Southern Sun Cullinan Cape Town

... the road in the sanctuary enclosures there were: lions, crocodiles and a leopard - the cheetah couldn't be spotted.

Had lunch before departing back to Cape Town driving on the older road instead of going through the tunnel to give us views over the Winelands region. Went out for a meal at Nandos once we got back to the appartment.

16th - Got on the Red sightseeing bus from opposite the Camps Bay Hotel to Victoria & Albert Waterfront. Went ...

... buffet breakfast every morning, catching up on some emergency emails, shopping, eating fine food every day... oh there was this place near the hotel called Manhattan which served the nicest chicken snitzchel with garlic butter... mmmmm! No wonder I've put on so much weight!! Enjoyed a few early nights, so nice to have the option of watching TV. As we had already done the wine route we decided to stay in Cape Town an extra night and meet the truck in ...

... touch the elephants. I was torn about who to have my up close and personal encounter with but i had fed Tandy and walked Jabhu so i needed to meet Marula, the matriarch. She's 17 years old and just beautiful. She too is not fully grown but she was large. Oddly enough, i should have been scared but the magic of the moment forced me to forget fear. The same guide had my camera and he took a video that i will always love. I was rubbing Marula's forehead and then looking ...

... not take well to being crawled on by the middle one. it's not certain if any of these chicks are from the same clutch but i look forward to seeing them again. they live at Cheryl's house when they are this young so she can feed them every few hours and despite the fact that Cheryl has 80 cats (that is not a typo folks), i am going to have to take an allergy pill and get over there to see my babies again. they are just too cute!

... in two which we felt was quite an achievement considering the heat that day and the fact that some parts were so steep we were on (in a very dignified way) all fours. The views as we walked through the gorge and to the top were amazing, and I can't put them into words- check out the (not so good Sony cybershot) pictures. Another highlight was our trip to Simon's town and boulders bay. Here we were greeted with an idyllic, white sanded bay ...

... times I've had with my friends here...and we'll be together again back home. Here is a list (in no particular order) of some of my top impressions from this semester. Some have to do with South Africa, some do only indirectly, and some don't at all: 1. I take efficiency for granted in the U.S. 2. South Africa may be more developed than the rest of Africa, but one should NOT consider that to mean it's comfortably on par with Western Europe or the ...

... the views! We had planned to absail down the mountain but unfortunately due to it being windy in the morning (although not in the afternoon when we got up there) the absailing wasn't running that day...a shame as it would have been so cool to do! On the Sunday we managed to get ourselves tickets to the South Africa vs New Zealand final one day cricket international. It was a nice day for it so we arrived at the stadium fairly early to get a good seat on the grass (after riding on ...

... located, all while trying to make it before 6am, not always guaranteed. This is a common thing for most of the people around here. They all live on the outskirts of Cape Town, which if you just start to drive a bit out of the city the sides of the roads are clustered with townships which consist of shacks made out of steel or any sort of metal or wood found. The electricity lines are all streaming down to the multitudes of shacks looking like spider webs. He was very ...

... gathered on the seventh deck around the pool as the administrators and faculty danced around in costume, and King Neptune, or the captain of the ship, covered head to toe in green body paint and wearing a grass skirt, sat at the head of the pool. If you wanted to be initiated into the world of the scale backs, you had to prove yourself worthy. After pouring "fish guts" (a mixture of milk, oatmeal, and fish oil) on you, you had to wade through the ...

... of ground beef in a sweet and sour mildly spicy sauce, topped with a custard. Albert and Dino's warmth, graciousness and generosity bowled us over and we hope that we can reciprocate it someday. We will be leaving tomorrow morning on the truck safari that will take us from here to Nairobi over the next six weeks. With the pre-departure meeting and a good look at the truck, all our concerns that we may have made a bad choice are gone. There will be 8 of us on a truck generously ...