{"id":200,"date":"2008-07-27T09:37:45","date_gmt":"2008-07-27T13:37:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/?p=200"},"modified":"2008-12-27T12:58:18","modified_gmt":"2008-12-27T16:58:18","slug":"day-43-getting-settled","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/?p=200","title":{"rendered":"Day 43: Getting Settled"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is the big day we\u2019ve been dreading: Negotiating our way, safely, to Rocklands.<\/p>\n

We check out of the hotel, dump our bags and pads into our cute little euro car and say adios to the parking attendant. No sooner does Paul start up the car (using a choke!) and tunes his brain for driving on the \u2018wrong side\u2019 of the road, does another car pull up along side us, waiting for our parking pace. More pressure please? Help us out here people. Luckily, our tiny Volkswagon is the little-engine-that-could and miraculously pulls out of the parking space, on a hill, from a dead stop, in THIRD gear…since Paul wasn\u2019t able to successfully find first gear with his left hand. Good job little car. Way to take one for the team.<\/p>\n

After numerous stop and go\u2019s in third gear, and only one near-miss fender bender (don\u2019t forget to look right!), we finally make our way out of the downtown city center and begin cruising on the interstate. I snap a few pics of the city with Table Mountain in the backdrop as we zoom away.<\/p>\n

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\nTable Mountain hovering over Cape Town, South Africa<\/p>\n

Soon, we\u2019re away from the city and cruising through the Western Cape countryside. So far, what we see is absolutely beautiful. The mountains, cliffs and rocks of the western United States, meshed with the lush green pastures of the eastern United States….(my best description).<\/p>\n

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\nA glimpse of the Western Cape, South Africa, along the N7<\/p>\n

WEIRD THING #4:
\nMonkeys!…or Baboons!!….or some other monkey-like creatures! Just as we enter the dirt roads of the Cederburg Wilderness Area, past the town of Clanwilliam, about 3-4 hours from Cape Town, I say to Paul, \u201clook…a pack of dogs up there on the road.\u201d Not dogs, stupid. Baboons? Baboons are supposed to be pretty prevalent here in the Cederburg Wilderness. I snap a few pics. They\u2019re all staring at us! Sheesh, is it THAT obvious we\u2019re American?!<\/p>\n

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\nBaboons in the Cederburg Wilderness!<\/p>\n

At about 3:00PM, we finally pull into our accommodations at the de Pakhuys Farm. We empty the car and move into what will be out little home for the next 6 weeks, the Blokhuys cottage, cute as a button.<\/p>\n

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\nThe Blokhuys cottage on the de Pakhuys Farm<\/p>\n

After some grocery shopping and a nice dinner, Paul and I are finally able to sit back and relax….I mean really relax, without the stresses of traveling in a foreign land. We sip on wine and delve into the printed online bouldering guides we have strewn about the table, salivating over the boulder problems listed in front of us, over the boulder problems awaiting outside.<\/p>\n

excerpt from April\u2019s journal, dated Friday July 25th, 2008<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the big day we\u2019ve been dreading: Negotiating our way, safely, to Rocklands. We check out of the hotel, dump our bags and pads into our cute little euro car and say adios to the parking attendant. No sooner does Paul start up the car (using a choke!) and tunes his brain for driving […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.apadventures.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}