Greetings from Cape Town

Hello!

We have been off to a slow start on this blog, and for that I'd like to apologize.  I've very much been in vacation mode and not necessarily world traveler mode.  As we are getting ready to leave our first destination it is sinking in more and more that we have barely begun this journey.  Cape Town has been the perfect kick off for Samantha and I.  Similar enough in culture where we don't feel like complete tourists (read most everyone speaks English), but after 30+ hours of travel it also feels very far from home.

We have been obsessing over the food, and have had some truly unbelievable meals.  If you're ever in the area La Mouette and La Boheme are musts.  That being said, we haven't had a bad meal yet.  We've spent a considerable amount of time just walking the different neighborhoods and everywhere we have stopped has been a real treat.  The craft beer scene is young but seems to be thriving, and its been really fun to see styles like "West Coast IPA" and "American Pale Ale" on the menus.  We are leaving Cape Town tomorrow to head up into wine country which we're both very excited for, which is weird for me to say being that I'm not a big wine drinker but everything Samantha has had me try to far has been fantastic.  

We have also thoroughly enjoyed the natural beauty that Cape Town has to offer.  Earlier this week we spent the morning hiking up Table Mountain.  Unfortunately the clouds didn't burn off like we had hoped and the views were non-existent.  Nevertheless the hike was awesome.  Straight up for about 2 hours along a forested gorge and then loads of climbing massive granite peaks on top.  It really was too bad we weren't able to take any photos, but when we are back in Cape Town we're planning on taking the cable car up on a nice day to capture the views.  We also finished up our scuba certification this week with four dives along the cape.  While primarily getting tested on all the required skills we also got to see some really cool marine life - octopuses, some small sharks, and loads of star fish and sea urchins.  I'm itching to get to Indonesia to dive some of the best reefs in the world.

While out to lunch last week we met a group of people from Durban in town for a wedding.  We ended up spending the day with them out in Camp's Bay and then later back at their apartment.  They gave us about a million things we "had to do" while in South Africa and we hope to get to most of them.  On their recommendation after wine country we will be taking a rental car along the Garden Route on the southern coast.  They have given us recommendations for wine tours, kayak spots, a cool antique car collection, and, most excitingly, a great company for cage diving with Great White Sharks.

Expect photos and videos soon!