Capetown (part 1: Mostly About Sharks)

My first sight of Capetown was at night as we drove down the twisting highway through the mountains that surrounded it. It came into view and all I could think was, this is no town. This is a sprawling, sparkling beauty of a city. The lights went on in all directions until they stopped, at the deep blackness that could only be the sea. This was what happened to a city when it had room to spread out.

We couldn’t enjoy it quite yet, though. First there was the minor hell of returning the rental cars to get through. At a strange airport in a strange city, we were of course immediately lost. We finally managed to get rid of the cars, (which we had seriously considered at one point just ditching in a parking lot and making stupid Imperial Car Rentals go try to find them themselves) got picked up by the shuttle to our hostel, and were driving up Long Street by 1am.



Our first impression of this street that would be our home for nine days was pretty much pure insanity. Every building was lit up and crowded, the streets were swarming with people. Music was blaring, people were shouting, the cars were bumper to bumper. We got out in a daze. After six hours of driving ending up here seemed like a dream. Our shuttle driver had given us our keys, so we unlocked the heavy wooden door and made our way quietly up the stairs to our rooms. Katie, Lindsey, Liz, Scott and I shared a room – with Luke, who was only staying for three days then going to Mozambique, on a mattress on the floor. Nouria, Jerica and Sheneita were downstairs and shared the room with three other girls.

Before bed, we stood for a moment on the large wraparound balcony that gave us a view of most of the street. Directly across from us one of the clubs was packed, loud music pumped from its open widows and its own balcony was full of people. We could hear everything from the window of our little room, but we were so tired I don’t think any of us cared.



We slept late. Our tired bodies only waking up when the intense sunlight coming through our window, and transforming our room from bedroom to sauna, became unbearable. Outside it was not much better but we were distracted by our first site of Capetown during the day. In the sun we could see Long Streets white Victorian architecture enclosing small crammed together shops and restaurants. Towering above it all, against the blue blue sky was the wide flat cliff of Table Mountain.

The next morning Katie Scott Liz and Luke left to hike up Table Mountain. The rest of us, having no real desire to hike up a mountain in the heat, decided to take the cable car up at a later time, and instead went to the beach. Because it was by a city and not more isolated, as we had begun to get used to, this beach Clifton Beach, was more commercialized and crowded then we were used to. It was still beautiful, though. The mountains surrounded us in the distance, the sand was white, and the water was crystal blue and directly from Antarctica. It was so cold I could step in for less than thirty seconds before my feet turned numb.



The next day we celebrated Easter Sunday by going shark diving. We were picked up a little after 5am, the sky only just beginning to transform from black to that early morning dark blue. The van was full of other young people whose idea of a good time was also to get up at 5am to go swim with sharks. The ride was long, around two hours. I nodded off for a while and when I woke I could see the sun, just rising, burning red over the mountains. We stopped at a little building and got of the van, stretching and yawning. We paid, signed our life away on a few forms, ate a small packed breakfast, heard a few facts and instructions and then were off to the bay to get on the boat.

The boat was not small, but it was not big either. Especially with a large group of hopeful shark divers crowded on board. We all found a seat for the ride out to open water, though. I sat near the rail, enjoying the bright sun and the still slightly misty feeling of the morning air. The ocean was calm, but the boat rode high in the water bouncing rhythmically up and down. I saw signs of seasickness on some people, including some of my friends, and I was glad that my dad had somehow associated bumpy rides and turbulence with “fun” when I was little.



We stopped maybe twenty minutes out, in an area known for its migratory birds and near an island with a large seal population. If we had just kept going eventually we would have hit Antarctica. As soon as we stopped and the first piece of bait, tied to a rope, was thrown over the side, a shark was spotted. This was apparently pretty unusual, usually they had to wait a little for the sharks to find them. This one, I guess was eager. We scrambled to the side of the boat, grabbing for cameras that weren’t out of their cases yet. The shark was beautiful, small for a great white, which still means it could probably have eaten me in about two bites. I most clearly saw its fin, slicing through the still water, just like in the movies. We were ready and looking around now, and more started coming. Some tried to attack the bait, making enormous splashes, so large that in all the foam and angry movement I could only get glimpses of grey fins.



Then I got to go in the cage. I had put a wetsuit on, which was making me slightly cold and damp. The cage was tied to the boat, all the way submerged in the water except for a little room for our heads. I dropped into the cage to join the four other guys already inside and moved to the edge, grabbing the inside rail. We waited, staring, for a shark to come near the bait. When the captain saw a shark he would yell “down!” and we would lower ourselves completely underwater, our eyes straining to see the shark swim past. I often didn’t see the shark underwater- despite the weight belt that had been dropped over my shoulder, I still tended to float up a bit, and I wasn’t always looking in the right direction! But then I saw it. We submerged and there was a great white shark swimming right towards me. It’s its mouth I remember. It was like staring into some enormous dangerous, living piece of machinery. A mouth that could break any of us in two without a thought. We had been warned to keep our hands and feet inside the cage, not because they might become food but because a shark could press up against them when swimming by, and the scales could scrape us. I hadn’t thought of that much while in the cage, but at the sight of that mouth I checked my hands and feet and found myself moving back a little. And not, I think, because I was worried about scrapes.



Between the shock of the cold Indian Ocean, the amazement at having an up close experience with a shark, and the simple enjoyment of being in the water in a beautiful place on a beautiful day, I was feeling pretty happy when I finally climbed out of that cage. I spent most of the rest of my time on the boat, lying on the bow in the sun, occasionally holding things for seasick people as they threw up over the side, and spotting more sharks. We headed back after almost four hours, the sharks starting to lose interest and most of us content. The total at the end of the day: 7 individual great white sharks. The smallest 2 meters (about 6.5 feet) the largest 3.5 meters (about 11.5 feet).

Road Trip

I’m updating! Here is the first week of April break- Capetown will come soon…

After finally getting our rooms packed up and everything stored in padlocked rooms, we left Grahamstown around noon on what was probably one of the hottest days of the semester. Opening the windows as we drove down the highway only managed to blow more hot air on us. It was a relief to pass through Port Elizabeth and get closer to the coast and the cooler sea air.

We got to Jeffreys Bay in the late afternoon. Our hostel was called “Island Vibe” and set right on the beach. Made up of a bunch of low, wood buildings it was crowded with other vacationing backpackers. We had a small dorm room that we shared with three other people. We didn’t do much there, just relaxed, enjoyed the beach and celebrated our first day of vacation.



We drove off the next day, all of us a bit tired from a fun night, toward Tsikimma National Forest and Djembe backpackers. Arriving in the evening we were given most of the run of a large cabin, down the road from the main building. I was happy to sleep in the large open loft with its wood panelled walls and garreted roof. It was rainy that night but we made the short walk to the main building for a drink. We sat around the outdoor fire, still burning in the drizzle.

The next morning we were up around nine, and packed around ten. We said goodbye and drove the twenty minutes to Storms River and the world’s highest bungy jump. The bridge over the narrow gorge was certainly high and the gorge was definitely deep. We said farewell to Lindsey and Shenita as they strapped on their harnesses, promising to tell their mothers they loved them if they died, and made our way to the view point. From where we stood, looking at the platform balanced right in the middle of the arch of the bridge and under the road, everything looked tiny. The people were indiscernible, just movements in the shadow. The first person jumped, and the cord looked like a piece of string. Like the dolls tied to string that I used to launch from the backs of chairs in pretend bungy jumps. Yes I remember I used to do that. I sometimes got bored of playing dress up with my barbies.



I had brought my new camera with me, so I used the zoom to look for our friends. They were some of the last to go, falling straight, the cord loose and trailing behind, until suddenly, it snapped and their bodies hurtled up again, and then down, until they were just softly swinging upside down, in the shadow of the gorge.

After that excitement we went back a little further into the Tsikimma forest to go on a ziplining tour through the canopy. Standing on platforms at the tops of such huge ancient trees was amazing. And the ziplining wasn’t bad either!



After lunch we headed again for the coast, to the small beach town of Knysna. We stayed in a small house down the road from the quiet downtown. Filled with shops and restaurants, the town and waterfront reminded me a little of a beach front version of Old Town, Alexandria. And behind the more expensive stores, in the parking lots of the supermarkets, the large Rasta community of Knysna has their vending stands. Bob Marley t-shirts, knitted caps, jewellery and herbs of all kinds are in plentiful supply here. Jerica made friends with a rasta named Brother Charles. His dreads falling past his waist, he would smile showing the gap where his two front teeth used to be, and tell us the healing properties of the herbs he was selling.



After two nights in Knysna we left for a small beach house right outside of Mossel Bay. Probably the nicest place we stayed at, we had the whole upstairs to ourselves including a large tv and a kitchen. We walked up the road to the beach which was incredibly beautiful in the early evening light. A small river ran into the ocean- over the bridge running across it the sun was setting, and opposite, over the water the moon had just risen. We drove into the city to pick up some food and wine, and used the barbecue area (or braai area as we call it here!) to make dinner of hamburgers and sausages.



The next morning we had planned to go shark diving, but we had been warned by the very nice owner of our beach house that no sharks had been spotted in a while. So, not wanting to waste a trip, we decided to cancel and wait until Capetown. We drove over to the Cango Caves near the town of Oudtshoorn instead. Carved out of the side of a chain of mountains, the caverns were beautiful, and hundreds of millions of years old. They reminded me very much of the Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, although I think some of these formations were even older. Walking out on the observation deck after our tour I noticed the mountain across from us dotted with forest fires, sending white smoke into the blue sky.

By late afternoon we were driving away from the caves and, finally, toward Capetown.