November 20, 2008 – Madikwe Safari and transfer to Cape Town

We again had a 4:00am wake up, coffee & biscuits at 4:30 and were on the road by 5:00. It was overcast and cooler than previous mornings but we started by seeing a giraffe on the road just outside the gate. Although we saw several more giraffe, several elephants and wildebeest, most of the reserve’s animals were in hiding. We did see about 10 giraffe all around the airstrip when we went by it on search for lion. Guides from all the lodges are in radio contact and none reported any sightings. It was a pleasant sunny morning so the drive was enjoyable. We returned to the lodge a bit early around 8:30 and the chef requested that we spend an hour to shower and pack (he wasn’t ready for us yet.) We had another superb breakfast and relaxed around the lodge until it was time to go to the airstrip. It had started drizzling and the temperature had dropped so it was a bit chilly driving to the airstrip. A couple of giraffe and elephants said good bye to us on the way. The plane arrived, dropped some new guests and took us to Johannesburg where we had a ½ hour delay in the Cape Town flight. It was a 2 hour flight but they still fed us a sandwich and wine – at no charge. On the drive from the airport we saw quite a bit of downtown Cape Town including the 65,000 fan soccer stadium being built for the 2010 World Cup which will be played in South Africa. Cape Town will host opening ceremonies and semi final games. Digital clocks are everywhere showing the countdown time until the start of the games, 500 and some days away. At the back of the city is the famous Table Mountain, a flat top mountain often capped by a cloud layer, prompting the comment “the Table is covered.” We were back in our suite at 6:30, showered & changed and joined friends for a dinner at the V & A waterfront mall, about 200 yards from the ship. The mall is fairly new and has about 350 shops including about 60 restaurants & coffee shops. The majority of the restaurants were upscale but the prices were incredibly low, much like Buenos Aires. Good wines in the restaurants went for $5.00 to $17.00. We had a tour scheduled the next morning so we went straight to sleep when we returned to the ship.