Holly and I wanted to travel to Cape Town because we've heard its the best place to visit in SA. We were going to fly, but since we had 6 day break from school we decided to take the Garden Route. The Garden Route is a beautiful drive with lots of scenery and places to stop along the way. Its around a 12 hour drive to Cape Town, but we split it up between a few days so we could stop and do a lot of the things along the way. Its a straight shot to get there, but thankfully we didn't have to drive it alone. Debbie has a travel agent friend named Tracey, who use to be a teacher. Tracey picked us up from Grahamstown to give us a tour of the Garden Route. She is WONDERFUL.
On the first day, Wednesday, Tracey picked Holly and I up from Grahamstown and we headed down the road. We passed by Jeffery's Bay on the way. It is famous for the Billabong surfing competition they have in July, it has huge waves. Our first stop was at the Tsitsikamma National Park. Its a tiny place out in the middle of no where. The ride reminded me of home again, not only because of the cow pastures on all sides, but because of the large amount of pine trees. I had not saw one pine tree up until then. They plant acres and acres of pine trees and let them grow and then harvest them for lumber. The don't grow naturally here. Around the pine trees and cow pastures were the Tsitsikamma mountains. A really nice view.
At the park, we took a hike through the woods to a rope bridge over Storms River mouth. You can go kayaking, tubing, and do lots of water sports along the river, which leads to the ocean. The view was beautiful because we had the mountains all around with huge trees and flowers. Then on one side of the bridge was calm Storms River and the other was the Indian Ocean with huge waves and rocks. A lot of people visit Tsitsikamma for camping and for the canopy tours. We were going to do the canopy tour on a zip-line, but we didn't make it in time. I hoping to go back and do it before I leave.
After our time at Storms River we checked into Tsitsikammas Backpackers. None of us had ever stayed at a backpackers place before, but it was really nice. We had our own room, but just had to share the bathroom and kitchen with everyone. It wasn't bad at all. There were lots of bed and breakfast places around, or B & B's as they say. Besides the B & B's and a few backpackers places Tsitsikamma has one street with a handful of shops and restaurants. The restaurant we ate at was so cool! I really felt like I was at home. It was called Marilyn's, after Marilyn Monroe. It was 60s themed with black and white tile and decorations of Grease, James Dean, the Beatles, and of course, Elvis. Along with Marilyn pictures and memorabilia, there was also a ton of Elvis stuff. The owner of the restaurant has 10 old Cadillac's. He had 3 of them in the restaurant. The menu was just like at home. They had different entree's named after certain states, like: The Mississippi, New Yorker, The Ohio, Nashville burger, and “American Pancakes,” SA pancakes aren't the same as the ones we have. They even had part of the restaurant called the Tupelo House! Not only where Elvis was born, but also the same place where my Bigmama lives! Such a small world.
Marilyn's played music by Elvis, Percy Sledge and Eric Clapton. They also had posters from The Elvis Festival, where people impersonate Elvis Presley! The impersonation pictures looked really good. The last Elvis winner was from Scotland. Can you imagine? A Scottish Elvis? That sounds strange to me:-) Supposedly many people come from all over to the Elvis festival. This place blew me away. Its weird to think how famous and world wide Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe are even years after their death.
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