Category: this is south africa

The journey back

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Wow. That was a great few days away.

Lovely company, great place, amazing weather, superb service, friendly people. It had it all.

But can I admit that I was rather disappointed with the flight back?

Heading out to Mauritius, I went via Joburg and landed (pun intended) with my bum totally in the butter on one of Air Mauritius’ (almost) brand new A350-900s.

And yes: that’s how modern air travel should be. 4 hours (ish) of comfy seats, legroom, wifi, fancy screens, USB charging and really decent service.

And if you’ve ever been to Mauritius, you know that stuff just works. The roads are well-maintained, the streetlights work, it’s clean, it’s tidy. There’s a sense of pride about the place.

So when we flew back on the 6 hour trip to Cape Town last night, I don’t think it was unreasonable to look forward to the same level of comfort and the same sort of high standards.

Eish.

We ended up on a 20 year old A330-200. Cramped seating, uncomfortable armrests with handsets in (remember those?), a screen that looked like it had come from a 1980s laptop.
A cabin that was hot, cold, and then overwhelmingly hot again. No personal air vents.

Ugh.

I’d genuinely forgotten that medium/long haul flying used to be like this. And it was nostalgia I really didn’t want to relive.

I have to say that I have no issue with flying on old, clunky aeroplanes up to Joburg or Durban. 2 hours is no time at all, and anything is bearable. But when you’re on there for 6 (or more) hours – and you’re paying damn high fares for the privilege – I think it’s ok to want a bit more.

That’s why I don’t tend to go anywhere with British Airways anymore, as mentioned here and here. Although to be fair, they do sometimes have nice A350s and B787s on the Cape Town runs, now. But there are still some 777-200s on BA59 that are even older than yesterday’s relic.

They might have had some cabin upgrades though. Maybe that’s something Air Mauritius should think about, because unfortunately, that plane (and I believe that they have another of the same… “vintage”) really does really let their brand down.

But. Safe flight. Decent landing.

And then we were back in Cape Town, and immediately got both sides of the South African welcome: a truly miserable cow at passport control, followed by the nicest, most cheerful toilet attendant in the baggage reclaim hall.

Ah… So very South African.

Welcome home!

Blue Flag

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I might be on a nice little island with some lovely beaches, but are any of them Blue Flag Beaches?

Well, actually, no.

While Mauritius is making efforts to achieve Blue Flag status for its beaches, and some beaches have the potential for it, there are no universally recognized Blue Flag beaches listed in the search results for 2025.

Although the water here is stunningly blue and appears to be crystal clear.

Back home, however, Cape Town is full of Blue Flags:

Yep:

  • Bikini Beach
  • Camps Bay
  • Clifton 4th
  • Fish Hoek
  • Llandudno
  • Melkbosstrand
  • Muizenberg
  • Silwerstroomstrand

As ever though, (some of) the locals are accusing the city of “paying” for the titles (that’s not how it works), complaining that their local beach (not on the list) isn’t very clean, or quite simply inventing weird reasons why Cape Town shouldn’t have any Blue Flag Beaches.

Ah yes, the old “orange urine” thing.
And that “continuous” issue.

You might want to see a doctor, Johann.

But I don’t think there’s much danger of that sort of thing, really. Let’s say that 10,000 people each urinate 250ml into the ocean. That’s a total of 2,500 litres of wee. And that sounds a lot until you understand that the volume of the South Atlantic is 160,000,000,000,000,000,000 litres. (That’s 160 million km3).

I think that’s going to be pretty diluted.

I think we’re going to be ok.

As for me – I’m going to take my chances with the Indian Ocean outside my door.

Happy Swimming!

A travel day

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I’m away for a few days.
Traveling all day today – well, the daytime hours, at least – for a few relaxing days away with Mrs 6000.

Actually, she’s already there, so there are plans for a romantic rendezvous on the west coast of a tropical island this evening.

As for the blog, well this is a holiday dedicated to slowing down (almost to a full stop), relaxing and enjoying the sunshine. So there is not much likelihood of any blog posts while I’m out there.

[audience gasps]

Which is why I am writing and scheduling (have written and scheduled by now, I suppose) a few before I go.

[audience sighs with relief]

But, you know, if the need and/or opportunity arises…. You know where to look.

(It’s here.)

See you on the other side. 🙂

Terrifying dinosaur

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On our patio, nogal.

OK. Not so terrifying.

He’s a Cape Skink (Trachylepis capensis) and he’s completely harmless.

Not uncommon around here either. You may remember them from previous posts on 6000 miles…

We have a family of them living in the back garden, and with the warmer weather now with us, it’s nice to see them out and about, legging it between the woodpile under the braai and the bushes on the far side of the patio.

Always with a slightly knowing smile on their little faces.