South Africa/Seychelles Follow-up
10/28 - Day 1: We left on our adventure, a long flight to Johannesburg with a layover in Dakar. Funny one to tell you as we left Dakar I guess it's South Africa policy to "spray" the inside of the plane prior to take-off with an insecticide - WOW what a stink, but as the PA announcer put it "it's not harmful to humans" yeah right!
10/29 - Day 2: Arrived in Johannesburg in the early evening! Picked up our car and GPS and headed out to The Michelangelo. Nice room, bed was rather hard but a nice place to rest our heads. We had dinner at a pizza joint in Nelson Mendon square - O.K. meal not the greatest. We then proceeded to book a full day trip to Lion Park and game drive to Pilanesberg National Park for tomorrow.
10/30 - Day 3: 9 A.M. comes early when you've been in the air for 18 plus hours, we found a great little coffee shop called lattelicious and had a quick breakfast and met our guide Carlo for the day. The first stop was Lion Park where we got to pet a few lion cubs as well as drive around the park and see the big lions. It was a blast. After leaving Lion Park we headed out a stopped at a traditional African roadside curio/craft market, not a bad place to shop, however the vendors were very aggressive. Next stop was Bakubung Bush Lodge in Pilanesberg National Park for lunch, good food and a relaxing view to take in. From lunch we headed to Sun City, could have skipped that! Not really our taste. Around 3:00 or so headed back to the park for our game drive. What a great time, we saw a ton of wildebeests, zebras, giraffes and a hippo and rhino even charged our "van" on the way back. Our adventurous day ended with a long two hour drive back in the rain to the Michaelango Hotel where I thought several times we were going to die as our driver Carlo zoomed across the road, but we made it back to the Michaelango Hotel save and sound. Great Day!
10/31 - Day 4: Happy Halloween! Today we headed out to Pretoria the capital; the GPS put us right at the Church Square. We then headed to the Transvaal Museum, where we didn't stay long. Funny story about our next stop Voortrekker Monument as we were going to walk from the Museum however I'm glad we decided to drive and the GPS said on 1.5 miles but I wouldn't have wanted to do that walk! The Monument was pretty kool, we were able to walk to the top and see a great view of the city. We then headed to the Paul Kruger Museum, pretty neat place. The day ended with a drive back to the Michaelango Hotel and dinner at a little cafe at Nelson Mendon Square.
11/1 - Day 5: Midnight flight to Seychelles, however the flight was delayed until 1 :30 A.M of course we didn't know this until we got to the airport after a great drive in the country side to Maropeng an exhibit on the Cradle of Humankind. The museum was O.K. thought the fossil exhibit would be a bit better then it was. There was a neat boat ride at the beginning of the museum which made my day!
11/2 - Day 6: After a late departure from Johannesburg Airport we arrived to Seychelles via Air Seychelles. Amazing view as we fly into the airport. Pickup up our rental car and headed out to the Four Seasons which was located in the other side of the island. Didn't know at the time of booking (at least that my story ;-)) that each Villa had a plunge pool, AWESOME! My first stop after breakfast was da plunge pool! We then took a four hour knap awoke and there was a bottle of Champaign on the door step so we headed out to the balcony and took in the amazing sunset with a few classes of Champaign. Once the sun set we headed to dinner on the resort, expensive meal but it hit the spot.
11/3 - Day 7: Breakfast buffet that was included began today's adventures which included a trip to downtown Victoria the capital where we had lunch at A bit of walking around, saw the one and only stop light and the clock tower. Afternoon return to the resort and a trip to the beach for a quick dip in the Indian Ocean, salads for dinner at the resort and off to sleep.
11/4 - Day 8: We tried to book a snorkel trip for today, but no luck as there weren't enough people interested so it was cancelled. We decided to drive around the island today to see a few sites. A lot of driving and no sites! Breakfast was at the ARC , my bride and I had coffee and crepes, yummy! An afternoon return to the plunge pool awaited and was GREAT. Dinner this evening was at the Opera House -less expensive than resort. We stopped at the Anchor Cafe for desert and met the Project Engineer for the Four Seasons resort. A private villa starts at $7.5 million, not bad, yeah right not on my salary. It was nice to "chat it up" with him.
11/5 - Day 9: A day at da beach it was at the resort, a little sunburn but not too bad. Have to head back to D.C. with some sun! Dinner was going to be at the Anchor Cafe; however they were closed so we went to the Opera house again. Early to bed for an 8 AM flight home :-(
11/6 - Day 10: We left the resort early and headed to the airport, a long, long, long flight was ahead. We arrived home on 11/7 Saturday at 6 A.M. A layover in Johannesburg where we had lunch at Nandos and desert at Fournos Bakery. We picked up the boys from the kennel and a few food items and spent the day relaxing and unwinding from out adventure.
