CAPE TOWN et CAP de BONNE ESPERANCE

Ecrit le Dimanche 12 Avril mais mis en ligne Lundi 13 !

Et voilà, notre voyage vers le Sud est terminé ! Depuis hier soir nous sommes en navigation en direction du Nord Ouest avec comme prochaine escale Walvis Bay en Namibie. 

Ce soir nous changeons à nouveau d’heure, et cette fois-ci nous serons 1 heure en retard par rapport à la France, mais dans le même fuseau horaire que la Grande Bretagne !

Donc…nos deux jours à Cape Town !

Il y a beaucoup à voir dans la ville et dans les environs, mais comme il fallait faire un choix, nous avons privilégié la visite de la ville et une excursion au Cap de Bonne Espérance. Nous aurions pu aller visiter Robben Island où fut incarcérer Mandela, mais John pensait que le recueillement dû au lieu serait gâché par les centaines de touristes Costa ! Nous ne sommes pas non plus montés au sommet de Table Mountain, la célèbre montagne qui domine la ville. Ce sera pour une autre fois…

Le premier matin, nous sommes allés à pied jusqu’à un grand centre à la fois commercial, touristique, culturel et sportif, le « Victoria and Alfred Waterfront » complexe aménagé à l’emplacement d’anciens docks. Un lieu très agréable, mais très éloigné de ce qu’on peut imaginer être l’Afrique. Je suppose que c’est le genre d’endroit qu’on pourrait retrouver dans de nombreux pays en bord de mer. En plus grand et plus important, c’est le même aménagement qu’à Port Louis sur l’Ile Maurice. Et apparemment, c’est le premier site touristique de toute l’Afrique du Sud !

Naturellement nous avons dépensé quelques « Rands » locaux dans un centre d’artisanat africain…avant de rentrer au bateau pour déjeuner et ensuite partir à la découverte de la ville du Cap. Le début de la visite a été un peu décevant, car la brume s’était installée, venant de la mer, comme semble-t-il souvent l’après-midi, et les vues sur l’Océan Atlantique et sur les montagnes environnantes étaient complètement bouchées !

Heureusement plus tard dans l’après-midi tout s’est éclairci et nous avons pu nous balader à pied dans les rues anciennes comme dans le quartier de BoKaap aux maisons colorées qui sont maintenant protégées. C’était le quartier des tailleurs. Au départ, d’après le guide, les maisons étaient peintes de couleurs vives pour permettre aux habitants illettrés de reconnaître la maison du médecin, de l’apothicaire, des différents commerces etc… Notre guide a été élevé dans ce quartier et sa famille y vit encore. Pour avoir épousé sa mère d’origine Indienne, son père qui est d’origine Hollandaise a été incarcéré pendant 8 ans ! Une famille très engagée politiquement, puisqu’il a lui-même rejoint l’ANC à l’âge de 16 ans et a combattu dans la section armée pendant 14 ans. Son oncle paternel a été même conseiller de Nelson Mandela et fut son ministre en charge de la police.

Il (le guide !) semble très aigri et a d’ailleurs quitté l’ANC au début des années 2000 car il était en désaccord avec la politique menée. On a vraiment senti que les tensions raciales sont toujours très présentes et il nous a plus parlé de la période de l’Apartheid que de l’histoire de la ville elle-même. Mais c’était intéressant. Nous avons visité le musée d’Afrique du Sud qui aurait mérité qu’on s’y attarde mais John et moi nous sommes retrouvés à discuter avec le guide ce qui nous a un peu retardés. Ensuite traversée à pied de l’ancien Jardin de la Compagnie des Indes où se trouve le Parlement et que les « gens de couleur », c'est-à-dire les métis, et les noirs n’avaient pas le droit de fréquenter sous l’Apartheid. Une ville qui nous a semblé très européenne dans sa conception mais surtout très différente de Durban qui est vraiment « Africaine ».

Le deuxième jour, excursion au Cap de Bonne Espérance qui comme la veille a commencé dans le brouillard ! La route qui mène au Cap longe l’océan mais malheureusement, sur une longue distance, nous n’avons vu que des paysages cotonneux où mer, ciel et terre se confondaient ! 

Premier arrêt à Boulder’s beach où nous avons retrouvé les Manchots du Cap, les cousins des pingouins de Magellan que nous avions vus au Chili !

Ensuite direction le Parc national de la Table Mountain, la même que celle qui surplombe la ville, puisque la chaîne montagneuse traverse la péninsule jusqu’au Cap de Bonne Espérance. Petit à petit le brouillard s’est levé et finalement nous avons bénéficié d’une superbe journée ensoleillée.

Naturellement arrêt obligatoire pour la photo souvenir au cap de Bonne Espérance, où nous avons reconnu la photo de notre calendrier familial prise au même endroit il y a un an ! Ca tombe bien, elle est justement sur la page du mois d’Avril ! Le Cap de Bonne Espérance est en fait le point le plus Sud-Ouest de l’Afrique. Après un repas en terrasse surplombant l’océan, qui lui était encore dans la brume, nous sommes montés en funiculaire au sommet du Cap, « Cape Point », où se trouve un phare et d’où la vue est splendide sur 360° ! Il s’agit cette fois-ci de la pointe la plus au Sud du continent Africain.

Pendant le repas vous imaginez bien que certains Costaistes se sont fait remarquer, (je n’aime pas le poisson, JE veux du poulet ! et puis du vin blanc pas du rouge…) presqu’autant que les babouins qui se sont invités à une des tables de la terrasse, immédiatement chassés par les serveurs !

Au retour nous avons aperçu d’autres babouins sur la route, à la recherche de quelque nourriture. La guide nous avait avertis qu’ils pouvaient se montrer agressifs et de faire attention. Puis nous avons vu un couple d’antilopes du Cap, les « Bonte Boks » qui ressemblent beaucoup à une certaine espèce que nous avions vue dans la réserve à Durban et que le guide avait appelée d’un autre nom. Des autruches en liberté vagabondaient dans la nature alors que d’autres, derrière les grillages d’une ferme, attendaient de finir dans une assiette ou en sac, ceintures ou autres portefeuilles… La guide de cette excursion était « blanche », et cette fois-ci nous n’avons eu aucune allusion à l’Apartheid, elle nous a juste pointé du doigt la prison où Mandela a passé 8 ans quand il est sorti de Robben Island. Mais elle a vraiment fait son travail de guide, en gérant bien le groupe, et en nous apportant beaucoup d’informations intéressantes sur la faune et la flore. A l’approche de la ville du Cap, nous avons traversé des quartiers très aisés où les maisons se vendent à des prix dignes des beaux quartiers de Paris ou de la Côte d’Azur et qui sont protégées par alarmes, hauts murs et vigiles en faction…

John a lu que l’insécurité était un des problèmes majeurs de l’Afrique du Sud. D’après la guide, 40% de la population vit avec moins de 2$ par jour, ceci expliquant peut-être cela ! 6% de la population paye 80% des impôts et 70% des gens qui votent pour le gouvernement actuel sont au chômage !!!! Des chiffres qui sont inquiétants et donnent une vision un peu moins idéaliste que celle qu’on a depuis l’Europe et la fin de l’Apartheid.  

En 2 jours nous avons eu 2 images de L'Afrique du Sud!

La route du retour nous a menés à travers un paysage « lunaire » d’arbres et buissons qui ont été ravagés par un immense incendie de forêt quelques jours avant Pâques.

Retour au bateau à 16H30. Nous pensions pouvoir passer au contrôle de sortie du pays immédiatement, mais il nous fallu redescendre à terre à 17H et avons fait la queue pendant ¾ d’heure ! C’est le premier pays qui demande à voir « face to face » tous les passagers du bateau plus tous les employés et membres de l’équipage !

Et maintenant nous avons retrouvé l’Océan Atlantique et remontons le long de la côte Ouest de l’Afrique dans un brouillard épais avec de temps en temps la corne de brume du bateau qui retentit pour avertir d’autres embarcations de son existence…

Prochaines nouvelles Mercredi, nous vous raconterons le désert de Namibie !

Messages persos à Michel pour lui souhaiter un Joyeux anniversaire et à David pour lui souhaiter bon courage pour son opération du genou demain.

Bises à toutes et tous !

M.Christine  et John.

Monday 13^th April

So that’s it – we have now left South Africa and are on our way to Namibia!!

We spent a most enjoyable 2 days in Cape Town – arriving in the bay and then coming into the port with the sun rising behind Table Mountain and lighting up the bay through the clouds – glorious. What a sight, what scenery and coming in from the sea must surely be the best way to first see the city nestled between the ocean and the mountains.

So much for the poetry – so what did we do?

The ship was tied up to the main quay in the port, right opposite the main terminal building and was 15 minutes on foot from the Victoria and Alfred Waterfront complex. So as we had our included excursion – “Visit the City” - programmed for the early afternoon of the first day, we left the ship fairly early that morning and found our way to the V&A Waterfront area. Again it is a little like the London docklands redevelopment – the old Victoria and Alfred (not Albert but her second son Alfred who was in the Royal Navy and represented her several times on official visits to Cape Town in the 1890s). The docks were largely abandoned since the new commercial ports were built in the 1930-50s. In a conscious effort to physically link the city to the ocean side despite the large roads etc running between the two, successive councils and governments have sponsored redevelopment projects which have been progressively renovating the old wharves, warehouses, Port Authority buildings, prisons (used to house the convicts that built the original wharves) etc and adding new buildings where necessary. It is now a very extensive complex based on several basins, bays, jetties with footbridges between different parts complete with numerous restaurants, individual shops, shopping malls, hotels, museums, aquarium, marinas, fishing boat & tug boat quays, a small dry dock for small ship repair and quays with cruises out to Robben Island and around the peninsula etc. Very pleasant and relaxing to just walk around and something which is totally missing at Durban (let’s not talk about- Richard’s Bay and its coal piles!). We even visited the top floors of a shop (the African Trading Post) housed in the Old Harbour Master’s Offices which is effectively an unofficial museum of African native art from all over Southern Africa. So a very pleasant 3 to 4 hours just wandering around there –and we did not see everything!

And the afternoon “included tour”? It started off with a drive along the ocean coast to the south of the city through the “multi-millionnaire” areas where you would need anywhere between 3-5million euros to buy some of the smarter houses looking over the sandy beaches and shorelines. Apparently Mr Mugabe the 80+ year old highly “respected” president of Zimbabwe has a 5M€ private house here (for his possible retirement? And paid for by…who knows!). In fact we did not see much sea as the early afternoon mist came in from the sea and limited the visibility to 100 yards maximum! The water on this Southern Atlantic coast is only 13°C (all year round as it comes up from the Antarctic – compared to 20°C+ for the water coming down from the north east on the Indian Ocean side!!). Anyway we saw where some of the richer South Africans live. And also some of the very rich Europeans who come to spend their European winters in S.Africa and are called “the swallows”.

We then drove up over the top of Signal Hill (one of the hills behind Cape Town) and back into the city where we stopped off in an old quarter which used to house Indian and Malay “tradesmen”. The Dutch brought in the Malay people, principally from Surinam/Indonesia to work as slaves on the sugar cane plantations (the Africans were used principally in the mines). There was a lot of “mixed” breeding between whites, Asians and Africans which led to the “coloured” community (principally mixed European/Asians) – a very significant part of the Cape Town population. Our guide for this visit was effectively “coloured” himself – his father (Dutch white) had illegally married an Indian girl (3 sons – one of which was our guide- and a daughter). As this was illegal, the father lost all his property and spent 8 years in prison whilst his wife, supported by her community, raised the children. Apparently her family was very involved in the “independence” movement and one of her brother’s was Mandela’s first police chief after 1994! Our guide had been raised as a child in this old quarter which is now a “preserved area” – the houses are painted very bright colours, apparently so that people who could not read would be able to find the house of the tradesman that they wanted. The nearby mosque built by the local community, had been designed to look like a church (more acceptable to the Authorities of that time) and is even on a road called Church Street! 

Then we went by the old stone walled fort in the city towards the Company Gardens – originally set-up by the Dutch Governor to grow fresh fruit and vegetables for the ships going around the Cape on their way to India. We visited the Cape Town Museum but in fact we spent most of our time in the museum talking to the guide who had apparently run away to join the ANC armed units when he was 16. We had a lot of difficulty following what he told us as he was now very bitter about post-Mandela ANC politics and what was happening in South Africa. Apparently he had risen to the level of Colonel in the ANC but he does not appear to have been integrated into the South African Army in 1995 as we were told at the time – he said there was no way that the Boer soldiers would have taken orders from ANC officers. He must have then spent some years in politics but apparently resigned from the ANC in 2002 and now seems to earn his living as a guide. I asked about the fighting between the Zulus (led by their king and financed by the extreme right “white”) and ANC in 1993-4 and he said the problem still exists between the Zulus and the Xhosa who don’t mix and still work on a “clan basis”.

He also talked about the present wave against “European” statues – “nationalist” groups wanting to take down statues put up before 1994 and who “glorify” people like Cecil Rhodes or other British/Dutch Governors and Generals who set-up or reinforced the colonies/apartheid. For him it is stupid to waste time on such issues when there was so much still to be done for the people – jobs, education, welfare, housing etc.

In fact he was a very disappointed and possibly disillusioned gentleman. 

The next day was great – a tour to the Cape of Good Hope at the end of the peninsular south of Cape Town. This time we had a very “un-ANC” guide – a very “well bred English” lady of 65-70 with a very upper class British accent (probably too pronounced for the BBC nowadays) with some South African intonations and very few references to anything that has happened in South Africa over the last 50 years (except when we drove past an “on-land” prison south of Cape Town where she said Mandela had spent his last 8 years of imprisonment prior to being released). However she did say at one point, when she was talking about the cost of luxury houses on the coast, that 6% of the population pays 80% of the income tax in S. Africa (and don’t vote for the “present” Government) whereas 70% of those who do vote for this Government are unemployed (they don’t receive unemployment money but get some form of “survival payments”) and only 8 or 10% of companies registered in South Africa actually pay tax!! And finally 40% of the population lives on less than $2/day. 

So yesterday was dedicated to driving down the peninsula coast to the Cape of Good Hope itself, the most south westerly point, and the nearby Cape Point Lighthouse. As soon as we left Cape Town and the nearby coastal towns/resorts, we started driving up into the hills which are a continuation of Table Mountain all the way down to the end of the peninsula. Very rapidly we were in a lunar landscape – there had been a terrible fire in the scrubland and most of the vegetation over dozens of km was completely burnt. Although it was very recent – just before Easter – already there were patches of green pushing up from the rocks or sand. Apparently fires are frequent and the vegetation recovers quite quickly even though this particular fire was quite dramatic – it even spread to some of the vineyards on the eastern coast around False Bay.

We drove across a high pass on the coast road – Chapman’s Point – with superb views on the cliffs etc. We then drove through some quite attractive villages or towns with names like Llandudno and Scarborough before getting to Simon’s Town and the Penguin Colony at the Boulders. A very pleasant stop off to walk along a raised wooden pathway on the coast to  ”meet” a colony of the local penguins – close-up photos and film of penguins singularly unimpressed by the Costa mob. And a stop in the souvenir shop on the way back to the bus – Who has now got a South African hat to go with his Australian hat?

Then on to the south and the end of the peninsula. We drove by the Cape of Good Hope towards the Lighthouse with the intention of going up the funicular to the lighthouse itself. However other Costa buses had got there before us and there were at least 100 people queuing to get the funicular. And the lighthouse was getting lost in rising mist! So a rapid change in plan – back to the Cape itself which was not yet in the mist. There we did the usual things like get our photo taken by the sign saying this is it – “the Cape of Good Hope!” Then back to the lighthouse – stopping to see some baboons on the side of the road (equally unimpressed by the bus!).

A lunch on a terrace overlooking the Ocean (invisible as lost in the mist) and then everyone taking the funicular as they want up to the lighthouse and the view over the “lands end” and the ocean. It was one of the finest scenic views that I have seen and also quite moving to think that we were there at a point that we have heard about in all our history lessons from an early age at school – like Cap Horn. One of the most political and geographic sites in terms of the historical development of the world over the last 500 years.

And for once we were not in a hurry and had all the time we needed to look and reflect. After a casual stroll back to the bus, the guide asked the driver to take us by an ostrich farm. Apparently ostriches had been bought here in 19^th century (apparently from N. Africa?) – for their meat, for their skins and above-all for their feathers (ladies hats) and lots of people had made fortunes until the bottom dropped out of the feather market at the beginning of 20^th century (ladies feather hats were not compatible with the growing trend for travel by motor car!!). We had seen a number of wild ostriches (escaped birds?) on the hills but at the farm, the birds came up to the fences to see what we wanted!!

Then a pleasant drive back to Cape Town and our ship – followed by a massive queue to get our passports stamped “out” (departure) by the South African authorities.

The ship finally left at 22h00 and we watched as it pulled out of the port. Clearly 2 days was not long enough in Cape Town – we had not been able to visit either Table Mountain (lost in mist on our first afternoon) nor Robben Island.

Some years ago Sue gave me a copy of Mandela’s book which gave me a fairly detailed understanding of “the road he went down”, the character of the man (he never pretended to be either a god or an angel but someone who tried to be honest with himself) and the contemporary history of South Africa including the role of and conditions on Robben Island.

Robben Island has now become a major “tourist attraction” and I am not sure that I would have appreciated visiting it with some of the baboons from the Costa mob. If we ever come back, I would like to visit it by ourselves.

In fact the evening we left Cape Town I stayed on deck until about 22h45 when we sailed past Robben Island after leaving the port.

One of the gentlemen I talk to now and again when we meet during the 3^rd deck walks is German but was raised in Cape Town. He still has many friends there which he met with during our stop-over. I met him yesterday morning on the 3^rd deck and asked him what had changed in Cape Town since his last visit 2 years ago. He said that surprisingly (positive) he found both the town and his friends much more relaxed than in the past – that the atmosphere in the town was getting better, less stress etc. However he said that he felt that Durban was really getting very difficult and I must admit that we certainly felt much more at ease in Cape Town than Durban although obviously our visits were far too short to “have a good idea” of what the situation is really like.

Next stop Walvis Bay in Namibia. We will probably have mist almost all the way – apparently a regular event on this coast where the cold Southern Atlantic water meets the hot land masses. Yesterday the ship was blowing its fog horn most of the day as visibility was down to a hundred meters or less.

Un jour où l'océan était vert...à l'arrière du pont 3 lors d'une d'une marche matinale

Les 4 prix Nobel de la Paix sud africains. De gauche à droite : Albert Luthuli en 1960. Desmond Tutu en 1984. FW Deklerk et Nelson Mandela en 1993

No comment!

Le Table Mountain vue du Victoria & Alfred waterfront. 

Photo souvenir!

Toujours une partie du V&A waterfront.

Plage dans la brume...

Le quartier de BoKaap

Une mosquée construite sous forme d'église pour éviter les problèmes...

Signal Hill en arrière plan.

Perron du bâtiment où Mandela a fait son premier discours appelant les noirs au calme. La photo n'est pas ytrès bonne car prise à travers les vitres du car!

Ancien parlement

Nouveau parlement.

Vaisseau fantôme...

Chapman's point

Non ce ne sont pas les pingouins de Magellan mais les Manchots du Cap! Nous ne recyclons pas nos photos...

Les femelles couvent leurs nids.

Oui nous y étions...

Photos du Cap

Cap de Bonne Espérance

Babouin...

Brume au-dessus de l'océan.

Restaurant en terrasse

Cape Point.

Depuis le phare de Cape Point, le Cap de Bonne Espérance de l'autre côté de la plage. 

Sous un autre angle!

Bateau dans la brume...

Enlevons quelques centaines de Kilomètres et nous ne sommes plus très loin...

Phare de Cape Point.

Vue de la ville du  Cap et en premier plan les dégâts de l'incendie...

On se croirait en Provence après le même genre d'incendie...