We arrived back in Cape Town with tons of plans for Dad's last days in South Africa. But after a painful laundry experience, a parking ticket, and missing the last boat to Robbin Island we more ore less gave up.

We saw a few things around the city and Dad's departure date arrived too soon. He nearly, however, spent a little extra time in South Africa as I almost caused us to miss his flight. I ran off to pay the parking ticket I'd gotten by misunderstanding the obtuse loading zone markations on Cape Town streets. This took hours.

"You cannot pay a parking ticket at a police station."
The "payment office" mentioned on the back of the ticket is "closed until further notice." And despite what the ticket-issuing lady and rental car agent said, you cannot under any circumstances pay a parking ticket at a police station. The hotel concierge, though, had the best misdirection. "Go to the grocery store," she said. "You can pay your ticket there."

After laughing her head off at me, the nice lady at the Pic 'n Pay sent me in the right direction. I took off for the traffic police office and thought all was well when I entered the building. Then I saw the lines.

"Before seeing the sign that said eye testing."
There were people everywhere, standing in lines going to places where something important must happen. A man at the entrance directed me to line number five. I stood in line number five for a few minutes before seeing the sign that said "eye testing." Relatively sure my vision was unimportant for paying my fine, I asked again and was directed to the longest line in the establishment.

Turns out this line is not for paying your parking ticket. This line is for having your parking ticket stamped, which is of course a prerequisite to entering the second-longest line... the line to pay your parking ticket.

I finally found someone who'd take my 200 rand and quickly got out of there. I had to take a cab back to make it in time to get Dad to the Airport.

"A small crossroads town."
So after putting Dad on South African flight 206 to Atlanta, Matt and I set out across Africa on our own. Our first night we drove into Beaufort West... a small crossroads town where truckers stop for the night. The budget hotel we stayed in was nice, but a big step down from the joints we'd frequented while with Dad.

Even though it was in the middle of the town, the hotel reminded me of a big southern platation mansion. It was old and creaky but reasonably maintained. We discovered the door to the breezy veranda that stretches around much of the second floor. We wrote a bit, read some guidebooks and pondered the enormous jouney laying before us.

Off to Lesotho and Matt's Peace Corps friend.