(North) then South and East

Normally I am pretty good with directions. Our plan for leaving Cape Town was to head south to Cape Point and the Cape of Good Hope via a scenic stretch of road called Chapman's Peak before venturing  east to the southern most tip of Africa and our next stop, the seaside town of L'Agulhas. Being pretty close to the heart to the city, I thought I would program our destination into the GPS I'd hired with the car. Cape Point appeared on the list of favourites so: select -> calculating route -> and off we went - heading north??  OK, loop road round the city or something, I'll go with that. Still heading north?? Don't think this is right. Still still heading north, definitely not right! Either there is another Cape Point a similar distance north of Cape Town as to the one we wanted to go to south or I fell the victim to a GPS destination bomb prank!!  Anyway, 40 minutes later and were back on track. 

The drive down to the Cape of Good hope, originally named Cape of Storms by Potutguese explorer Bartolomeu Dias in 1488 is spectacular, some of the most picturesque scenery I had ever driven along. The cliffs are rugged and steep, plunging into the turquoise clear water of the Atlantic. I had no idea of the sheer beauty of this part of the world and am so glad we were able to get here. 

For many centuries, it was erroneously thought that this peninsular was the southernmost point of Africa and the waters off the coast have claimed to many hundreds of shipwrecks as they attempted to round this perilous headland. The original lighthouse, bulit in 1859 turned out to be too high and too far set back from the actual point to be of any practical use so asecond, more useful lighthouse was built lower down to serve modern navigational needs.

We saw our first baboons (other than the two we are travelling with) on the steep slopes of the tacks leading around the peninsular. There are signs everywhere warning people not to feed them or touch them. On our walk back to the car, a poor unsuspecting family had left their child stroller at the bottom of some steps. This temptation proved too much for a troop (I had to look that up) of baboons who decided to claim it as their own, rifling through the bags, eating the baby food and drinking from the bottles!! In the car park we also saw an opportunistic baboon trying to open car doors!!! We were warned. 

We also saw our first Dassies, cute balls of fur that scurry over the rocks. At first we thought they were rodents but it turns out that they are more related to elephants than rats!! 

As we were playing a bit of time catch up, it was unfortunate that we could not spend as much time exploring the Cape as we originally planned and we were soon back in the car heading east (yes I was sure we were heading in the right direction this time) through the Naval town of Simon's Town and on to yet more spectucular coast line of the Cape Overberg coast.