Day 9: Stunning Drive Along the Southern Coast

Today, Thursday 17 June, is beautifully warm and sunny. Cape Town feels brighter and happier this morning after a couple of days of cold and wet. We're lucky we still have the car on such a great day, and we head east from the city, hugging the southern coast of Africa, towards the town of Hermanus.

On the way, we pass thousands of shanty homes built along the highway, and at every set of traffic lights, cars are beseiged by hawkers, mainly selling World Cup 'merchandise'. The tin shed homes and piled on top of each other, many without electricity and heaven knows what they do for water and sanitation. But the flash cars speed past and ignore them as if passing a pile of rubble.

Once out of Cape Town, a cliff-hugging road has been built most of the way along the coast, and the scenery is so good that we stop many times just to take it all in. Hermanus is supposed to be the best place in the world to watch whales from land (isn't that Hervey Bay?), and as soon as we arrive, we see a whale floating languidly about 100 metres out. It does little more than come up for air and bob down again, unwilling to entertain the tourists.

South Africans are very disappointed by their 3-0 loss to Argentina, and feel robbed by the penalty and sending off. The loss by Spain to Switzerland is also a big talking point, but Argentina (my tip for the Cup) look good.

Enough from me. Debbie is on her third big trip so far in 2010, and had previously written a blog in Europe and New Zealand. So I'll add hers next for a change of scenery.