first days in Cape Town

We have been living a very charmed life during our first few days in Cape Town, and this charmed life has not been conducive to blog posts. We've enjoyed settling in, eating all our favorite South African treats, seeing friends, and waking up to views of Table Mountain and Lion's Head each morning.

But let's start at the beginning...

My parents met us at JFK to see us off. We arrived at the airport hotel after a bit of a fistfight with our car battery. It decided to be difficult and stop working the day we were leaving. The nice AAA man who replaced it got a big hug and a tip from me.

Away we went. This photo was taken approximately two hours before the nasty man in the seat behind me decided to shove my seat as hard as he could (causing my forehead to nearly collide with the seat in front of me). When I spun around to ask him what the heck his problem was, he informed me that I could not put my seat back because he did not have enough room. I gave him an earful, with some backup from the South African Airways flight attendant. I also tried to plead my way into an upgrade. Sadly, those efforts bore no fruit. 18 hours, 2 inflight movies, and a complimentary mini-bottle of sparking wine later we were in Cape Town. 

Two hours after our arrival we returned to the airport to fetch Parker. He was delayed, so we went and got a red latte to share. They are lattes made with a rooibus tea "espresso" and are just fabulous. We thought it was a bit of a good omen that the barista used the foam and honey to draw a cat face on ours. 

These are our views from our bedroom windows each morning. It isn't possible to wake up and see Table Mountain and Lion's Head and not feel happy to be alive and in Cape Town. 

Our darling cat had perhaps the most harrowing of all our trips. Thankfully he is settling in wonderfully, even if he is a little bewildered by the new view. I took him out onto Candice's balcony to scope out his new hood. 

Here is evidence of Parker's happy state. Candice's work seat is his new favorite spot to sun himself. It is a race to see who gets their bum into the chair to claim it first for the day. 

This past Sunday we went to Kalk Bay, a lovely bohemian little town on the sea. We went with a singular vision: breakfast at Olympia Cafe. My word, this place is like Cape Town's version of the lovely Tartine in San Francisco. We shared a mushroom and mozzarella croissant with some scrambled eggs, and then another croissant with jam for dessert. 

Swoon. It was too good for words. My face hurt when we left because I was smiling so much. 

After breakfast, we walked down the main road and window shopped. We ended with a walk along the pier, looking at the boats and chatting to a fisherman here and there. 

And this little house? This place, dear friends, is the the result of good fortune smiling upon us once more, because this is the house we are moving into next week. A colleague of Brendan's at the University has to leave suddenly for England to care for an ailing family member and has offered to rent her darling Victorian house to us. It has a wonderful sunny courtyard, a spare bedroom (book your tickets, folks), and a new kitchen. And there is a bathtub!! We haven't had one of those for 3 years. We are feeling so happy and fortunate and thrilled. Update addresses and such will follow, along with a virtual tour next week.

So life is great. We are embracing life in the Mother City in a big way, and there is no sight of decreased excitement in the near future. The weeks ahead will bring driving lessons for me (should be good for a comical blog post), settling into work life, a new sweet little baby niece, a visit from Brendan's parents, and lots and lots more guava yogurt for yours truly. Man, I just can't get enough of the stuff.