South Africa (Part 2)

The next part of the trip was one of the highlights; Knysna. A great little town with a crackin' waterfront. We tried the oysters, which Knysna's famous for, but they didn't compare to the Kudu we put on the Braai the following night!

We also took a township tour, something that was recommended by some magazine article I read before we headed out on the trip. It turned out the be a good recommendation; great to see a whole side of the nation that you'd be excluded from under normal circumstances. A group of kids latched onto us at one part of the tour, clearly intrigued by us. One girl was very enthusiastic to pose for us, and proceeded to organise the other kids into place ready for more photos. One boy in particular stood out, he stood still holding his little toy train in his hand, his expression never changing from that sad look, barely moving at all from his pose the whole time. I wish I could know what he was thinking.

Next stop was Oudtshoorn. We got off the bus at George and had to catch a shuttle up to the hostel. The town (a very Afrikaans type place, apparently) was famous for ostrich, which we tried immediately, and, being a town in the mountains, it was a great place for bike riding. We didn't cycle upwards but instead got a car ride up to Swartberg pass, a high-point in the strip of mountains near the town. We spent the next 50-odd kilometres riding downwards back to the hostel. Needless to say, we saw some fantastic views on the way down, not least of all being the stop at Cango Caves we did on the way down. The caves were formed by acidic water obliterating the rock several hundred million years ago, and later, when the water dried up, made a perfect home for a group of Khoisan people; an indigenous group of people of Southern Africa (and later the rest of Africa, and then the world, though physiologically very different by then). After seeing some great stalagmites, stalagtites and pre-historic cave paintings, we carried on free wheeling down the road.

Hermanus was where we went shark cage diving. I can't advise you enough to strike that one off your bucket list, huge disappointment. The coastal walk and whale watching, however, made Hermanus another fantastic stop. You would struggle not to see whales on the coastline there, and, as always along the garden route, there were plenty of nice restaurants and cafes to chose from, little of which we sampled but instead chose to eat picnics with red wine next to the water. What else could you want?!