It was another beautiful day. We have been so lucky with the weather. Although we occasionally had rain in the night or early morning, the rain always stopped by the time we got on the bikes. It was going to be a long ride today (66 miles), so I opted to sit out the first 15 miles on the busy two lane main highway. I took the van with Jean Claude, Werner and Heidi. Werner stopped in Robertson to get money at an ATM. He must have done something wrong because the ATM ate his card. Jean Claude was at a loss what to do and couldn’t reach Caren. Since it was Sunday, there was no one at the bank to help. Fortunately, the innkeeper came by, took charge, and got the card cancelled. All of that took at least an hour. If it had to happen to anyone, it figures that it happened to Werner, who seems to be the most rigid member of the group.
As we sped to catch the riders, Jean Claude missed the turn and had to back up on the busy road for about 50 yards while passing cars and trucks buffeted the van. When we finally caught the group, I was thrilled to get out of the van and on my bike. It was comfortably cool and the gravel road had nice rolling hills. We reached the paved road, the head wind picked up, but so did my energy. Tif took off and I followed close behind in his draft. We flew along the Breede River valley to the outskirts of Worcester where we waited for our companions. Caren led us through the town, on and off a very busy road to a less busy two lane road. The headwind was still pretty fierce, so I stayed close to Caren’s rear wheel. We stopped for lunch in another eucalyptus grove.
Views from our lunch spot. At this picnic, it became very obvious that a romance had bloomed between Matthias and Sandra.
Caren described the Bainskloof Pass coming up as a 16 km climb that was a “soft” climb the first 10 kms and a steep climb the last 6 kms. As we rode after lunch, I kept looking at the Hex River mountains, trying, without success, to find a manageable pass. The road to the pass finally appeared and we started to climb. It was a narrow road, but it was paved — and it was a delightful ride! I thought it was the easiest pass we’d done.
Still smiling after the steep part!
Tif at the top. Our descent was on a beautiful road that was very gradual, so I wasn’t white-knuckling the brakes. It seemed to go on forever, which was just fine for the last leg of the ride. The views of the vineyards below were lovely.
Wellington was a very British town with a park commemorating someone’s coronation. We didn’t spend long there since it was getting late and we were staying a few miles out of town. Our accommodations were in a development associated with a vineyard that reminded me of golf resorts in the US south. We shared a chalet or condo with three other couples. Unfortunately, it was down a long gravel walkway which was not easy to navigate with a rolling duffle. Our room was huge but we had little time to enjoy it before gathering for dinner at the resort’s restaurant. The food was pretty good but the wine was just mediocre. Fortunately, Jens had realized that he didn’t have enough room in his luggage for all the wine he bought, so he shared a few bottles of great red wine with the table.
Monday, 11/23 Stellenbosch and Kleinmond to Gordon’s Bay to Cape Town
Jean Claude drove us to Stellenbosch, the second oldest European settlement in SA, established in 1679. It’s in a fertile wine-producing area, so vineyards and wine tastings are big business here. Stellenbosch was much bigger and much more busy than I had expected. We were able to wander around for a few hours. Tif and I walked to the beautiful leafy campus of the university where workers were cleaning up piles of trash and furniture in intersections that students had set on fire the night before to protest proposed tuition hikes.
We also visited the nature reserve where we found this sugarbird perched on a Giant or King Protea, SA’s national flower.
Small beetles and the sugarbird pollinate the King Protea.
The Stellenbosch architecture was Cape Dutch, Georgian, and Victorian. Some examples are below.
Tif in front of the Powdery.
On our way out of Stellenbosch, I saw this whimsical strawberry farm
I was glad to leave this too busy, too touristy town (for me). We drove to Kleinmond on the coast for our ride along the coast to Gordon’s bay.
Our picnic lunch was near the beach. It was breezy, but the breeze would be a tailwind for the first time on our trip. As we rode through beach communities on the rocky coast, I was reminded of a similar ride on California’s coastal highway. The road surface was smooth and the traffic minimal. The road hugged the edge of the hills that dropped to the sea. We had some climbs, but the tail wind made them seem easy.
Who was happier on this ride?!
Note the road along the coast in the distance by Tif’s left shoulde
Once in Gordon’s Bay, we had to put the bikes on the trailer for the last busy leg of the road into Cape Town. Once again, I was surprised at the size, traffic, and tempo of Cape Town, SA’s oldest European town with a population of about 3.75 million people. There were interstate-like highways with convoluted overpasses. The city center is in the bowl of Table Mountain with development spilling out in all directions and up the hills. Among Cape Town’s neighborhoods, the Atlantic Seaboard to the west has some of the most expensive real estate in the country and the highest concentration of multimillionaires in the city. The northern suburbs include mostly Afrikaans-speaking people while the southern suburbs are mostly English-speaking people. The cape flats southeast of the central business district is home to people the apartheid government considered non-white.
Our guest house was in a prosperous, hilly residential district with narrow streets, a few blocks from the beach. I guess it would be considered the southern suburbs. Most houses had security gates and walls crowned with razor wire or electric fences. Tif and I decided that we just wanted to have a quiet dinner by ourselves. We found a nice French restaurant within walking distance, in an area filled with bars and restaurants catering to locals and tourists alike. This commercial district was similar to restaurant rows in Brooklyn.
SecondWindCycling 
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