South Africa

What a trip! Sean and I are now suffering post-vacation blues. We would love to be back in Cape Town, but reality calls.

Our adventure to the Mother Land, as Sean puts it, was fabulous. We started the journey with an 18 hour flight from JFK to Cape Town. We did have a layover in Dakkar, where we refueled and had a security inspection. However, we did not leave the plane. We arrived in Cape Town on Friday, June 13 and met Granny and Grandpa. After some tea, good conversation and good old South African bobotie for dinner, we headed to bed for much needed rest. The following morning, Granny and I joined Zonna and the girls for hair dos and giggles. Excitement was in the air! Later that afternoon, we celebrated Zonna and Steven's wedding. What fun! Those South Africans love to give speeches and they love their wine.

Here's the rest of the vacation in a nutshell:
Sunday, June 15: Lamb cookout at Annika and Martin's house (friends of Auntie Viv and Uncle Ron). Yum!
Monday, June 16: Scenic road trip to Calvinia with Granny and Grandpa for a visit with Auntie Viv, Uncle Ron and Arron at their hotel, Hantam Hotel.
Tuesday, June 17: Sean and I meandered around the small town of Calvinia. He finally got his biltong (jerky-type food. His was made from kudu). I got my mango juice. Tasty! Had a lovely dinner with the gang.
Wednesday, June 18: Headed back to Cape Town in the rain. Winter weather there. Sean and I checked out Tyger Valley Mall that evening. Had a delicious meal at Annapurna Indian restaurant. Probably the best we've ever had.
Thursday, June 19: Breakfast with Grandpa's brothers. Great to see them! Then Sean and I ventured out alone and booked a hotel at the waterfront. Walked along Victoria and Alfred Waterfront. Shopped a bit and had dinner at Ferryman's Tavern. Braved the rain and wind again.
Friday, June 20: Drove all along the Cape peninsula. Saw beautiful cliffs, bays and beaches and a mangy baboon. Ate delicious fresh fish. Didn't get to see Cape Point due to heavy fog.
Saturday, June 21: More fog so we missed out on Table Mountain. Instead we headed out to Stellenbosch and found a lovely guest house to check into called the Villa Grande. Walked around the quaint town and had dinner at De Volkskombuis. More bobotie and chicken pie. Of course, the ever present bottle of wine and rooibos tea.
Sunday, June 22: Drove out the Stellenbosch wine route and checked out some wineries. Found my favorite Spier chardonnay and brought it home with me. Dinner at 1802.
Monday, June 23: Time to leave. Granny and Grandpa got us to the airport. We met Zonna and Steven for lunch (they were coming back from their honeymoon) in the airport. Sad goodbyes!
Tuesday, June 24: FINALLY arrived home at 11:15 a.m. after 24 hours of travel. Ahh, home!

Thank you to Granny, Grandpa, Zonna, Steven, Viv, Ron and Arron and all of the wonderful friends we met there. You made our stay extra special and we miss you already.

Check out all of the links for a bit of education and check out these photos . . . South Africa (Sean would like you all to know that Picasa doesn't do a great job displaying them. Unfortunately, the compression they use doesn't give photos the same quality that the originals . . . whatever that means).

Zonna and Steve

Ok,
Just a quick update. Here are the pic's from Zonna and Steve's fabulous wedding in S.A
I promised everyone I would post them asap, after my final editing and quality control!
I am now also faced with the daunting task of going through the other 518 pictures I took.
Updates on those to follow as soon as I can get through all of it!
If you would like the original copies, let me know and I will gladly email them to you.
Picasa's lousy jpeg compression tends to really make things look grainy...


Click on the link below.

Wedding

Day After

For those of you who travel, you know that flying to and fro can pose some challenges . . . getting to the airport on time, standing in long lines for check in or security, going through customs in an efficient manner, dealing with other travelers, and most importantly: Sleeping on the plane! Luckily for Sean and I we had no trouble with any of the above mentioned experiences. Except that last one. It is the kicker and most important and necessary on a long flight. There is no way to get comfortable on a plane. I do believe we could now be considered contortionists after finding multiple sleeping positions throughout our 18 hour flight home. Yes, I said 18 hours! We left Cape Town, South Africa at 6:00 p.m. their time, so that would mean noon our Eastern Standard time. We flew all night with a stop over in Dakkar for refueling and a security check. Although we never got off of the plane. Then we headed on to JFK and arrived there at 6:30 a.m yesterday morning. After going through customs and claiming our baggage we jumped on the Air Train to take us to our long term parking lot. Finally, we pulled out and headed home around 8:00 a.m. and turned into our own driveway at 11:15 a.m. Which means we were traveling for about 24 hours. Ahh, home!

It is good to be home. I speak for Sean as well when I say that we feel like we've been hit by a truck. But it was all worth it. We had a fabulous couple of weeks in South Africa celebrating his cousin's wedding, spending time with family and taking in the sights. There will be more blogging on that later when we upload the photos. But for now, here are two fun shots of a mangy baboon we saw near Cape Point.

Belated

Sean's 33rd birthday was on Tuesday, June 3. I'm a few days late with these wishes. I had wonderful intentions of blogging that day, but, well it just didn't happen. So, here's how we celebrated and my wishes for Sean . . .

I have a philosophy that birthdays are meant to be special. Maybe because my parents always made the effort to make my sister's and my birthday a day set apart from every other day. That could mean something as simple as a special dinner. (By the way, thanks, Mom and Dad). So, since Sean had already purchased his new camera for his birthday, I set about trying to make his day a little different than the rest. I made him breakfast in bed, which simply consisted of an English muffin and tea (I don't cook.). I think he was awake enough to enjoy it. He's so not a morning person! Then I gave him 2 T-shirts so he'd have something to open on the actual birthday. Finally after a day of work for the both of us, we went to dinner at Annie Bailey's, one of Sean favorite restaurants, so he could drink a Guinness and have some good ole' Irish fish and chips. Ahh! When he said it was one of his most enjoyable days, I knew my simple little efforts had paid off.


So, happy birthday, Sean. I love you for so many reasons. Here are a few that I'll share with our devoted blog readers.

• I love Sean's ability to be completely his own person and not care what others think.
• I love his creativity . . . in visual art and musically.
• I love his sense of humor and ability to make others laugh.
  
• I love his ambition, work ethic and integrity.
• I love Sean's South African heritage.
• I love that he comes with a great family.
• I love his patience with me and his sensitivity.
• I love his "it is what it is" attitude and his positive outlook on life.
• I love Sean!