Whales and Penguins and Dassies, Oh My!!

Another 4 busy and exciting have passed here in Cape Town, I am constantly amazed by how fast the time is passing - tomorrow will mark the halfway point of my journey!

Saturday and Sunday were what have become normal workdays for me, except that on weekends there is only one staff member working so you are given more responsibility and less supervision. After just a few weeks at SANCCOB I have pretty much figured out the routine of what needs to be done and when. Both days I was assigned to work with penguins which was quite a task because most of the penguins were on two-hourly fluids meaning we had to give them water and darrows five times during the day as well as two fish feedings and some even needed formula twice a day. The reason for this is that many of the penguins had been oiled so they were very dehydrated. Luckily they are doing better now and will soon require less fluids by tubes and hopefully in a short time they will be ready to be released.

Yesterday didn't turn out as planned, but we adapted for the weather. Two other volunteers and myself were booked to go shark cage diving, but found out at the last minute that it was canceled due to the large swells on the ocean. We called Robben Island to see if their boats were still able to go out and told yes, the tours were still available so we caught a taxi into Cape Town. When we arrived at the ticket office we were told that the Robben Island tours were canceled for the day, once again because of the swells, so needless to say we were all disappointed. Luckily we were already at the beautiful V&A waterfront so we decided to take advantage of our time there. Our first stop was to the Two Oceans Aquarium which has hundreds of species of wildlife from the Atlantic and Indian oceans. It was amazing to see such unusual species of fish that we would never see back home and by the size and looks of some of them - ones I would not want to see in our waters!! After visiting the aquarium we walked around a few different markets to do a bit of shopping and pick up some souvenirs.

Today was one of the most exciting days in South Africa so far. A few of the volunteers rented a car for the day to go whale watching in Hermanus, which is about a two hour drive from Cape Town. Originally I hadn't planned on going because it is part of the tour I'll be doing in a couple weeks, but decided I would rather go whale watching twice than to sit around the house on my day off and am I ever glad I did! The drive to get to Hermanus was absolutely stunning, driving up and around mountain ranges, unlike anything I have ever seen. We arrived at the whale watching location just in time for our briefing before heading onto the boat. For the first half hour or so there were no sightings, but we were all excited just to be out on the ocean. Half an hour into the trip we spotted two southern right whales quite close to the boat. It was so exciting as this was my first time ever seeing whales and the fact that they were so close to us made it even more special. One of the whales was an albino which we were told is quite rare, only about 4% of the population are albino. We stayed and watched these whales for about 20 minutes before heading off to find some more. Within 10-15 minutes we spotted another eight whales, most of whom were busy mating. It was an amazing sight to see!! I was busy taking a video of some of the whales when all of a sudden one came right up beside the boat, I almost felt like I could reach down and touch it!! We ended up being out on the boat for 2.5 hours which I think was a little too long for a lot of people who had trouble dealing with the huge swells, luckily I wasn't one of them.

After whale watching we drove along the coast up to Betty's Bay where there is an African penguin colony. This was a very special moment for me because it is proof of the important work that is done at SANCCOB, rehabilitating penguins and releasing them back into the wild. We spotted some penguins with tags on which means they had once been at SANCCOB. We walked around taking pictures for about half an hour, but I could easily have spent much much longer there. The rest of the drive back was gorgeous and we had an amazing view of the ocean. We arrived back in Cape Town just before sunset so we decided to drive up Signal Hill to watch it because we heard it was the best place to see the sunset here, which I would have to agree. We got to the top of the hill just in time and although it was very cold outside, the view was perfect. A lovely way to finish off a perfect day.