Sensational South Africa!!

DAY ONE
      Back home, a four-day weekend would call for sleep, relaxation, maybe a get-together with friends or family, but here, in Lagos, it calls for a "mini-trip". For us, this long weekend had South Africa written all over it. Obviously, four days are not enough to really see and experience South Africa, but we made the most of our time, focusing our attention on Capetown and the surrounding winelands.
     The fun began as soon as we landed in Johannesburg where we were supposed to catch our connecting flight to Capetown. Of course, the customs line was outrageously long and slow-moving, so by the time we got through the line, our connecting flight was scheduled to leave in 10 minutes. Now, we WERE traveling with 5 other ladies from our school, but as their seats were closer to the front of the plane, they were way ahead of us in the customs line, and by the time we made it through, they were long gone, not bothering to wait for the rest of their group! Britte' and I high-tailed it through the airport, stopping to ask personnel for directions to security (we did not check any bags) and were then escorted to the security gates while having to sprint through the throngs of people and carrying our bags (I assure you, this is no easy task!). We begged security personnel to whisk us to the front of the line so that we could make our flight, which, surprisingly, they did:) We sprinted once again to the gate and were literally the last passengers to make the flight. It was at this point that one of our colleagues asked us "Where are the other two?", to which I replied with a confused look on my face, "Who are the other two?". Apparently, we had outdone our friends and made it to the gate before they did! To their disappointment (and quite frankly, to our relief) those other two missed the flight! So, the next few hours were spent perusing the shops at the Capetown airport while we waited for our friends to arrive on their newly scheduled flight.

Lunch in the courtyard at the Manor.

Dutch Manor at the vineyard where we stayed.

     Soon, with our party reunited, our driver had our bags packed into the van we'd rented and we were on our way to Franschhoek, a picturesque, little, wine town outside of Capetown. Note: this was my first time in a country where they drive on the left side of the road! It was here that we had rented a manor, yep, a manor with it's very own vineyard and winery, to stay in for our first night in SA. The manor is a Dutch manor house built sometime in the 1600's. It has a thatch roof, claw-foot bathtubs, and a ton of charm. First up - a picnic lunch of yummy finger-foods in the courtyard over-looking the pool.  La Motte. Here, we enjoyed a multi-course tasting of the local red & white wines offered. We had time to stop off at one more local winery for more wine and then back to our manor again for massages:) Now that we were totally relaxed, we spent the next hour out under the giant oak tree enjoying canapés and champagne, and putting up with a few mildly-annoying mosquitos, with the sunset-illuminated mountains as our scenery (not to mention the vineyards right at our feet). Eventually, we took our gathering inside where we were dive-bombed by flying cockroaches!! No, I'm not joking! At first, we thought they were giant, mutant, bees, but after one landed on one of the ladies, we realized they were cockroaches. Don't expect seven ladies to sit in a room with flying cockroaches and not hear some screaming or a commotion:) One of our Texas girls clobbered the roaches with a shoe and things calmed down for the night!
DAY TWO

Those are baboons!!

     The following day, we began with another wine-tasting (it was like 11 o'clock for all you tsk-tskers). This place, whose name escapes me, was the best one of the bunch. Our driver took us up the mountain for a quick picture-taking moment where I was startled to see actual baboons! I had no idea that we could expect to see a baboon on this trip - I guess I assumed they lived in the jungle - and we were so not in the jungle! It was rather weird - almost like seeing some stray dogs on the side of the road.

The gang.

     We decided at last to head into the actual town of Franschhoek for some shopping. Several of the girls bought handmade leather shoes, but I walked out with nothing (regretfully). We followed up this expedition by more shopping in yet another little town called Stellenbosch. Here, I was ecstatic to see that they had a gelato shop (that's italian ice cream) and it was heavenly - they had both of my favorites - lemon and chocolate - so I had both:p That afternoon, we finally made it to Capetown, found our B & B and melted the hotter than normal day away! One of our party came down with food poisoning we think, I lounged in the pool, a few girls took the funicular (that's one of those fancy words that Rick Steve's uses all the time, and until recently, I had no clue as to what he was referring to - it's a cable car) up to the top of Table Mountain. This is SA's most famous landmark, a flat topped mountain. It is a breath-taking backdrop to the city of Capetown. Our first night, we walked down to the V & A waterfront for a good, old steak dinner. Delicious:) We don't eat a lot of beef in Lagos, so this was a real treat:) Later, we walked through the adjacent mall, and a couple of the ladies saw a late movie, while the rest of us went for a drink at a local watering hole down the road from our B & B.
DAY THREE
     The next morning, we found out that our friends who saw a movie the previous night, had had quite the adventurous evening! Apparently, their cab had dropped them off in front of our hotel, but as they gabbed away, they mistakenly went through the wrong gate, and found themselves locked-in! Not wanting to wake the soundly sleeping guests at the wrong hotel, one of the ladies (our superintendent's wife - who is in her mid to late fifties) climbed the fence, only to find that she was now stuck in the gated and locked alley way between the two hotels. This is when they lost their composure and began yelling for help, which drew the attention of the security guard at our hotel, who was able to get them out of the locked areas and into our own facility and safely to their room. We definitely had a laugh over breakfast hearing that one!

Scrum-diddly-umptious!! Tea treats!

     So, on our last day in Capetown, Britte' and I decided to buy a ticket for one of those double-decker, sight-seeing buses that they have in many touristy areas. It was well worth the 20 bucks. We had fun jumping off (not literally) to shop or rather peruse the goods, and made it after a few hours to our agreed upon meeting place of The Grand Nelson. This is one of those old-timey famously grand hotels that all the elite Europeans stay at. They offer a "high-tea" like in England, which one of our group-members really wanted to experience, so we all partook. It was wonderful! The tea was fantastic, the buffet of sweets & savories was delightful, and the ambiance was serene. This was one of the highlights of the trip - very unique and totally not what I had anticipated doing in SA.

A view of Table Mountain from our double-decker bus.

     Several of us hopped on the double decker bus for the complete tour of Capetown and were rewarded with a breezy, unobstructed drive along the coast back to the waterfront mall. Capetown is a beautiful place - I can't say it enough! And so, we ended our last evening back at the waterfront with another meal, a little more shopping, and a ride on the ferris wheel before we said adios to SA:(

The coast of CapeTown.

DAY FOUR
     You know how in movies, when someone is on their way to the airport in a hurry, inevitably, they end up with a flat tire and miss their flight? Well, that almost happened to us! We no sooner had gotten on the freeway to head to the airport, when our taxi started making a sound like we had a flat tire! Our driver pulled over and got out to look, didn't see a flat, so started driving again, but the sound continued, so he called for a back-up vehicle. We made it to the airport with with just enough time to get through security and grab a coconut mocha (absolutely delicious by the way - Starbucks doesn't even make them this good!) from the local coffee shop. Everyone made it on board and safely back to Lagos:)
     So now we're home - at least "home" for another year and five months! And we can't wait to go back to SA! Next time, we hope to have  a little more time to see the sights - like Robbin Island where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned, or Cape Point, the southernmost part of Africa, and the penguins that live there.  Til then...:)