And so it begins again. Another travel adventure of the two lovable slobs Mel and Andi from Leipzig. Stressed by work and plagued by wanderlust, this trip was to take them to Africa once again. To sharks, penguins and once again very lovable people. But let’s start the story at the beginning of the trip.
14.09.2021 – A turbulent start
After saying goodbye to our offices and colleagues with a joyful and expectant grin and (once again) packing our backpacks at the last minute, we made our way to Berlin airport where our journey was to begin. First, of course, the journey began with a long delay of the ICE train due to “police investigations” – whatever that meant. So of course we missed the connection in Berlin, but we still had plenty of time before departure.
Berlin BER … without construction work for a change
To kill time until departure, we withdrew a few US dollars from the ATM and said goodbye to Germany with beer and onion bread rolls. The flights to Cape Town with Turkish Airlines via Istanbul went without any major incidents – only the rather rough turbulence on the second leg ensured that the contents of our stomachs were well mixed.
To our health and yours
15.09.2021 – At the foot of Table Mountain
After arriving in Cape Town, we had to stand in a long queue – like everyone else – to hand in our “health form”. After 30 minutes, the time had come. The form was handed in, the temperature was taken and we were allowed to continue to the immigration counters. The actual entry was the most uncomplicated thing we had experienced so far.
Now the usual procedure began – surrounded by eager taxi drivers, we looked for an ATM and already had a look for a possibility to buy SIM cards. A little tip on the side: never buy SIM cards directly at the airport, as the prices there are simply utopian.
A particularly nice and unobtrusive Uber driver convinced us with his offer. So we drove with him the 23km to the hostel for 200 Rand (about 12€). After checking into our room at 91 Loop Street Boutique Hostel (highly recommended), we set off to explore the city centre and the nearby Bo-Kaap district with its colourful little houses on foot.
With Table Mountain always in view, we made our way to the V&A Waterfront. There we enjoyed a very good coffee and a “Bay Muffin”. Afterwards, we bought 2 SIM cards with 10GB data volume each for a total of 200 Rand and bus tickets in the business district. Unfortunately, we had misjudged the time – the Castle of Good Hope and Table Mountain were already closed for the day (4 pm).
After another hard walk, we stopped at Marco’s African Place for a good meal to end the day.
The service was very friendly and fun and the local beer and food were delicious. For starters we had Themba’s Meatballs (juicy beef meatballs that were still almost raw inside) and a seafood soup. For the main course we had springbok, kudu, ostrich and crocodile with rice and umngqusho. The latter was a mixture of beans, corn and other ingredients – the pronunciation was infinitely more difficult … the emphasis was on the “gq” and you had to make a clicking sound with your tongue. Our dinner was accompanied by a fantastic live band who played African jazz with pure joy.
After some safety instructions from our waiter, who escorted us about 300m on our way to the hostel, we reached our accommodation safely despite complete darkness and some strange figures. Once there, we talked to the security for another 20 minutes. He had travelled a lot with the South African Boy Scouts in Germany in the 80s and 90s.
Our now very obvious tiredness led us to bed shortly after 10pm, where we fell asleep contentedly.
Recent Comments