October 26, 2014, Sunday. Our last day on this train. We will arrive in Cape Town tonight and transfer to the Mount Nelson Hotel and a welcome night's sleep in a real bed. We hope it will also be quiet as last night this train was not. Meanwhile, we are traveling through the Karoo, a vast high plateau surrounded by low, rocky mountains. Hardly any trees, just scrub and the occasional windmill. We saw a few sheep,this morning, confirming that this is sheep ranching country. It reminds me of Australia's Nullarbor.

We made a stop around 8am to allow most of the passengers to disembark for a 5K or about 3 mile walk to Matjiesfontein, a reproduction World Heritage site. John's swollen feet and ankles made that walk impossible for him, so we stayed on board along with about a quarter of our fellow passengers. We did walk around the town, snapping pictures of the Victorian era buildings and enjoying the warm/cool fresh air. That made our heretofore perfectly nice train seem stuffy and stale, adding to my desire to leave it behind tonight. It's been a great trip, however, and I would recommend it to anyone. 

The museum devoted to transportation is a claim to fame here

After leaving this nice little town, we entered wine country and what looks like the bread basket of S. Africa. The climate here is so much more temperate and less harsh than in the previous countries that the difference is easy to see. We roll through countryside that is obviously productive, with huge vineyards and wheat fields, Not to mention roadside flowers such as we haven't seen until now. This is a beautiful, open country and easy to imagine as a homeland. With whites, mostly Dutch Afrikaners and English comprising only 10% of the population, I can't help wondering about the ownership of these productive farms.  We have been told that in some of the countries where the native African people seized control from white dominance, farming and commerce have both suffered as a result. There is always a period of transition needed with that kind of upheaval. I would like to think it will be short and that countries like Zimbabwe will move forward into both prosperity and less dictatorial and incompetent governments over time. 

Prosperous or not, every country we have visited in Africa has 

pockets of poverty to deal with.

 At 6:15 pm, we pulled into the Cape Town station and disembarked our luxury train, the first step in our return to reality. Once again, we were met by Rohan Vos, who thanked us all for riding his train and kept his people performing at top efficiency. Our bags appeared along with rides to our various hotels, and after some parting hugs, John and I were off to the Mount Nelson Hotel, a sprawling old grande dame of a hotel, frequented by royalty in the old days. I do love upscale old hotels! They have so much personality. Once again, our room is elegant, spacious, thoroughly modernized, and supremely comfortable. We checked in and were too tired to go out for dinner so settled for eating here even though only the Planet Bar was open. We were able to order two light vegan-friendly pub type items and a glass of wine apiece for a very moderate price, much to our surprise. After two weeks of way too much wine and food, we were very happy to return to moderation. Another happy surprise was the discovery that the Austrian couple and four of the Dutch couples are also staying here. It was great fun to see people entering the bar who now seem like old friends.