Another round of photos. None of this was in my imagined South Africa. We pass an ostrich farm, and then turn down a wind-swept road, finally entering the Cape of Good Hope Nature Reserve.

Gary shares that the Cape was first discovered by the Portuguese. Tired of paying the outrageous overland prices of the Ottoman Empire, they wanted to find a better trading route than that through Europe. Vasco De Gama first sailed to India, around the Cape over a few years beginning in 1497. I credit him with the $5 Uber black ride we took home from Gold last night.

As we drive the last few kilometers to the point, Gary directs our attention to small structures located on the promontory overlooking the water.

“Those overnight hiking chalets allow one-night’s lodging for those choosing to discover the beaches and the indigenous bush.”

“That’s like a Colorado “hut trip”, Tara alerts us with excitement.

I can’t “unhear” indigenous bush. Such a child, Royce.

And then we park. And we walk 15 minutes up the hill to an old lighthouse that marks the Southwest edge of Africa. The views, guys. I looked over the edge, and heard, smelled…felt the waves find landfall after leaving Australia, crossing the Indian Ocean, and finally merging with the Atlantic offshore. The Cape of Good Hope. A sailors aphrodisiac. I’ll never forget.

Scott noticed a trail that led down from our viewpoint and out further into the sea. Land that sat in the shadow of the lighthouse jutted out like a knife point, and 20 minutes later we passed along a narrow path that dropped down hundreds of feet to the water on both sides. We had walked to the edge of the world.

Later in the day, as we sat at dinner on the harbor back in Cape Town, Scott asked what our favorite memory from the day was. I was back on that foot bridge, looking down, looking out, looking across False Bay to the shadowy peaks of Africa to the West. I’ll never forget.

We visited Simon’s Town after the Cape, had lunch, drank a beer, and then walked down a wooden pathway to a beach, crowded with cute little African Penguins. The only place in the world where an Antarctic voyage is not required to see these creatures in the wild. They were cute, and it was worth viewing if but to share with our Penguin-crazed family…but I still hadn’t left that Cape.