Addo to Stellenbosch

Leaving Addo National Elephant Park behind, it was long day drive to Knyzna, along the garden route! We passed through many townships, usually located on the outskirts of the town. Often they were across a street from the very big and wealthy suburbs, as this is where they are employed!

Millions of people live in townships like this. 

Many have no power and running water. 

Lots of road work happening, but if there is a long wait, there is always refreshments to be bought!

           Coffee break on the beach!!!

Stopped to admire a lot of these in a field along the highway!

                   Handsome, eh?

Biltong...an air dried, plain or flavoured with spices piece of beef! A snack found all over South Africa!  Moister than our beef jerky. 

King protea....South Africa's national flower. It can get to be 12 inches across. This one was only about 8 or 9 inches. Growing wild along our morning hike in Stellenbosch. 

Addo Elephant National Park

The drive from Port St Johns to Addo was beautiful! Reminded me of the rolling hills in Montana or Wyoming!  Just bigger! A long day of driving, so some driving shots!

A Xhosa village. One of many we drove past. 

Each grouping of houses represents a family in the village. 

          Driving through a small town. 

                   Another town!

And, of course, we stop for many a coffee....cappochino or a filter coffee!!!

The next day.....Addo national elephant park!

      We saw huge herds of these guys

                A pregnant lioness

And a weaver bird and her nest, at our guest house. The hole for the nest is at the bottom!

Port St Johns

Capetown! This is the first place, where we have had wifi at our accomodation! We have seen a LOT of South Africa! It's a beautiful country! Diversity in the landscape, in the peoples and how they live and even in the temperature.

Before we left on our tiki tour around South Africa, we visited a zulu village, where life on a traditional village was explained to us. We passed by many Zulu villages on our drive through this country. 

We left Pietermaritzburg on November 5, and our first stop was at a guest house right on the Indian Ocean outside a town called Port St Johns! Driving through this town, we came upon a riot! Police with guns, rocks being thrown and the smouldering remains of burning road blocks! We were given a police escort through the town, so got to our guest house safely!!!

On the beach in front of our guest house

                   Whale watching! 

        

Toto, our hired guide on a hike through a jungle forest! 

Wild!  Keep your windows closed. They will come in and steal!

Giraffes and zebras and......OH MY!

Well, our internal clock is still somewhere between home and here! We were wide awake at 5 AM again!!! So no trouble being ready for the 6:45 leaving time for market! Bought vegies, meat, bread and a milk tart, which we had for dessert in the evening! A typical Afrikans dessert. Very tasty!

The ladies were invited to Sally's house for breakfast. About ten ladies were there...all from James' and Joan's church. After the breaky,  we went to 'Deluxe Fabric', where we bought shweshwe fabric. It is a stiff hundred percent cotton fabric.  Apparently when the missionaries came to South Africa and saw the bare chested black women, they did not know where to leave their eyes!!! So they introduced this fabric to the king, and the ladies loved it. It is now a traditional dress!

       My stash! Aren't the colors lovely?

Just outside Pietermaritzburg is a nature reserve. We went for a hike through it with James late afternoon, to see what we could find.

We got within 100 feet of this big guy!!

And I always thought zebras were black and white!

I got a picture of this monkey, while sitting in Alty's courtyard. He was running along the prison wall, apparently coming to raid Alty's strawberries!

And we hear the Bombers were defeated again!

Pietermaritzburg

We are in AFRICA!  WE are in Africa! I have to keep pinching myself so I know this is for real!  

Our friends, the Alty's, work for MCC, and live in an old jail! So now we are sleeping in a jail!

It is spring here!  The jacaranda trees are in full bloom throughout the entire city!!!  Purple petals are covering the roads!!

As I sit here in Alty's courtyard, the fragrance of the jasmine vine is surrounding me!  

We walked the downtown area yesterday, and saw the statue of Gandhi. Pietermaritzburg is the town where Gandhi got kicked off the train as a young man, because a white gentleman was offended that there was an Indian sitting in the car he wanted to sit in. Even though Gandhi had a legitimate ticket.