Cape Town's Welcome Back

I've passed the one week mark... and it's been amazing. Peter and Theresa arrived last Friday night (a couple hours after my luggage, thank you) and they have been keeping me busy. Not sure how they'd feel with the jet lag Saturday, I made no plans. To hint at how the week has been since they arrived, we started up Platteklip Gorge (you can see the path up the gorge we went up on this first picture) on Table Mountain Saturday morning at 9am. Six hours later, we were back at the car after summiting, walking to the far edge of the mountain (MaClear’s Beacon, the highest point on the mountain at 3,563 feet), and ready for a break from the 95 degree heat. After grocery shopping, a quick ocean dip and showers, we invited the rest of the team (Mike, Tom, and Lynne) over and grilled ostrich steaks on the grill on my patio; it was quite the perfect day.

Sunday was another Table Mountain summit and we went up Devil’s Peak. It was a shorter hike and different from Platteklip because we actually had a nice breeze and didn’t feel as we were hiking up the racks of an oven… Then we cleaned up and headed out to Stellenbosch and visited 2 vineyards for winetasting. After two fantastic days, you could say that I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of the approaching work week.

The fun activities continued through the week complementing my work . With Peter and Theresa as extra motivation, we’ve fit in some beach runs, a morning hike up Lion’s Head, and another Table Mountain attempt (we ended up halfway up the mountain, missed the ravine and instead had a scenic traverse walk on the ocean side of the mountain). The week has flown by and I’m excited for the weekend. The agenda will hopefully include plenty of rock climbing as well as some fishing on False Bay. Peter and Theresa’s vacation here is spoiling me – but it’s definitely a positive!