After the conclusion of UConn In Cape Town 2014, I spent six weeks backpacking across South Africa. While six weeks may seem like a lot of time, it was nowhere near enough time to begin to absorb and appreciate the incredible beauty, diversity, and richness of South African history, culture, and geography. This trip felt like an entirely new experience even after my 3.5 months in Cape Town, and it was full of its own challenges, rewards, and surprises. I’m getting misty thinking about it. Below is an itinerary for my trip, and here is a map.
The Garden Route (Weeks 1-2)
- Wilderness
- Knysna
- Plettenberg Bay
- Stormsrivier
- Otter Trail (5 day hike)
- The Crags
- Port Elizabeth
The Eastern Cape & Kwa-Zulu Natal (Weeks 3-4)
- Cintsa (Start Week 3)
- Bulungula
- Coffee Bay
- Umzumbe
- Durban
The Drakensberg, Lesotho & Gauteng (Weeks 5-6)
- Southern Drakensberg (Start Week 5)
- Sani Pass (Eastern Lesotho)
- Central Drakensberg / Giants Castle
- Northern Drakensberg / Royal Natal National Park
- Monantsa Pass (Northeastern Lesotho)
- Johannesburg (Rosebank)
- Johannesburg (Braamfontein)
- Pretoria
As I sit here in my comfortable dorm room in Storrs Connecticut, I remember the experience of sitting inside a rondavel hut on a warm night and listening to women sing and dance, of stepping outside and being surrounded by only inky black night and stars, deep within the Eastern Cape province. I remember the grungy-as-hell bed that I shared with my Australian traveling buddy while staying in an entertainingly sketchy Johannesburg rooftop hostel, in accommodations that I’m pretty sure were used to house black domestics during the Apartheid days. I remember the friendly young colored women braaiing boerewors over the fire at a hostel in Plettenberg Bay, talking to me about their aspirations and the nearby township in which they grew up. I remember meeting the Caveman in Wilderness, crossing the Bloukrans river at low tide with my pack on my back, watching the Xhosa fisherwomen scratching out a living on the Knysna lagoon, exploring Durban’s indian district and feeling like I was on another continent, and getting up close and personal with dassies, baboons, and more than a few monkeys.
My nostalgia has distracted from the fact that this post is meant to serve as a reference for all the places I traveled to while in South Africa. On this map, the markers in blue are places I traveled to as a UConn student, the places in red are where I traveled alone, and yellow indicates where I lived in Cape Town. As I write posts detailing my experiences in these places, I will link them to the headings above.
What David Does 