St Georges Cape Town

... a couple of dassies, which are large rodents (I think -- they look a bit like prairie dogs) that live on the mountain. I gather they are quite common here, so for the locals it's probably like seeing squirrels or something, but since I've never seen one before, I thought it was very cool.<br><br>Soon we're off to have dinner in Fish Hoek.<br>

Happy 4th of July!!<br><br>Val and I decided to call a cab to take us downtown, rather than try the minibus system, since we haven't had our transportation orientation yet. Maybe we'll be more adventurous next time. We got dropped off, paid our driver about $6, and headed up to the 10th floor of a building. We walked in to meet the yoga instructor, a really nice white South African ...

... back to the truck to unload all of our gear. I have no idea how we managed to accumulate so much clutter in 6 weeks. We had booked a hotel down near the Waterfront in Cape Town and had to get a taxi there as we couldn't carry all of our stuff. I had got us a cheap last minute deal at the hotel and we were delighted to find that we had been upgraded to a suite. I had the foamiest bath in Africa and a good long soak to de-grime ...

... bar scene isn't as much my thing as it clearly is for others on the program. Today we started orientation. After awaking at 7am to a beautiful and delicious free breakfast at the hotel, we walked to this auditorium (and took pictures along the way of Table Mountain under the amazingly clear, blue sky--reminds me of Colorado) where we had some lectures on South ...

... it was. They told the ladies that they would keep him over night just to be careful and incase anything were to go wrong. So they left innocent little Matthew at the hospital all alone. Only 3 hours later the women at the House got a call from the doctor with some bad news. When they were trying to put in a drip to make sure he was getting fluids and some medications his heart stopped and they couldn't get him back. The doctors told the head ...

... little game drive through the reserve. One of the guides needed someone who was brave and fearless to be the spotlight guy, my hand shot up and I was given the job. I must say I have quite a good eye for spotting wild game at night from a distance, if college doesn't work out I may have a fallback. The game drive turned out to be successful and we saw many small game including ostrich, kudu, and springbok (that is about the ...

... who was attaching the ropes to try to distract myself from the view of the gorge floor so far below me. I explained to him my reason for doing the jump, and that it was more than a little out-of-character!<br><br>Finally I stood. Brandon told me to lean backwards until I felt the pull of the swing rope. My words went something like this: "Oh my god oh my god, this is scary this is scary! This is for you Mim oh my god! No, no, no, this is scary this is scary, no no no no no!" At which ...