Thursday February 17, 2011-Cape Town wind sucks.

Pulled into port early this morning. I was up at 0630 to see us approach the most spectacular port I have ever seen.   Look at pictures online at how beautiful it looks, then imagine seeing it from the ocean for the first time.  The huge Table Mountain had a perfect blanket of clouds rolling over the edge of it as it towered above the buildings of Cape Town.  Everyone on the ship was ecstatic to arrive in under an hour.  If only we had known what was coming next.  The ship which had been headed directly towards shore, gradually turned parallel to the city and eventually began driving away.  We received word from Marti (basically our cruise director but instead the self proclaimed “The Voice” because she makes all announcements) over the PA that we would need to wait about an hour until the wind calmed to pull alongside port.  You see, Cape Town must have built one of the dumbest ports because it is so narrow that if it is wavy, you cannot pull into it without being knocked around.  For the next 4 hours we were given updates every ten minutes about what little progress the wind was making dyeing down.  0800 turned into 0900 which turned to 0930 which turned to 1030 which turned to 1200 which turned to 1400, and so on from there all the way until 1500 when they finally told us that we may not get in until tonight.  Imagine how aggravating for everyone on the ship.   The majority of them, Cape Town was the port that they were most looking forward to on the entire itinerary, and to lose a day is just terrible.  Finally around 2030 we were told that we would be pulling alongside port between 2330 and 0100 of Friday.  Everyone was really excited and revved up because that meant if we got cleared that we would be able to get off of the ship and go out at least for a few hours.  Plus, most of the big safari people had flights out of Cape Town in the morning which they would be able to make.  Well everyone got dressed and 2300 rolled around…not even close to the lights of Cape Town.  2 hours later 0100 rolled around…no closer to the city.  People gave up hope of going out that night and instead retired to their beds to get an early start in the morning.  At leeeaasssttt we will be there in the morning.  Right?