The Garden Route, South Africa

Our plan for the last week of our 6 week Africa journey is to do the Garden Route - a stretch of South Africa's south coast from Mossel Bay to Storms River.

We say goodbye to the high-life as we leave the manor and continue East. The road out of Franshoek is steep and winding, giving us some incredible views of the valley that the town sits in.

We stop at a small town for some road-trip supplies (snacks and energy drinks). The place is going off. People everywhere, in the car parks, wandering around. Lots of market stalls selling all kinds of stuff. We are wondering if this is going to be representative of the towns of South Africa. Time will tell.

We are aiming for a town called Oudtshoorn - a town we hear is run by Ostriches. They have farms where you can see them up close and potentially ride them, although, doesn't sound very humane.

We arrive a fair bit later than we anticipated. Too late to do an Ostrich farm, but we see flocks of them on the side of the road. We pull over and give one some company. He seems very intrigued by us and sticks around while we chat and take photos of him. We don't ride him and continue on our merry way.

Our destination for the night is Mossel Bay. We arrive on sunset. The views are cool into the bay, which apparently has the largest colony of Great White's on the coast due to a nice little island housing thousands of seals. Yummy, yummy seals.

We head to the main street for dinner. We catch some of the Man Utd Vs Liverpool game. It's a little difficult to watch as the local drunks are trying to engage in conversation with us. I use the word "trying" for two reasons. 1, they are maggot drunk and introduce themselves about 5 times. 2, we're trying to watch the game - stop talking. Our walk home sees us encounter a couple more drunks as well. Pretty little town, shame about the people.

Day 2

We have a shorter drive today which we are grateful for. We forgot how road-tripping can take it out of you. Our destination is Jeffreys Bay and the real pretty part of the Garden Route is set to begin.

We drive through two major local tourist destinations Knysna and Plettenberg Bay. Both seem to be without charm but quite lively. Knysna is surrounded by a massive lagoon which seems pretty cool.

We stop at a padstal (farm stall) and have a coffee and pick up some food. Padstals are all the rage along this route.

We arrive at Jeffreys Bay in the early afternoon. It's windy and pretty chilly. We're wondering if we are going to be able to head into the water.

Our accommodation is a 50m walk to the beach of Supertubes, home of the J-Bay Open on the world surfing tour due to its reportedly "best right hander in the world". This is also the site where Mick Fanning was attacked by a shark a few months back.

We walk down to the beach and its beautiful - but the surf is terrible. No one is out there. We walk down the beach and make friends with a seabird. This looks like a good place to set up shop for a few nights.

We cruise around the town for half an hour, looking in every nook to see what it's all about. It looks as though this place is a dedicated "beach-house, summer holiday" town. Some very nice houses all along the coast.

We spot a Greek restaurant - a chance to have something semi-healthy. Yay. The owner is super friendly and gives us plenty of information. Where to go, what to do, where the fishing is good (we don't fish, but all good).

We both order a lamb shank and its the biggest slab of meat we've seen. We somehow cram it in and head back to our place. We make plans for tomorrow and get to sleep.

Day 3

We have the low-down on a good cafe in town. So off we go. It doesn't disappoint. A strong coffee and a full belly later and we are off.

Our Greek friend told us that low tide was at 9:44 this morning and the rock pools exposed at Supertubes make for good foraging. We take Lola, the resident dog down to the beach with us and walk up and down the rock pools. We spot plenty of little fish and star fish. No octopus though. There are a few others doing the same thing, but with bags and poles. They seem to know what they are doing. One guy was eating what he found. That's pretty fresh.

When in Rome, go surfing... or however the saying goes. Jeff hires a board and wetsuit from our hosts who are a surfing family from Europe. They have traveled the world and found their place. They are home-schooling their son due to lack of decent schools here though.

The surf is much better today. Too good for a beginner at Supertubes due to the their size and the fact they pretty much break on rocks. So we head to the Kitchen Windows, the safer surf beach for beginners and swimmers.

Jeff misses out on booking an actual surf lesson, but that doesn't matter, how hard can it be?

After a lot of "faffing about" in the surf, including a nice wipeout with the board to the back of the head, Jeff manages to stand up. He improves as the afternoon goes on. Courts catches up on some reading and laughs at Jeff from the sand. She comes in for a dip and a spot of body-surfing. A similar result to when we were in Rio occurs with a major wardrobe malfunction and that was the end of that chapter. We pack it up and take the board home (it doesn't fit in the small VW so the back hatch is wide open and Courts is riding in the back holding the board).

As is usually the case, we are starving after being in the water. We head to a Mexican place. The food is sooo cheesy. Our waiter is almost stereo-typically South African. He says "it's a pleasure" about a thousand times. This is the South African equivalent of "you're welcome".

We head to the factory outlets of all the familiar Aussie brands - Rip Curl, Billabong, Quicksilver etc. The prices are cheap, but not super cheap. Jeff buys a couple of pairs of boardies.

We grab a coffee from a good looking place. You can buy beans there and have them roasted while you wait.

Jeff wants to try one more surf. We head to a small beach near where we are staying that is accessible without tackling the rocks. He tries heading in but due to the high tide heading back in, there is some sort of rip there. He flails about for a bit and then calls it quits.

We walk back to Supertubes and watch the experts do it in style. They make it look effortless despite the size of the waves. Some pretty massive wipeouts have us cringing. Better them than us. We also see a heap of dolphins diving about near the surfers.

We pack it in for the night only to be woken at 1am to an incredible electrical storm. Lightning and thunder all around the bay all night. A very impressive light show means we don't sleep as much as we should have.

Day 4

We head straight back to the cafe from yesterday. There didn't seem to be any places that were going to beat what we got last time. Awesome spot. We get going as soon as possible so we have plenty of time at Addo National Park - one last game drive for us in our own car this time.

Entry is about $20 for the car. We are given a map and now its over to us. We've learned a few things along the way, so we should be safe.

We haven't seen any animals in a while so being able to hunt for them again is exciting. We spot some warthogs pretty soon. We get right next to them, they don't care. It turns out the park should have the nickname of Warthog Park instead of Elephant Park, though. Sooo many of them.

We nearly run over a leopard tortoise and spot a number of new animals. We happily add them to our long list. We pass a fellow driver and he says they have spotted a huge number of elephants nearby. We check the clock and decide to head for them. We spot them along with some zebras right on the side of the road. Worth the trip.

We head back to the entrance gate slowly, wait for the occasional animal crossing (Buffalo, Red Hartebeest). So long animals. Great to see you.

East London is our destination for tonight. The driving is pretty comfortable at this point. The highways allow for 120kmph and the drivers are extremely considerate, driving in the shoulder lane to allow for easy overtaking. This is always thanked by a flash of the hazards.

Driving through the small towns is another story. People show no regard for cars. They seem to wait for the lights to go green for the cars before attempting a ridiculously dangerous crossing. There are also more and more cows, goats and dogs appearing near and on the roads.

We arrive just on dusk and manage to get into the complex we are staying. Adri is our host. She is new to the Air BnB game, but makes up for her inexperience with her bubbly personality. She offers us a beer on arrival. She is drinking wine and seems to be well on her way and is very happy to chat. She shows us around her massive house, of which we have 1 bedroom. It overlooks the
Nahoon River which looks spectacular the next morning.

Adri gives us a great tip for dinner and off we go. Its on one of the main streets of East London - the nice part of East London. One thing we have noticed about the cities of South Africa is that they always have 2 parts: The hustle and bustle of the CBD - full of markets and people and general chaos, and then the nicer, quieter area with generally some nice houses and shops. Our restaurant serves up a great menu, full of tough choices. Courts goes with the Ostrich medallions, Jeff goes for the venison burger with cured Springbok. Both are amazing.

Our waiter is very friendly and we talk about Africa for a while. Jeff picks up on his accent and mannerisms and asks if he is Zimbabwean. He is a little shocked and says yes, his Mum is Zimbabwean, well spotted.

East London has a casino, so we must go. We do, we get dominated at Blackjack and head home to Adri's place. She is "asleep" on the couch with the volume right up.

A very long drive for us tomorrow. Longer than expected. The distance is not great, but there will be some interesting roads to tackle, according to Adri.

Day 5

Despite Adri continually reminding us of the long drive in-store for us to Durban today, we are quite slow in getting ready and leaving. Adri cooks us breakfast and we continue to share stories. Its good to hear more stories from a local about how things work around here and in the country. It sounds like SA are very progressive in some areas, such as health care and insurance with the introduction of "Vitality Points" which seems to be gamifying healthy living across SA.

We finally make it out around 11am. We head for the city centre to see what it's all about. As usual, it's a tale of two cities. The centre is a hectic mess. Jeff is glad to escape out of the place with all fenders in tact.

We head for Durban. Adri was right - the roads become more and more interesting. Cattle become a huge concern. Courts is on sheep watch and spots one about to jump in front of the car. As night falls it starts raining. It's difficult to see and there are still plenty of cars cruising past at 130kmph. The white water rafting was definitely scary, but I think this drive would have been 10 times more dangerous.

We arrive in big Durban at around 9pm. The city is empty aside from a few ladies of the night on the corner. We are absolutely spent from a week of driving and cannot be bothered organising accommodation. We head straight for the casino resort Suncoast and get the nicest/cheapest room available.

We order room service, spread out on the bed and watch some TV before heading down the hall to the casino. Jeff essentially loses all his money to Courts and we head back. We do a last check to make sure everything is organised for our return home tomorrow and get about 4 hours sleep.

Day 6

This is it :( our final day. Coming home day. First step is to get this rental car back and get our flight from Durban to Johannesburg. The roads are busy with the morning commuters but we get there and get the flight without any issues.

We now have the bulk of the day to kill at JoBurg airport. Not a bad thing as we have some blogging to do and some reading. We chill out in the cafes until we can check our bags. Jeff notes that the JoBurg casino is about 1km away (he has an eye for these things) - so we get on the next shuttle bus and spend an hour there.
Courts wins what Jeff loses (again!), we add a couple of chips to the souvenir collection and head back to the airport terminal.

It has been an absolute whirlwind, these last 6 weeks. We will need another 6 weeks to digest it all. The animals, landscapes and sunsets were incredible and have to be seen to be believed. Our photos will not do them any justice. The people proved to be friendly and happy, despite some of the tough conditions they are facing. We did feel less safe than during our trip to South and North America - we were unable to pinpoint exactly why, however.

While much progress has been made since apartheid, you can see there is along way to go for SA. With so much natural beauty and an incredible pride shown for the country by its people, the odds are in their favor.

Thanks for having us, Africa. Cheers.