Two Sides of Cape Town

Our second day in Cape Town dawned clear and hot. We decided to take the Hop On, Hop Off tourist bus on its route around the peninsula, as it passes many interesting places and is actually one of the cheapest ways to get around. We drove around the side of Table Mountain and made our first stop the world renowned Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens.

The gardens have only plants indigenous to the Cape region, the smallest but most biologically-rich floral environment in the world. We saw all sorts of strange flowers and birds, including this guy and his cartoon eyes:

Guinea fowl, I think?

 There were gorgeous views of mountains...

 Really exuberant birds of paradise plants...

And all sorts of fynbos, which are scrub bush plants including pincushions and protea. There are over 9,000 species of fynbos in the area, 6,200 of which live nowhere else beside the Cape region.

The King Protea, national flower of South Africa. It was probably over 8 inches across!

 After a few hours enjoying the gardens (we also saw ducklings and two baby owls!) we hopped back on the bus and continued to the next stop, the Constantia wine region. Constantia is one of the oldest non-European wine regions of the world. The first vineyards were established in the mid-1600s and are known worldwide for their high quality. We decided to make a quick stop at Beau Constantia, a winery within walking distance of the bus stop. We didn't really know what to expect, but were incredibly happy with our choice. In some ways it was very different than the Charlottesville vineyards: we had to be buzzed onto the property by a security guard (a sign of South Africa's incredibly high crime rates) and we were immediately seated on a gorgeous couch and served right there instead of standing at a counter. The pours were also much bigger as well. The beautiful views and the wine were much the same though!

After wine and a snack we got back on the bus. We would have loved to have stopped at the World of Birds and Monkey Jungle or some of the beautiful beaches, but we had to be back on the ship by 3pm for our afternoon/evening plans. So instead we just watched the most gorgeous beaches I've ever seen go by the window. I may have also taken a small, wine-tasting induced nap. 

Our morning trip makes Cape Town out to be a paradisaical place, which it is, but as Jason pointed out in his post there is another side to Cape Town. As tempting as it was to spend all our time at the beach and in the winelands, we had signed up to sleep overnight in a township. We left around 4pm, drove 30 minutes to the Tombo township, and were immediately accosted by adorable children. 

 We then met our "families" for the evening - ours was Mama Tobeka, her 8 daughters (!!), and her grandchildren. Our experience was interesting because we expected things to seem very different and to have the sort of experiences we had in Morocco, but Mama Tobeka and her family reminded us an awful lot of the Muhlenkamps! They had a big family (although all daughters), the children were grown up but everyone still lived close by, people came and went all day long, and things were generally informal, laid back, and comfortable. In the end, our township experience was really educational not because we saw differences, but because we realized that people at opposite ends of the world and with very different historical backgrounds were fundamentally the same.

We did get to learn some Xhosa, the local language that involves click and pops as well as sounds more familiar to us. It was really tough!

We'll leave you now with a picture of (a small fraction of) our "South African Muhlenkamp" family.

Mama Tobeka is seated, the three adult women are some of her daughters, and the little kids are her grandchildren.