Since the 1st of the Month

Casey arrived in South Africa on December 1st, but the final leg of his flight was canceled due to Nationwide Airlines being grounded. A week or so prior one of their plane's engines fell off during takeoff. He had to catch a midnight bus from Johannesburg to Durban. I didn't know that he was on a bus though, because the day before my bag was stolen, and it had my phone in it.

We eventually met at the airport, where I learned that Delta lost his luggage along the way.

Neither of us got more than a couple hours of sleep, but we drove into the Drakensburg mountains with the intention to hike to the top of the second tallest waterfall in the world. On the way there, we were pulled over by the police and assigned a bogus 2000 rand fine that we were told we needed to pay immediately. We lied and told them we didn't have any cash on us and they let us go.

We camped at the top of a fantastic gorge and enjoyed a couple of days moving in and out of the clouds, the curve of the earth as the horizon line. Once while walking, we heard awful screaming noises and couldn't figure out what it was until we rounded a corner and saw a huge heard/pride/gaggle/school/pack of babboons. There were probably 20 or more of them running full speed across loose rocks. They would stop to look for food under the rocks, chucking them down the hill, sometimes at our heads. We stopped to watch them, partially because they were cool, partially because they were terrifying.

After getting back to the car, we called Delta and Casey's luggage had made it to JoBurg. Rather than entrust every piece of climbing gear that he owns to the slightly sketchy South African transport system, we decided to go try to track it down at the airport. I'm pretty sure that JoBurg has one of the highest (and ugliest) crime rates in the world, so I was a bit nervous, but we made it there and out again with nothing more than the normal delays trying to navigate a foreign airport communicating with people who don't really care to help and who don't speak very good English.

And now, we're in Cape Town, the 'fairest cape in the world.' It is gorgeous. The first day here we walked out the Cape of Good Hope, where the Indian and Atlantic Oceans meet. We got there just in time for sunset and scrambled a trail out to the lighthouse on the tip of Africa. The coastline here is absolutely breathtaking. The waves crash against enormous rocks that pile up into these huge mountains. The landscape doesn't really make sense, it is so uniquely beautiful.

We climbed Table Mountain yesterday and are about to go do it again. We plan to head North into the Cedarburg Mountains, then trek the undeveloped coastline East. The frustrations of the beginning of the month have definately died down and we're having a great time. See you all soon. Take care!