Wednseday

Happy Campers

This morning started off with Lynn making a dramatic entrance to the dining room. Of course she does always turn heads! All was well and she carried on all day with the slightest of limps. Althugh truth be told, when we got to the penguin colony they mistook her for one of their own. More on that later.

We drove first to Hout's Bay where we checked out Mariner's Wharf.This was modeled on Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco. Got to see some interesting fish- Ira was in heaven. We also finally met the travel agent who planned our trip. In the fishmarket we learned about a local fish - the kingclic. This is the only scaleless fish that is allowed to be kosher. Seems it was too good to leave to the goyem.

From there we drove up the coast on the Atlantic side to the Cape of Good Hope. Originally named the Cape of Storms by Diaz but changed by the Portuguese king. He figured no one would want to go there with that name. False Bay was on our left - so named because the sailors thought they had arrived in Cape Town but since they had not they turned around and went back. Unwise.

A quick stop to buy stone statues made from black serpentine from the Zimbabwians on the side of the road. Martin our guide claims this is the real deal.

We drove through a section of the road where the baboons were hanging out. Got to see a family with 2 babies. Really cool. A little further down there was an ostrich.
On to Cape Point where the Indian and Atlantic oceans meet. A very high climb and 60mph winds - wait for the pix. A beautiful view of the oceans, rocks and mountains beyond. From there down the many steps to the Cape of Good Hope - again wait for pix. We had the added excitement of witnessing a marriage proposal at the top.

Time for lunch.... to FishHoek where we ate at a fish restaurant. I ordered the special prawn dish and Lynn ordered Mozambique prawns. Mine came with the heads still on and was extremely spicy. Lynn loved hers. It wasn't until the meal was over that we realized that she had my dish and I had hers. She was glad - I was not. I was careful to order something different from her tonight.

We stopped to see the statue of Just Nuissance the dog - Just Nuisance was the only dog ever to be officially enlisted in the Royal Navy. He was a Great Dane who from 1939-44 served at HMS Afrikander, a Royal Navy shore establishment in Simon's Town, South Africa. He died in 1944 and was buried with full military honours. (from Wikipedia - read the rest here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_Nuisance It's a great story for you dog lovers.

The penguin colony was great. The penguins roam all around and Stephen asked if we could walk among the penguins. The answer was a definite no - apparently they are quite agressive. We saw babies and penguins making babies. It was very entertaining to watch.

Last but not least we stopped to see a shark spotter. This girl stands on the side of the road on a cliff looking for sharks to alert the people on the beach below. A boring job made more exciting by Steve's annoying questions to her about her life-saving job. Obviously distracting her from this important work and putting surfers in danger.

Back to the hotel and out for dinner and now .......hope for sleep in this time zone. Check back tomorrow for our latest adventure to Table Mountain.