Day 3: Not what it should have been

Unfortunately we were unable to go to Robben island or visit a Township as originally planned today which was really disappointing.

To cut a long story short, there have been taxi strikes all this week in Cape Town because the Government have imposed a requirement that all taxi’s have to be road worthy or they will be seized and destroyed. Sounds good in theory but the reality is that people in the townships run taxi’s for others to get to work that are not roadworthy. This new legislation means that the township taxis will be unfairly penalised so as a result they are all striking in protest, meaning that lots of roads are blocked, tensions are running high and lots of township workers can not get to work.

The result of this is that we couldn’t visit a Township due to raised hostilities and that the Robben Island ferries aren’t running due to a lack of staff for this whole week.

After getting over the disappointment, we still ended up having a great day in Cape Town. We spent the morning learning more about the history of the city on a guided tour and really now feel we understand Cape Town and all its political issues much more.

We also got to go to Bo Kaap which was a part of Cape Town we really wanted to see but probably would not have ventured to without a guide. It has the most beautiful brightly coloured painted houses which are an expression of freedom. Initially all the houses were leased and had to be plain white but when rules were passed enabling slaves to buy properties, they painted them in vivid colours and they really are an incredible sight!

We had lunch back at the V&A waterfront which gave us a chance to sample a Gatsby sandwich which is apparently a Cape Town speciality. It’s basically meat, salad and chips all in a massive baguette and its really very good!. We then took a boat trip round the harbour which had some great views of the city and Table Mountain.

The weather was absolutely glorious after yesterdays chilly winds so we then headed back to our apartment and spent some time soaking up the sun by the pool before heading down to Camps Bay for dinner at Bo-Vine Wine and Grill House where we all had amazing steaks.

Tomorrow is our last full day in Cape Town before we move on to Franschhoek on Friday. We are supposed to be heading down to Cape Point and Boulders Beach. Fingers crossed this trip goes ahead as scheduled!!