Candy{s} Land: Road trip 2 Cape Town

Friday 18th March-We planned a trip to Cape Town for the long weekend ,which went like this...

Well we started off early and went to Ouma and Oupa's house(my mom and dad)to drop Tayla with my mom and collect my dad. Tayla got to fly to Cape town because my mom had promised her long ago that she would take her in a plane.

Tayla was very excited and couldn't wait to just get to the airport.

We made Tayla promise to phone before she got on the plane and straight after she got to Cape Town so we could hear all about it.

And off they went

When Tayla got to the airport she had a yummy Wimpy burger and Chocolate milkshake for breakfast while we still had a long road ahead....

It must have been a boring,lonely, long trip for Josh with out his sister and I am sure he missed her while he was alone in the back of the bakkie.Not that he would ever admit it.

Joshua wanted to take a photo of his mom.Not a bad photo either by the way.

The guys had their travel tunes and and the GPS set.Josh even made a Justin Bieber request.

Granty deep in driver mode

Grant and my dad were in major conversation about this GPS of Grants.

We finally nearing Cape town

When Tayla and my mom got the Cape town they were taken to Canal Walk :)

Where they were meant to do some shopping,they weren't very good at it though.They said they were tired.Tayla did buy her brother a Kinder joy egg and a lint bunny.She had the whole of Canal walk and didn't buy anything hehe.

Finally we were there!

At 3 Saldanha Strand

While the girls went got for a ride to Somerset mall the guys went to the beach and to get some things for the braai.

Saturday 19th March

We went to the V& A waterfront to go catch our boat to Robben Island.

When we arrived there we all went to the bathroom before boarding the boat.And to my joy they had a vending machine int he bathroom that sold a few things one of which was sea sickness tablets.I got out my R5 coin and forgot to move the lever to choose what i wanted so I got some bubblegum.:( and Neither of us had another R5 coin hehe just my luck. tayla on the other hand was rather glad she got some bubble gum.

then off we went.

My dad and Gratn loved this part of our cape Town trip.Anything to do with boats and the sea and you can't shut those 2 up.

From a distance you can start seeing the Island

Then the boat finally....Stopped :)

And we arrived at Murray's harbour and had to get on our tour bus.

First stop on our bus was at the Robert Sobukwe house.

This is were Robert Sobukwe was kept.He was housed alone ,completely separated from any other prisoners.as a way to silence him,because if no one can get near him he cannot tell them anything.

the small cage like structures on the right are dog cages for the dog unit as when Robert was no longer housed there they built that for the dog unit as to make that part of land not completely useless,to justify the use of the tax payers money.

Then we went to the Lime quarry
All political prisoners worked here as a way to make them so tired and physically drained that they would be to tired to think of any plans to plot.

To the centre of this photo there are some stones pilled up.Those stones are there as a kind of a monument.All the political prisoners that worked there came back when it was to be made a museum and each put down a stone there.They worked here 5 days a week for I think 8 hours the tour guide had said.As sat was short staff and sunday was church day.

Our tour guide Craig.He was very good.He also said he does not rehear what he says on his tours,he just speaks freely as they practice freedom of speak on the Island.He was very funny,no one wanted to ask any questions.So he said do you see these TV screens here on the bus so we all looked ,thinking they were going to switch on and show something.He said they can easily replace him in his job and just ramble off the facts,but the differance is that the Tv screen can't answer question's if we had any so for the sake of his job can we please ask him some questions.It at least broke the ice and made us all laugh.Questions did follow.hehe

Did you know that people actually stay on the Island today.And their kids go to school on the Island and the older kids catch a boat every day to go to High school.

Then we stopped at a little shop on the island and enjoyed the view of Cape Town.

Then off the bus at our next stop to enter the prison

Where a ex prisoner from Robben Island takes you through the prison telling you his story of how he was just a number.

The censor's office where the prison officials went through the mail and cut out anything that they didn't want the prisoners to know and also what they didn't want the prisoners family to know when the prisoners send mail home.

Some photo's you can view in the grounds where the prisoners had free time,played tennis and also where Mandela had his garden.

The prisoners built this prison and this wall around this open ground.

The tour guide mentioned that there in the far corner that was where Mandela had his garden.He also said that they would receive and send messages to the other cell mates in differant sections with the tennis ball.They would cut it open and put a message in side and throw it over the wall.Only one person in each section was in charge of these messages otherwise they would get caught.The for communication outside of the prison they would use the paster that would visit them on a sunday.I thought that was rather interesting.I have never read the Nelson Mandela book called long walk to freedom so was all new info for me.

Josh at this point took a break it was very hot.I can't imagine being a prisoner and having to work in that dry heat.

This was Nelson Mandela's cell.

then it was off to the communal section.

We sat in the prison room where the normal prisoners would stay all together.And he showed us how the black people would get differant food the the others and also would get less food.