Tag: fish

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Cape Town, South Africa

Back in 2010 South Africa hosted the World Cup and several of my friends went down there on a trip I unfortunately was unable to attend.  They came back and raved about the country and everything it had to offer.  Luckily my chance to visit South Africa happened with a family holiday trip.

Our journey started in Cape Town, a beautiful European, non-smoking, English speaking (1 of 11 national languages) city with Southern California weather; it reminded me very much of Sydney.  It didn’t feel like Africa, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing after a 14-hour flight, and quite honestly, as I discovered throughout the trip, South Africa is a really easy country to negotiate for foreigners (just watch out cause they do drive on the left there).

One major thing to note is this:  The tap water in Cape Town is fine.  Our tour guide, Warren, insisted that we ignore what the guidebooks said, so we took the chance and didn’t have any problems.  I wouldn’t go drinking it in large amounts, but for brushing teeth and eating vegetables it’s perfectly fine.  (Warren was a great tour guide, I’d highly recommend reaching out to him if you ever visit: warrenmorris34@gmail.com) We also discovered that South Africa is also pretty progressive, as it’s the first country in Africa to legalize abortion and gay marriage; just a small step towards making up for the years of racism, which I’ll touch upon in depth later.

We stayed around the Victoria Wharf waterfront, which is super touristy, but very comfortable.  The waterfront, with live calypso bands playing constantly, is the center where most of the activities, food, the aquarium, and shopping can be found.  And there is plenty of shopping and eating to be had.  The exchange rate when we were there was a generous $1 to 13 South African Rand (R), so let’s just say we indulged in some very nice meals for the price of a trip to Olive Garden.

Here’s a rundown of a few things you can find at the Victoria Wharf waterfront.

Ferry to Robben Island

I’m going to start my coverage of South Africa with this.  1) Buy tickets in advance for Robben Island.  They should be around $23.  2) Even then there’s no guarantee you’ll make it there.  We did NOT go to Robben Island.  Robben Island is like the Alcatraz of South Africa, the place where political prisoners were held, including the great Nelson Mandela who was imprisoned for 27 years.  And we didn’t make it there.  Why?  Who the hell knows.  The official excuse was that the ferry broke down.  The unofficial theory is that there was some form of corruption in play that apparently is not unusual that stopped the ferries.  Even though we got our money back, it was unfortunate and disappointing to say the least.  So if you’re planning a trip to Cape Town, yes you have to try and go to Robben Island because it’s like the Statue of Liberty of Cape Town.  But it’s annoying that you may travel all the way there and something might throw a wrench into that plan.

Breakwater Lodge (Protea Hotel)
Portswood Road, V & A Waterfront
Cape Town, 8001 South Africa

If you’re looking for a place to stay, Protea Hotels (the Protea is the national flower) are all around Cape Town, but the Breakwater Lodge is the location that’s closest to the waterfront; it’s about a 10-minute walk. The hotel is super clean, very modern, and has a fantastic breakfast buffet.  The hotel is located on Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business, which also happens to be a former women’s prison, so it’s unique to say the least.  But it’s the proximity to the waterfront that is it’s biggest selling point.

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Two bedroom

Quay Four
4, W Quay Rd, V & A Waterfront
Cape Town, 8001, South Africa

Pronounced “Key Four” (dropping some knowledge on you there), this was our first meal in Cape Town and was quite honestly one of the best.  The restaurant is right on the water and is composed of two parts.  The downstairs is a bar and patio with cheaper fare, whereas the upstairs and upstairs porch is a bit more fine dining.  We grabbed food upstairs and I had my first taste of Kingklip, a regional fish popular in South Africa.  The fish was quite good, a lot meatier than I thought it would be, and it was served with potatoes and butter sauce.  I’d also recommend their calamari appetizer.

Willoughby & Co.
Shop 6132, Lower Level, Victoria Wharf

This seafood restaurant is actually located in the mall, and you can’t miss it because of the crowd of people sitting in the atrium tables they’ve set up and the line of hungry patrons trying to get in.  After we saw the line we figured it had to be good and worth trying.  While in line, they offer a wine tasting to ease the waiting period.  We were told the sushi was the most popular dish by our wine server, so that’s what we tried.  They have a “4 X 4” sushi platter which is a combo of their popular rainbow reloaded roll (tuna) and spicy creamy rock shrimp roll.  The food was great–the service, well…the waiter was pretty smarmy.  I couldn’t tell if it was him being just being a dick or if it was a South African attitude thing, but it rubbed some in our group the wrong way and it takes the restaurant down a peg.

Belthazar
Shop No. 153, Victoria Wharf

If for some reason you’re craving steak there’s a restaurant option in the mall called Belthazar that was actually pretty good.  They claim it’s rated the best steakhouse in Cape Town, which could easily be made up, but also could easily be true because I’m guessing there aren’t THAT many steakhouses in Cape Town to compete with. Regardless, the steak was damn good, and as I mentioned before, pretty reasonably priced, but again it’s only really worth going to if you’re craving steak.

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Chicago Cut Steak

Watershed and V&A Food Market at the Waterfront

These are just two of several places to go shopping on the waterfront aside from the traditional mall, which is like any other mall you’d find in the U.S.  The Watershed and V&A Food Market are quite charming and offer some non-chain products from locals.  In there you can find local artisan foods and goods, such as jewelry, nuts, fudge, teas, textiles, home goods, etc.  It’s worth a walk through if you’re looking for a souvenir.

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Wat Xieng Thong, Phu Si Hill, and the Night Market

After we decompressed for a little bit at Le Bel Air, we made our way across that freakin’ bridge and headed into town.  The walk to the main part of the town is about 15 minutes.  Our destination was Wat Xieng Thong, which is one of the key wats in the all of Laos.  It’s at the further end of the town, so don’t mistake one of the many wats you’ll pass by for it (we were fooled once and walked into the wrong wat).

Once we did find Wat Xieng Thong, the admission is 20K kip.  Unsurprisingly, the wat is a peaceful, zen-like monastery with several shrines featuring a multitude of gold Buddhas.  Monks, in the traditional orange attire, mill around and go about their day-to-day tasks.  It does feel a little strange as a tourist to essentially be wandering around their residence, but the monks we encountered seemed used to the scenario.

After Wat Xieng Thong, and a quick stop for a croissant at Le Banneton Cafe (Laos is known for their bakeries from their time as a French colony), we walked down along the Mehkong River and headed toward Phu (or Phou) Si Hill.  You should try and time this walk a little before sunset, the views along the river at that time are amazing.  It’s like something out of a movie set with the mountains, fisherman, and monks along the river’s sandy beach.

We reached Phu Si Hill along with everyone else a few minutes before sunset.  This is probably the only time Luang Prabang felt really touristy, but even then it wasn’t so bad because most people kept quiet at the top to enjoy the view.  The climb up is rather challenging, but doable, and it costs 20K kip to ascend to the top.

Once you get to the top, it’s inevitably going to be crowded, but people were pretty polite and quietly sidestepped all around to get out of the way of people taking pictures.  The sunset is a sight to see and is probably one of the must-do experiences of Luang Prabang.

 

When you’re done with the sunset, by the time you reach the bottom you’ll literally be right on top of the Night Market.  I cannot say enough about how impressed I was by this market and how enjoyable of an experience it was.  The market sold the typical touristy souvenirs and such, but the ambiance was like no other market I’ve been to (and I’ve been to quite a few).  It was so quiet; you couldn’t hear anything louder than whispers.  The vendors were all sitting politely, not in your face or loud, and their goods were all so neatly laid out we almost felt bad picking up the products and disturbing their presentation.  For the backpackers, the Night Market offers a 10K kip street buffet dinner (remember $1 = 8K kip) which was packed with hungry young people.  This market ended up being where we did the primary amount of shopping for folks back home based solely on the comfort at which we were able to shop.

For dinner I would recommend stopping in at Coconut Garden, located at the end of the Night Market (that is if you don’t do the street buffet).  Coconut Garden is a Lonely Planet selection and the guidebook lives up to their usual standards when it comes to food choices.  The restaurant offers both meat and vegetarian tasting dishes on top of their usual menu.  We orders a veggie tasting menu along with the Laos signature Steamed Mehkong Fish in Banana leaves and a Chicken/Vegetable Fried Rice w/ Fried Egg.  After that, we grabbed a beer across the street at a great little bar called Tangor to people watch before heading back to The Le Bel Air for some patio beers to finish up the day.