Inland and Back to the Coast

We stayed two nights at a very nice, one of the best for sure, backpackers in Oudtshoorn, a small ostrich town. I say ostrich because the birds outnumber the humans 3:1. Some 80% of the world's ostrichs are there. We had ostrich egg omlette for breakfast and ostrich steaks for dinner and ostrich jerky for a snack. We took the backpackers up on one of their outings and had them drop us off at the top of Swartberg pass with mountain bikes. The morning of the ride the clouds and rain moved in, but we were committed, so off we went. We rode very quickly off the mountian, to slightly warmer and less-frequent rain.

On the way down the pass, we were treated with a very nice rainbow. Here is Em forcing a smile as she is very cold....it was beautiful despite the weather, and it was fun to be on bikes again.


We made one stop at the local attraction of the Cango Caves. We did the caves 'adventure tour' that takes you the deepest into the cave, including several small chutes and passageways, one called the Devil's Chimney and the next the Devil's Coffin. The cave is noted for its dramatic formations, but we will spare you many pictures, as they never do the cave justice. The only ones worth showing are us squeezing through tight spaces. Here is Keith coming up through Devil's Chimney:


It was a nice cave overall, and if you are into caves and want a better look at it, you can visit this website: http://www.cangocaves.co.za/

From Oudtshoorn, we moved on to Swellendam, revered as one of the prettiest colonial towns in South Africa. We intended to stay at Bontebok National Park but their camping was closed due to renovations. We never did make it into the park, but instead went to the Marloth Nature Reserve and did a long day hike up in the Langeberg Mountains to the top of 12 o'clock peak (Twaalfuurkop in Afrikaans). Apparently another cold front was on its way, and although we had a delightfully sunny day, it was incredibly windy up there. Seriously, it was enough to knock you off the edge if you weren't careful.

Here is Em almost on the saddle just before the last scramble up to the top:

After the hike we drove another 100km south to the southern most tip of Africa, Cape Agulhas.

On the way we went over another spectacular pass of which the name is eluding me at the moment...starts with a Th....


We camped that night in a small fishing town close by to the point called Struis Bay, and huddled up in the local pub as the cold front continued to move its way in with more gale force winds. We woke to sunny skies the next day (although still quite windy) and spent a few hours walking around the southern tip and exploring the lighthouse. Agulhas means 'needle', and sailors gave the point this name because they discovered that their compasses pointed directly north here.

Here is Keith where the two oceans meet. To be any further south and still be on land, you'd have to move on to Antarctica!


The view from the lighthouse:

From there we officially hit the west coast of South Africa and started moving back north towards Cape Town. We drove on as the weather progressively got worse, finally arriving in Hermanus. Hermanus is famous for its whales. The southern right whales come here in the winter seeking warmer waters for calving and raising their young. Hermanus Bay is a particularly good place to watch whales as there are high rock outcroppings that look right out over the bay and the bay is deep, so the whales can come quite close to the shore. We looked a bit for them yesterday, but the weather was too bad to stay out for long. We huddled up in the backpackers for the rest of the day as we got a mini-repeat of the storm that visited us in Tsitsikamma.

Today we woke to much clearer skies and calmer wind, so we spent the morning walking up and down the coast and saw quite a few magnificent whales. They were quite close in and while they didn't do any dramatic breeching for us, they exposed themselves enough on the surface for us to get a good idea at how massive they are. Such a neat animal...I've always said that I'd like to come back in my next life as either a dolphin or a whale....seems like a nice, peaceful, fun life.

Tomorrow it's off to the much anticipated and much talked about Cape Town!