Africa Travel Company Tour - Day 1

Today was a day of many firsts. The first time I’d slept in a dorm, the first Braii and the first day of our tour from Cape Town to Nairobi.

I have to admit the dorm was an experience and I’m sure I annoyed people with my continued rustling and unnecessary 6.00am alarm. We shared our dorm with another chatty couple from the trip which helped to ease our nerves.

Breakfast was available but we needed to sort it for ourselves including the washing up. This provided a taster for what was to come and far from the previous day’s hotel lifestyle we were used to. Then we were off for the first group activity of the tour which were the townships of Cape Town.

This was an impressive but grounding experience and the scale of the poverty was totally unexpected. The buildings were simple with some made from stone but most were metal shacks. The atmosphere within the townships was homely and very family oriented with the children all happily running around, a true community.

The local pub was great and similar to what I was used to with drunk locals and a buzzing atmosphere. We all got to have a slurp of their beer which was… different. Not that bad actually, even after seeing a nest of cockroaches next to where it was being brewed and realising our cup was a recycled Paint canister.

We had lunch at a local restaurant which consisted of a selection of Braii cooked meats. The restaurant also doubled as a bar and just as we were leaving the music was beginning. It would have been nice to spend some more time mixing with the locals.

The townships were followed by our first truck drive of many on to our next location for our first night camping. Hopefully, not the first time (or ever) we see scorpions under the tent but apparently this is likely…

Cara Bertram