Jaci Negra gets some unusual guests at her seaside restaurant. They are longer than a bus, weigh more than a tank and eat three tons of food a day. They are southern right whales, whose growing numbers in South African waters are making the resort of Hermanus one of the most popular spots in the world for whale watching. Negra's restaurant, the Bientang Cave, is right on the shore beneath the bayside cliffs.
Guests sit down to dinner just a stone's throw from the frolicking, blue-black behemoths.
They make a lot of noise. You never get used to it. Once a fishing village that played host to whaling ships in its tiny harbor, Hermanus is again becoming dominated by whales. Each September since 1991, the town of 20,000 residents has held a Whale Festival. This year the festival, which ran from Sept. 24 to Oct. 4, attracted more than 100,000 visitors.