Essecke: South Africa 1: From Zürich to Beaufort West

The hex river valley

Our holiday in South Africa. I'll write and add the pictures in parts because there's so much to tell...like always :) Actually we hadn't planned to do a long trip this year, but it just kind of happened. Last spring, I think it was in the end of April, we watched a documentary about South Africa on tv and got infected by the travel virus. The very next day I had to check about the flights and their prices and found out them to be suprisingly affordable. So we booked flights for two with Qatar Airways: the price altogether was 1527 CHF (about 1405 EUR).

The first thing I booked after the flights was the accommondation in Cape Town, because Cape Town is pretty popular destination and often well booked. After that I made reservations for the Test Kitchen, which is a famous restaurant in Cape Town. I'll tell more about it and also about all the guest houses and prices along the way.

So let's start the first part. Our flight from Zürich departed at 16:00 on Sunday the 18th of October. After about six hours of flying we landed at Doha Hamad International Airport in Qatar at the local time 22:45. The airport is big, new and clean and there are plenty of shopping and dining possibilities. Didn't make any photos :/ Our connection time was about two and half hours so we had plenty of time to have some tea and wonder all the different people hurring past us. Our flight Cape Town started at 01:25 where we landed at the local time 10:30. It was about a nine hour flight comfortably over the night. Everything with the Qatar Airways worked fine but we didn't find it to be quite the same high standard as the Emirates we had flown the previous time.

By the way, I'll be using the following exchange rates (from google) to give you an idea of the costs:

1 ZAR = 0.066 EUR

1 ZAR = 0.072 CHF

1 CHF = 0.92 EUR

I know the rates were a bit different (specially between euro and franc) in thes spring when I did most of the hotel and flight bookings but I'll use the rounded rates from now.

Traffic on the N1

On the road

The reservation for the car we had done already in Switzerland. We used the Europcar because I have a membership card and everytime we have used them before, we have been satisfied. The price for 10 days was 3904 ZAR (about 258 EUR / 281 CHF). We decided not to keep the car for our last days in Cape Town and that was a good decision. There are otherways of getting around in Cape Town like taxis which we found were cheap.

About the rental: for a tourist normally an ordinary sedan is enough unless you are particularly planning to do some off road driving. The main roads and highways are in good condition. Some of the smaller roads are not tarred but are otherwise well kept. You might have to adjust your speed and travel time though. Even on many of the not tarred roads the speed limit is 100 which isn't so comfortable for a normal sedan and this will, of course, influence the estimated travel times. For example, our estimated travel time from Beaufort West to Upington was about 7 hours but we needed almost ten...it had of course also something to with all the photo breaks. And for all the drivers: stay on the left side!

So after we landed in Cape Town on Monday the 19th we still had quite some travelling ahead of us. We picked up our car and started the drive towards Beaufort West. It was sunny and warm and it was just fantastic, after three years, finally to be again in South Africa. Hubby was driving and my job was to take photos, remind him to stay on the left side ;D and use the warning lights to thank the guys who gave us an easy pass. That's a nice thing they do down there. When a faster vehicle approaches from behing the slower one gives, if possible, some space for the overtaking and afterwards you will thank the other guy with a flash of the warning lights.

On the road some where between Touws river and Beaufort West

We were driving towards the storm, which we caught up shortly before Beaufort West

The drive to Beaufort West from the airport is about 500 kilometers and took us about 5 hours. Unfortunately we didn't think about it to write up the exact kilometers and times so I just try to remember more or less how it was and use the google maps for the kilometers.

The guest house we stayed in Beaufort West is called Die Herehuis. We were there for one night, because Beaufort West was for us only a quick between stop on our way to the north. The guest house was lovely though. The people there were super friendly and cheery and the room was well equipped and clean. The garden was big and green and there was plenty of secure parking places. We wanted to get us some wine and small things to snack for the evening but we didn't realise that the shops close already at six so we ended up picking up some fast food instead. There would have been also a restaurant which apparently serves nice Karoo dishes but after so much travelling we were a bit to tired and wanted just chill at the guest house. One night + breakfast in the luxus double room cost us 870 ZAR (about 57 EUR / 63 CHF).