Cape Town, I just can't get enough

Oh, Cape Town. I chose to spend my last weekend in South Africa revisiting Cape Town, as we were there for such a short amount of time and I wanted more time there, so I headed back last Wednesday and stayed with my friend Matt. I had all day Thursday and Friday to myself while he worked, so I went to Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens which were phenomenally beautiful, and then took the nerdy tourist bus again and sat on the beach at Camp’s Bay, which was gorgeous. Surrounded by mountains, big clouds moving around them, and basking in the late summer sun, it was exactly what I needed. Friday I went to the neat District 6 museum, which chronicles the devastation caused by apartheid to the area of District 6 in Cape Town, in which thousands of people and families were evicted and ‘relocated’ and had no where to go, and instead of using the area to rebuild study and not slum-like homes, they just left it empty. Very eerie, seeing the empty public spaces where thousands of families used to reside not too long ago.  I also spent Friday just walking, relishing in the fact that I was in a walkable city- the weather was so lovely that I was able to hit up the uber popular Long Street with all the bars and coffeeshops, and I nerded out with a trip to the National Library of South Africa- Cape Town branch, just to hang out with some old books for a moment or two.

Chilling at Camps Bay beach for a bit

The rest of the weekend was spent meeting up with another friend from the Splashy Fen music festival, Mikey, and we hit the down, seeing all the nightlife that Cape Town has to offer. One highlight was Alexander Bar, which was 1920’s themed and every table had a telephone that you could use to call other tables, call the bartender, or send telegrams to other people. Super fun! 

Curtis with the Cape Town boys, Mikey and Matt

Curtis arrived late on Friday which was wonderful, and we got up early on Saturday and headed straight to the Victoria and Alfred Waterfront, which is gorgeous and filled with loads of restaurants and shops on the water. We ended up walking from there to Long Street, and then through the Company Gardens which reminded me a lot of the Public Gardens in Boston but on a smaller scale. That night we went to Matt’s friends’ place for a small get together and met a lot of really great people, most of whom were from Joburg and not at all from Cape Town, which was interesting. Reminded me of LA where nearly everyone is a transplant. I did hate a bit when people asked me when I was leaving and I had to reconcile with the fact that oh yeah, I’m heading out in just a few days.

View from Kirstenbosch gardens

Sunday was another unbelievably gorgeous day, and Curtis and I rented a car to drive out to the Cape of Good Hope, or Cape Point, which is supposedly the southern most point in Africa (its not.. but we pretended like it was). The drive is all down the coast, and all these craggy mountains were looming next to us, really gorgeous. Once we got to the Cape Point area, we noticed that tons of cars were stopped in the road in front of us and we started getting annoyed until we realized that they were stopping because baboons were EVERYWHERE. I mean sitting right nex to the car, grooming each other, and I nearly died inside when I saw super tiny baby baboons running around, and some clinging to their mothers backs. Really amazing. We trekked up to the lighthouse which had a gorgeous view of where the Atlantic Ocean meets the Indian Ocean, and we both felt so lucky to have experienced it together, especially since Curtis and I hadn’t really had a chance to spend quality time just the two of us before, so it was great to have that time getting closer to him. 

View from the lighthouse at Cape Point

Curtis and me at Cape Point, not posed at all

He’s lucky as he’s in Joburg until July before he returns to NYC, and I’m definitely jealous. As we drove me to the airport we had to drive through huge mountains, and on the other side of one was a sprawling view of Cape Town, which was enough to make your heart clench. I’m so glad I came back here and had some down time, though it almost made it a bit more rough as the plane touched down in Joburg, as it felt so much like coming home that I was just overwhelmed with emotions.