Charles Apple

As I gazed out from the executive dining room on the 19th floor upon a blue, dreary, rainy-looking Tuesday morning, my waiter informed me: The Cape Doctor has arrived.

The view of Signal Hill out the window of my room
at about 7:30 a.m. this morning — 1:30 a.m. EDT.
—

The Cape Doctor is what they call the strong southeasterly wind they get around here. I don’t normally quote Wikipedia, but I’ll make an exception today:

It is known as the Cape Doctor because it has long been held to clear Cape Town of pollution and ‘pestilance.’

Although the wind smites a wide area of the sub-continent, it is notorious especially in and around the Cape Peninsula, where it can be unpleasantly strong and irritating.

During the summer, then, the Cape Doctor can be a good thing. But it’s not summer quite yet. In fact, spring doesn’t officially begin for a few more weeks. As beautiful as the weather has been the past eight days, this is winter in South Africa.

Just like “April showers” or the February-March rainy season back home in South Carolina, the September Cape Doctor often brings rain, clouds and a biting wind to the good people of Cape Town.

You can’t see Table Mountain in the photo above. It’s back there, though, lurking behind a curtain of clouds. In this next one, the top of Lion’s Head is totally buried in the clouds:

Remember that oil rig we saw towed into harbor Saturday morning? It’s moored just off to the right of my hotel room:

Please forgive the “ridges” on the right side of that picture. That’s the reflection of my drapes. I can’t figure out how to shoot out the window without reflecting them.

So folks are telling me it’s cold and windy out there and to dress warmly. I checked the report for Cape Town on the Weather Underground and discovered while that yes, there’s a chance of wind and rain today through Thursday, the high temperatures will still be in the mid-60s. Which seems quite warm enough to me:

As I write this, it’s 57 degrees and I’m about to leave for the newspaper. I’m sure I’ll be fine.

I brought only one jacket with me: My sport coat. I brought only one long-sleeved shirt. I wore it Saturday — and nearly roasted — but I had it laundered yesterday. If any of the next two or three days seems cold to me, I can always switch to long sleeves.

But I’m wearing a Hawaiian shirt today. I think I’ll be fine.

I’ve had laundry done in a hotel before, but it’s not something I commonly do. It wasn’t practical to drag two weeks’ worth of clothes 8,000 miles from Virginia Beach to Cape Town — and back again, dirty and smelly — so I planned to make a couple of laundry drops while I was here.

And if I extend my visit here — and it’s looking as if I will; details to come — I’ll need a third round of clothes-cleaning.

It’s a fairly simple process. You stuff your dirty clothes into the large plastic bags supplied by the hotel. You fill out a form in which you carefully supply a count of your items and where you state your preferences: Hangers or folded; starch or no starch; wash or dry clean.

If you have your clothes picked up before 9 a.m., they’ll have them back into your room by 6 p.m. or so:

Those were my shirts and pants, hanging just inside the door of my room. On the floor was this box, wrapped quite formally:

Inside were my socks, handkerchiefs, underwear and T-shirts. It was as if Santa Claus had paid a visit.

Like I said, I traveled as light as I possibly could. I planned at least one laundry drop — which I made on Friday. I made a smaller one Monday. I’ll have to make a third this Friday or next Monday, perhaps.

Here’s what I packed or wore on the way up here:

• 1 Long-sleeved shirt
• 3 Short-sleeved dress shirts (plain-colored)
• 4 Short-sleeved Hawaiian-style shirts
• 2 pairs of Dockers-brand khaki-colored pants (this is as close as I get to dress pants these days)
• 2 pairs of blue jeans
• 1 sport coat, dark blue
• 1 tie, dark blue (which I hope I won’t need. I hate ties.)
• 7 T-shirts (I sleep in these, which is why I brought so many)
• 1 pair of casual short pants (just for bumming around the room)
• 8 pairs of white athletic socks
• 5 pairs of black athletic socks (which are basically my work socks)
• 1 pair of white walking shoes (for off-duty hours)
• 1 pair of black walking shoes (my work shoes)
• 8 handkerchiefs
• 10 pairs of underwear
• 1 hat (which I didn’t think to wear on Sunday and got sunburned as a result)

Most of this was packed in my large suitcase. A few items were in my carry-on, so I could change clothes on the plane or get by in case my luggage was delayed a day or two.

Here’s the way my closet looked this morning before I left for the day:

Those are my shirts and pants hanging in the middle. That’s my sport coat, second from right. On the far right is the bath robe the hotel gives each guest. It’s not even close to my size, as you might imagine.

Up top is my hat and the blue jeans I wore to dinner last night. The red thing down below is a collapsible clothes hamper. My T-shirts and other items are stored in the drawers at left.

The plan today is to continue working on various projects each staffer has cooked up. I’m floating around the office, offering encouragement, tips and whatever expertise the artists need to keep them on track. I have a few more lecture items to cover, but at this point, we’re pretty much in informal mode and will remain like this most of the week.

—
EXPEDITION TO SOUTH AFRICA

You’re reading chapter 13 of my journey to Cape Town, South Africa. Previous installments:

• CHAPTER 1: Preparing for the journey.
  
• CHAPTER 2: I made it as far as the Dulles airport bar
• CHAPTER 3: Getting really bored sitting at Dulles
• CHAPTER 4: Safe and sound in Cape Town
• CHAPTER 5: Day one in Cape Town
  
• CHAPTER 6: Day two; No effects at all from jet lag
• CHAPTER 7: A tour of the Westin Grand
• CHAPTER 8: Dealing with little things like money and electricity
• CHAPTER 9: Thursday night on the Cape Town waterfront
• CHAPTER 10: Ending the work week on a high note
• CHAPTER 11: A Saturday trip to the Cape of Good Hope
• CHAPTER 12: A Sunday visit to Cape Town’s Table Mountain

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 1st, 2009 at 2:58 am and is filed under Charles Apple, Travelogue, Trip to South Africa. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.