Thendele hutted camp uKhahlamba-Drakensberg Park

... bear in mind I'm no expert here - just the way it made me feel seeing white stones piled into cairns where soldiers died and remain, strewn across empty fields).

The day came to a rather unfortunate close with us discovering a 4inch roofing nail embedded in
our back tyre. We limped 19km(!) to our hostel in Dundee and the following morning, with the assistance of a very kind ...

... but the weather then turned against us and it became miserable so we put in some miles and covered some distance so we could go to the Drakensberg mountains. From there we popped into the neighbouring Lesotho. I thought this was part of South Africa but it turns out it is a completely separate country, as the stamps in my passport confirm! We did a tour because you had to have 4 wheel drive to go over the Sani pass through the mountains. It made the pass we did a few days ...

... name of their choice. In the courtyard the students proceeded to have their faces painted like warriors (very stereotypical I know), but the students had a great time. After we cleaned up it was time for show and tell. The students asked me many questions about Native Americans and American in general. They thought maybe I lived with Native Americans ...

... we got off the bus - pure mountains and the hostel set in the middle of it. Nothing in sight at all, no shops, no restaurants, no bars. Just the hostel and the mountains! Turned out that from this hostel you could rent a bike and cycle for hours around, do a village to to Lesotho, abseil or hike. Not great options for Neasa and myself who aren't exactly outdoor kinda people. But when in Rome...I would recommend Northern ...

Today we headed towards the Drakensberg mountains and a luxury tented lodge to be shared with a family of baboons. This was wild 'luxury' camping at its best!! The following two days were to comprise of team football, walking in the mountains and a trip to the ...

My Safara was absolutely amazing. We saw 4 of the Big 5, minus the leopard which I could care less about. I saw the elephants and so my life is complete. We have a photo of 3 of the 5 together by one brook. Our guide asked us to send it to him because that's never happend. It was an Elephant bull, 2 white Rhinos and a lioness. Amazing. I'm glad I didn't get malaria or sunburn so I'd say my trip was an absolute success!

It's the beginning of the evening of the second day of our brilliantly planned holiday! We arrived at 1:15 am this morning and were completely knackered - would that stop us from having fun? No, obviously sleep was the first thing on our mind but unfortunately the last thing we did! ... Sleeping was just an impossibility with Andrew singing and immitating his parot with the new ...

... though!! There is so much to see and do here i am really glad that i have two months to do it all. The house we are staying in is really nice although a bit secluded although i dont really mind that, i haven't had my turn to cook yet i think i will have to offer next week though so god help them!! Well anyone who knows me will be really impressed that i have been up at 7 every morning so far, not sure how long that will last mind!

... blocked by a large elephant who was eating in the middle of the road. He wasn't moving for anyone and after a few trys (including the old turn off the lights of the car so he won't know we're here trick) we were forced to turn around and take the long way back to the camp. The park here is really beautiful with rolling hills and from the Hilltop Camp you have a beautiful view and may see elephants grazing in the distance.

... from Kenya. A lot of people end up lump Africa into one name, one place because it is all unknown. Most Americans have no connection or knowledge about the land and people so the whole continent is lumped together as similar. However from my couple of days here South Africa has more similarities with America or Europe than it does from what I saw in Kenya. Here there are highways are well taken care of with strip malls as rest ...