Friday 19 January 2018. Photos.
Highlights: Cape Town Landscape, Township Tour, Farewell dinner

The last drive day in the truck and the last full day of the Great African Expedition tour (57 days) that started on 25 November some 56 days ago. It was with mixed feelings I backed my bag and walked down at 6.10 am to the truck for today’s last included breakfast. I’m both happy with the trip and what I’ve experienced and enjoyed but at the same time looking forward to returning home. The good thing is I didn’t have a headache after yesterday’s wine tasting and later that night drinking.

We left our campsite at around 7.30 am which was 30 minutes later than planned, I don’t think we were very well organised today without a duty roster. During the drive to Cape Town we had to undertake an unscheduled toilet stop which combined with the road construction work delayed us somewhat getting into Cape Town. Later this caused some issues with people not thinking they had enough time to find and eat lunch before our 2 pm township tour.

Before that however we stopped on the Cape Town coast to admire the sights; the beach, Robben Island and the cloud covered Table Mountain. During this stop it was obvious to everyone that this is a colder place than most of Africa and very windy.

After settling in at our final destination the Ashanti Lodge Gardens (a hostel) it was time for a township tour provided by a local from a Cape Town township.

This tour saw us go to several notable locations in amongst the shantytown including the killing location for 7 activists back in 1988 and some of the riot locations during the apartheid era. Our guide called most of the offical version on the memorials as misleading with facts changed and he seemed slightly bitter about how South Africa is processing while happy to have tourist visit. We also visited a location store and a local ‘unofficial’ pub and tried a local made beer with a high alcohol level content and a warning to only sip a small portion of the beverage.

We also visited a local shantytown restaurant for local food which I hope doesn’t get me sick later. Back at the hostel I asked about going Shark Cage Diving but was informed that this wasn’t a good idea as there was openly 20% chance of finding the sharks due to the rough weather and whales being in the area, disappointing but you can’t get everything. Gives me a chance to go curio shopping tomorrow instead.

After in the evening the entire group meet up and went out for a final dinner together. Onary handed out our t-shirt orders and I was happy with my official memento of this long tour. Presentations were made to our excellent crew and Onary made a speech thanking us for coming to Africa and encouraging us to come back and to get our friends to visit as well. At the end of the dinner it felt like the tour was finally over even if officially it ends tomorrow morning.