CAPE OF GOOD HOPE - CAPE POINT

  When we got to the Cape of Good Hope there were about 40 Japanese tourists haveing their photos individually taken behind the sign.  Our driver politely shooed them away saying there was only three of us and proceeded to take our photos.  Apart from me there was a German girl who had just arrived in Cape Town that day, and a Hungarian IT guy who was a colleague of the Rumanian guy who had been on the safari trip yesterday.

  Cape Point (last photo) is where the Atlantic and Indian oceans meet.  That is somewhere behind me, although precisely where I wouldn't like to bet on, however the water temperature in the Indian ocean is 13 degrees higher.  There is a lighthouse at the top of Cape Point where this photo was taken along with a signpost that as I recall stated it was about 11,000Km to Sydney.

  On the way back our route was impeded by a gang of baboons who had decided upon an afternoonn stroll up the road!  These are the Chacma baboons and they are the only protected population of this species in Africa.  They subsist on fruits, roots, honey, bulbs, insects and scorpions.  During low tide they can be seen roaming the beaches, feeding on sand hoppers and shellfish - that is when they can't find any houses to break in to!

  Further along there is a monument to Vasco de Gama who discovered the route round the Cape to the Indies.  There is also another monument facing the Atlantic ocean dedicated to another pioneer, but I didn't get my camera out in time to snap him, and anyway I didn't catch his name!

  We then drove back to Cape Town along the Indian ocean coast going through Simons Town which house the South African navy as well as a penguin colony.

  We then drove through Muizenberg where Cecil Rhodes died in 1902 and was then sent to Rhodesia for burial.  The beaches around there are good for whale spotting but we didn't see any, I think they are there slightly earlier in the year.  Apparently the East Coast of the penninsula is good for asthmatics because of the Indian Doctor wind that blows over the ocean. 
  We also saw loads of proteas, the national yellow flower after whom the South African cricket team are named.  Somehow I appear to have omitted taking any pictures of these flowers.  Ah well, eyes down for the wine tasting tomorrow!