More Adventures in Africa: Cape Town

What a beautiful, beautiful city!! We arrived at the airport and took a cab to Ruth's house in the Constantia section of Cape Town. Ruth was the perfect Couchsurfing hostess as she was very friendly and welcoming and a lot of fun!. Her house is beautiful with lovely gardens and we had a lovely room and bath. We chatted a bit that night and she offered to drive us all of the way around the Cape Town coast the next day.
After a yummy breakfast on Ruth's terrace, she drove us through part of the peninsula with great views of Table Mountain and then we drove through Simon's Town on the Indian Ocean with its nice old hotel and buildings. The next stop was to walk through the penguin sanctuary and then on the rocks by the sea to see the penguins which numbered in the hundreds. We even got to pet one! We stopped at Boulders for another walk on the beautiful beach and to pick mussels from the rocks for dinner. We then drove across the mountains to Scarborough and the amazing Chapman's Peak Drive. on the Atlantic Ocean side. Chapman's Peak is deservedly known as one of the world's best ocean drive as the ocean views down sheer cliff sides are spectacular. We met Ruth's friend Craig, a very interesting guy, for lunch at a seaside restaurant in Hout Bay where we had delicious tuna and sushi. We walked down to the wharf after lunch and were almost bowled over by the fierce winds.The waves were wild! We drove through Clifton, an upscale beach community before driving through the city center and seeing more views of Table Mountain.
That night, Ruth made us a braai dinner of kudu and lamb which was yummy and we also had those mussels that Ruth had picked earlier in the day and Craig had deliciously prepared. Ruth's neighbors came for dinner also and it was a lively and fun evening.
The next day we took the train to the center of Cape Town which was quite an experience. We could barely get in the door as people were packed so tightly and there were even people riding on the attachments between train cars! The first stop that day was Robben Island which we reached by ferry. It was a sobering experience to see the desolate island within view of Cape Town and Table Mountain. Former political prisoners are now the guides and some even live on the island, although I don't know how they could stand it with all of the bad memories.
We had lunch on the waterfront, rode on the ferris wheel and then took the cable car up Table Mountain. We enjoyed some hikes and the views on top before coming down to meet our next Couchsurfing hosts, Kevin and Monique. We met them as well as Rith and Craig at a Pechakucha event. We had never heard of these before but they are held all over the world. Various people get up on the stage to speak about a topic of interest to them for 6 minutes. There was quite a diversity of topics and it was quite interesting. Kevin and Monique have a cute house in the Pinelands area and we had a nice chat with them before going to bed.
Monique dropped us off at Kirstenbosch Gardens which has a canopy trail and a braille trail as well as lush lawns, over 22000 types of indigenous plants and the Table Mountain backdrop. We took a taxi to an Indian market for lunch and then toured the Slave Lodge. Slavery was started here in the mid 1600s by the Dutch East India Company. The exhibits were informative and horrifying as expected. We took a walk to Bo-Kaap, a largely Muslim section with its brightly colored houses, before joining Monique and Kevin for a dinner of Boerwoerst, a traditional dish of sausage and fried onions on rolls.
The next day we picked up a rental car ans sadly left this gorgeous city.