Welcome to South Africa

Another overnight flight, another seat screw up from our original seat booking, and again with the lost meal selection... this time on Swiss Air (acting as a Star Alliance Partner with Air Canada).

In our decent over South Africa I was surprised by how much it looked like everywhere else... atleast from the air. There are fields being cultivated and there are buildings and roads. I'm not sure what I expected to see. Maybe its just a way to be reminded that the world isn't as different from place to place as we like to think.

We landed in Johannesburg (Jo'berg for short) and flew through border control. It was actually pretty similar to Zurich in the way it was organized. We were immediately spotted as tourists when we stepped out of the luggage area and a guy with a bright orange jumpsuit stenciled with PORTER asked us where we were going. We said "Cape Town" and he simply said "Follow me". We were a bit dazed I guess and started following him. It became apparent once our senses returned that we were going to have to pay him for his assistance. We got to the top of an escalator and he grabbed a cart to put our bags on. We stood there having a discussion of whether to put our bags on the cart or not long enough that he got sick of waiting for us and simply walked away.

We knew the general direction now to get to the local flight terminal and started off. We had to go outside and down a walkway and then we were there. It is actually quite a distance from the International terminal. It seems like every airport on the planet is under some sort of construction/renovation/improvement!!

When we walked into the terminal a man with a walkie talkie (I thought he was security) asked us where we were going and we told him. He took us to the check in desk (jumped the queue actually) and then asked us to give him $10US!!! By this time I was done with the silliness and told him he was crazy. I wouldn't pay that at home and he didn't even carry our bags! We gave him $4 and were done with him.

After we checked our luggage through to Cape Town and checked our boarding passes we simply hung out for a few hours waiting for our flight. We ate a meal at an American type steak house and relaxed. The flight to Cape Town was only a couple of hours and fairly uneventful.

Landing in Cape Town we picked up our bags and headed out into the main terminal. We were met by a friendly gentleman from the backpacker hostel we were staying in.

On the trip from the airport he gave us a bit of a tour, pointing out the Table Mountain and the harbour. It's quite a nice little port city actually. We also had our first glimpse of the tin shacks that form the unofficial townships. They are constructed with whatever is at hand and the floors in them are just dirt. Apparantly, there are now roads into them and they can get power. There are community taps to obtain water and there are community bucket toilets that are emptied by the city four times a week.

The hostel is really nice. It has a pool, a bar/restaurant and the rooms are small but clean. Being a coast town and winter is just ending, its fairly chilly here. In the evening the temperature dropped to around 15C or so with a fairly constant breeze. The hostel is courtyard style so the door to our room opens into the courtyard and you have to go outside to access the shower rooms and community toilets.

The predeparture meeting is in the TV room at the hostel. It looks like its going to be a full house. The crew: Paul and Melissa from Boulder Springs who are on their honeymoon
Claire and Jenine from London, both starting their final year of university
Michael and Ryah from Australia but live in UK right now and moving to HK
Sabrina from Mexico City but living in Madrid
Michel and Nadine brother and sister from Switzerland
Jim and Lerece from Australia who travel to get away from the kids for a bit Anna a travel agent from Scotland who lives in England
Kerrie a chef from Australia
Daryl and Kate from Brisbane, Australia
Wendy and Helen from the UK
Nicholas a former wine grower from New Zealand
Quite the bunch!!

The 6pm meeting was to review the itinerary do's, don'ts, questions and logistics and to make our local payment for the tour. We were soooo tired and hungry that I thought this meeting wouldn't end. It was hard to process everything that she was telling us but I'm pretty sure we got enough to get us through... and she'll keep reminding us as we go. Steph is our tour leader and Tony is our driver. Tony is from Kenya and quite a jokester.

The meeting ended at 8:30pm. We have to be at the truck (not bus, TRUCK) with our bags at 7am! EARLY!! We headed to the bar for a bowl of soup and toast and then off to bed.

The hostel rooms aren't really insulated but there is a radiant heater and the showers across the way were nice and warm. There is also a nice puffy duvet on the bed to help keep the cold at bay. Being dead tired didn't hurt either!