In Search of the Horticultural Big Five

South Africa Trip Expedition Log
2/5/2005 - 2/24/2005

click thumbnails to open large images in a new window

Day 16, Sunday February 20

We bounced our way to the top with Thys naming all of the 65 heaths that we were seeing. On of the rarest was the yellow-flowered Erica angsymyfoia growing among a beautiful red flowered tritoniopsis. As we got near the top, we were very surprised to find Protea cynaroides, the famous King Protea, both in bud and in flower. The closely related leucospermums such as L. cordifolium were also equally as amazing. While we were at the top, Thys took us to a moist depression, filled with Drosera cistiflora (sundew). Coming back down the mountain, we pulled off on a side road after spotting masses of Brunsvigia orientalis in full flower. Although Thys is a cattle farmer, he has become quite an amateur botanist and also gives tours to plant groups interested in ericas and proteas. He can be contacted by e-mail at mjdevilliers@telkomsa.net.

We departed around lunch time and headed west again. We stopped for lunch at Caledon to stumble onto the Caledon Botanical Garden sharing the same parking lot. After lunch, we ducked into the garden to find an amazing array of infrastructure and plants, albeit lacking in general garden maintenance. The amount of structural work and planting were on a mind-boggling scale that few US gardens could equal. We managed to find two stunning ferns here, the giant Todea barbara and what I think is a finely cut Adiantum raddianum. The central pond of the native Cyperus papyrus was absolutely stunning. All of these would make stunning garden additions if they are winter hardy.

Still suffering from the bouncing of the morning ride, we re-loaded for the remaining ride to Capetown. Capetown is a large and bustling city and we arrived just as everyone was returning from their weekend getaways. Again, we past the bourgeoning shanty towns that have developed over the last decade outside of Capetown. Cameron had described South Africa as a third world country within a first world country. If you drive through Capetown, you'll realize that his statements are right on the mark. We followed the signs to Kirstenbosch Botanic Garden to find cars parked along the road for miles. As it turned out, they were having an African sculpture show and antique sale. Since our hotel was only 10 minutes away, we turned around and headed for the hotel to return to Kirstenbosch tomorrow.

This was our first hotel with a crime prevention gate that must be opened for each vehicle. We arrived to find that we were staying our second 4-star hotel. We had already decided that South Africa uses a different scale of stars to rate their hotels than we are used to in America. The American scale is from 1-5 stars. It became obvious that the South Africa scale has from 1-10 stars. The hotel was obviously designed by an architect who finished at the bottom of a very dumb class. The stairways and hallways were so narrow that they were barely traversable even without luggage. After you climbed the two sets of stairs up to your floor, you had to climb back down another set to reach your room.

Dinner in the hotel restaurant was quite good, except for Jim whose squid had evidently exercised a bit too much before he was grilled. The service here and in much of South Africa was quite poor. Hospitality to guests is something that is obviously still foreign to many of the food service workers. Our waiter was surly and managed to botch much of our orders to the point that we named him, Mr. Happy. Several of the front desk employees weren't much better, giving us bad driving information. Jim was particularly impressed with the pool, which had a healthy layer of green algae growing on the sides of the pool. When he complained, he was told that people swim there all the time. Carl and Wade couldn't get clean towels in their room, but my favorite story was the battery operated wall clock in our room. We noticed that it didn't work and took the clock down to find no battery. We laid it on the counter so that the maid would see that it didn't have a battery. When we returned at the end of the day, the clock had been carefully re-hung... still without a battery. When we asked at the front desk, they replied that they would report it to housekeeping and that it would be fixed the next day. Are you getting the picture?

Day 17, Monday February 21

The slope of the garden made walking quite tiring if you were walking up hills, but coming back down was a breeze. Since Kirstenbosch sits at the base of Table Mountain, the clouds hit the top of the mountain and moisture is released. Consequently, Kirstenbosch gets the most rainfall of any location in the Western Cape. Many succulents from other areas of the Western Cape are grown inside their spectacular conservatory to keep them dry during the rainy season. We were surprised not to find more of a fern or bulb collection, although well-grown representative specimens of both were also found in the conservatory.

The gardens have two wonderful book and gift shops along with three cafes, so you can literally spend the day looking at plants, eating and shopping. Jim split with us early in the morning to visit other sites in downtown Capetown. We were finally ready to depart the gardens at 5pm for the 45 minute drive south along the coast to Simonstown. In the early 1980's a couple of South African native Jackass penguins (I'm not making this up), which normally live in rocky outcrops just off the coast, took up residence in a small coastal community called Boulder Bay. By the time we visited, their population has swelled to over 1000 animals.

We parked along the coastal road and made our way through the penguin fence (designed to keep hungry penguins from devouring neighborhood gardens) and out onto the huge tractor-trailer size rocks. We were attracted to one unusual rock that we nicknamed 'Plumber's Crack.' When we turned our focus from the unusual rocks, there they were... seemingly unafraid of humans, although huddling close together while casting a wary eye. Although the winds had picked up to gale force, we were able to complete the requisite photography and we were off to pick up Jim at the hotel and get some dinner. In order to avoid Mr. Happy at the hotel restaurant, we opted for the Capetown waterfront.

Jim had already scooped out the waterfront, which resembles a combination of the Baltimore Waterfront and New Orleans. This delightful area was teeming with police, which is probably why the crowds also mobbed the area. There were hundred of vibrant shops and restaurants... a far cry from much of Capetown that we visited. We returned to our hotel to find the winds still howling so bad that we felt like the windows and doors of the hotel were ready to be blown out as we went to bed. Fortunately, the hotel stayed together through the night.