7.21.2012

South Africa Part 1

Our vacation to South Africa was comprised of five separate parts: Family vacation, wedding week, time with friends, anniversary trip, and visiting Jeremy and Delani. Therefore for time's sake and organization, we will start with part one. The saying "a picture says a thousand words" is definitely true about South Africa. It is one of the most picturesque places in the world, in my opinion. This trip was two-fold from the start: celebrating the wedding of my brother and also celebrating our third wedding anniversary. Out of all our trips so far, this has become one of my absolute favorites.

Of course the night before the trip, we did our special pre-trip-stay-up-all-night-preparation-thing which generally leaves a person in a rather dazed mindset but the point of it is to help get adjusted later on in the trip. All that said, we walked with our bags to the bus stop at 5:45am and waited for the bus to arrive to take us 3 hours to the airport where we waited another few hours for our flight to leave. 


The original plan was for my parents and eldest brothers' family to arrive just a few hours after us but unfortunately their flight was cancelled in America and they had to take the next flight out the following day. So Jeremy, Robert and I hung out at a mall and stayed at a mission guest house that we used to go to when I was a little kid. It was fun to connect a place to old memories. When the rest of the family made it, we headed to the farm. 






There's never a shortage of dogs :) 


Ladybrand's cutest coffee shop... Living Life











On a hike to see the cave drawings on the mountain 



  









Me & my boys 



I looked over and this is what he had done by himself...smarty pants :) 




Ty had his first bike ride and horse ride on the farm 









Spoiled much? :) 

This is how we watch movies on the farm

We headed across the South African border and into Lesotho where my family lived when I was 8-10 years old. It was so much fun having Robert finally see that chapter of my life. We visited my old village, Matukeng, where the Gaults have been living since we left. The house always looks so much smaller than it did back then :) Maybe its just  perspective... 








~our old house~





"yeah, we cool" 


Munchkin


Mamba

After a few wonderful days on the farm, we started out at 4:30am for the day-long road trip to Cape Town to begin the wedding festivities. 








Despite some crazy weather, the trip went well and we arrived safely in Cape Town where we met up with Delani and her family. Thus begins part 2... 

4 comments:

Jenofwa said...

Ah yes! I've been looking forward to your blog(s) about your trip!

The Hopewell House said...

This looks like you guys had a blast! I always love your pictures of cute little cafe/coffee shops that you find :)

Unknown said...

Enjoying looking through the photos! I have been wanting to go back to Matukeng for a while now and it was good to see the photos from there again. :)

Rayia said...

Wow, so beautiful!