Windsor Hermanus

... 140 whales in the bay this week. <br><br>Hermanus is so good we&#8217;ve decided to spend another couple of nights here and miss out going back to Cape Town &#8211; we&#8217;ll still be there for two nights before we leave for Perth. It seems hard to imagine that already this part of our trip is nearing an end. No disappointments, this is such an amazing country, the only things we still find difficult to come to terms with are the townships. There are so ...

... fish restaurant on the beach, this also gave us time to dip a toe in the very warm Indian ocean. After lunch we continued on to Cape Aghulas and the monument on the coast where Indian and Atlantic oceans meet. There was time for a few touristy photos and action shots on top of the monument, exploring the rock pools, sunbathing before setting off to Hermanus. <br><br>Our final few nights ...

... the coast we found a mother playing with her calf, who enjoyed laying on his back with his fins sticking out of the water. It was quite cute. And rather unbelieveable that a baby was that big. Most of the time our whale viewing was limited to a head that we could distinguish just under the water. While this is very neat to see, it makes a totally uninteresting photo. Not that we could get great photos anyway, what with our telephoto being gone. Next time, said ...

... they were for eating and that the people preparing them were actually skilled in the removal of any bits of brain, sinue etc that were not fit for human consumption (but for the dogs). She also explained that when an animal is slaughtered the Africans use every part, and that the white butchers could not sell animal heads to customers, so black township inhabitants were able to pick them up really cheap. The process she described of skinning and removing usefull ...

... Beach to see the penguins. You have to pay to get into see them on the beach but you can also walk behind the beach on a path to see them as well. There were so many and they were all very cute, little babies included. Boulders beach was quiet lovely, there is one place on the beach you can go and hang with the penguins as well. There are nice little restaurants and cafes to fill your time here for some R&amp;R.

... their blowholes and to roll over to let us have a look at them. There is nothing like seeing that size of creature up close and personal. In addition to whale watching, there are also these INSANE people who PAY MONEY to get into a large metal cage in the middle of the ocean, hang raw, bloody meat from the cage bars and wait for GREAT WHITE SHARKS to come a bang around the cage. Crazy!! But this gave us the opportunity to see a great white from our nice cushy, safe boat ...

... them into the impenetrable Karoo earth. It took 15 minutes to complete and I felt pretty confident then. It was like riding a bicycle - I last camped and backpacked independently through Europe 10 years ago - I didn't forget. It was winter and we (I was traveling with an enormous friend of mine named Mike) had to down two shots of Stroh Rum followed by 20 push-ups before bedtime, in order to keep warm. I cooked up some 2-inch thick organic t-bone steaks - home ...

... largest Black Township in Cape Town. Small Apartheid lesson: The country was divided into multiple different race classifications, Black, Colored, Indian, Chinese, White and a few others. These people were all separated by race from each of the other groups, there was no inter marriage allowed and very little contact. The whites had all the privileges and all the wealth. The townships were created when the non-whites were forced out of their homes and the main city and given no place to ...

... them, you get your money back). The operator we went through was the same one that was hired for Celebrity Shark Bait (not that I watch any of those dreadful reality shows, of course) although I could not prise any celeb-based gossip out of them, sadly. Was lucky because the boat was pretty empty - just me and two v sweet Israeli guys - so we could spend the whole time (about 4 hours) in the cage. Water ...

... The towns on the way down south are all on False Bay, which sometimes catches glimpses of the Southern Right Whale (so called as it was the right whale to catch) but not today unfortunately. I kept thinking I saw one out inthe bay, but it turned out to be a big rock (that old story). False bay is so named, as the sailors and navigators rounding the Cape thought they had spied the turning into Table Bay (ie cape town) but it just led ...