Day 1: I woke up at 530am to watch the ship come into the Cape Town
port. I got to see the sunrise as we pulled up right in front of Table
Mountain. After the sun rose and we were docked, I went and laid in
bed until 730am when Randy (the guy who makes all the announcements)
came onto the PA system to wake everyone up and remind them that every
person on the ship has to have a face to face 'meeting' with South
African immigration before anyone is allowed to debark the ship. This
was the first port we have had to do this so Kelsey, Dylan and I went
and stood in line for our passports before we went to breakfast. The
line was really long but luckily it moved fast and we were able to
catch the end of breakfast at 830ish. Then of course there was like 5
kids who ever one had to wait on to go have their meetings, once
everyone finally did Kelsey and I met up with some friends to head
into the Victoria Albert Waterfront. We took a cab to the waterfront
with Sean, Kyle, Kelsey, Brooke, and Alex. We walked around the mall
and the whole waterfront and then ate lunch at Hindebrands, which is
right near the water. I got a cappuccino (which I have realized I have
come to like cappuccinos!) and ate an awesome Caesar salad Panini. I
had made plans to stay with a woman who lives in Cape Town named
Maureen. Maureen's sister lives in Arizona and plays tennis with my
dad so it all worked out wonderfully that I was able to stay with her.
Maureen asked me to call her when we arrived in port to figure out to
meet. So after I ate I took Kelseys phone (since my phone doesn't work
in port) and called Maureen. We decided to meet at 430 outside the
hotel at the waterfront. My friends didn't have plans so we headed
over to the info centre for a while, while they all looked for tours
to do. Then they all left around 1pm to go on their tours and I
wandered around a bit by myself (luckily found a novel in the mall I
was supposed to get before the voyage for one of my classes, good
thing I had one last English speaking port!) then walked back to the
ship (and of course got a little lost). One I got back to the ship I
finished packing up my bag and headed back to the Waterfront. I timed
it perfectly to meet Maureen in front of the hotel. I had only been
sitting there for a couple minutes when I saw a woman looking around.
I had told Maureen I was wearing red pants so she spotted me! We
finally met and got into her car. She then drove me around the
peninsula and we stopped at a gorgeous beach, I had no idea Cape Town
had beaches like this, Maureen said the water is too cold to swim
though. After driving for an hour or two we headed back to her place
and waited for her son to get home from work. Then when her son
(Adrian) got home we went out to dinner at a Mexican restaurant. I was
so excited to have Mexican food! It was really delicious (I tried a
cheese stuffed pepper, really good, definitely going to try to make
them at home!) Then we went home and went to bed after watching a
little TV.
Day 2 : The next day we woke up and Maureen and I headed into
Stellenbosch (there is a good chance I am spelling that wrong but I
don't have internet to look up how to spell it…But Stellenbosch is one
of the wine lands!). Before we drove all the way up there, Maureen had
to run some errands so I tagged along. One of her errands was to pick
curtains from a woman who lives in one of the very poor townships. I
thought it was really interesting to see the extremities between the
first world and third world neighborhoods in South Africa. After that
we headed on a Stellenbosch where we went to a bird sanctuary (there
used to be cheetahs there but they moved, but we went into the
sanctuary anyway to look at the birds!) The birds were way cooler than
I thought they would be, I got to hold and pet owls! Then we walked
around this awesome restaurant where the tables are all up in the
trees, it was one of the coolest restaurants I had ever seen. And then
we headed to the wine farms. The first one we went to we ate lunch
there and tried a couple different wines. The restaurant/lounge we
were in was absolutely beautiful. Then we drove around some more
looking for anther wine farm to go to. Every left and right turn you
can take off this road takes you to another wine farm; it was amazing
how many there were! We got a little lost but ended up driving up onto
one Maureen was excited about that she had never been to. So we drove
up to it. This wine farm was less crowded than the last so one of the
guys pouring the wine gave us a whole history on each wine and was
really interesting. We also got to see one of the workers use a sword
to chop off the top of a champagne bottle. After spending a while
there we headed off out of Stellenbosch. On the way back to Maureen's
house we stopped at some little shops and art galleries and walked
around them. And then we drove back to Maureen's house. That night we
ate burgers for dinner, they came with bbq sauce, but it tasted like
what I know of as sweet and sour, they were really good though! Then
Maureen's daughter's flight was landing around 930 so she went to pick
her up. We went to bed after watching some tv after her daughter
(Lauren) got in.
Day 3: The next day I happily slept in and went out for lunch and
drinks at a restaurant by the gorgeous beach in Camps Bay with Lauren
and her friend. Then we drove around and drove down into the port to
attempt to show them the ship. Sadly our ship was docked behind a huge
building that help security, so you couldn't get through the building
unless you had a SAS id card, so instead I only got to show them a
portion of the ship, a little anti-climatic. Then we drove back to
Maureen's house and Adrian and I got ready to go hike Lions Head.
Lions Head in the small peak to the side of Table Mountain. Table
Mountain was incredibly foggy all weekend, very few SAS kids actually
got a chance to go up to the top of it, but Lions Head was the next
best thing. Lions Head was a great hike, the top was pretty
treacherous because you had to rock climb on chains and ladders and
handles and things, and it was pretty scary at points but really cool.
It was also the most ridiculous wind I have ever experienced, if you
were wearing baggy clothes I wouldn't be surprised if you just flew
away. I don't think I will ever experience such extreme wind ever
again. Then we hiked back down which was just as treacherous because
we had to climb down all the chains and handles. I loved the hike, it
ended up being almost as exhausting as my hike in Ghana, but it was
very different scenery! Then when we got back to Maureen's house,
Lauren was there with a few of her friends about to go out so they
waited for me as I quickly showered and got ready and went to dinner
with them. We ate some delicious sushi at the end on Long Street and
then walked over to one of the bars (called Neighborhood) to try to
meet one of Laurens friends. Her friends never ended up coming so we
went to a bar right near Maureen's house. I was so exhausted from the
hike but I rallied and had a lot of fun at the bar. Adrian and some of
his friends came and met us at the bar. We danced all night and ended
up walking home (since we were just 2 blocks away) around 230am.
Day 4: The next day I woke up and Maureen was skyping with her sister
Marion (who is friends with my dad in AZ, which is the reason I was
able to get in touch with Maureen and was able to stay with her) so I
met Marion over Skype and chatted (since I have never actually met her
in person, I'll have to do that once I get back to Arizona. Then we
all got ready and Maureen and Lauren and I headed to Boulders Beach to
see the penguins! We bought our tickets and headed down the walkway to
where the penguins hang out. Most of the penguins were molting so many
of them looked like they were in a very awkward stage in life, with
half of their bodies with nice new feathers and the other half of
their body with frayed and fuzzy crazy looking feather. It was very
funny to see! I took a think about a hundred pictures of the penguins,
such goofy creatures. Then we drove a little farther down the coast
and ate some fish and chips by the harbour near the boulders. Lauren
had to make sure she was back in time to get picked up for the airport
so after lunch we hustled back and Lauren's dad came to pick her up
and then Maureen dropped me back off the ship after I thanked her. I
found my friends once I got on the ship and we headed back over to the
waterfront and went shopping for little gifts in the mall and market
and then went to a sushi bar for dinner (I have learned that I love
sushi!). The sushi was delicious, and I was starving. After dinner we
walked back to the ship. I was exhausted so I went to bed pretty soon
after that.
Day 5: Then the last day I woke up early because I signed up for a SAS
trip to the AM Biehl Foundation. (I missed breakfast by like less than
a minute) so I bought a muffin from the snack bar (which was way
better than I expected) and caught my bus to the Amy Biehl Foundation.
Once we got to the offices of the foundation we watched a dvd about
the whole Amy Biehl story, which I think is such an amazing story, all
of the people involved are incredible. I have never heard of such a
story that shows how forgiveness can really make such a difference. I
won't attempt to explain the whole Amy Biehl story, but in short
(really really short) Amy Biehl was killed because she was in the
wrong place at the wrong time and was assumed (because she was white)
that she was against the black population is South Africa when really
she was an American on a FullBright Scholorship trying to help every
race register to vote, she was very much an advocate for equal rights.
She was stabbed to death, and her killers were sentenced to 18 years
in prison. After 4 years her killers applied for amnesty, which they
were granted. Amy Biehls parents started this foundation to carry on
what Amy believed in. Now after many years, 2 of Amy's killers
actually work for the foundation and have made big improvements with
the foundation. The whole story is quite remarkable. After the DVD the
owner Kevin came and spoke to us and then we had the opportunity to
buy some Amy Biehl things (bracelets and books and things, I bought a
couple bracelets to support the foundation) and then we headed to a
few schools to see what the foundation actually had done to improve
the education in the townships in South Africa. One school we went to
we watched some 7th graders read to 1st graders (to have the younger
have role models to look up to and learn how important reading is).
After that we just wandered the school, though we were definitely
being disruptive because the kids were stop paying attention in class
as we walked by, I felt bad we were causing such a ruckus! Then we ate
lunch at a local popular restaurant in one of the townships (that was
basically a giant open area with a roof over it) but we ate an
assortment of sausage, chicken, mealie meal (don't know how to
describe this, but it was plain but good!) and salsa. Then we went to
2 after school programs where the kids were very talented. We saw them
play instruments, dance and helped them with their new gardens they
are building on the school ground to help feed the kids and teach the
kids how to grow their own food. I wish we could have spent more time
at each school but we were on such a time crunch that we could only
spend like 20-30 min at each school. I would have rather we went to
less schools and spent an hour or more at each school so we could
actually meet and chat and get to know the people and the kids at each
school. We got back to the ship at 5pm and had to turn our passports
in with another face-to-face meeting with immigration. We were
supposed to sail at 20:00 but the port agent advised us not to because
the winds are so rough outside the port. So we stayed the night at the
dock (though sadly no one was allowed to leave or enter the ship) and
ended up not leaving until 11am the next morning!
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