Unlike yesterday, when we were completely free to decide what to do, today was an organized “fun day.” At this point, our distributors haven’t arrived so it’s only my follow Scranton employees and me enjoying the activities. The organizers had originally requested a van for the eight of us, but apparently the van was in use…so the tour company sent a bus that seats 44 people. We had plenty of room to stretch out; I wish my flight over the Atlantic had been this spacious!
The first thing we did was visit Sandy Bay…the only “official” nude beach in all of South Africa! Unfortunately, a couple of things conspired to keep us from enjoying the full experience. First, it’s nearly winter in the Southern Hemisphere so the nudists are mostly clothed now. Second, we were up very high on the cliff and the telephoto lens on my camera isn’t very good.
After our attempted voyeurism, we took a boat to visit some seals on a rock in the ocean. I’m not exactly sure why this is such a tourist attraction; it’s just a bunch of rocks in the ocean with some seals laying about sunning themselves. There were some baby seals, and I could understand the attraction had we been allowed to “go Eskimo” on them with baseball bats…but all we were allowed to do was take pictures.
I think my favorite part of the seal outreach program was the boat ride. I was truly amazed by how close the captain was willing to get to the rocks. We were just a few feet away from being dashed to death against the rocks. Any survivors, I imagine, would have been devoured by the seals. What fun!
Luis Wasserman also provided a bit of entertainment when he needed a pair of sunglasses and attempted pricing negotiations with a local vendor. He ended up calling the vendor “crazy” and a bunch of other things. As a result, relations between South Africa and Colombia are now at an all-time low. We keep telling Luis to mind his manners when he travels internationally, but our advice falls on deaf ears.
It was then time to check out the penguins. I’d seen penguins before…but only in captivity. These were free-range penguins living a life of swimming, catching fish, sunning themselves, and avoiding the Great White sharks that eat them like popcorn. A few of them were walking about, but the great unwashed penguin masses seemed to be huddled near one another on the beach, face down, snoozing.
We eventually made it to the Cape of Good Hope, which was the highlight of our tour. Contrary to popular belief, this is NOT the southernmost part of the African continent. The southernmost point is actually 90 miles to the east-southeast. Nonetheless, this is the point of land on which Bartholomeu Dias landed in 1488. He gave it the name “Cabo de Tormentas” which means “Cape of Storms.” I can certainly see why he named it this; the day we were there, the winds were blowing like mad. It would have been very, very rough in a boat off-shore…and we were there on a “good” day! The King of Portugal, John II, wanted to colonize this part of the word and his marketing people thought that “Cape of Good Hope” might be a better name to attract would-be settlers. It’s been known as such ever since.
The next day, we visited a shopping center called the “Century Mall.” I went there primarily to find some books to read…the supply of books I took on this trip have mostly been read. Time to re-stock.
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