A Trip Home

Landing in Cape town is always a slightly emotional experience for me. We moved to Cape Town when I was 2 and a half (the half is very important) and - excluding a very brief stint in Poland when I was six – we lived there for 7 years. This means Cape Town vies for first place in the category of the-longest-Steph-has-lived-anywhere (although not in the category of consecutive years, sadly)*. Look at my good looking family, circa 1997. That's our dog Merry, and the cutest little baby you've ever seen is James.

Fast forward 18 years (What?! That's a long time. I feel old now), and you find us landing in Cape Town once again. We’ve only visited twice in the last ten years, so things have changed enormously and of course things seem different when compared with the memory of a nine year old girl, but I still love it. It is still one of the most beautiful places on earth.

Landing in the plane took my breath away (which, yes, was due in part to one of the bumpiest landings I have ever experienced but also, you know, the exceptional beauty). We were house sitting for one of my mom’s friends in a part of the city called Muizenberg, quite close to where we used to live. Muizenberg is the name of a mountain and a beach and this house is situated so you can walk five minutes from the front door to the beach, or 10 minutes the other way to a hiking trail. It’s a hard life.

Our time in Cape Town is always spent catching up with old friends. On Sunday, we went to see Kelly’s family (with a rather less whole Kelly than the last time I saw her**). Kelly’s mom makes THE MOST AMAZING food. It felt like Christmas had started early with roast pork and delicious potatoes AND chicken curry. We were spoilt. I don’t have any friends that I’ve known as long as I’ve known Kelly and most of my friends don’t even come close (in terms of length of friendship - you are all wonderful people, and I cherish our friendship!).

There is something so special about visiting a house you’ve known since you were three, and seeing parents of friends who have known you since then as well. I don’t get that very often and it’s very nice. Kelly’s parents are also the only people in the world who are allowed to call me Stephy because they have been doing so since 1995. Don’t call me Stephy. Don’t you dare.

On Monday, we went to go see some of my parents friends but then…DA DA DA DAAAA DAAAA DA DA DA DAAA DAAA DA DA DA DAAAAA DAAAA DA DA DA DAAAAAAAAAA.

That was the Star Wars theme song. Yes, I saw it. No spoilers I promise (although now that I am writing this ... I just realised I am about to publish this post on the 4th of May - this was so unintentional BUT: May the fourth be with you). I loved it. I want to see it again as soon as possible (I have seen it multiple times since). That’s all I’m going to say. IT WAS SO GOOD. I’m done.

Tuesday was another Kelly day (so much Kelly time!! We have to make up for five years you see). We went out to eat and found the biggest cocktails I have ever seen.

It was the size of my head. Almost.

Wednesday was our last day and I went up Muizenberg*** - it was about an hour and a half climb to the top where we got to see the most spectacular views. Look! My mom!

She’s so pretty.

From the top of Muizenberg, one can also see the lakes we used to live on.

Our house was right in between Rondevlei and Zeekoevlei. Fun Fact: this area is now a RAMSAR site**** called The False Bay Nature Reserve.

I got a slight fright on the way down the mountain. We were making our way back to the path and I climbed over a rock and almost stepped on the tail of a cape cobra, which is a very large, golden snake. I wish I had a more impressive picture, but you must understand I was not in picture taking mode until it was making its way away from me.

It had its head reared, thankfully in the other direction, and was looking rather fierce. I leapt back over the rock and my heart was beating fast all the way back down the mountain. It was a cobra everyone. A COBRA. In real life.

Our flight home went very smoothly***** and we landed back in Johannesburg, refreshed and ready to make Christmas the best one yet.

I love Christmas. Post to follow******.

Thanks for reading every one xx

*It's very complicated (see my 'About' page).

**She fell off a horse and has a cast on one arm and the other in a sling. I won’t tell the story because she’s a little embarrassed by it. Let’s say instead that she was going over 50m jumps on an incredible stallion and in an attempt to save a small child that had strayed onto the jump course – she fell. (this may be fiction – but she did actually fall off a horse).

*** The mountain, not the 5 minute walk to the beach. Berg=mountain in Afrikaans so to say Muizenberg mountain would be a phrase from the Redundant Department of Redundancy –although it is a little confusing having both mountain and beach called Muizenberg. But hence this asterisk explaining everything. So efficient.

****See previous post.

*****At the beginning of this post, I may have left out an embarrassing story. At the Joburg airport, on our way to Cape Town, I may have mislaid my passport. I think I left it at a table where we had been drinking tea. Some nice person had handed it in to the boarding gate people but it took us a while to ask them. There was much panic and I’m ashamed to say I did not stay calm. But we found it and all’s well that ends well (as my dad, and Shakespeare, said).

******My footnotes game is BACK with a vengeance.

#Family #SouthAfrica #CapeTown