So four years ago after attending the World Cup festivities in Germany, we immediately decided that we would do all we could to try to attend the next World Cup in South Africa. I had Cape Town on my list of cities to visit worldwide, so it would kill two birds with one stone. Well after 4 years, we finally made it here, and we are not disappointed. Now, getting here was a bit of a rollercoaster. Of course we had to find a way to get down here from Sicily, so that’s when the adventure began.

We hopped a flight from Trapani in Sicily to Madrid, Spain….the only flight out of Sicily that flew direct to Madrid in fact. We then had an 8 hour layover in Madrid, but thankfully got upgraded to business class for the long flight to South Africa, so got to chill in the lounge, which has been touted as the nicest one in all of Europe. Some relaxing, dinner and drinks later, we headed to the gate to hop on our flight….which was chaos! Everyone that was waiting for the flight was headed to the World Cup, and they must have all thought the plane was going to leave without them because them rushed onto the plane faster than hell. We got to our seats, and were actually seated in front of two Americans from LA, and next to a family of 8, all in business class, from Caracas, Venezuela. Other countries represented on the plane that I noticed were England, France, Italy, Uruguay, Paraguay, Mexico and a few others. It was a multicultural flight to say the least.

So we took off and embarked on our 10 hour flight to Johannesburg, only to be followed by another 2 hour flight down to Cape Town. Of course none of our travels come without hiccups, and we hit our first one on the flight down to JNB…the TV’s in our seats didn’t work…for the whole flight! Safe to say, I was able to sleep for about 8 hours, but Annemarie got about two winks and stared at the travel map for the rest of the flight. Misery was waiting in Johannesburg, but we never found it, because the airport was so alive and packed with people you couldn’t help but be full of energy.

Not much to say on the layover part of our trip, other than we hit a pub, and saw R. Kelly with some security walking through the airport. Despite his troubles in the USA, he’s regarded as a God down in South Africa, and the girls were going crazy to say the least. So we finally hop our flight, and head down to Cape Town, which was an incredible flight, just because of the landscape you see on your flight down. And then getting into Cape Town, with Table Mountain from the air was pretty cool. We landed, got our bags, got our rental…..and then ran back and got a different rental since for the second time on the trip the cigarette lighter didn’t work to power our GPS. Thankfully, swapping cars wasn’t an issue, and we were on our way. Did I mention that they drive on the left side of the road down in South Africa? Yeah, let the adventure begin on the road now!

It actually wasn’t that bad, other than the fact I kept hitting the wipers instead of the turn signal, and I couldn’t find reverse for the first day….and good thing I never had to back up! Didn’t realize there was a button on my shifter that allowed the car to be put in reverse. That’s clever, but how was I to know that? We made it to the hotel without much issue, a little B&B in Green Point, and headed down to the V&A Waterfront for the first evening and a quick dinner to complete the day. We decided to turn in a bit early to get a full day in, and that’s where we’ll pick up next time on Reading Rainbow!

Cheers!