Top of the Bucket List, and a Grand Adventure, all rolled into one neat package. We flew from Kansas City to Chicago, with a layover of four hours before boarding a KLM flight of 7 hours to Amsterdam. There we waited three hours to fly to Cape Town, South Africa for a 9.5 hour flight to start the adventure of our lifetime! We arrived around 9.30 pm local time (7 hours ahead of cental time), met our guide Owen, and settled into our hotel for a long nights rest.
We awoke this morning to a view of the infamous Table Mountain. Owen recommended that we explore the Waterfront District before heading to wine country in the afternoon. Friday was Freedom Day, the day Nelson Mandela won freedom for the blacks in South Africa and Tuesday will be a May Day Holiday for the workers so Africans have a long weekend and a lot of them spent the day on the waterfront. The clocktower was built in 1862 on Table Bay, the swing bridge was added later for pedestrain access to the quay. Lots of shops, restaurants, bars and entertainment including the iconic ferris wheel are found in this district.
We transferred to the village of Franschhoek (pronouncd Frans - shook) this afternoon where we have a delightful room at the Country Inn. Art galleries, restaurants and souvineer shops are along the main street while vineyards surround the town. Tomorrow we will taste wine from those vineyards.
