Day 26: Good bye Cape Town, Hello Pretoria!

And so today we say goodbye to our little slice of heaven by the beach. Another beautiful morning makes it hard to believe that it was rainy and miserable just before we got here. We finished packing and had our “clean out the fridge” breakfast (yogurt, berries, eggs, ham, cheese, etc.) before our Uber picked us up for the trek to the airport. Not knowing how morning traffic is here, we opted for a 7:45 pick up to make sure we got to the airport by at least 8:30 am for our 10am flight. And of course the Uber was early, and of course the traffic was light so we arrived at 8:15, sailed through the priority security lane and were planted at a coffee stall with WAY too much time to kill. (We managed to successfully do Wordle and the Daily Quordle but missed the Weekly Quordle…. grrr….)

Eventually our FlySafair flight was ready to board and our priority tickets meant that we got to stand in a special line to board. Our exit row seats were fine and we settled in for the 2 hour flight back to Joburg – which actually took a little longer since we were late. No worries – we had a car meeting us to take us to Pretoria. Because we have given up on the baggage handling system, even being last off the plane with our carry on luggage meant that we had plenty of time to meet our driver: an adorable, petit woman who was propositioned at least 3 times between our pick up and her car. One guy thought he was being cute by saying she was a sweet 16 lady. Her response: I got two kids, what are you talking about? (Love me some sass!)

Half an hour and only 1 wrong turn later, we arrived at our home for the next few days: Casa Toscana Lodge. On the plus side, it’s right next door to the conference centre. On the down side, the hotel and conference center seem to be far away from EVERYTHING ELSE. {sigh} We were early for check in and had to wait just a few minutes while they finished up our room. In the meantime we did paperwork and ran into the person we most wanted to see: my friend and colleague from Uganda who has been the mastermind behind so much of the stuff that has kept me busy over the last few years. I usually only see her in small Zoom boxes so it is a real treat to see her in person. But as one of the conference organisers, she had things to do and so scurried off while we settled into our room: the honeymoon suite. Seriously! I was so worried about going from a two bedroom flat to a hotel room but this makes the transition simple. Queen size bed, two couches, jacuzzi bathtub – it all works for me. That said, we are still in South Africa so the window is cracked and the curtains don’t quite shut all the way. But we are quite pleased nonetheless.

A late lunch in the hotel restaurant (two mains and a bottle of wine for £20!) and we were ready for some exploring. There isn’t much nearby but we found the botanical gardens about 2km away and so off we went. First thing we noticed about Pretoria: people don’t seem to walk here as much as they do in Cape Town. For most of the 2km there were paths instead of actual sidewalks. Bonus: we got to see lots of examples of the beautiful purple jacaranda trees. When we got to the gardens, there was no obvious entry for pedestrians. It wasn’t until we walked through the car park that we were able to find the entry. Frank met the concession age (read: old man gets in free) and I paid my £2ish entry and we proceeded to wander all over the gardens. With no map or guide we didn’t have much info about what we were looking at. And being early spring, most of the plants aren’t at their peak. So we had a nice quiet place to wander and had the place pretty much to ourselves – with two exceptions: the yoga class meeting on a nice stretch of grass at the bottom of the hill and the two (probably American) tourists rolling a joint at the top of the hill.

After completing our wander, we walked out the car entrance which completely confused the guard at the gate. We wandered back toward the hotel and then headed past to see what retail options were around. We found a petrol station where we could pick up a few snacks and saw a shopping area not far away but being tired and not up for consumerism, we headed back to the hotel. I finished my keynote speech while Frank swore at the TV remote. And after a little bit, it was time for dinner. While I’m not a fan of always eating in the hotel restaurant (except at all inclusives where it’s expected), it seemed to be the obvious choice since we just arrived today. The restaurant advertises itself as having singing waitstaff so we had no idea what to expect.

We met my friend at 7.30 and had a wonderful meal. We talked about African politics, her world travels, the state of world tensions, and a range of other topics. All of this was punctuated by musical interludes of song from two of the waiters – who had very good voices indeed. Our dinner was lovely and the singing waiters ended with “Summer of 69” which had the entire restaurant singing. (I was itching to do some air guitar but I refrained!) We purchased a lovely bottle of pinotage to take to the Honeymoon suite as a nightcap and called it a day.