Table Mountain

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The first day I climbed Table Mountain.  I mean, that was the goal.  First I had breakfast with a few people and hooked up with the crew I’d be going with.  It included Tien, Emerson, Xiao, Taylor, and myself.  I think it was just the five of us by the end.  First we walked around the Waterfront a bit to change currency and get tour information and that took like an hour, but then we got on a bus that took us around the city.  It was kind of expensive ($12) and I was a little upset about that, but whatever.  First we stopped at a castle, which wasn’t too interesting, except for they “fired” a small cannon at noon and it was REALLY loud.  We also tried to take pictures on top of the castle and I tried to take a jumping picture but the picture didn’t take in time and I landed and hurt myself and felt stupid because I didn’t even get a good jumping picture.  Oh well.  RUN ON SENTENCES ARE AWESOME.

 

We got back on the tour bus after waiting a couple minutes and went to Table Mountain.  We thought we would take the cable car up and then hike down, but the line was REALLY really long and it cost more to do that so we decided to hike up and then take the cable car down.  We walked a couple km to the start of the trail, and then started making our way up.  It was pretty steep, I think, about as steep as you’d want to get without having any gear on you, and I was in my sandals.  I keep meaning to really clean out my shoes after the incident in India but I never get to it.  Anyway, the trail was supposed to take us about 2.5 hours – to get up the gorge.  I was doing okay for the most part although breaks were nice, but one of the girls with us was having a fairly hard time.  But in the end, we all made it!

 

Getting to the top was the coolest part.  So the bottom of the mountain was like hot and sunny and sweaty, but as you went further up you walked into a gorge that got thinner and thinner and the wind whipped through it really fast and clouds came down it and swirled around and when you were up there, you could look down behind you and see clouds rushing past you.  That was pretty wild.  It was also shady, so suffice to say it got pretty darn cold.  When we got to that part, I was ready to just put it away, so I told the others I was going to run up and I’d meet them at the top.  People said it was only like 20 minutes away so I just went for it and made it in a little less.  When you get to the very end, the gorge closes in and it’s only about six feet wide and like a steep rock staircase, and you just walk up it, and as you do the cloud stops coming down at you and the wind stops blowing and the sun hits your face when you get high enough and then you walk out of the gorge and onto the top of the mountain and it’s just silent, and then the view hits you, and then you realized you just walked a kilometer into the sky, and you’re like holy shit this is awesome.  If you’re ever in Cape Town, climbing Table Mountain is like, one of the two things that’s worth your time to do.  (The other is to see a township)

 

Anyway, I got some food while I was up there and talked to a couple kids who came from a school in Joburg (they were volunteering there, two were American and one was British), and the others all met me soon enough.  The horn sounded though which meant they were shutting down the cable car soon, so we rushed to buy tickets and got in line.  We were sort of afraid we wouldn’t make it, but after about a 45 minute wait we made it in.  The car spins you around while you’re on it so that no matter where you stand you can get a good view of the entire place around you.  When we got down we saw our bus was there, and it was the last tour bus going back to the Cape the whole night, so we rushed to get to it and said goodbye to the guys from America and Britain too quickly as we did.  I found one on Facebook, I think, but I don’t think he accepted my friend request.  Oh well, it’s okay.

 

The bus got stuck in traffic on the way to the main road, and then took us all the way around the Southwest area of the city, which was super beautiful.  This is where you can see the Twelve Apostles.  The voiceover narration in the bus really had an attitude and kept talking about seeing beautiful bronzed bodies on the beach, which kept making us laugh.  It also talked earlier about a “very ugly building” and asked, “Could you believe it was actually designed by an Italian architect?”  Anyway, we got back to the ship all together and in one piece around 7pm or so.

 

That night we went to a Thai restaurant in the waterfront.  It was basically me and eight Asian people, whom I would try to name or spell except I don’t really know how to spell all of them… but I guess I’ll try.  Emerson is the crazy character I described before.  Xiaolong is a somewhat muscular guy with a great camera who films a ton of stuff.  Xiao is a pretty good friend of mine who’s slowly teaching me a bit of Mandarin here and there.  Xiaoxia is a tiny little math major who I jokingly call my wife just because she’s a math major.  Moning likes to joke around and I often miss the joke because I don’t understand the tone she’s using, but everyone else there understood it.  Tien is from Singapore and speaks English as if it were her first language and moved to China when she was older.  Oh, I should say that Emerson is from Thailand and really really loves Thai food and was incredibly excited to take us all there and had a great time telling us what on the menu was good or bad or legit Thai food or not really Thai food.

 

I ended up getting chicken pad thai, and it took a LONG time for it to come.  We were sitting outside and a lot of the girls were starting to feel cold and we thought about moving inside but they kept saying that our food was almost there.  We met Mats there, and he had a crazy camera, and we put together that he was the staff captain on the MV Explorer and so we talked to him for a little bit.  The girls really wanted to have their picture taken with him and he obliged.

 

Finally we finished and I still wanted a tiny bit of desert because their chocolate mud cake sounded AWESOME and someone else wanted a bit of ice cream, I think.  So we moved to a table inside and asked them if they could do this quickly, and they did, and it was amazing.  The bill was pretty high – R1400 = $200!  But it was split between like 8 people so it really wasn’t too bad…

 

Anyway, from there I think we hung out on the ship for a little bit but it was basically time to go out for the night.  I wasn’t particularly interested except for the fact that Emerson said he wanted to dance and when he’s in that mood you know that something crazy is going to happen.  So I figured I’d go along for the ride, and we ended up getting a big taxi that could fit all of us.  We tried to go to a smaller club called Chavelle but we couldn’t find it when we got there, or it was closed, or something, so we had to go elsewhere.

 

I looked inside a window when we were driving around looking for it, and I saw lights on in one window with bars across it and blue all over the walls and it looked like there were still like twelve people or so in there dancing.  Not like club dancing, but like practicing for a dance team.  I wanted nothing more than to just knock on the door and say, “Hey, could I just chill with you guys for a while?” but I wasn’t alone, so I couldn’t do whatever I wanted.  We drove past that window once or twice more before we left, and I felt a bit more upset every time we went by it.  I think that window will be probably my clearest memory from that night.  I wish I could have gotten inside.

 

We finally just went to Long Street and started looking for a place.  We would walk in somewhere that we heard music but not really see people dancing, and one time they took us to a well-lit back room that was totally empty and made for eating and we were all just like, “Dude, what?  We want a dance place.”  So we left.  I made sure that everyone hung really close together because we were already getting advances from some pretty sketchy dudes when we were walking around.  Fortunately nothing happened, not even anything taken.

 

This place called Dubliners was playing really loud music and looked pretty big and like it had people in it, so we just went there.  Surprise, there were about 100-200 SASers there.  Emerson insisted this was the place and I didn’t feel like trying to go do something on my own, including pay for a full cab ride back, so I just stayed.  I talked to Drew for a second who appeared to be having a pretty okay time, and Hillary was there too.  I’m happy for them.

 

I walked outside after a little bit and found Nolan and Tania and Mason and Brandon.  Apparently Mason’s camera had been lifted from the pack he was holding it in on his waistline, and he was pretty sure he knew exactly who took it and where they were.  Brandon saw that he was probably going to approach the guy, so he told me to sit with Tania and not leave until he got back.  She wasn’t drunk or anything, just didn’t want her to be alone.  They basically just crossed the street, went past a little “superette” (corner store) and talked to the group of guys hanging against the wall.  I could see Mason and Nolan and Brandon talking with them, and there was a police officer there to make sure nothing got too out of hand, but they made no progress.  Mason came back pretty upset and sounded like he wanted to do something to them, but Nolan was able to talk him down pretty easily.  It’s not hard to do that when you’re a white person on Long Street in South Africa after midnight.

 

After that I went inside.  I looked for a quiet place where people were talking but none existed.  I found a staircase and climbed it and sat on a chair in the corner and there were a few other people on the balcony looking out.  I downloaded a few episodes of Radio Times with Marty Moss-Coane and caught up with some blogs and stuff I think, but didn’t really talk to anyone.  My roomie was there and he had a girl on his hand; I don’t think he knew I was there.  A kid was dancing up on a girl while holding a bottle of champagne and offered me some and I said no and he looked mad.  If only he knew, oh well.  I could see everyone dancing downstairs.  The singer was pretty good (two people doing live music) and the songs were fun (Lady Gaga, Black Eyed Peas, etc.), but it was too loud.  Emerson was going crazy dancing and Xiaoxia was doing her best to keep up.

 

Finally it was 12:45 or whatever and it was time to go.  I was relieved.  Emerson asked for one more song and so he danced to it and jumped on me in the middle of it which was totally fine (Bon Jovi’s It’s My Life), but I was glad to get out and walk back to where we were dropped off and take the cab back.  I went to sleep soon after.  My roommate had to leave for a safari at 3am or 4am.  I don’t think he really woke me, but if he did, I can’t remember anymore, but I didn’t see him again for like three days.