Cape Town, South Africa! {Part 2 of our trip}

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I’m back with more about our South African adventure today! A few weeks ago, I told you all about our visits with animals and the safari’s we went on in my post – South African Safari Part 1. Today is all about Cape Town, known by many as one of the most beautiful places in the world. It’s very far south and has the Indian Ocean on one side and the Atlantic Ocean on the other. We had lots of things in mind for this part of the trip, but we didn’t quite get to all of it.

The view from our room.

Ocean view from the hotel

One bummer was that since we were in Cape Town during their winter, it ended up being pretty foggy around the mountains. Apparently it’s not like that during the summer. So one of the things I was most looking forward to (Table Mountain), we were unable to do. When it’s not foggy, you can see the mountain from the city and it’s supposed to be beautiful. You can also take a cable car up and look out over Cape Town. I really was bummed we didn’t get to do that, but we still had a great time.

The first day we had was the prettiest. Sunny, but foggy up the mountains. We chose that day to drive along the coastline and check things out. It was amazing and there was so much more along the way than I realized. The red line on the map below is the route we took.

Map of the safari route

First up was Clifton. It’s the fanciest of the beach areas. Honestly, the coastline reminded me a fair amount of California. Very rocky and cliffy. Another similarity to California – all the wineries (SO many!). The little purple wine glasses on the map above are just some of them.

Buildings on the cliffside by the ocean

It was so cool to see how all the houses were built into the hills. I wanted every other house we saw. Especially the ones built onto the beach. Could you imagine stepping out of your backdoor and onto that sand? Bring it.

Clifton house on the beach
Selfie at Clifton
Ocean view from Clifton
Ocean view from Clifton

Despite all the fog, the mountains were also very pretty. It was cool to see beach, homes/town, then mountains. So much beauty in such a small space.

Mountains in the clouds

Next was Camps Bay. This one was probably our favorite. It was easy to get to, had a neat little area to walk around and grab food and the beach was very accessible as a beach to actually go to and enjoy the day.

Camps Bay beach and ocean
Camps Bay town
Camps Bay town
Houses in Camps Bay

Then we got to Houte Bay, known for all their fishing. We had wanted to stop at Mariners Wharf for fish and chips (because the hubs has only been telling me how good it is since high school), but we had a lot of ground to cover, so he decided we should come back another day.

Houte Bay with mountains in the background
Houte Bay view from the left

Sea lion!

Sea lion in the ocean at Houte Bay

There was also a good beach here, surrounded by beautiful mountains.

Houte Bay Beach
Houte Bay Mountains from the beach

Looking back at Houte Bay as we continued our drive.

Houte Bay Point
Houte Bay view from the right

I thought the mountains and rockiness was super cool, so there’s several pictures. πŸ™‚

Rocky mountainside along the drive

Another beautiful beach – Chapmans Bay.

Chapmans Bay beach

It was here that we finally were super hungry, but didn’t want to have to stop. So what did we see? McDonalds! Because why wouldn’t there be a McDonald’s in Africa? So yea, we got a burger. πŸ™‚ It tasted exactly the same.

Partially-eaten McDonalds burger in a wrapper

Then we crossed over to the other coast.

Glenncairn hillside

Driving into Simon’s Town, there was some of the bluest water. I had no idea South Africa had such beautiful water and coastline. Seriously.

View as arriving at Simon's Town

Such a cute town!

Simon's Town village

A sign you don’t see every day – caution! Penguins!

Caution sign for Penguins

They might even be under your car!

Warning sign for penguins under vehicle

Right by Simons Town is the penguin colony with TONS of penguins. Of course I had to check it out.

Penguin Colony beach

I’m pretty sure they have some of the best real estate.

They were all along the walkway.

Penguins on a dirt path
Mom and baby penguins
Penguin Colony walkway

And ALL OVER the beach.

Penguins all over the beach, rocks and water
33penguins2

Aren’t they so cute?!

Penguins on the beach

Then we kept driving…

Coastline past St. Simon
Steep rocks alongside the road

When we got to Cape Point and The Cape of Good Hope, we got out to walk around. I hadn’t realized it was the kind of place you get out and walk around/hike. I figured you drive up, check it out and that was it. But no. Wrong. There’s a LOT of walking involved. You’ll notice in some pictures that I wore flats. Not a good call. Hiking around mountains in flats is no good. It was worth it, I’d just wear sneakers next time.

Baboons everywhere. On cars. Stealing people’s food. I didn’t get a picture, but there was one area where there had to be at least 20 of them just hanging out. Nutty.

Mom and baby baboon on a rock wall in front of the sea
A baboon sitting on the roof of a car

So at Cape Point, there’s two lighthouses. This point of South Africa is a hard area for boats to be able to get around. There’s actually a few wrecked boats out there and because of the fog they get, they had to move the original lighthouse. This is the original one. It was built up high so boats could see it. But because of the fog, it was hidden a lot and boats couldn’t see it.

Walkway up to Old Lighthouse
Old lighthouse

So this is the new one, built lower so it’ll be out of the fog. Darn fog.

Ocean view from lighthouse
Ocean view of new lighthouse from old one

And this is Dias Beach. It sits between Cape Point and Cape of Good Hope. So beautiful.

Dias Beach view from above

We decided to make the walk down to where the new lighthouse was and to get to the farthest point south that we could. πŸ™‚ It was this tiny little path.

Steep path to beach point
Walking path to point
Author walking along path to the point

The view back from the point was beautiful.

View from Cape Point

And we sat and watched the waves for a while. So pretty, we had to take it all in.

View of water and beach from the point
Ian at the point with water and beach below
Dias beach overhead view

Then we drove over to where we could walk around the Cape of Good Hope.

Posing at sign for Cape of Good Hope

Another tiny path. πŸ™‚

Path of Good Hope path along beach
Author walking along path

And hiking. So many beautiful views.

Ian at Good Hope
Ian on Good Hope

I sat and looked at my beach (which is what I started calling Dias Beach) for a while. It was so pretty, so untouched. I was dying to find my way down there and put my footprints right in that beautiful white sand. πŸ™‚

Sitting at Dias Beach

Then we had to go. πŸ™ We had to meet some of the hubs’ family for dinner and we had quite a drive back, so we got up to go and started walking. This is where it got real.

We’d noticed some ostrich chillin’ when we were walking over. One big mom and maybe 6-8 β€œkids”. They weren’t babies, but they weren’t fully grown. I remember thinking, β€œOh that’s cool. We hadn’t seen ostrich yet. Check that off the list.”

No. No. No.

We came over a little hill and right in the path, less than 10 feet away, was the big momma ostrich. She looked right at us and was not happy. Immediately, the hubs was like, β€œTurn around. Go. Now.”

Apparently you do not mess with a big ostrich.

So we walked. We got over a hill, where we couldn’t see her anymore, and waited. She had followed. So we kept walking.

We got over another hill and waited. We were looking back to see if she came. All of a sudden her head popped up over the hill, looking for us.

I about crapped myself.

At that point, we just kept walking. I was pretty sure we were gonna die. The hubs was all, β€œDon’t run, she’ll chase”

I was all, β€œWe’re gonna die.”

The hubs remembered another path we’d seen and suggested we try that, so we did.

Well that path ended at a cliff. No go.

I had no idea what we were gonna do. There was only one way back to the car, unless we took the path back over to Cape Point, which would’ve taken almost 2 hours. The sun was setting and the park was closing in about 45 minutes.

Death was surely imminent.

Next thing I know, the hubs is all, β€œWe have to get to dinner. We are going through those birds.”

I’m like, β€œForget dinner, we need to live.”

He started gathering rocks and getting very bossy. πŸ™‚ And very serious. So what did I do? I took photos. If we lived, I needed proof of this ridiculousness.

Collage of Ian avoiding an ostrich in the distance

Of course I took the pics very covertly. If the hubs had noticed he’d have not been happy. Once it was over though (obviously we lived) he was glad I had them. πŸ™‚

So I’ll try not to make this story too long. Basically, we came back down the path and a β€œkid” ostrich was there. He was not bothered by us at all, but also wasn’t moving. The hubs brilliantly started making some noises that got him moving, so we followed and tried to get down the path.

Then we came over a hill and there was momma ostrich again. Boy was she a mean looking bird.

The hubs continued with the noises – and she ran off! It was amazing! It was then that I realized we might just live!

Ostriches

They moved out of the path, though not too far away, and we moved quickly. We got to a little bridge that was made of wooden slats, which we knew they wouldn’t cross, and were relieved.

Life! We were gonna live!

And coincidentally enough, the dinner we were meeting his family for was a preset menu – with ostrich as the main course.

We win. πŸ˜‰

I was quite windblown when we finally made it back to the car. And relieved to be alive.

Author with windblown hair

The rest of the trip was not life threatening, fortunately. The next day we went to the area called the V&A Waterfront. It’s on the water, with a mall and lots of shopping. Yay!

V&A waterfront area
V&A waterfront boats
Waterfront shopping for souvenirs

This lion is made entirely of beads. Impressive!

Beaded lion statue

We rode on the ferris wheel to try and get a few of the views we wouldn’t be able to see from up on Table Mountain. Not quite the same, but oh well.

View from waterfront ferris wheel
View from waterfront ferris wheel

We also did some wine tasting! I’m not really a huge wine person, so we weren’t sure if we’d do it or not, but I’m SO glad we did. If you go back up to that map at the top, you should be able to see the wineries noted by little wine glasses. You could seriously spend a whole week going from winery to winery and still not get to them all. SO many! And they aren’t even all on the map. We passed a lot that weren’t on there.

The first one we went to was actually not on the map. It was called Constatia Glen.

Constantia Glen wine tasting sign

Wondering about the sign that says β€œPOWER ALWAYS ON”? Yea, so I’ll talk more about this in my next post, but basically South Africa has this thing called load sharing going on where there’s not enough power to go around, so there are scheduled power outages everyday, everywhere.

Everyday. Everywhere.

There was one day when we were in Joburg and were visiting family. We went from home to home and everywhere we went they had load sharing going on. It’s seriously nuts. And a big deal for businesses. So having power always on was a big deal, as you can tell.

This was easily my favorite of the wineries. We only had time for 3. I wish I’d known I’d enjoy it so much – I could have spent days doing it. But this one had an AWESOME experience. You sat down at a table and could order cheeses and meats and they had a preset flight of wines to taste.

Constantina Glen vineyard landscape
Constantia Glen vineyard landscape

The guy that did it brought the cheeses we ordered and gave us one wine at a time, telling us all about the wine before leaving us to eat, sip and enjoy. He only came back when he saw we were ready for the next one. It was so pleasant, informational and overall a fun experience. We also really liked their wine.

Constantia Glen cheese, bread and wine
Constantia Glen red wine in a glass
Author with a glass of red wine
South African pink flowers in a pot

Next we went to Constantia Groot, which is a very well known, older winery. They had lots of wines to choose from. There were long tables that you could sit at and then go up to the bar to chose the wines you wanted to taste. There were also some crackers to eat.

Groot Constantia wine barrel
Groot Constantia inside
Groot Constantia wine tasting

We did buy a bottle of wine. There are two kinds of wine specific to South Africa – Pinotage and Chenin Blanc. They had a Pinotage that the hubs loved, so we got some.

At this point, we took a break to go back to Houte Bay and get the fish and chips at Mariners Wharf.

Mariners Wharf
Fish and Chips on a plate at a restaurant

Delish!

Then we went to one more winery – Klein Constantia.

Klein Constantia Vineyard map

It really was fun to taste everything and even though all the experiences were so different, it was fun to check them all out.

Next, we went to high tea. I’d never been to one before and it was recommended by the hubs’ cousin. So many desserts! Which was obviously the main draw for me. πŸ™‚

Tea desserts buffet
Collage of tea desserts
Tea desserts on a platter
Tea desserts collage
A variety of tea desserts on a white plate

Despite the fact that I wouldn’t call myself a tea person, I actually loved the tea. They had so many options. I had the strawberry vanilla one that came in this cool pot and glass and it was delicious. I could’ve had several pots of it.

A variety of loose-leaf teas
A cup of tea

On our last night, we decided to back to Camps Bay and check it out again – one last time.

We walked along the beach and the hubs pointed out the little water hole areas that they have for families with kids and stuff. Aren’t they cool? Keep out the sharks and it’s so calm.

Camps Bay waterhole
Camps Bay waterhole

We watched the waves crash until the sun went down and said goodbye. It wasn’t just the last day in Cape Town, but the last day before we left South Africa. Bittersweet.

Ian in the sunset at Camps Bay
Camps Bay rocky beach

Thanks for sticking with me, if you’ve gotten all the way to the end. πŸ˜‰

So there you have it! Cape Town in a nutshell! I will have one more post to tell you all about Johannesburg (Joburg). We spent a lot of time there with the hubs’ family and it was probably the most eye opening and interesting part of the trip. Also the most real. Be sure to check that out soon!

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10 Comments
  1. Erin

    Oh, this brings back so many memories–I’m glad I stumbled upon this post! I was actually born in South Africa, and lived there for two days shy of seven years before moving to Canada πŸ™‚ I haven’t been back since moving, but I miss it immensely. We were planning to go visit, but then COVID-19 cancelled those plans πŸ™

  2. Swang Enticott

    I feel as though I was on the trip with you looking at all the familiar places! You certainly got around! Great photography and good advert for our Cape Town! We are very blessed???? to live in this part of the world. Β Thanks for reminding me of the load shedding we used to have! Thank goodness now only a distant memory! We now have the severe drought so prayers???? for rain are much appreciated!Β 

  3. Sally andrews

    Thank you for your post about your trip to Cape Town. I am going there in April. It looks beautiful, can’t wait to see it

  4. Erin R.

    Ostriches are SO BIG! I’ve been right up next to them (through a fence) and they are way bigger than I realized. Glad you didn’t get kicked or pecked or trampled. And that’s good to know about the wine tasting. My husb and I joke about going to one all the time because we’re, like, the crappiest people who go to the store in our gym clothes. But it sounds quite accessible and fun the way you described it. And I high fived my screen when I saw your tea party dessert plate. πŸ˜€ That’s exactly the way mine would have looked, too.

    1. lifeloveandsugar@gmail.com

      I totally go to the store in my gym clothes – all the time. πŸ™‚ The wine tasting was fun though – and now the hubs wants us to try wineries around us some time. Problem is I know it won’t be nearly as good having Georgia wine as it was having South African wine. πŸ™‚

  5. J.nelly

    Holy.Crap.

    I feel like your ostrich story should be submitted to America’s Funniest Home videos and they may just pay you to re-enact it. That was HILARIOUS!!!!! I had to read it out loud a second time for Jeff to hear it. Seriously so funny…!!! Not to mention, your wind-blown pic after you made it safely to the car almost looked like you wrestled with that mama bird, but the relief on your face is freaking priceless! Cape Town sounds AMAZING all around…but that ostrich story is by far my favorite part. Dude, thanks for the great laugh! So glad you guys had a great trip!!! And that you lived to tell it πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

    1. lifeloveandsugar@gmail.com

      Thanks Nelly! I was actually thinking during the entire thing that I wanted to record it, but the hubs would’ve totally gotten mad at me. The photos were even taken incognito. πŸ™‚

  6. Julianne @ Beyond Frosting

    First of all, these photos are stunning! I can imagine that if we were in that situation together, not only would we be terrified but also dying laughing and I can totally picture you covertly taking photos of Ian LOL! I am also so glad you lived

  7. Julia @ Sprinkled With Jules

    Wow, what a beautiful place!! The houses on the cliffsides remind me of Pismo area in CA. I feel silly saying this, but I was surprised to realize there are penguins in Africa! Haha! And that baboons are there too? It’s amazing all the wildlife you were able to see. And that ostrich?! OMG I would have been so scared!! Makes for a great story though!

Lindsay
About Lindsay

I'm a wife and a mom to twin boys and a baby girl! And I've got a serious sweets addiction! Bring on the treats!

Scripture I’m Loving

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Matthew 11:28-29