7am Game Drive

We woke up bright and early today and got onto the jeep for our second game drive. It was freezing and dark, but they gave us blankets. The first part of the drive wasn't very eventful, I think the animals were still sleeping or something. We went into the lion cage and they were feasting on a cow caucus, I'm glad I didn't eat before we went out. The sunrise was amazing, the different colors kept peaking out from behind the mountains. We also saw warthogs, cheetahs, and crocodiles this morning. The breakfast buffet was ready when we got back, it was almost better than dinner! We had to checkout right after, and we decided not to go horseback riding since we already went on the trail twice. It's more money I will have for home. After the reserve we took a three hour bus ride back to Wellwood :( and had a sum up class at 7:30. We all sat around and gave input to Professor Andre so the Study Abroad office can make the trip even better for next year.

Welcome Drink

YAY Safari day!!!We headed off on a two and a half hour drive to Aquila Game Reserve and stopped at the Language Monument for lunch and pictures. We also received our grades for our time at Rocklands Camp. Meganne and I received a group grade of a 94, which is great. However, while at the monument and eating lunch we heard that others had received 98's. We both felt that the groups that received these high grades did not do as much or put forth as much effort as we had. But life's not fair I guess, oh well.
Champagne was waiting for us as we got off the bus and arrived at Aquila. We then went to our cottages, two people in each. The cottage was adorable, two full beds, built in closet, fireplace, rock bath, and outside rock shower. At four o'clock we went on the first drive, the jeeps were awesome, felt like a roller coaster at times because it was so high up. We saw Water Buffalo, Hippos, Rhinos; Springbok, Zebra, Giraffe's, Lions, Jekels, and Ostrich's. We pulled into a big patch of dirt and waited for the other two trucks, the drivers then pulled out a cooler and trays of snacks. We all ate and drank in the middle of the reserve, it was amazing, there were mountains all around and the sun on one side, moon on the other.
The 7pm dinner buffet was the best! I was so sick of the chicken patties at Wellwood, this was a nice relief. One aggravating part of the day was that they told us due to the World Cup, they were not doing ATV or Horseback riding! They changed their mind and then said only six could go horseback riding. Many of us were not told of this, including myself. We'll see how tomorrow goes.

Bloody Chicken

I was expecting today to be really boring, we had three different sessions to meet with people from various businesses in Cape Town. Our first stop was at the Platteklip Wash House in Table Mountain National Park. We met with Quintin Vaughn, the tourism manager at the one point in the park. He described the different things people can do at the park and the different places they can stay overnight. The location of the meeting was so cute, it was a lodge, but had contemporary fixtures and two lofts with steel stairs. After, we met back up with Ivan Groenhof and he spoke to us about The Rim of Africa and the various trips he takes people one. He started this business with one other person, they are in the beginning stages. I really enjoyed listening to him, although it was a little slow at time, we got to hear about his different careers and how he ended up
in the one he is in now.
We then drove deeper into Cape Town and stopped for lunch before meeting with Cape Town Tourism. A couple of us went to Spur, a local sit down Rib/Burger joint. I went the safe route and ordered a chicken burger, since I don't think the beef burgers are real. I took one bite into my chicken burger, looked at it and saw blood. I guess they don't clean their chicken as well as we do, that was the grossest thing ever, I spit it right out!!! The tourism meeting was by far the best of the day, we met with Lianne Burton the Director of Marketing and she talked to us about the effect of the World Cup on Cape Town. She did a forty-five minute presentation, and at no time did i check the time or want the presentation to be over. Her information was very interesting and appealing.
Meganne and I broke off from the group after the meeting and met up with her friend at a bar on the Water Front. We stayed for a couple drinks and were able to catch the USA game and England game at the same time. Go USA!! We eventually took the train again, and that is the last time we take it at night. It took us an hour, the train had to stop at every stop and at random times, that were not even stops.

Hiking!!

Went on the best hike of my life...so far!!! Today was amazing, we started at 9:30 and headed up a 750 meter (.46mile) high mountain that overlooked a valley and the ocean. The trail was full of twists and turns that had the occasional look out point. I decided to wear Capri leggings, bad idea, my legs were all marked up from the brush that we had to walk through. I was terrified that I was going to see a snake, but we were lucky and didn't run into any. When we finally made it to the top, after about a two hour hike, the views were unbelievable. Seriously, when you guys see the pictures, your going to think they are backdrops. At the top, our guide Ivan read us a poem and then told us to find a spot about 20feet away from any other person. We had to stay in that spot for an hour and reflect on the poem and think about a couple questions he asked; Is it the journey or the destination that is important? How did the trail reflect your life? I think that the journey is the most important part, the destination is always amazing, but the journey is memorable and made up of many great experiences.
After descending the mountain and looking up at it for the tenth time, we all walked away with a sense of accomplishment and many memories. I'll probably take away the memory of one of the girls talking on the phone for 15 minutes while climbing down the mountain, complaining to her father about how she hates hiking. We also went to see the Penguins at Boulder Beach, there weren't as many as I thought but they were still really cute!!!

Today was probably one of the top five since I've been here.

FIFA World Cup Game!

Today was the day! We went into Cape Town around 10am, Meganne and I went separate from the group so we could do a little shopping. I picked up a couple T's for Hepher and Cameron, hope they like them. As soon as we left the store it started raining, but we headed down the Fan Walk anyways. We ended up running into part of the group at a really cool bar, so we stayed for a couple of Cider's(fruity beer) and dried off. I think we were the loudest group in the bar! We all left to go to the stadium around 12 and joined the parade of people walking towards the gates. Oh I forgot to mention, when we got on the bus in the a.m. we did a drawing for who would get the lower level seats, there were only five. Meganne and I were both picked!!
The stadium is amazing!! I took lots of pictures, so don't worry, they will be up soon. Our seats were parallel with the field, 25 rows up. The game started of slow, 1 - 0 at half time. Portugal ended the game 7 - 0!!! It was their biggest victory so far in the Cup. The best shot of the game was taken by Ronaldo when the ball rolled off his back, over his head and he just simply kicked it into the goal. You guys should try to see if it is on YouTube, it was hilarious. We booked out off the stadium a little early and headed to The Waterfront to do some more shopping and left shortly after at 5.
So we dropped off laundry in the a.m. before leaving, we had piles of clothes and nothing left in our closet. We walked in for dinner and were told that not all the laundry was done, of course....ours wasn't done!!! Tomorrow we are hiking and we have nothing to wear! No idea what to do, we'll see how it goes lol

Rocklands Camp

Finally, the day ,most of us have been waiting for...camp week!! We arrived at Rocklands around 11am today and had a discussion with Shaun and Vyan, the camp leaders. We talked about all the activities we were going to do with the kids and we also brought up new ideas that were incorporated into the schedule.
After lunch, I volunteered to be the dishwasher, of course. I didn't mind doing 30+ dishes since the window over the sink looked out over the ocean and mountains. We then played a team building game of Human Foosball, which was a lot more fun than I thought. Since it rained all day we couldn't do the outdoor rope course so we did a 30' rock wall instead! I decided to tackle the easy side first then went over to the outward sloped wall. We all cheered for each other as we went up. We went to the adventure center common room to do group bracelets to unite each person. Meganne and I had team Switzerland, white bracelets. A couple of the girls had choreographed a dance that we performed when the kids arrived at camp. We got the dance down after about an hour of practice, Shaun and Vyan loved it!!
The whole day was a great bonding experience for the group, we saw each others strengths and weaknesses and helped each other through them. We found out who could or couldn't dance, what music they liked, and if they liked to clean. The kids arrive tomorrow.

Update

Hey everyone, just wanted to let you know I will not have phone or Internet until late Friday night. We will be at Rocklands camp leading about 60 kids from townships in activities for three days. On Friday we will be going to Robben Island with the kids and then a fan park to watch a game for the rest of the night. For the most part, things are going well here. I am sick of getting woken up at night by people that go out to the bar and think its okay to come back screaming. I can't wait to sleep in my own bed and know what food I am eating. The weather has been decent for the most part, only 4 or 5 days of rain. I'm a little worried about the weather at Rocklands because it is situated on a hill overlooking the ocean with a mountain behind it....really windy. Looking forward to the sun back home! More blogs next weekend.