A personalised tour of South Africa’s Cape Peninsula
We were collected from our hotel at 9.30am – that was the beauty of being on a private tour, it meant we could be collected at a time which suited us.
First stop was Signal Hill. The number 1 place to start our tour, as we had just arrived and straight away we could get an overall view of the town. Wow, was my initial impression. What an excellent place to live! I could see the sea on one side, and Table Mountain on the other, and I began to go insane with my camera. We also had a full view of Robben Island and I was happy we had tickets for one or two days time.
Our guide drove us toward Cape Point along the Indian Sea side. We passed through Muizenberg and did a fast photograph stop at St James as I needed an image of the brightly contrasting beach sheds. The sea pool was empty as this was a college day but can imagine it being busy with kids on the end of the week.
I had been anticipating visiting the penguin colony all year and the experience was above my expectancies. Loads of penguins were scattered in couples all over the beach and fynbos. At the base of the ramp ‘the motherhood wing’ kept us entertained with their new chicks. How fortunate that a breeding pair made a decision to make Boulders beach their home, and today there’s a colony of about three thousand penguins living in their natural environment. It was tough to tear myself away but after taking enough pictures to fill a few albums we set off to the Cape of Good Hope.
Standing by the sign indicating the most South-Westerly part of Africa we started to take in the enormity of the first journey around Cape Point made by the Portuguese explorer Diaz. Our guide escorted us on some short walks within the nature reserve so that we could make the most out of visit. By now we were ready for a break and our guide took us to a small restaurant located just outside the reserve.
The food in the deli was delicious and we were the only tourists eating – the restaurant was filled with locals, always an indication that the food will be excellent. Our guide did discuss with us all the lunch options available, but we went for the tasty, lighter option as we wanted to make the most of our day and had special dinner arrangements for the evening. Although we were now heading back to Cape Town I didn’t realise that some of the best scenery was still to come.
Chapman’s Peak Drive takes your breath away which was great that we could stop along the path when we thrilled to take stills. Opened in 1922, this road was carved in the cape cliff and must’ve been an awesome engineering project at that point. Today we could see all of the netting built to capture any falling rocks.
As we still had masses of energy we made a fast stop at the Groot Constantia wine estate prior to going back to the hotel. I was so satisfied that we were able to get here as the estate house reflected the ideal example of Cape Dutch design : thatched roofs and gables. We made a fast stop at the wine sampling centre which was the best way to finish the day.
We found two advantages to having our own guide. Firstly she was able to share anecdotes about the history of the Cape and secondly she managed to avoid the crowds as we travelled in reverse to the coaches and were able to enjoy some of the special locations with minimal people around.
South Africa tours have never been so simple to put together, or so affordable! Cape Tours assures a superb African tour that’s at least ten to fifteen percent cheaper than if you were to book your tour directly. Visit us at http://www.capetours.co.uk
Tags: Cape Peninsula, Cape Town, Destinations
August 08 2012 06:04 pm | Destinations