With a couple of days left before returning to the UK I decided to use the time to explore some of the west coast of South Africa. This had been recommended to me by my friends in Bloemfontein, as they had told me that the landscape changes as you travel north from Cape Town and the beaches are eye catching with white sandy beaches stretching for miles. I certainly felt like I should take a look before leaving South Africa.
My route took me from Somerset West through Stellenbosch via Malmesbury and Darling to the west coast at Yzerfontein. The terrain was very different, just as my friends had informed me, quite flat and arid and certainly not mountainous and green which I had experienced riding down from Bloemfontein to the south coast.
Wine farms were prevalent along my route with fields of grape vines for as far as the eye could see. Each of the wine estates I passed had the most amazing wine estate buildings, which I had the opportunity to visit.
After a relatively short ride from Somerset West, I made it to my first stop along the west coast, Yzerfontein. It was quite cloudy when I arrived but continued down to the main beach. The beach is a long white sandy beach which is lined with holiday homes. I realised as I took the photo that I probably wasn’t seeing this place at its best, a cloudy and empty beach!
Other than the beach there was not much else to see, so I rode out of Yzerfontein passing some amazing holiday homes. I had only ridden about half a mile before i came across 2 Ostriches who were doing their best to decimate a very grand holiday home‘s front garden. Where these 2 Ostriches had come from I had no idea as I was in the middle of a holiday home housing estate.
I continued along the coast and headed to my overnight stop in Langebaan. This town clearly caters for the holiday maker with an abundance of restaurants, bars, holiday homes and hotels. It was certainly a busy town, even though it was not currently their peak holiday season.
After finding a bar with WiFi it didn’t take long for me to find suitable accommodation in Langebaan, an apartment overlooking the sea for the equivalent of £45 for the night...result!
On my way to my apartment I passed a beach bar called Die Stranloper. This place had been recommended to me on my travels as a place to visit. It is a sea food restaurant that is renowned for their buffet where you can eat as much as you like. When I arrived they had lobster on the BBQ with a random guy playing a guitar moving from table to table singing away. It was quite an odd place as there was no bar just a load of tables in the sand under a large piece of tarporline. I wasn’t actually able to find a free table and non of the staff seemed interested in talking to me, so I left. The sea food certainly looked good but I didn’t get to find out for myself.
It was a short stay on the west coast before I had to return to Somerset West to start packing, as I had arranged to drop my bike off at Econo Trans, the freight company in Cape Town the day before my flight back to the UK.
The ride back to Somerset West seemed to go very quickly and before I knew it I had packed up the bike and was on my way to Cape Town to drop the bike off.
Now it was back to reality. I had a 16hr flight home via Dubai and my epic African Adventure, riding my bike from Nairobi to Cape Town had come to an end. I had covered close to 7,000 miles without any problems with the bike, no punctures,no major incidents or accidents, so in all a very successful trip although now I have to hope that my bike makes it back from South Africa in one piece!