Castle of Good Hope

Hello you wonderful people!!! I can't believe how quickly time is going by but there's loads of exciting things happening at the moment and I almost forgot that I wanted to share something I did for my birthday, almost two months ago, with you! 

I lived in Cape Town, on and off for about four years but I always avoided visiting the Castle of Good Hope. It's the only castle in South Africa and even though I've got a bit of an obsession with castles I just wasn't sure if I would enjoy going to one in my own country. 

I was right, I should have trusted my instincts... Going to visit this castle and reading all the history it made me really sad. For those of you who don't know, South Africa lived under an Apartheid government which meant there was a lot of segregation of different races and for a long time, each race was treated different to the next based on the "superiority" of one to another. 

When I visited castles in Ireland and Germany I was intrigued by the history and excited by all it but in my own country I found it haunting and at times frustrating.  

Besides that the castle is not structured like the ones I've seen in Europe but also its now in the middle of Cape Town CBD. When the castle was built 3 sides were surrounded by the ocean but with time the tide stopped coming up so much and the city built on the open land.

My birthday was an extremely HOT day typical of a Cape Town Summer's day so the skies were clear. 

So here are some of the pics from my day out! Hope you enjoy! 

Behind me is where prisoners were kept... So tiny and would have been freezing cold.

What's it like being a tourist in your own country? 

x Nats x