So after the longest journey by road I’ve ever done, we had finally arrived in Cape Town to the beautiful new house in Sonkring, Brackenfell. A million miles away from the bug-dropping, electric shock giving, power cutting out house in Katima. The first couple of days were of course spent unpacking and organizing whilst getting to know the area. Cape Town is very American feeling; the buildings and streets look like they’re straight out of Florida and the feel of the place is quite American too. Being a fairly new city that suddenly multiplied massively in size the transport isn’t that great unless you’re in central Cape Town. The surrounding areas have been zoned into massive residential areas where there are all sorts of different houses as everyone seems to build their own (it is so much cheaper to build a house here). I haven’t really seen estates of identical houses anywhere. The good thing is that each residential area seems to have its very own mini-mall so you’re never to far from a shop.
One funny thing is that there are ‘English’ areas that have windy lanes and have a very British feel to them, and there are the Afrikaans areas that feel very American, with everything in between. It’s not like Birmingham for example which has a similar feel throughout (albeit apart from the posh bits and poorer bits); every area in Cape Town looks and feels completely different. There is the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront (and yes it is Alfred and not Albert - Alfred being their son) which is the harbour with a huge shopping mall and plenty of coffee shops to boot; this is very modern, well kept and touristy. Then there’s Table View which surprisingly enough is on the opposite side to Table Mountain so you get the view; it’s trendy with lots of bars and restaurants. If you venture further out into the vineyards it is a lot more picturesque with pretty white villas. The time I’ve been here we seem to have been in areas from one extreme to the other. It being difficult to use the public transport we’ve driven to the destinations we wanted to go to so have managed to see quite a bit of Cape Town. The good thing is that unlike London it is very easy to drive around the city, even in the centre and the parking is ridiculously cheap and easy to find. On our travels I’ve seen picturesque beaches with the mountains towering behind the bay, really rundown areas that remind me a lot of the scummier parts of Birmingham, huge modern malls (and plenty of them), windy lanes, massive motorways, mountains and the Cape Flats which are the ‘slum’ villages.
On the whole it’s an astoundingly beautiful place with the mountainous backdrop, vineyards spreading for miles, skyscraper city centre and gorgeous beaches but it still lacks a few creature comforts. For example when we went into a shop to enquire about internet they only seemed to offer internet via a dongle. When asking if they had broadband the reply was that they haven’t got it yet. Is it me or have we had wired internet for about 20 years? That’s the funny thing about Cape Town, on some levels it’s really advanced and seems super hi-tech, but on other levels they seem years behind. The internet and mobile phone prices are ridiculously expensive, it’s like the few providers have the monopoly so can and will charge whatever they want. The cinemas (in Cape Town and Namibia) don’t have surround sound; it took us a while to work out why the sound quality was so rubbish but when we finally did it seemed really strange. I guess it’s something we just take for granted but when you’re then sitting in a cinema it feels like you’ve got back in time. One explanation for this is perhaps that the weather is so much nicer here that there isn’t the market for indoor activities like in Britain, so maybe they’re not willing to spend the money on it as they certainly have the technology, who knows. Generally anything electronic seems either on par with us or a lot more expensive depending on what you’re going for, but the food prices and other things are loads cheaper. You can easily get a nice lunch in a good restaurant for 3 people with 3 coffees for less than 10 pounds, it’s a steal.
One funny thing is that there are ‘English’ areas that have windy lanes and have a very British feel to them, and there are the Afrikaans areas that feel very American, with everything in between. It’s not like Birmingham for example which has a similar feel throughout (albeit apart from the posh bits and poorer bits); every area in Cape Town looks and feels completely different. There is the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront (and yes it is Alfred and not Albert - Alfred being their son) which is the harbour with a huge shopping mall and plenty of coffee shops to boot; this is very modern, well kept and touristy. Then there’s Table View which surprisingly enough is on the opposite side to Table Mountain so you get the view; it’s trendy with lots of bars and restaurants. If you venture further out into the vineyards it is a lot more picturesque with pretty white villas. The time I’ve been here we seem to have been in areas from one extreme to the other. It being difficult to use the public transport we’ve driven to the destinations we wanted to go to so have managed to see quite a bit of Cape Town. The good thing is that unlike London it is very easy to drive around the city, even in the centre and the parking is ridiculously cheap and easy to find. On our travels I’ve seen picturesque beaches with the mountains towering behind the bay, really rundown areas that remind me a lot of the scummier parts of Birmingham, huge modern malls (and plenty of them), windy lanes, massive motorways, mountains and the Cape Flats which are the ‘slum’ villages.
On the whole it’s an astoundingly beautiful place with the mountainous backdrop, vineyards spreading for miles, skyscraper city centre and gorgeous beaches but it still lacks a few creature comforts. For example when we went into a shop to enquire about internet they only seemed to offer internet via a dongle. When asking if they had broadband the reply was that they haven’t got it yet. Is it me or have we had wired internet for about 20 years? That’s the funny thing about Cape Town, on some levels it’s really advanced and seems super hi-tech, but on other levels they seem years behind. The internet and mobile phone prices are ridiculously expensive, it’s like the few providers have the monopoly so can and will charge whatever they want. The cinemas (in Cape Town and Namibia) don’t have surround sound; it took us a while to work out why the sound quality was so rubbish but when we finally did it seemed really strange. I guess it’s something we just take for granted but when you’re then sitting in a cinema it feels like you’ve got back in time. One explanation for this is perhaps that the weather is so much nicer here that there isn’t the market for indoor activities like in Britain, so maybe they’re not willing to spend the money on it as they certainly have the technology, who knows. Generally anything electronic seems either on par with us or a lot more expensive depending on what you’re going for, but the food prices and other things are loads cheaper. You can easily get a nice lunch in a good restaurant for 3 people with 3 coffees for less than 10 pounds, it’s a steal.
One thing that the Africans in general seem to have that we don’t are basket trolleys. Genius. They are small trolleys that hold your basket in the supermarket so you don’t have to lug one round and they even hold up to 3 at a time, why haven’t we thought of that?! Also the men in the petrol stations that fill up your car for you, I know we used to have a similar operation but these guys also do your oil, water and tyres for you, without you even having to get out the car. To think what better condition all our cars would be in if we had a service like that. The parties I’ve been to here have also been awesome, generally very friendly and lots of good fun. The men seriously need to work on their chat-up lines though; at one party I had a guy that first told me he was gay, then admitted he was straight and continued to go on saying he thought we were made for each other without having even asked my name. When I pointed this out to him he seemed a little flustered and so I showed him my driving license to give him a clue to which he exclaimed Lizzie! Not the sharpest tool in the box.
I would definitely recommend a visit to this beautiful place if you ever have the chance, but whether I’d want to live here long term I’m not too sure. If you’re doing the touristy thing there are loads of places to go and see, plus with the amount of malls (Century City, Tiger Valley, V&A, N1 City to name just a few) there are certainly some opportunities to do some shopping. Table Mountain is worth a trip as are the vineyards. You’re spoilt for choice with beaches; some on the Atlantic perfect for surfing with others on the Indian which are great for sunbathing and swimming. It’s worth checking out what’s on at the CTICC (a bit like the NEC) as both the events I’ve been to there have been amazing. There are also the gardens and plenty of historical sights to see too. The only thing really that makes me debate about a life here is the pure difficulty to get any information about anything. Why not use the internet you say? Well we have tried that too but if you’re lucky enough to find a website about what you’re looking for then it’s usually not up to date. We tried for weeks to find out if there were any busses running in our area. We asked at tourist information (which took us 3 attempts to find in the first place as the maps and websites were out of date) but although they were very helpful, they didn’t know much about the transport. We finally found a website for the busses but it didn’t state where or when they ran so we rang the enquiry line, which referred us to the website. We are were starting to think that it is some form of secret bus service that only very particular people could use and have contemplated just standing on the road until we see one (if we see one) and trying to flag it down. We even found lay-by type things that look a lot like bus stops but don’t have a sign or a timetable so we’re not entirely sure what they are.
The secret bus service pretty much sums up the attitude here about information. If you don’t already know what you want to know then it’s unlikely you’ll ever find out. So as a tourist destination, definitely, but to live permanently, maybe not.
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