Peter's World: Strandfontein and Cape Town December 2011

We had a wonderful holiday. It all started off on a rainy December day. The airport transfer was late due to the bad weather. Our plane was late due to the bad weather. Somehow whenever we go on a local holiday the plane is delayed. The kids are older now so they could manage a little better. Eventually we were on our way in the “green airplane” as Dylan called it. We were lucky again and had 5 of 6 seats in our row. A poor young man (who appeared to be on his first flight ever) got the privilege of sitting at the window seat next to Dylan, who kicked him often while Dylan was trying to get to sleep. Emma slept most of the way on Dylan’s actual window seat which he gave up before the plane took off because he wanted to sit with his Mommy. The kids are much better at flying now and know how things work with taking off and landing since their 4 flights in the last two months.
Our holiday started with a one night stay over in a downtown Cape Town City hotel. We had booked a suite because we wanted some space for the kids. It turned out to be a fabulous two storey suite. The kids slept downstairs and we slept upstairs (See the pictures for more details). The kids were impressed that they had their own TV in their room. They never watched any TV but that wasn’t the point. We went to the Waterfront in the evening to buy some supplies for the rest of the holiday and then later had some dinner. The weather was gorgeous and very warm.
The next morning we got together with Anina’s sister and her husband for breakfast. After breakfast we finished the rest of our shopping and headed north to Strandfontein to meet up with Anina’s parents. The kids were very excited to meet their grandparents. We can’t tell if they could remember them from the previous visit a year before. We stayed in exactly the same place we stayed the previous year. It was wonderful to see how the kids had developed and what they could do now that they couldn’t do the previous year. Our holiday routine this year was far more relaxed since the kids now sleep in the afternoon and don’t need to go to bed at 7pm anymore. This meant that we could do things in the morning and in the late afternoon. We went to Lutzville one morning to take the kids for a ride in their Oupa’s vintage truck. They also got to sit in some tractors which made their day. They both love farm equipment especially Dylan. All to soon sadly our time in Strandfontein was over.
Then it was back to Cape Town. This time we stayed in a magnificent apartment in Mouille Point near the Cape Town Soccer Stadium. I found this treasure on the Internet through a letting agency. It was a penthouse apartment clearly added on top of an older apartment block. This was evident from the fact that the lift only went to the four floorth and we were on the fifth floor. Anyway the view and apartment itself which was huge (200 sq meters with two bedrooms) made up for this in spadesful. We didn’t have much of a schedule planned for this part of the holiday. We ended up eating most meals in the apartment since it was the best place to be in Cape Town with the best view. On the first day the kids spotted the kids train from the balcony and demanded that we had to go there right away, which we did. We ended up riding the train twice after Emma insisted that we needed to do it again. Then we found a slide that was suitable for the kids and they played the rest of the morning on that. (See the videos of this below) We also went to the Cape Town Aquarium. The kids really enjoyed this especially seeing the penguins. They have fluffy toy penguins which Feli gave them from South America they were really keen to see the real ones. Since we are back from Holiday their toy penguins are receiving much more attention than before. They also liked the fish. Dylan seems to remember the sharks most. The last day we went to Kirstenbosch gardens with Anina’s sister and her husband. We enjoyed a beautiful picnic lunch in the gardens. Then sadly the holiday came to an end. Fortunately the return flight had no delays and we were entirely spoilt again and had a full 6 seater row (3 seats on each side of the asle) to ourselves, not that the kids really noticed the difference. They still changed seats often and bounced around a lot.
For the last three days we have been catching up on Christmas Shopping and preparing for Christmas.
See pictures since the Mauritius Holiday
See pictures of the Standfontein Cape Town Holiday
Videos on YouTube: