Overland Day 1

After a less than private night in a backpacker dorm in Cape Town we (all 13 of us) were taken on a ‘Tour of a Township’. This consisted of being driven to a ramshackle slum settlement, walked down the street (poverty porn) and shown memorials of people killed in the struggle against apartheid.

Then we were taken to a local pub, a smoke blackened shanty where the beer is brewed in big open drums and scooped out into large billy-like tins to be passed around and shared. Granted I have made homebrews that tasted worse – but I threw that muck out! Despite the complete lack of anything that might be described as sanitary I did risk my digestive tract’s equilibrium and took a sip. The next morning I paid for it.  Georgie pretended to sip and smiled politely – she clearly has more sense than me!

After the smoke stained, claustrophobic dimness of that shanty we were then taken to a kind of undercover beer garden where you had to first walk down the clamorous street to buy your stubbies then walk back to where the DJ played the music so loud that two of our group put ear plugs in, and the rest of us just gave up hearing anything anyone said. Then some big plates of meat and sausages were plonked on our table. Using our fingers we all tried some. Yaarrggh! Chilli! Nursing my poor bruised taste buds I opted to drink beer instead. Georgie, however, ate two pieces of somewhat undercooked, chilli soaked chicken, and paid for it later.

After that ordeal we piled into our real tour bus (truck) and set off on our real adventure. We drove through stark, dry country, passing numerous vineyards until we stopped at one very scenic farm, set up camp and settled into a wine tasting. After which I managed to manoeuver a somewhat tiddly Georgie – who is unused to drinkling – back to the camp where we were fed a huge meal. I poured a still giggling Georgie into her sleeping bag and turned off the light.

Shanty pub

Sunset at the vineyard