Cape Town - A slow day in the sun

Dock House and Table Mountain

LEON:  What a beautiful day it was here.  We awoke late and the sun was shining brightly.  It was very quiet outside, and the air was still.  In the distance, away from the city were some very rugged hills or mountains.  And if you craned your neck from our balcony, you could just barely see Table Mountain, that iconic landmark of Cape Town.  Below our room was a small garden and pool area for the hotel.  Over to the left is a grassy field, perhaps for lawn bowing.  And all around us are the hotels and wharves of the Victoria and Alfred waterfront area.  Check our hotel out at this link:  Dock House Hotel.  It is a great place.  The personal service is incredible.  Breakfast is served in the downstairs lounge, and morning coffee or tea is brought to the room.  Personnel are dressed in loose, almost flowing white simple outfits.  An older gent walked in from the lawn. Of course I am closer to his age than to anyone else in the hotel.  On seeing Barb and I, he looked around and said of the hotel, “this doesn’t disappoint, does it?”.  He’s from Boston and just arrived last night also.

The good news of the day for Barbara is that we went to the boat show, and returned to the hotel without buying a boat.  That’s also the bad news.  Both of us fell in love with some of the amazing craft we saw.  For background you should know that South Africa has become a world center for construction of pleasure water craft.  They are especially well known for their sailing catamarans.  The workmanship is outstanding, plus the designs and layouts are often technically superior.  Many of the Moorings charter boats are built here.  And how do I know so much?  I have lusted for a catamaran sailboat for many years.  I even, in desperation, considered building one.  So, why don’t I have one?  For the same reason we travel in Cattle Class, (er.. um..Economy) seating on airplanes.  Catamaran sailboats are sold at a real price premium.  They have twice as many hulls and twice as many engines are two of the excuses/reasons I have been given.  But oh, are they building some beautiful boats down here.  There was one amazing 60 foot long Carbon Fiber boat that was designed to be sailed at speeds in excess of 20 knots with one hull flying out of the water (just like the 16 foot Hobie cats that many of us have sailed).  But the interior was just as well designed.  You could live in comfort on that boat!  [Barb:  This particular boat was remarkable and had a distinctive ‘airplane’ look and feel, right down to the ‘cockpit’.  So that is probably one of the reasons that Leon was so enamored by it.]  And the layout of the running rigging on the Leopard 39 was really cool!  Here was a large sailboat with all of the complex rigging perfectly set up to be single handed from the Helm.  I took pictures of that setup to try to remember it.  And the next time we charter in the Caribbean, I want it to be a Leopard (Robertson & Caine) catamaran.  That should be a lot of fun to sail.

But the boat show and the jet lag did me in about 3 p.m. Grumpy from yesterday has now become Sleepy.   But not, Miss Energetic-and- still-Truly-Excited.  No, as soon as we get back to the V&A Waterfront area, we have to go to the African Crafts shopping mall.  It’s the size of a large warehouse (which it probably once was) and it was filled with these crafts.  She saw and admired many wonderful and interesting items.   But the memorable one for me was the guitars whose body were made out of one gallon/four liter metal cans.  It was actually a good sound.  [Barb’s note:  But Leon reminded me that I should have brought partially empty bags, rather then overstuffed ones, so that I would have had some room for souvenirs.  I did see a shop that sells suitcases but I’m not going there with him just yet...]

Back at the hotel, and  Sleepy has now become Dopey.  He needs a nap really bad.  Barb goes to the pool to enjoy the warmth and the sun.  Dopey goes to sleep. 

BARB:  For me, so far, the long flight and trip has been pretty easy to adjust to.  I slept at least six straight hours between Dulles and Senegal while Leon claims that he may have slept for a total of three on the entire flight 30+ hr flights, and that was intermittent.  I made sure that I stayed awake the remainder of the flight so that when we arrived at the hotel, I was ready for bed.  It worked because I had the best, long, night’s sleep.  But poor Leon, he slept like a baby, awake every two hours with difficulty getting back to sleep.

I thought that I’d use my time wisely this afternoon so while Leon was recovering from his afternoon nap, and after my time by the pool, I thought that I would get started on our week’s activities while in Cape Town and met with the concierge (but it’s hard to call Mannie a concierge because he does so much more - he’s like our own personal assistant - did we mention that this is a wonderful hotel?). 

While we were waiting for our dinner to be served tonight, at one of the many great restaurants in the Victoria Wharf area across the street from the hotel, I pulled out the several tour company brochures that I had tucked in my pocket and proceeded to go over them with Leon highlighting all of the possibilities and what we could do every day (he probably was thinking “But we just got here and I’m still tired...”).  Tomorrow’s plan is to wake early and after breakfast head out on one of those red double-decker city bus tours.  There is a Market at Green Park that is only open on Sunday where African artisans bring their crafts.  I am not anticipating any complaints from Leon - at least not until tomorrow.  After all,  it’s only fair because I walked around a Boat Show all day today.

The next stop on the bus will be at Table Mountain, where we will get off and do one of the hikes.  Two gentlemen we met this morning after breakfast did a hike today and they said it was rather difficult - and that was the easy hike.  Unfortunately, since tomorrow is Sunday, most of the shops in the down town area that the City Tour passes by will be closed so we may just have to do the remainder of tour again another day. 

I don’t think that I mentioned that across the street in the Victoria Wharf area, there are over 400 shops under one roof, with other craft markets nearby.  If Leon needs to rest in the afternoons after our excursions, I am thinking I have plenty to keep me busy.  And I’m pretty sure a few of these shops sell suitcases.