not good when the stick shift hits the passengers leg when shifting.

In our boredom, we created a new drink: the Hermanus Hammer. Not good and i don’t think it will catch on. Grape Fanta, Jaeger, Red Bull and Vodka.

Not a good drink...

After our Hammer invention, we were pretty tired and went to bed in our 5 bed hostel room. Maybe it wasn’t a five star hotel…or even a one star, but…well, there are no positives.

The next morning we drove up the coast to the dive spot, Gansbaai. http://www.sharkcagediving.net/ was the tour company, and Brian McFarlane was our company. Apparently, he is of some fame…and he was great. Very excited to captain and show us the sharks. The harbor is a rocky enclave that the boats need to shoot through the surfline to get out…needs a little work. After getting through the break, it is about a 10-15 minute ride to a small island and its neighbor island. The small gap is called “Shark Alley” which is the highest concentration of great whites on the planet.

Getting a closer look...of us.

Just the dorsal fin...

Carcaradon Carcarias

The tour boat is 51′ and holds 40 people. We had 36 people on our tour, and groups of 8 people were in the cage at a time. With the chum, tuna head as bait and the seal decoy, the sharks arrived immediately. We saw between 10-12 great whites, that were between 12-15 feet and weighed about a ton.

Video grab from our dive

They were massive, curious, quick, powerful, graceful and scary. It was awesome. You stand in this cage with your eyesight at the water line. As a shark is nearby, the crew yells a shark is coming and you lower yourself into the water to watch them swim, eat and explore. (Except the English guy next to me- he told me it was safer to look from above…With no sound, it was eery; you would be looking one way at a shark and gaze to the other side and a huge shark would be 5 feet away. Humans really have no chance against them. That being said, they weren’t too interested in us or the boat at all once the bait was removed from the water.

we're going to need a bigger boat

At certain points, the sharks would come straight up and attack the seal decoy at a good pace, which was spectalur. They can accelerate very quickly and when you are in the path of their wake, it is quite impressive how much water they displace.One group, entering the cage with great whites around, screamed, “close the lid!! Please.” Pretty funny, actually.  

Our cage

Curious shark...

A little close- the power of their tales is amazing.

In the cage…

After everyone gets a dive, if you are interested, you can go back in, which we all did. Glad we had a cage…and overall a great experience! Well, not the part when they dragged a dead tuna’s head over my head…but everything else was pretty amazing.

The view from our apartment

From the top after our hike

We woke up with intentions to hike up Table Mountain, take the cable car down and use the early afternoon to drive down to the Cape of Good Hope, check out some penguins and come back for the USA-Algeria game. After taking the long way up, our short hike took over 3 hours and by the time we got back down the mountain, it was time to head to a bar for the game.

View from Table Mountain...

Finishing the hike up

Both the USA and England games were on at the same time at the bar, which is a large bar overlooking the bay in Cape Town. The bar was split 80/20 in favor of American fans and the place was covered with American flags. We had the entire bar singing the national anthem- which you don’t get too often in Africa.

As the game progressed and we still hadn’t scored, our hopes began to dim and some of the fans began to watch the England game in hopes of a Slovenia goal, which would have put us through. With all of our missed opportunities and chances, it seemed like we were doomed to miss out at the expense of the bad calls. But then, the goal happened. I have never seen a celebration like it. People hugging, jumping, singing, rounds of 100 shots, vuvuzelas being used as beer bongs….it was complete craziness. One Indian-American was there and was buying bottles of tequila and passing out shots to American fans. It was an amazing experience but didn’t bode well for the next 40 hours of traveling I had starting at 5 AM the next day.  It was the perfect way to end the trip.

Celebrating the win...

I flew on Emirates, which was the official airline of the World Cup. If you liked, one of the channels showed the previous days’ games on your personal monitor. The third game of our 8 hour flight to Dubai was the USA game from the night before. We were about 6 hours into our flight. As the goal was scored, about 40% of the plane erupted in a cheer again- pretty cool. Almost as cool as the Russian that was sitting next to me reading Russian Playboy. Even better was when he took it with him to the bathroom…yes, to read the articles.

After the 8 hour layover and subsequent 16 hour flight, I arrived home with severe jet lag but it was an amazing trip, a spectacular country that exceeded all expectations and held a fantastic World Cup.

Proper use of a vuvuzela

Last thoughts: Vuvuzelas: yes, they were everywhere. Yes, they were used too often. By everyone. Construction workers, retail employees, airline employees, tourists, locals…us. But, they added a unique vibe, a special feel and provided a great atmosphere at games. Well, unless the guy behind you had one. The TV does not capture the essence of them and at the games they do not sound like a bee hive; rather, they provided an ebb and flow of emotion and decibels at games. As most of the horns were blown by the locals, they would get in synch with each other and it was actually pretty cool to listen to.

vuvuzela....

Culture: (soccer) Soccer in South Africa has a long way to go to be accepted by the white minority(10% of the population, we heard). They are still a rugby loving minority and don’t quite embrace or even understand soccer. The opposite is true of the black majority. They love soccer and don’t quite embrace rugby. The animosity is thinly veiled in conversations. That being said, the entire country was engulfed in the World Cup and the success of the South African team. Everyone had their jerseys on for game day. Mom’s, kids, workers, grandparents, whites, blacks…it was cool to see. I can’t remember any event that had such widespread support from a country.

Safety: We were warned, repeatedly, of the dangers of South Africa. Usually, the first thing we heard about the country. That fact is unfortunate. The country offers so much from a cultural, natural and tourist destination that the safety issue should not be the primary description of the country. We never felt in danger- and while we were careful- it was not a fear that overwhelmed us. We drove ourselves at night. We walked to dinner. We went to action bars and shabeens…ok, that is a local joke. But, overall, the safety issue was overblown and should not be a rationale for not going to South Africa.

After the 1 hour 40 minute flight, we tried to take advantage ofthe warm weather to hike up Table Mountain. Apparently, we weren’t the only ones with that idea- as about 5,000 other people were trying the same thing, so we headed to our hotel in the wine region, about 30 minutes outside of town, Stellenbosch. Our friend, a local South African, was givng us a tour of the wineries…and driving.

He picked us up and promptly took us to a great winery overlooking the wine valley and wine farms. After our tasting, we grabbed lunch and headed to the next winery. The wine valley is spectacular- similar to Yosemite and Napa mixed together…

The next winery was a Dutch/Cape winery built in the 1600′s and we sat on the lawn and had enjoyed wines in the sun. After that winery we went to an even older winery but wasn’t as nice, and it was similar to a winery in Ercole’s…but with spider webs and dirt. Although the ports were amazing and the old school winery feel was nice.

Makes Ercole's look clean...

After that winery our host drove us around the valley a little more. As he continued to drive, he kept mentioning the properties his family owned. I kept thinking of Four Weddings and a Funeral, when one of the characters asks the other if he is in fact the richest man in England. He replies, matter of factly, that he is 7th. The Queen is 1st and that Richard Branson did quite well…

Our host may have been the richest man in South Africa. After the tour, we headed back to his estate and winery for dinner. He provided us winery’s wine and we had a proper South African braai, or BBQ.

After sampling all of their wines by the bottle, we headed back to our hotel in order to drive to Hermanus for our white shark dive.

Greg, not in here...

Wine farms…

View from Tocara winery

The next day, we hit up two more wineries on the way out. We wet to the next region over- similar to the Napa and Sonoma proximity- and then drove the remaining hour to Hermanus. Hermanus is considered the best land based place in the world to see whales but we are about a month early on their migratory route.

We are in a hostel tonight and off to the dive tomorrow.

Soccer City- Argentia vs South KoreaOur seatsMessi's corner kickA little colder in Joburgred devils

We had an early, although quick,  flight to Jo-burg for the next three nights, and three games. So far, Jo-burg is just like any big city, so it isn’t that different or distinct. Took the rental car straight to a “Park and Ride” location where you jump on a bus to the game. 10 minute bus ride and you arrive at the stadium. The new complex, Soccer City, is awesome- but not sure what they are going to do here once the WC ends. Reminds me of a Rose Bowl type stadium, in an offset area, with a hint of Qualcomm in San Diego.

The stadium was incredible and we had really good seats. The Argentines were clearly the majority, and the locals were also clearly in favor of the South Americans. Something we haven’t caught onto as American fans yet are the draping of flags from the rafters- the Argentines had flags and banners everywhere. It felt like we were in Buenos Aires.

 Very good game and lots of goals again- we’ve been lucky so far. 9 goals in two games. We sat next to a Haitian-American, a South African, a North Korean and two Scots….and yes, they were wearing kilts. They were from Falkirk, where a famous battle was fought by William Wallace and represented in Braveheart, but against all my better intentions, I didn’t yell, “Freedom!”

Our seats...

Left the stadium, endured some rush hour traffic and headed over to my buddy’s parent’s house where we are staying for the next three nights. They cooked us a proper South African home-cooked meal which was fantastic and we heard great stories about life in South Africa over the past few decades and lots of cultural stories about integration, segregation, etc.

**Sidenote- driving on the wrong side of the road, in a manual transmission while shifting with your left hand was a challenge.

Big game today- we are off to the USA-Slovenia game, which should be really fun. Looking forward to catching an American game on foreign soil. The Americans represent the largest group traveling in the WC so we should have a good crowd here.

USA Game:

10 rand....or $1.25.

Chris and I drove in from our house in the suburbs to Dave’s hotel to pick him up. He also had a couple friends in town that would be joining us. As we pulled up to the hotel in our car, two Slovenian men came out and asked if they could have a ride to the game. We said sure, and they joined us.

We carpooled to the game and parked in a “park and walk” about a mile from the stadium. The walk was through a little bit of a dodgy neighborhood, but all of the residents were chanting “USA! USA”, which was pretty cool. We walked by a school(a nursery school) that was in session but was advertising sausages for sale as a fundraiser. We asked if they had any beers, she said yes, so for the kids, we went in. The slogan, “beers for kids” was coined. As the sea of Americans walked by, we lured them in with our slogan and soon we had about 100-200 American fans tailgating in a nursery school. Pretty incredible.

After an hour of fundraising, we headed over to the stadium. Chris and I were in the Slovenia section and they were quite fun to sit next to. Fun, jovial and they bought us beers.

After their first two goals, they were apologizing to us- Chris and I kept telling them it wasn’t over yet. After our first goal, they instantly became nervous. After our second, we went crazy- running up the aisles, and celebrating with the other American and South African fans that were rooting for us. After the third, pandemonium broke loose. We were going crazy and it took a couple minutes before we realized the goal was disallowed. They refused to show a replay on the big screen to avoid any controversy.  It was the most fun I’ve ever had at a sporting event.

Our view from the game

Nursery pre-party...

The amount of American fans supporting our team on another continent with such passion was a sight to see- very memorable. As is tradition with soccer games, the players exchange jerseys after the game. Chris, my travel companion, exchanged his US jersey with a Slovenian fan and is now the proud owner of a Slovenian jersey.

I don't want your scarf, man, i want your jersey

After the game, and a police escort to our car, it became very cold and we went to a nearby plaza to watch the England game…but the temps were in the 20’s and the game was boring so we called it a night.

Post-game...

The next day we went over to the local lion park. Sounds normal, like everyone should have a lion park. The park enabled you to pet and hang out with the lion cubs and then drive around 4 lion enclosures to get close to the lions. (Don’t be like the Chinese tourists last year and get out of your car to take pictures. You end up dead.)

A little too big to be in the lion cub area...

Anyway, the lions don’t like vuvuzelas. One of the cars, adorned in an Argentina flag, blew their horn in one of the enclosures to the dismay of the lion pride. Two of the matriarchs stood up to get a better view. The car blew the horn again, louder this time. The lions took offense and walked over to the car, and promptly ripped the flag off the car and trunk. It was in shreds shortly after.

Brazilian lions don't like the Argentine flag

Messi corner kick

Dave pointing at the crocs on the islet

Safari: Day 2.

We woke up early for the 6:00 AM safari drive. Thankfully, no Germans or Austrians on our Jeep, but we did have an interesting group with us; proving once again that the most interesting animals in the park were in our jeep.

The tour starts out in the dark, and cold, and after about 30 minutes, the sun rises and the removes the need for spotlights. We did see the same lion eating again but didn’t have as good of a vantage point and didn’t stay long; although the pride looked like it had another kill, a zebra this time. The couple in the first row(we were in the second row) were not a fan of animals, which is interesting being on a safari. After watching the lion eat for maybe 5-10 minutes, the lady, asked if we could go, that we’d seen enough, and that lions were dangerous….next, we saw Nyala, Impala, giraffe and a couple buffalo. Once again, the lady asked to leave shortly after seeing each animal as they were “dangerous”. She fell asleep shortly after and began snoring. We took a poll in the jeep and she just missed out being fed to the lions.

The three hour tour, yes, a three hour tour, ended and we jumped in our Renault  and headed around the park for our own tour, sans crazy Europeans and frightened ladies. Immediately, we came across a large family of baboons which were climbing next t o us and at one point, we thought they were going to jump into our windows.  We came across a large herd of Nyala, a pack of elephants and a cool black rhino. The black rhinos are the aggressive type and one had attacked a car the night before and smashed the entire front of it. Our Renault would have exploded if it touched us. The rules at the game parks are simple- keep a safe distance from the elephants(and rhinos apparently), don’t get out of your car for any reason and don’t drive a Renault. We adhered to the first two guidelines but the third one, we failed to follow. Shortly into our drive, the “check engine” light came on, and then the passenger window refused to go up. Driving on dirt roads, with animals potentially jumping into your cars was an adventure. By the time we finished up the drive, we had a fine layer of dirt over us and the interior, and a baboon in the back seat. Ok, I made that last part up. Not to mention, we had a 2 hour drive back to Durban the next morning with no window.

Rhino crossing

The next morning we once again drove into the park, and headed to the flatter portion of the park, which was also drier. We spotted a pack of vultures hovering over the road and in the trees and knew a kill was nearby. Thank you, Discovery Channel. Right next to the road, a couple of hyenas were munching on the leftover carcass from a lion kill. We didn’t see the lion pride, but the hyenas and vultures were sharing the meal. Lots of giraffe, wildebeest, elephants, impala and baboons. The strange thing about safaris is how you quickly get sensitized to seeing these amazing animals. We would come across a pack of giraffe that would be 10 feet away, and we would be nonchalant…”yeah, we’ve seen these before…”

We took a short drive out of the park, and stopped at a roadside shack to buy some  nick-nacks. The matriarch did not speak English – her dialect was one of the 15 official languages, which incorporated clicking noises. I gave her a coke bottle. OK, enough of my obscure 80’s movie references. After leaving the shack, we headed to another World Wildlife Preserve, the St. Lucia Wetlands. We stopped at a Croc Centre to check out the four types of African Crocs, before heading to lunch on the river. The patio had a view of the wetlands where we could easily see 10-15 crocs on the shore nearby with hippos coming up and down, wading nearby. The restaurant was part of a ski boat club and people were launching boats nearby. Kayaking, and skiing in that water…uh…no thank you but didn’t seem like a big deal to the locals.

After lunch we drove back, in silence with our window down, to Durban. We checked into a really cool B&B, and walked to another nice part of town for the Bafana Bafana game- once again everyone was in their SA jersey. Listening to their loud singing and pride while their national anthem played was really cool. Unfortunately, they didn’t play well, and the crowd was muted a bit. The area was full of pubs and they were all packed with Swiss and Spanish fans, as they had played nearby that night. Watching the SA women dance with drunken Swiss fans was a sight to be seen. And, after watching the Swiss dance, it is confirmed, that I am part Swiss.

Back to the airport tomorrow morning for an early flight to Jo-Burg and the Argentina-South Korea game.   

Safari sunrise this time...

Rhino crossing...

Close up...

The Thinker

Giraffe crossing

Another monkey...

Pack of impala waiting to be eaten.

Wildebeest and zebra relaxing

Vultures flying to their next meal.

Baboon family in the street

Game totals….

Vampire baboon...

Sunset from Imfolozi

Safari jeep.

Hluhluwe/Imfolozi Park/Safari: We woke up early in Durban and made the 2.5 hour drive to the state park for our wildlife tours and safari. After driving through uninhabited areas from the outskirts of Durban, we finally arrived to some dodgy areas and in the midst of sporadic shanties and a school, you enter this vast state park. Within 2 minutes, we drove up on rhinos. The proximity to the outside world is amazing and we did see some locals walking within the park on the road. We were told not to. We drove another 12 miles in the park to our Hilltop Camp, which is on a Hilltop. Weird. During our drive, we saw more rhinos, giraffe and baboons but we really wanted to see lions and leopards, but weren’t too hopeful about the leopards. After checking in we arranged to join a nighttime safari drive in an open air jeep, which seats about 12 people. There were four of us, two Austrians that weren’t smart, and two sets of two Germans. The Austrians asked if the rangers fed the lions…”no”, he replied. “They feed themselves.” Do you feed the animals that feed the lions? No, once again… When the Austrian continued on about the prospect of seeing a lion, our ranger said that he hoped to and saw one hunting earlier in the day. “Did you shoot it?” No, the lion was hunting…we preserve the animals, we don’t shoot them.” At this point, I laughed out loud. As the sun set, we turned on our spotlights and began looking for animals near the road or looking for their eyes reflecting off the spotlight. Almost immediately we came across two sets of rhinos. Then nothing for about 45 minutes…and the weather was a little chilly with small micro climates of cold air. We did have blankets, as well. Then, a hyena ran across the street and the ranger mentioned a kill was nearby. He said a lion was close. He began searching the bushes with his light and backed up. About 25 yards in, we could see a lion…and she was eating. He cautioned us that he was not allowed to drive into the bush to get closer. So, he drove in. We parked maybe 10 feet away, straight away from the lion as she devoured an enormous buffalo. A second lion was directly behind the lion eating, but was resting. The lion that was eating was completely focused on the buffalo and barely gave a thought to us. The only thing that could have possibly distracted her would have been a Vuvuzela…the lion would spend minutes at a time chewing, ripping the skin and meat and attacking the flesh. While the visual was pretty raw, the sounds were one of a kind. The grunting, breathing, but most of all the bones cracking and breaking from her bites was just awesome. She would stop after a few minutes and just breath heavily to get her breath back and go in for more. We could have stayed there for hours but our guide got nervous and wanted to press on. As we pulled away, the hyenas were waiting. As calmly as a dog laying in the backyard, two hyenas just sat by and waited for the lion to finish…and it will be a few day wait. We pressed on and stopped a mile up the road to stretch our legs and have a drink. We all got out and I took a nature pee in the dark…the most nervous pee I have ever taken… As we pressed on we came across a huge elephant walking down the road. Apparently, he was a dominant male and didn’t think too much of us. (Now, to the German. He was concerned with the obvious and everything was loud…really loud. We were told to only talk in low voices. As we saw the elephant that you couldn’t miss, he screamed “Elephant!” Shh, said the ranger. ) The elephant looked back at us and began to turn…and he was maybe 15 feet ahead of us. The ranger put the jeep in neutral and stepped on the gas. The loud revving of the engine spooked the elephant and he headed just off the road as we put it back in gear and sped off. Our German friend continued to make friends with us and point out animals after we had seen them. Upon seeing a buffalo next to our jeep, he screamed again. The buffalo ran off. “That’s why we don’t scream and shine lights on them- would you want to be woken up while you were sleeping? , asked the ranger. A couple more sightings and were almost home. A jeep in front of us was stopped and shining their lights in a tree, so we crept up slowly. It was clearly an owl. But, the German asked anyway. “What is it” An owl, responded the jeep. He yelled, an eagle!…as the owl flew away. We couldn’t stop laughing about him at dinner. For once, it wasn’t the Americans that were loud. Next up, a 6:00 morning drive.

We headed down to the fanfest in Durban, which was about a 15 minute drive south of here. Very similar to if it were in Santa Monica- we are in a place that is like Hermosa Beach. The fanfest is an enclosed area on the beach and boardwalk with tents, music, big screens for the games and lots of fans. For some reason, I expected more tourists than locals, but it was 80% locals yesterday, with them all supporting the other African nations in the Cup- yesterday it was Algeria and Ghana. When Ghana scored, the place went crazy- makes our Cameroon-Denmark game that much more appealing. (I think I will root for Cameroon now)

Our travel companion Dave, told us the game was at 4:00, local time, we took the bus down around noon. Turns out we had the 8:30 game. We were nice and early for our game…he has been removed of all time-keeping duties from now on. (Just like Chris has been removed from all parking brake responsibilites after we drove on the freeway with our parking brake on)

The Aussies were en masse and were outnumbering the Germans by about 2:1. Both groups were in full gear. Germans wore flags and face paint, while the Aussies had blow up Kangaroos and Kangaroo hats…pretty funny costumes. The fanfest is about a ten minute walk to the stadium and it was a current of people, songs, and horns- the excitement was incredible.

As we approached the stadium, which is absolutely amazing, you could hear the din of the Vuvuzelas from a mile away. We showed up to the game over an hour before kick-off and it was completely full. Everyone standing, singing and cheering. It was the loudest sporting event I had ever been to and it hadn’t started yet…

The Germans were clinical in that game and destroyed the outclassed Aussies, which dampened their spirits throughout, but the Germans were going strong.

**Transportation- no parking at the stadiums. You have to go to park and rides and shuttle in. After the game, everyone heads to a central transportation hub for busses back to their original parking locations. Took us a good 1.5 hours from the end of the game to get back home…being on our feet all day, we were pretty exhausted but it was an amazing experience.

Off to Imfolozi National Park now for two days of safaris and malaria prevention….can’t wait to see the  Big Five: lions, water buffalo, elephant, leopard and rhinos…

Pictures come soon!

After the game ended, loads of people congratulated us on our “good result” and the English thought they were lucky to have a point but were not happy with that goal.

We continuted to party at a local bar and a local family invited us to go fishing with them at 6AM the next day, but we graciously declined.

We were all pretty exhausted and decided to walk back to our hotel for preparations for the Germany/Australia game the following day.

It was interesting that we flew over the Arctic ice caps, over Iceland and Greenland and then down over Europe to get to Dubai in the middle of summer. Dubai was hot. And, dusty. There were quite a few other soccer fans on this flight and they also had the same sadistic travel coordinator with the layover. A few of them were heading into Dubai to check out the nightlife but the prospect of a proper bed and shower proved to be too much, and I opted for sleep, shower and another meal.

Now, we were off to Johannesburg and it was much the same as the first leg:  movie, reading, eating food and Ambien, and a little sleep. The flight was almost all soccer fans which was kind of cool- Brazilian, Nigerian, South African, Mexican and American fans made up the majority. Upon touch down a loud cheer went up and you could feel the excitement building. As we walked through the airport in Jo-Burg, the excitement was palpable. And audible. The Vuvuzela horns were blasted in the airport by fans and airport workers. And the enthusiasm: every worker in the airport was wearing a South African jersey and banners are everywhere. The South Africans we talk to are very hospitable and very, very proud to be hosting the World Cup to show off their country and culture.

Quick flight to Durban on a Southwest-y type airline and we were all set. The opening game was an hour away, and people were going crazy. We rented a car and had a 15 minute drive to our bed and breakfast in the north part of Durban, Umhulanga. Reminds me of Hermosa Beach, San Diego and Hawaii with a little bit of Mexico’s third world flavor thrown in. We watched the game in a little plaza and we were the only foreigners there and only people that weren’t in a yellow , Bafana Bafana(South African team nickname-the Boys) jersey. Crazy atmosphere with the horns blaring throughout and cheers going…although after the game, no one was really into the France-Uruguay game.

Today, we are heading into Durban-proper to check out the fan zones and to watch the Nigeria-Argentina game and find a spot for the USA-England game. Two more of our travelers join us today from Kruger National Park.

The bags are packed for winter in June. The e-books are loaded. The malaria pills are ready. The Ambien is ready. Am I ready? Not sure. I am in store for a 16 hour flight with a 9 hour layover, followed by another 8 hour flight, followed by another 2 hour layover, culminating in a one hour flight to Durban. I should arrive by the end of the World Cup. Actually, I arrive on the 11th in time to watch the first game between South Africa and Mexico.

We have tickets to the following games:

Germany-Australia.

USA-Slovenia.

Denmark-Cameroon.

Argentina-South Korea.

**we may scalp tickets for the Spain Switzerland game or one Portugal game while in Cape Town.

Wine tasting, a safari at Imfolozi National Park(http://www.places.co.za/html/1979.html) and a shark dive (http://www.cape-xtreme.com/adventure-tours/shark-diving/) are also on the agenda.

I will update this once I get to Dubai…