Holiday Inn Garden Court Pretoria-Hatfield

... alarms in ev**y room, a keep door upstairs with 3 locks, and lock in my own room with direct int**com to guards. It cant really get bett** than that...and even whilst bird spotting I was chatting to the friendly cop wh**e my room ov**looks. Might as well be my own private body guard as noone elses house is next to his car. I ov**look the road leading upto the 'estate'

Social calendar is full already. Already had a dinn** party within a day of arriving. Tomorrow I am ...

The next morning when Katie and I woke up, Riaan was at church. We read magazines waiting for him to get back and when he did, he brought us the English version of the Sunday Times (Cape Times)...he had the Afrikaans version for himself. Such a nice host (and all we'd given him was a bottle of wine we picked up at the airport...). So Riaan put on some Coldplay and we all read the paper. Hah. The rest of the day was dedicated to seeing Pretoria. We met up with ...

... must have been okay because gradually they agreed to ride with me to and from work. The two lane rural roads have short distances where there are three lanes to allow faster traffic to get by slower traffic. Needless to say unless there was a lumbering truck in front of me I was always the slower traffic. When Jane rode with me she always cautioned me as to when these sections were merging back together as I was surprised a few times when it happened. Also there were those ...

So, life in Pretoria has been going well. I still haven't ventured too far from Pretoria very often, there's always some reason to stick around. Today, though, I will be driving south to the Drakensberg mountain range, and possibly into Lesotho (a tiny mountainous country entirely contained within South Africa). The city life is wearing me out a bit, I need to get out into the sticks for a couple days. I have been doing some indoor ...

... Benefits include absoloute discretion in deciding when and where to go and the freedom to be whoever you please with whomever you please. You may also find it easier to meet new people as you are compelled into seeking people out socially, and fellow travellers are usually pretty keen to adopt a lone traveller! Personally, I would not have liked to have done this trip alone - in light of what i was wanting to get out of it. I found ...

... skin was already rotting and filled with puss. He put in the tongs and prised apart my skin. I felt him hit the bone as he dug to get all of the poison out. Then he rolled up the gauze and shoved it in to the hole; packing it tightly to keep my finger from collapsing. Blood and puss and brown antispectic oozed everywhere. As I watched, I realised that I was as far away from feeling 'at-one' with my little finger as I had ever felt in my life. It ...

... dangerous! 6th March Car Trouble Part One. Today I had my Medical for my flying licence. This involved going to a doctors in Tzaneen where I would be poked, prodded, electronically probed and pricked. I was fine and passed but I did have to run all over Tzaneen to about 3 different medical clinics as not one person seemed to be able to do it all. On my way to the private hospital, ?Hens car started struggling - no power to the engine. It then gave a final ...

... a remote control device (each resident has one). Once inside the compound, the gardens are very beautiful. Rolling lawns, Liquidamber and Jacaranda trees, rose bushes, lavender, foxgloves, lillies and daisies abound. After walking across the lawns, entry to the units themselves is then gained by yet another remote control device which opens the main door to the foyer. Up a flight of stairs, unlock the security grill across your front door and then ...

... safest suburbs in the area I was under no circumstance to walk around alone at night. My aunt was robbed at gunpoint in her home after she was tied up to a chair. My cousin herself was robbed in the driveway. So far I didn't get the impression that Johannesburg was like any other City. I hate to say this but I was glad to only be staying there for a day. I finally got to go back to the hotel where I ...

... as old as newgrange. Once he opened his mouth our enthusiasm basically extinguished. His name was Gerrit Van Der something or other. I missed his surname in a tidal wave of saliva as he spoke his first name. O yes, I got the weather and not the news. Its not prounonced how it's spelt. It's Ghhheeeeerrrrrit so of course after a couple of tries he was christened "hey". We had a bit of a trip to the first destination so we had a bit of a chat and he openly admitted that ...