Bhav at the place we stayed at in Windhoek the first time round
We had to “settle” for the honeymoon suite
The minivan journey to Swakopmund
Monthly Archive for August, 2008
Page 2 of 2
Table Mountain from the centre of Cape Town
An old building by the waterfront in Cape Town with part of Table Mountain in the background
Bo Kapp, the Cape Malay district
The President of South Africa’s house in Cape Town
The view from the door onto the balcony at our hostel on Long Street in Cape Town
View from the top of Table Mountain down onto Cape Town with Robben Island just off the coast
The top of Table Mountain
Inside Robben Island Prison
Nelson Mandela’s prison cell
Nelson Mandela’s prison cell
I just thought I should mention that I’m uploading pictures to my picasa account, that Bhavneet has a blog and that I have a very fancy page (no, I didn’t write the software) that display the location of each of my posts.
So I’ve finally made it to Africa!
After a wait of about 14 hours at Dubai airport I met up with Bhavneet and Craig (my travelling companions for the next 67 days) and flew down to Jo’burg. Jo’burg isn’t where I’d want to go for a normal holiday. Poverty was quite evident in what was a very industrial city. It’s the start of things I’ll have to get used to, like the razor wire fences surrounding peoples homes (and our backpackers hostel). We did get to see the Apartheid Museum although we weren’t able to visit Soweto, a slum district of Jo’burg that every tourist guide recommends. We rented a car while we were there which was surprisingly good value at only R205 (£14) for the day. Craig was the one driving and I’m quite glad he was. The directions to places wasn’t the problem it was the insane driving style of the other road users. One example being when we were on our way to drop of the car and we almost got crushed on all sides by larger minivans all trying to move down a street that was a lot narrower than all the traffic going down it. No doubt footage of said incident will be appearing on youtube soon.
Our journey out of Jo’burg was by sleeper train. Apparently the distance between Jo’burg and Cape Town is over 1400 km and our train certainly wasn’t in a rush, stopping regularly for passing trains and animals. I managed to spot ostrich and a warthog out in the seemingly endless plains. It took about 26 hours in the end but it was an enjoyable experience! I even got my best nights sleep so far in our own private 4 bed coach. It was a strange experience to shower on a train with the African savanna going past the open window. Not something First ScotRail will be adding to their London to Aberdeen sleeper train any time soon I expect.
Craig on the train to Cape Town
Me on the train
View from the train
Sunset from the train
The first view of Table Mountain from the train
The Apartheid Museum, Johannesburg
Nooses to emphasize how many people were sentenced to death. The museum was really well designed and had lots of things to bring it to life.
Outside the Apartheid Museum, Johannesburg
Criag on “Chico” our rental car in Johannesburg
I have to admit that I’m finding it difficult to resist the urge to put some sort of countdown timer on my site to display the exact time left before going to Africa. My excitement is similar in intensity to a child waiting for Christmas.
On Wednesday I went into Stirling to get my foreign currency for my trip. I’ve never seen so many US dollars. Economically it seems like quite a good time to go. Lots of African currencies are tied to the dollar and it’s pretty weak at the moment. The pound on the other hand has the opposite “problem” (it kinda depends how you look at it). Something that isn’t often mentioned in the British press is the state of the Australian and New Zealand Dollars. On Wednesday the Daily Telegraph ran a story titled “Australia may go down under as it faces up to a worse financial crisis than US”. The article ends with “Both the Australian and New Zealand dollars have fallen hard in recent days and now appear to be breaking down… against major currencies, including the US dollar”. The article also features a quote from the currency chief of BNP Paribas Hans Redeker “The Aussie is going down, big time”.
A bigger problem is the one currently faced by Italy. Quite a few economists believe Italy might be the first country ever to be kicked out of the eurozone. A report issued by Capital Economics said “An ugly combination of weak GDP growth, poor international competitiveness and rising government borrowing costs could lead to renewed calls for Italy to leave the Euro”. Italy is on the cusp of it’s fourth recession in 10 years. The idea of a return of Italy’s previous currency, the Lira, has already been floated by two cabinet ministers. It makes you wonder what we have to moan about.
Whilst this is very interesting, it does have the possible benefit of making the trip ever so slightly cheaper for me and possibly ever so slightly more expensive for my Kiwi traveling companions. Oh well, it’s only money.