The Cape of Good Hope

We just couldn't travel all the way to Cape Town without going the extra distance to the Cape of Good Hope, known as Cape Point - the place where the cold Atlantic and warm Indian oceans meet. It was an amazing drive through Chapman's Peak (not the best thing for my fear of heights), past hippy surf towns, craft markets and into the heart of the Table Mountain National Park. The park itself is quiet and huge in scale - but the Cape of Good Hope is busy with tourists taking pictures of the beautiful cliffs and rocks that line the coast. Though, a group of Japanese tourists decided that the blonde girl taking pictures on the rocks might make a better subject matter and started snapping photos of me. Too cute. After that, we buzzed around the roads deep in the bush hoping to spot some Zebra but did not have any luck. We had spotted a few baboons on the road (including a cute baby riding on his mother's back) but that was the only wildlife we had seen. Baboons are extremely prevalent in this area and there are warning signs everywhere you go. It's too bad we didn't pay closer attention to the signs.

Baboons are dangerous. And smart. We found this out the hard way.

After unsuccessfully locating some Zebras, we came upon another group of baboons relaxing on a beautiful cliff overlooking the sea. We took some cutesy photos from the safety of our car and all was good...until the Alpha Male showed up. Our driver, had left the vehicle to capture some photos on the cliffside. We had also stepped outside the vehicle briefly, but safely returned before the arrival of this huge, alpha male baboon. Our windows were rolled up and doors locked. Or were they?

All of the sudden, I hear Melissa furiously repeating my name from the back-seat. I spin around to see what is going on only to come face-to-face with a huge baboon who is sitting in our back-seat! He had opened the apparently unlocked door and climbed in. I cannot even remember what went through my mind at that point - only that I grabbed for the locked door handle and yanked on it until it let me out while swearing like a trucker. Outside with a knee that would not stop shaking, I saw that Melissa had also exited the vehicle and that the baboon had taken off with Melissa's purse. While the baboon was rifling through her purse, our driver (slash bodyguard) Mark, decided to frighten the baboon enough to get him to drop some of the items from the purse. The baboon then took off into the road, but the loud sound of a tour bus horn caused him to drop a few more items from the purse. Once we were all safely back inside the car, the big guy returned to show us who was boss.

Here's a video I shot after the baboon episode, as I wanted to capture exactly how big this creature was. What's funny is, while I was shooting the video we noticed an elderly couple who had not locked their doors:

Afterwards, we went for a chill lunch to calm down and spotted some penguins. I like penguins. They don't attack.

For dinner we met up with our lovely new friend Helene (along with some of her nice friends). We dined at Wakame in Mouille Point - which must have been a cool place because Annie Lennox was there too. Afterwards we hit up a club called St-Yves in Camp's Bay for a couple of beers and a good laugh at some Cougars who were searching for prey on the dancefloor. A cougar is still a cougar in any language.