On Thursday January 1^st, we took it sooo easy! We weren’t like hung over or anything, but we knew the beaches and malls and such would be hopelessly overcrowded due to it being a public holiday, and so opted to stay home. Damien made us flapjacks for breakfast; we watched “The Incredibles” on DVD; we dozed a little and read our books. I baked red velvet cupcakes as I had promised Glugs’ brother I would do so whilst we were there, and Damien had befriended a couple of local kids and he went to play soccer and such with them in a nearby park⁺.

Later in the evening my sweet Glugster could no longer sit still, and we went for a drive around the mountain past Scarborough and back. It was too dark to see much, but we did see a couple of penguins in Boulders! It seems they use the rain ditches and such and go quite far inland at night!

On Friday January 2^nd, we slept late- as had become the norm- whilst Damien and my Glugster’s brother did pork rashers, bacon and French toast for breakfast! How spoilt am I, bunnies!?! I didn’t cook once this holiday- except to bake cupcakes.

Then we took ourselves off to the Cape Town Castle with Glugs’ brother accompanying us. The Castle is very big, and very interesting (if a little dilapidated in some places). I was also a tad disappointed in that we weren’t allowed to take photographs inside all of the museums. We were also lucky in that the tourists were not out in force, so it was relatively quiet and we could saunter at our leisure. Afterwards we strolled around Parliament Gardens (AKA The Company Gardens) and fed squirrels with peanuts bought at the main entrance to the park. The pigeons and squirrels both like the peanuts, and will pay no attention to you unless you hold your hand out or go down on your haunches. The little furry buggers are very quick to run up and see if you have anything they want- but they don’t stand still for a photograph if your hand is empty! At one point Damien had two pigeons sitting on his hand and a third one trying to see if there was space for him too! Glugs and I also saw “Tuinhuis” through a big fence (which is where the president lives when he’s in Cape Town) which was cool, since I didn’t know it was so “easy” to see! There is also a huge museum in gardens, but we were unfortunately running out of time on the parking meter when we reached it and decided not to go in. Having looked online and seen photos of the place I am sorry we didn’t get a chance to go back.

After the Company Gardens, we drove to Table Mountain (or “cable mountain” as I keep calling it) to go up in the cable cars. We queued for probably 20 minutes- which I hear is way less than the norm- and froze when we got to the top! The cable car itself is pretty cool, with a revolving floor so you can see all around you as you go up. Although with it having a capacity of 65 people, you should try and get a place by the windows if you want to see anything. The top of the mountain is criss-crossed with paved walkways, and there are lots of places to stand and take some awesome photographs- when there isn’t a cloud making it look like you’re standing on the edge of the planet! It was strange and impressive at the same time. When it was clear, you could see the horizon curving ever so slightly in the distance, when the clouds blow over again you can see to the edge of the mountain but no further- ands its fargin’ cold! While we were up there, there was a couple getting married on one of the look-out points! Their wedding party consisted of all of 4 people apart from the bridal couple, all dressed in white and shades of orange, and in the parking lot we found the priests car- and it said I do weddings anywhere anytime! I reckon the poor bride musta been freezing her tootsies off in her strapless wedding gown, especially since my toes were like icicles in my sandals and I at least had a t-shirt on! We had lunch up there before coming down, and as we were descending the stairs to head to the car they announced they had closed the cable because of the weather!

We then drove to Hout Bay to try and find a place where we could have for sundowners on the beach- and ended up at “Dunes”! Man what a cool place! The only cocktails available that day were “Long Island Iced Teas”, and before we knew it we’d had several and the sun hadn’t set yet! We had supper there as well and we were treated to a truly splendiferous sunset between two hills above the harbour, with a palm tree perfectly placed in front of us to make the pictures interesting! Then it was off home again and straight to bed. After all the walking we’d done through the day we were quite wiped out!

Okay, I admit… there’s a part four!

⁺I just asked him not to buy anything off anyone as he didn’t know these people.