Cape Town

Cape Town. January 24-28

Everybody has told us how beautiful Cape Town is and how we must visit before we leave South Africa.

A friend here who works on the project lives in Cape Town. He goes home to visit family every two weeks so we took a long weekend and tagged along with him. Jacques and Maggel live in Wellington about 60 ks out of the city, in the middle of some of the most stunning wine country. We were prepared for the awesome view of Table Mountain but not for the other mountains that surround this lovely place. The weekend was spent tasting wine, dipping our toes in the oceans, both Indian and Atlantic, driving up amazing mountains and enjoying the company of friends.

It could be a long time till we get another weekend off together as Andrew is now working 6 days and will be until mid April. 

There is so much more to see in Cape Town and we will be back before we leave this country.

The brown grass and mountains reminded us of mid Canterbury and Marlborough.

We just couldn't get over the spectacular scenery 

The area around the tiny town of Franschoek, known as the food and wine capital of South Africa.

Andrew being a kid again!

Fairview one of the lovely wineries we went to

On our drive to Camps Bay at the back of Table Mountain we were thrilled to find some Pohutukawa still with a few blooms. 

Nelson Mandala spent his last 15months of imprisonment close to Franschhoek. This was what he said, on his release, after 27 year years in prison. Pretty amazing man.

Soccer- African Cup of Nations

Watching Soccer

Sam and I went to our first international game of soccer a week ago. Nelspruit is hosting part of the African Cup of Nations tournament and as the Mbombella stadium is less that 2kms away, as the crow flies, we though we really should go. It was a monday afternoon so unfortunately Andrew couldn't make it so we  took my friend Lindy instead.

We went to watch Zambia play Ethiopia. Getting there was  interesting. We could have walked but I was a little unsure about walking back after dark. We thought we had given ourselves plenty of time leaving  home at 4.00pm, the game was to start at 5. At the bottom of our street we were turned away and had to drive about 5ks to a 'park and ride' stop. The traffic was horrendous and  that drive took us about 30mins. We then had to make two separate bus rides and arrived at the stadium 5.15pm with the game in full swing.

The noise was amazing. Everyone seemed to have vuvuzalas and be blasting them as loudly as possible. A helicopter flew over twice and we couldn't hear it!!! I had taken ear plugs but  I wanted to take in the whole experience so didn't use them. When I got out and my ears were ringing I felt a bit silly.

Zambia were the hot favourites as they had won last year.  Ethiopia  hadn't played in the competition for 30 years.  About 3/4 of the spectators were supporting Ethiopia and we seemed to be sitting right in the middle of them. 3 red cards were given out in the game the first was  held aloft above the Ethiopia goal keeper as he was stretchered off.  You can imagine the Ethiopians spectators disappointment. Vuvuzalas and anything else they could get their hand on were thrown on to the pitch, people tried to push down barriers between spectators and the players, riot police were bought in with batons and shields. I must admit by this stage I was a little unsure but Sam's comment was "Wow this is just like a proper soccer match!"

The game ended in a draw 1 all. The Ethiopians justifiable proud of their teams effort.