South Africa - Part 1

Cape Town, Stellenbosch, Knysna and Plettenberg bay

By Michael Wilson

January 19^th, 2018

Me, three friends from school, two of which are married, and their son wanted to extend our Christmas break by exploring South Africa. I'd never really considered it as somewhere to visit but the more I thought about it the more excited I was to try the huge variety of things the country had to offer.

I was excited, but I wasn't quite prepared for it to be as good as it was.

Cape Town

After a long flight we touched down in the early morning in Cape Town. After we'd picked up our hire car (and swiftly changed it for something bigger, which could hold all of our luggage) we realised it was too early to head straight to our Airbnb so we headed to the waterfront instead.

After a bite to eat we jumped on a boat trip around the shoreline to try and take in the beautiful scenery on offer.

The next morning we got up early to try and beat the queues for the cable car to get up Table Mountain. Sadly, we weren't early enough so we had to queue for nearly 2 hours, in the searing heat before getting to the top.

Even though we were all a bit frazzled, the journey up was pretty good and the sights once we'd made it to the top were breathtaking. We also spotted our first new animal at the top, a Dassie, which is apparently a small hoofed mammal related to an elephant?!

By this point we'd also noticed we'd have to queue for ages just to get off the mountain so we decided to stay up as long as we could and went for an explore. The sights surrounding the mountain were pretty spectacular.

After what felt like a whole day of queuing, we headed back to the Airbnb to decompress and to figure out what we wanted to do next. Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden was chosen, so we jumped back in the car and made our way there a couple of hours before it closed.

The gardens are a beautiful place to wander around and especially good for families. This was also to be our first experience of just how amazing the light is in the last hours of sunshine. The weather was lovely nearly every day we had in South Africa, which meant there was hardly a cloud in the sky and the colours at sunset were immense.

If there was one thing I had to see while I was in Cape Town it was the penguins on Boulders Beach! After finding our rental car had been broken into and driving back to the airport to swap it for a new one we made the drive to find the penguins. We got to the beach, saw some penguins and if we're honest we were very underwhelmed...There were a few penguins on a rock nearby stood still and that was about it. I felt like the most ungrateful person on the planet.

Disappointed, we trudged back to the car until we noticed a sign for the penguins, which was pointing in the opposite direction to where we had come from. We'd gone to the wrong place! After realising our mistake we hurried to the right place and whammy!!! LOADS of penguins all over the place! This was what we were expecting. We watched them waddle about for ages and Louis (the little one we were with) was loving it.

Every time we went to a beach after this Louis would shout 'Penguins!', which was kinda sad because he'll probably never see penguins on the beach again.

Look at this little guy waddle!

It was New Year's eve and we'd heard that there's a tradition among Cape Towners to drive up Signal Hill and watch the fireworks at the waterfront from the top.

Driving up the hill was a surreal experience. Cars lined the edges, with their lights on and people invariably partying outside. It was also quite foggy up this high, which meant the lights made it feel like a scene from a sci-fi film. Sadly, this also meant the police had closed off the top of the road so when the fireworks did start no one could see them :-(

It did mean that everyone had a good laugh about how pants our view was though and we were still able to take in the unique atmosphere and the great views of the city at night.

On our final morning, before we made the short drive to Stellenbosch, we paid a visit to Bo-Kaap. An area of Cape Town, which is known for the outrageously coloured houses.

Stellenbosch

Less than an hour down the road was Stellenbosch, our next stop on the Garden Route drive we'd be doing. This area (and the nearby Franschhoek) is well known for the array of vineyards and incredible restaurants on offer so we checked in to our hotel and headed into town to look for some wine.

The high street is a quaint little place with architecture that reminded us of New Orleans. It was a lovely to be able to sit outside have some lunch and start tasting some wine.

The vineyard where we were staying also had a gold course so the next morning we got up early and played the back nine. I've never played golf before and I thought this was a pretty spectacular setting for my first try.

After a 'successful' round of gold (and a small argument with a few men who thought we were being too slow...) it was now time to start the vineyard tour. Vineyards stretch for miles down the road and each of them offer up an array of tasting menus. Most menus consist of a variety of white and red and give you a chance to sample wines you'd not try otherwise. Every wine we tried was excellent. It was great to be able to compare them to the others and work out what type of flavours you prefer. For example, I learned quite quickly that Pinotage is way too sweet for my liking.

The surroundings of all of the vineyards are so nice, which meant relaxing in them with a few glasses of wine was a really pleasurable experience. This ended up being one of the highlights of the entire trip.

When we'd had our fill of wine we continued along the road into Franschhoek where we'd made dinner reservations. However, before we ate, we drove to Franschhoek Pass where we had heard there were spectacular sights to be had at sunset. We perched on the side of the mountain as the sun went down and enjoyed the view.

Knysna

After wishing we had more time to test out some more vineyards, we made the long drive east towards Knysna. The drive was incredible as the breathtaking landscapes continued and changed from mountain regions to coastline.

Knysna is known for some excellent watersports, some great surrounding beaches and a good start for some challenging hikes.

After a nice evening in Knysna we planned to spend the next day getting some sun on the beach. We decided on the family friendly Buffalo Bay seeing as it was extremely hot that day and we were going to need a parasol.

I'm not a huge fan of the beach, so after agreeing to spend the whole day on one, I negotiated with the others to spend the next day hiking :-)

Luckily the hike we decided on had a 3km and a 9km route, which meant Louis and his pregnant mummy could take the shorter route, while we forged on with the 9km hike. After we'd all finished, we met up at a beautiful little cafe/restaurant nearby called Totties Farm Kitchen.

Apologies, I didn't realise I was making some tunes while filming this...

As we drove back from the hike, the sun was beginning to set and the colours in the sky looked incredible. We dropped a couple of people back at the hotel and jumped back in the car to catch the setting sun from the beach we chose not to visit the day before, Brenton-on-sea.

Plettenberg bay

Our next stop took us into the hills near Plettenberg bay at a beautiful retreat called Hog Hollow. Cocktails on arrival, our own private lodge and some glorious views meant that we had now entered the relaxing part of the trip.

After a gruelling 20 minute drive to get there we thought we'd treat ourselves to a day by the pool and a lovely dinner in the restaurant overlooking the canopy.

I love a hike and another one of our group loves birds, so when the staff at the lodge told us about a bird sanctuary that was a short hike away we filled our backpacks and headed on our way.

It was brilliant! Another one of the highlights of the entire trip for me. The birds were incredible and some of them were putting on a show and seemingly urging people to take photos of them. We also got followed and attacked by some crazy parrots, (look out for the green and yellow one with a yellow eye!) which seemed to like something on my bag that was causing them to dive bomb it.

It was our first evening at the Hog Hollow and now that we were away from any big towns or cities the night time skies exploded with stars. It was unlike anything I had ever seen before and was a real treat to see the milky way with the naked eye.

Our time at the Hog Hollow was coming to an end and we had one more leg of our journey to make. The final stop in South Africa would take us on safari, something I had always wanted to do in my lifetime. I'll save that story for another time though.