Thursday, March 31st, 2005- Cape Town, South Africa

Josh, Amberly, and I finally headed to catch the train to Simon’s Town at 11am to see the penguins. I say “finally” because getting Josh up to go took some prodding because he likes to sleep. When we arrived at the train station we realized that it wasn’t the greatest part of town. At the ticket booth we were met by a poster that described the trains as having a high crime level and it was the rider’s job to stand unified in fighting crime.

The one hour train ride took us out of the city, around Table Mountain, and out into the suburbs along the beach and Atlantic Ocean. We arrived in Simon’s Town around 1pm and walked about 10 minutes up the street looking for a restaurant called Bertha’s. We discovered it at a pier but decided to eat at a different restaurant at the pier. After lunch we walked another 20 minutes to Boulder Beach where all the penguins were.

Entering the park, we walked down the boardwalk and saw the penguins. Then we left. Well before we left we saw them nesting and walking around, however it wasn’t as exciting as it was the previous time I had been there when I was able to walk on the beach with them. Since then the Table Mountain Parks Association had taken over the beach and built the boardwalk. On the way back to the train station we stopped to peruse at a couple of tables full of handicrafts in the parking lot. Our attempts at catching a taxi in the parking lot were to no avail and we had to walk very briskly to make the train. We ended up making it just in the nick of time due to our running the last 600 meters.

For dinner, Amberly and I were joined by Chelsea and Karah Lockman at a Mexican restaurant on the Waterfront. After dinner I met up with Ari, and then invited Kara Morgan to go to a South African Improv show at the Artscape Theater. At the end of the show, Ari talked with one of the actors, Jess, and she invited us out for drinks with them. We hopped into one of the other actress, Fiona’s car and headed to a bar called Yum. While in the car Fiona asked us how long we had known Jess. When we informed her that we had just met before the show she replied, “So I could be driving three crazy people in my car?”

We met up with some of the people from the show and some of their friends and were at Yum until about midnight. We then headed down to another Bar/Club down on Long Street called JoBerg. One of the friends, Michael, who was a director, drove us down. As we pulled into a parking spot we saw all the Semester at Sea kids outside of this place called Cool Runnings. We kind of just walked by them not wanting to just hang out with them. When we walked into JoBerg we were the only Americans there and soon danced (even though I have no rhythm). We bid adieu to our new friends and went back to the ship around 1am.