Our clothes is drying in the fresh wind of the Marmara Sea. We are in Istanbul, but my mind is still in South Africa. While Natalie is taking a nap after our long flight from Cape Town this night, I decided to write some words down summarizing our time in South Africa. A couple of things in SA were very special to us which are worth to write down.
From the beginning of our trip we instantly fell in love with the sunrises in South Africa. From the frist day in the wilderness reserve we started to get up early to see the sunrise I got up at 5 am and made some coffee for my love and a cup of black tea with milk for me. Then we both simple sat outside with tea, rusk and coffee and enjoyed the early morning hours. We could see how everything was getting alive. Birds started singing and flying around, from time to time lions roared in the neighbourhood, antilopes fed quietly on grass and everything was enlightened by a beautiful warm morning light.
When we started our road trip we kept doing this every morning and we were gifted with stunning sunrises in the Drakensberg mountains and along the whole coastline down to Cape town. Every sunrise was somehow different and unique and Natalie and me loved the quiet time in the morning. As the days obviously started early for us we went to bed between 8 and 9 pm. We did not miss any of the things we would have done usually at home. We lived our life in a natural rhythm, just driven by the sunlight. It was amazing to see how many things you can do more during a day if you get up with the first daylight.
Not to forget to mention are the stunning sunsets as well. It all started almost everyday with the golden hour between 4 and 5 pm. The sun light was smooth and touched everything in a warm golden colour. Followed by some of the most stunning sunsets we have seen during our entire travel so far. We still have a hard time selecting the best pictures for our webpage, so do not be surprised if there are a lot of sunrise amd sunset pictures ;).
Another point which really impressed us was the diversity of landscap and wildlife in South Africa. We had amazing animal encounters during our stay at the Askari reserve and we were introduced to bird watching as well. This was such great fun that we kept doing it during our whole time in SA. I was excited like a child about some chocolate when I spotted rare and endangered birds like the horned hornbill, the secretary bird or the brown crested eagle, just to name a few.
Further we were so blessed to see southern right whales from the shores of Hermanus even though we stopped there for only 2 hours. We stood speechless next to each other and couldn’t believe that a couple of days before we were looking at giraffes, rhinos, elephants and lions. It is not possible to name all the wild animals we have seen during our 6 weeks. Our pictures capture a lot, but often we were not quick enough to take a proper pictures, especially when it came to birds. The rich wildlife along the coastline as well as inland is remarkable and more divers than any of the other countries we have been to.
The same is to say about the richness and diversity of the landscape. We loved the Savanna in the north east, the mysterious Drakensberg mountains in the middle East, the lonely wild coast in the South East, the wine region near Cape town and the spectacular end of the African continent at the Cape of Good Hope in the very South. And everywhere the scenery is not just beautiful, but really stunning. We stood there speechless every time and could not believe that it yet again is so breathtaking. Each place is exciting in its own right and worth staying there for longer.
And there was great food everywhere. My first food encounter was South African rusk. I had it almost every morning to dip it into my English tea. What I loved about it was the strong texture and the mild sweetness. You can easily dip it into hot tea without falling apart immediately. Than there is the amazing barbecue, called Braai in South Africa. It starts always with a big campfire to produce enough hot charcoal. This means you start between 2 and 3 hours before the actual grill session. Because of that it is much more relaxing and longer than a typical German barbecue, it is more like a real celebration and get together everytime. Once the hot charcoal is seperated a metall rack is placed over the charcoal and the grill session starts. Maybe influenced by German immigrants they also have some tasty sausages to grill or just very good beef or lamb steaks.
And South Africa is a great place to dine with wine as there are many suberb vineyards. Especially the Stellenbosch or Franschoek region are famous for their suberb wines and first class cooking. And Cape Town of course with its closeness to the wine region and big city competition has some amazing places to eat. We had some incredibly jucy lamb roast, but also amazing fresh seafood at the coast, and everything is always so colourful and fresh. But the best is that you get extraordinary food and wine for good value of money.
So you feel like you can really enjoy life here and treat yourself to nice things, even if you are not super rich. Natalie actually inspired me for the final words. She said to me „the country is so alive, colourful and intense, it makes one feel more alive as well, more than in other countries.“ There is nothing I could add. We just absolutely loved our time there!