IGTC Endorses...

Khaya Ngamay Game Restaurant
267 Long St.
Cape Town, South Africa

This place served me some of the best game I’ve ever had… mmm, those sprinkbok shanks… man, were they good. (For my vegetarian readers -- you know who you are ; ) -- I would have had the vegan version, but they were all out of bean curd...)

Great ambience, good live music and tasty local wines well-picked to go with their varied menu, this place is a winner.

The Cape to Franschhoek

Where the penguins live...


Renting a car in a foreign country always imparts a sense of trepidation… this is even more acute when you know that a) you’re going to be driving on the other side of the road, b) you’re going to be doing all of the driving and c) everyone keeps talking about how dangerous it is to leave your car anywhere in public, etc, etc. and the words “car-jacking” and “South Africa” resonate together…

I shouldn’t have worried; driving in the Cape Town area is easy. The roads are really well-marked, people readily move over to the paved shoulder to let you pass and the surfaces are beautiful – probably because they are investing vast sums of money into infrastructure in advance of SA 2010.

We decided to drive south first the other day so that Helene could see some penguins… It was a good choice because the trip was quite nice and as we pulled into Simon’s Town, where the pinguino colony lives, we saw a bunch of whales just hanging out a few hundred metres offshore! All that time in California searching for whales and here, we just pull up and there they were. [Note: just read about these very same whales in the paper – apparently this is not a regular occurrence]. The penguins were even closer… but man do they smell! The majority of them were resting at the beach or out on the rocks although some had moved up into the scrub above the sand. Their guano was everywhere and the stench kind of took away from their cuteness factor. The next time Disney or Pixar does a penguin movie, they should provide Odorama cards so that the kiddies can get the full flightless bird sensory experience.

Because of the haze (and the fact that I didn’t want to arrive too late in the wine region), we didn’t head all the way down to the Cape of Good Hope. Still the scenery around the parts of the peninsula that we did see was fantastic and the sand dunes and surf were the obvious attractions for the tourists who no doubt flock there during the high season.

Heading north, we came across some shantytown housing on the road to Stellenbosch – it just appears out of nowhere amongst the vines and fruit trees. Lots of people walking on the road and waiting for the combis to come by and pick them up. A pretty bracing reminder of the immense disparities between rich and poor in this country… and by many accounts, it is a division that is increasingly class-based as opposed to strictly racial.

Stellenbosch is very developed as a wine region and Lanzerac, one of the oldest houses puts on an “unabashedly opulent” show as the guide book put it. We had a nice cheese plate lunch and tried some of their wines before pushing on to Franschhoek (or however the hell you spell it…), which is a cute little town that is very reminiscent of Sonoma and Napa. Sarah had suggested a place there and wow, what a great recommendation. This is definitely the swank part of the 5 month trip so we enjoyed it and had a great dinner across the street at the French Quarter’s bistro.

This morning we headed north towards Paarl and the Wellington region to visit Diemersfontein, the best producer of pinotage for my money… It’s a nice winery in a very bucolic setting and was worth the drive, even if it was a little out of our way. The rest of the day was spent driving across vast valleys covered in wild flowers and backdropped by incredible mountain ranges… truly spectacular. One funny wildlife sighting: after we came out of a 4km long tunnel, we saw a couple of baboons! One of them was sitting on the guardrail taking the sun and the other, well, look away now if you’re prudish… well, he was masturbating in the middle of the righthand lane… cheeky monkey….

View through the back window...

I’m happy to say that our little car performed very nicely along and clocked a respectable 120 kph, as per the speed limit. Note: school zones along here were posted at a mere 90 kph… I guess Canadian kids’ reflexes aren’t as good as those of the South Africans, given that they need cars to slow down to 40 or even 20 kph! At times today there were long stretches where we didn’t see one other car… we could have been in rural Texas, it was so flat and straight. The mountain parts got pretty technical, though, and as the sun started to set, I was ready to make it here to Camp Hippy in Wilderness… finding the goddamn place was an adventure in itself as the mapquest directions were pretty fucked up. We made it in the end and some food and beer in front of the Sweden-Portugal world cup qualifier reduced my stress level… This place is called Fairy Knowe and is an old Victorian farm. The bar is a big open air thatched roof jobby that totally reminds me of Expats in Ceiba. Except of course that the young East German girl behind the bar is definitely NOT packing heat like Mark and rather than an assortment of ne’er-do-wells, scoundrels, jewel smugglers, car thieves and arms dealers, this place is currently occupied by hippies. Head hippy seems to be the german girl’s boyfriend and I just got the pleasure of seeing him send her on a guilt-trip for some narcissistic reason before forgiving her for whatever perceived (non-existent) slight had occurred… nice.

Oh, and did I mention the scorpion that I just saw outside the door of our farmhouse room? I told the girl and she said that if it was black, then it is VERY poisonous… it was black. What is it with us and creepy crawly poisonous things? Sigh. Oh well, nothing could possibly beat that hotel at Lago Yojoa in Honduras. Between the electrocution shower, the cockroaches and the coral snake living under the bed, it was a miracle we got out of Longwood alive! : )

The wee beastie that greeted me at the Victorian farmhouse...

Tomorrow it’s off on a hike or a canoe trip or both. Then back to Cape Town for a couple more days before flying to Namibia on Wednesday.

Ps: just went on a wee hike along the Toews river. It’s a very lush zone and the symphony of birdcalls was absolutely brilliant. The highlight of the trail, though, was pulling ourselves across the river on a pontoon… fun! Oh, and when we got back to the road, the ranger lady told us that some guys had just come across a puff adder on the road we were taking to get back to the farmhouse… and me without my machete! Hmmm…

Now it’s off to explore the Garden Route east a bit before the long drive back to CT tomorrow (Cape Town, not Connecticut). And, joy of joys, this one seaside town is famous for its oysters! I do believe that Helene was hiding this from me… ; ) But, ha ha, I read the guide book and discovered it this morning over some seriously yummy granola, yoghurt and fresh fruit. Hippies do granola well.

Cape Town

Oh will they, now? Something about that razor wire tells me differently...

Wandering around Cape Town feels a little like the first time I went to Lorca with Josechu’s family when I went for a walk by myself and while looking at the buildings and houses started wondering why there were so many bars and grates… and why there was broken glass cemented on top of garden walls… Even in a chill town like Cape Town, the security industry is booming. One sees the typical alarm company signs everywhere but unlike in Canada, here they are embellished by the added words “Armed Response.” Armed as in armed with guns not as in “your system is activated.”

This city is strikingly beautiful, though. The setting is magnificent and the air is clean. Today was a massive day of sight-seeing too. We got up and headed to the Kirstenbosch botanical gardens, then went up Table Mountain on the cable car, then visited the waterfront before walking back downtown and feasting on some wild game while listening to live guitar… a great day.

Here are some photos from the gardens…





And the mountain, where the clouds whipped in at incredible speeds…






As for the meal, wow… who knew that springbok shank would taste so good… or grilled ostrich? “Angolan Big Chicken” as they call it. I will definitely do up a separate IGTC Endorses for these guys.

Amsterdam to Africa

The hotel that I had reserved turned out to be quite good: the Museum House near the Concert Hall. I’m glad it was because now that there are all of these sites with people’s comments, etc. it’s hard to find a place for which some cranky prince/princess has not written a whiny screed based on the fact that he/she could hear the water pipes or some such thing. Once we made it into the city, it then took a little while to get out to the hotel from the Centraal Station. We took tram #16, which does not run right in front of the station, but rather a block away, but that was nice because a) I love trams on general principle and b) it’s a nice way to see a city. I had been to Amsterdam on two occasions previously but this time I felt like I really got a better feel for the place. Of course, the first time, back in ’91 was kind of booze-inflected and then the second was more a “take in what we can” 1 day tour after Helene and I had left Herstmonceux Castle and were bumming around for a bit before going home to stay with our respective parents in advance of moving to Ithaca. In any event, to be here this time during the fall was also great; it was nice and cool out and the leaves were changing… the canals were pretty (as were, it must be said, the women on their bicycles!) and it was great to just wander and check out the shops.

Somehow, I found myself talking to a wineseller who specialises in Italian and French (I noticed a couple of nice ’97 Burgundies that were begging to be drunk but there was no way that I could carry wine around at the start of this trip… but still… they made me think of that exquisite Vincent Girardin Aloxe-Corton 1997 that Joe and I shared in the spring of 2003…). Because we were starting to get pretty hungry (I think all that we had eaten was a bit of yoghurt on the plane), I hit up the owner for a nice place to go. He suggested a very much in-demand Italian trattoria and so we used that as our target for another hour’s worth of walking. The Jordaan area of Amsterdam is phenomenal and so pleasant to wander about…

As we were getting close to our destination, we passed another small restaurant and saw the staff eating dinner in advance of the evening service… the smells coming out of there were divine and I made a quick mental note… anywhere that smells that good for the staff meal has got to be worth checking out… It was good that we had walked by that place because, in the end, we did return to this non-descript resto. The one we were looking for turned out to be totally booked already -- even on a Tuesday night. No complaints from us, though, because the at Café Principe Curtis was fan-fucking-tastic. The incredibly friendly Dutch waitress sat us at the communal table, where we spoke to her in Spanish so that she could practice and chatted a bit with a regular from Curacao who apparently stops in every day for his tea. As we ate our bread and oil (sesame coated flatbread with a very soft and nicely spiced oil), the place began to fill up. I enjoyed my bresaola but the winning appetizer was Helene’s grilled tuna… the secret to its wonderfulness? It had been encrusted in fennel seeds, which had then toasted to varying degrees… oh yes, fennel…. Mmm… Am definitely going to try this out at home.

The mains literally took over an hour to come. We figured that the chef had decided that everyone should have their apps… and who were we to complain? Especially given the warm service? The owner brought in a couple of friends with a baby and we talked to them a bit, as well as to a woman from Toronto who sat at the table with us. She gave us a contact in Tanzania who works with children with AIDS and helped found an orphanage. At this point, it was good to have to talk to other people because I was fading fast (not much sleep on the plane after the fainting incident). When the next plates arrived we were as impressed as with the appetizers: my tagliatelle (finer than I’m used to) with wild boar was tasty, as was H’s pasta with rapini and shrimp.

All in all, a wonderful meal and a great evening in Amsterdam. We walked back the couple of kilometres to the hotel and then crashed pretty much immediately, what with having to get up early to catch a bus to Schipol for the flight to Cape Town… we’re about 3 hours out as I write this and just a few minutes ago I realised that I had crossed the equator for the first time! I was watching the great KLM flight tracker and seeing the line bisect Africa totally took me back to those primary school exercises where we had to draw the continents… it’s kind of crazy to think that in the course of a single day, one can go from northern Europe to the southern tip of Africa… isn’t it?

There’s supposed to be a bus of some sort available to take us to the Backpackers’ Hotel where we have a room reserved… I can’t wait to see the night sky, though, and check out the Southern Cross for the first time! Hmm, I wonder if you can see the moon in South Africa? Ha ha… that’s a play on the stupidest question we had at EXPO’92 in Seville… a woman from the Midwest asked Stuart that very thing… it was only later that we decided that the perfect answer would have been to say that no, the moon is kept in a geosynchronous orbit above the US…

Tomorrow it will be up to Table Mountain if the weather is nice and then to explore Cape Town a bit before we rent a car and head out on the swankiest part of our trip: the Garden Route through what is supposed to be some of the most beautiful wine country in the world…

Well, That Didn't Take Long...

So here we are in Amsterdam... but the trip over was not without incident and there's ALREADY a story to tell...

About 4 hours into the flight, Hélène started feeling flushed, dizzy and nauseous so I started walking her to the back of the plane -- to the galley to get some water -- and she almost made it but instead, fainted right there in the aisle... I carried her the rest of the way to the back, laid her down on the floor and put my hand under her head... and then was scared shitless by the totally blank look in her eyes -- she was completely out and staring off into space. Surprisingly, I stayed pretty calm and alerted the stewardesses who were sitting a couple of metres away. They instantly jumped up, mixed some water and sugar and prepared cold compresses. H was out for only maybe 30 seconds or so. When she came to, we were all standing around staring at her, which made her start. When she asked how long she had been unconscious, I told her just for a minute, but that don't worry, we had got some good pictures... and oh, that she's not allowed to sleep on the floor (earlier in the flight, they had made a funny announcement to that effect). Anyway, Hélène sat up and said that she felt better, but still, holy fucking shit... what a way to start a 5 month trip...

We think that it was probably the cholera medication we took before leaving the house... and then she may or may not have had some wine and beer... Later, we found out that another woman on the plane had fainted too, so the pilot added more oxygen to the air (duh! shouldn't that always be high?)

Relaxing now in Amsterdam... off to the cafes in a bit... no spacecake for H tonight, though...

Books...

This is a tough one... what to take to read while sitting in trucks, trains, out of the scorching sun, etc...
I'm sure that there will be some good finds on the way but for now, I'm stashing Don Quixote and The Red and the Black in my bag. Been too long since I read the former and have never even cracked the latter...

So We Leave Tomorrow...

Packing, packing, packing. And I don't even want to take that much stuff. I figure that I can always pick up cheap clothes along the way that suit the weather and I did leave a bunch of things at the flat in Barcelona...

Kind of nervous - not going to lie.

Tomorrow we fly to Amsterdam and spend a night before heading to Cape Town for 6 days or so. That will be nice: exploring the city and then driving along the Garden Route. It's supposed to be some of the most beautiful wine country in the world. Needless to say, that doesn't scare me...

The part after that, though, is a little more daunting just because I've never done anything like what we have planned. We're going to be travelling around Namibia with Philippe, a friend from Shawinigan, in a Toyota Hilux 4x4. The tents actually set up on top of the truck so that animals and snakes and things can't get at you... So it's going to be lots of desert and driving and camping... and I'm praying that it's not a million degrees out because we all know how extreme heat and I get along... : )

Updates to come...