September 2nd, 2026
As this is our second week in South Africa, the usual info blurb will not be repeated here but currently:
Currency: The Rand – One rand is $0.063 USD and $0.086 CDN
Gas: 26.11 Rand per litre = $6.18 USD per gallon (slightly higher than in Joburg a month ago)
License plate: (for Cape province)
Our flight from Maputo to Joburg was more or less on time (well done this time Air Mozambique!) and we now had a nearly six hour wait till our flight to Cape Town. Fran’s knees were extremely sore this morning and it was a long walk down to the Fly Safair counters to see if we could catch an earlier flight. There were a few earlier ones but the cost to change our flights was nearly as much as we’d originally paid so we passed on that. Too bad.
We went to the food court and got breakfast at Wimpy’s (it was pretty good) and then went to find a lounge to sit in. Turns out lounges here in the domestic terminal only give you two hours before your flight time, not your boarding time! So paying for that was not worth.
We were able to drop our bags at 11 for our 3pm flight and then we found a bar with power outlets and sat for a few hours. Our flight left on time and we landed in Cape Town safe and sound with our bags. We found the rental car office, got an upgrade and were on our way by 5:45. Our e Sims turned on when we landed and our mapping app showed a 22 minute drive to our friend’s house but Google let us know it would be longer. It turned out to be about 45 minutes from the airport to Somerset West.
Our friends, Lindy and Malcolm, moved to Cape Town from Pretoria in the 90’s. Doug had met Malcolm at a bus stop in early 1985 and we became friends and have kept in touch all these years with a couple of visits in between. In 2006 we shared a barge trip on the Soane River in France for a week and in 2009 we came to South Africa with our kids and stayed with them a couple of nights.
They had dinner waiting for us and we had a lovely evening catching up.
Thursday, we had planned to just chill as Malcolm had to work that day and the next (he’s retiring at the end of the year) but he called to say there was an opportunity for us to visit the archives at the University, where he is a doctorate professor, to see some private showing Robben Island artifacts. Since we had tickets to visit the island tomorrow, we decided that would be interesting.
The three of us got in the car and made our way to the Western Cape University.
Enroute we passed by one of the many squatter camps around the country:
After finding Malcolm and parking, we went over to the Library. Unfortunately, we were only able to see the public exhibits (there’d been a misunderstanding) but we did see and learn some new things.
Robben Island is an island in Table Bay 6.9 km / 4.3 mi west of the coast of South Africa, north of Cape Town. It takes its name from the archaic Dutch word for seals (robben), hence the Dutch/Afrikaans name Robbeneiland, which translates to Seal(s) Island.
Robben Island is roughly oval in shape, 3.3 km / 2 mi long north–south, and 1.9 km / 1 1⁄8 mi wide. It is flat and only a few metres above sea level, as a result of an ancient erosion event. It was fortified and used as a prison from the late-seventeenth century until 1996, after the end of apartheid.
During the late 20th century, it was used to imprison political prisoners who opposed the postwar apartheid state. Political activist and lawyer Nelson Mandela was imprisoned on the island for 18 of the 27 years of his imprisonment before the introduction of full, multi-racial democracy in South Africa. He was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and was elected in 1994 as the President, becoming the country’s first black president. He served one term from 1994 to 1999.
Two other former inmates of Robben Island, in addition to Mandela, have been elected to the presidency since the late-1990s: Kgalema Motlanthe (2008–2009) and Jacob Zuma (2009–2018). Other former prisoners have held a variety of political positions in the democracy.
Robben Island is a South African National Heritage site as well as a UNESCO site.
We returned to the house after picking up a few groceries and had a very late lunch. Malcolm got home a bit later and he too had a late lunch – none of us were hungry for dinner that night. We introduced our friends to the hilarious show: “An Idiot Abroad” and spent the evening laughing.
Before going to bed Thursday night, Doug received an email that due to the weather conditions (winds were picking up) tomorrow’s trip would be canceled and there would be no tours on Saturday either. We were able to get a refund and made a new plan for that day.
Some photos of the things in the exhibit:
The Cape Doctor is the local name for the strong wind that blows through the City Centre in Cape Town. The dramatic wind forces people to hold on to whatever is next to them. It is called the doctor as it generally occurs in the spring and “heals” the city from air pollutants.
Our original plan had been to do the island then a scenic drive south of Cape Town so we pivoted and Lindy joined us. After breakfast, we drove into Cape Town to see the city. As we left Somerset West the sky was clearing and we had perfect weather other than the strong winds for the day. We managed to find an awesome viewpoint for Table Mountain and took a drive around city.
We drove past:
The Dutch consulate:
Statue of Jan Smuts:
Views of Lions Head:
We also saw the outside of the Fort (no pics) and some nice city streets. Then it was a coastal drive through Clifton, Sea Point and on to Hout Bay passing by the Twelve Apostles on Chapman’s Peak Drive where we found a restaurant for a break and a “cool drink” as they say here:
Then we turned inland to Fish Hoek (a very busy, touristy town) and then we went along the south coast to Strand. Here the drive was very close to the water along Baden Powell Road and the wind was howling and the sand was blowing across the road:
We arrived in Strand hoping to take a walk on the lovely beach but the blowing sand would have made it uncomfortable (you can see from the photo, NO ONE was out there!) so we drove home to chill till dinner.
Saturday morning, we, along with Lindy, left around 9:30 and headed east this time to drive Clarence Road to Betty’s Bay to see the penguins. Malcolm had left earlier for a preplanned volunteer event.
Due to the wind the sea was so interesting with white caps, blowing wind and spray:
Enroute we missed seeing a rock and drove over it. About an hour later, the car felt funny and we had a flat tire. We pulled over and Doug changed it in less than 15 minutes. We were close to Betty’s Bay and found a petrol station that repairs flats. That was done in less than 15 minutes with three guys tending to it. For less than $12 (including a generou tip for them all) they repaired it and replaced it good as new.
Betty’s Bay was super windy as well and we began the walk to find penguins. This is the smaller of the two colonies along this coast but less touristy. We’d been to Simonstown, the larger and more touristy location closer to Cape Town, a few times in our visits to the area.
We saw a good number as well as rock hyraxes and lots of cormorants too. The sea looking very cool and after about a half hour of being wind blown we called it.
Then it was off to meet Malcolm for lunch. He was volunteering at a cycling race that ended at a winery so we had lunch there at Moody Lagoon restaurant. The day was lovely – full of sunshine and not so windy when we got to the restaurant so we sat outside. It was very good. We shared two meals so we could all have this lovely dessert:
We got home around 3:30 and Lindy had a prior engagement to attend that evening so we sat home with Malcolm and watched a movie while eating dinner.
Sunday morning was really nice – the wind had died down in this area. Fran actually slept until nearly 8am!
Around 10:30 we drove to Melkboostrand to visit with the sister of our South African friend, Neels, who lives in London. The first time with visited Neels and Hille in 2023, his sister Ingrid was there but not in 2024 when we visited. When she learned we were coming to Cape Town she invited us for lunch. She lives north of Cape Town and it was about an hour’s drive from Malcolm and Lindy’s.
It was another beautiful day and going up this direction we were able to stop in Bloubergstrand to look back and see Table Mountain:
We visited with Ingrid, two of her grandchildren and her sister in law for about 2.5 hours, had a lovely leg of lamb lunch and caught up.
We were back in Somerset West before 4 and played some cards until we had a light dinner and watched another episode of “An Idiot Abroad”. We went to bed early as we had to leave by 5:45 tomorrow morning.
Monday, we said our goodbyes with lots of hugs and drove to the airport. Traffic was good until about 8km / 5mi before but we still made it before 7 and all went well with dropping off the car and checking in.
We drove a total of 584 km / 363 mi in the Western Cape in our rental car.
The flight to Joburg on Fly Safair was on time and when we got to the airport we tried to see if we could get on an earlier flight to Nairobi with Kenya Airways; nope, it was overbooked and we had to wait until 1:30 to check in for our scheduled five o’clock flight.
Upon checking in with Kenya Airways for our flight we learned our flight as well was overbooked and that they had decided we were going to be amoung those that would have to rebook and reroute on Delta. What? We get to check in early and we have to pay that price!?! We were not pleased. They sent us to another counter and were told the Delta flight didn’t leave until 10 pm and went through Atlanta to JFK and it seemed too short of a turn around for us in order to make our flight from JFK to Vegas but we said, if you can get us good seats like we paid extra for on the Kenya flight, we’d consider it.
Well, all the available were seats were middles and despite being told there “were lots of seats”, they were maybe ten. So we said forget it we want our original flight with Kenya and we’ll chance a delay in Nairobi. We’d been told that despite the strike being over, there were delays there. Our connecting flight was supposed to land at 7:35 am at JFK and our flight to Vegas was not until 3 so we had a big window if the flight out of Nairobi was delayed.
So back to the check in counter we went, actually getting better seats on the first leg and the same seats we’d already booked on the second. Now it was getting later in the afternoon so we didn’t bother with going to a lounge as we had less then 1.5 hours to boarding time.
The flight left about a half hour late but of course, landed more or less on time. We headed straight to the gate for the second leg and man that took ages! After you show your boarding pass and ID we had to show it twice more, then go through security once again and show the boarding pass and ID three more times all within a couple of metres!
The flight left around 12 midnight instead of 11:35 but landed early in JFK. This was a fourteen and a half hour leg – man was that long. We both managed to doze some but it was not good sleep. At JFK we went directly to Delta to see about getting an earlier flight home but it was stand by only so we skipped it. We found a place to sit until we could check in at 1pm and then found a place to squat at an empty gate. Most gates here at JFK now have long tables with stools and outlets which is awesome.
Our flight to Vegas left on time and landed a little early. Upon landing and taxing, Doug got a message that our bags had been put on the earlier flight that we’d try to get on and were waiting for us at the Delta baggage office for pick up so we didn’t have to wait at the carousel. We caught an Uber home and our “African escape” was over. It was a very good trip and we don’t have much to complain about.
The temperature at home was 37C / 99F at 5:30 pm with a forecast of a few warmer days in the coming week but it appears we have managed to miss the worst of the summer heat.
As we have more or less “settled down” in our place in Henderson but have not stopping taking trips, we are going to limit this website to just our travels. For short trips within Canada and the US, we will just post on Facebook. Not sure what our next “escape” will be as yet, but when it happens, and if you’ve subscribed, you’ll get a posting when it does. Thanks for reading.
