Bon Voyage - Our Little Friends Seeing Us Off

At the airport we had our little friends sending us off. We will see more of these guys soon.

Heading Back To The US

Today is our last day in South Africa, but before we leave we decided to do one last site visit to Constitution Hill which is located downtown Johannesburg. The last time, I was in South Africa, I did not visit this place due to time, but I am glad I had a chance this time around. What I discovered on this guided tour, that this is nothing but Robben Island right in the heart of downtown Johannesburg. Constitution Hill is now the home of the constitutional court where your basic rights and freedom is protected. Yes, it is the highest court in the land. It has a very diverse set of judges on the bench today, with one even with HIV/ AID's residing on the bench. They were in their last session when we arrived. Before today, it was the site of Johannesburg's notorious Old Fort Prison Complex commonly known as Number Four, where thousands of ordinary people were brutally punished before the dawn of democracy in 1994. Many of South Africa's leading political activists, including Mahatma Gandhi, Albertina Sisulu, Winnie Madikizel-Mandela and Nelson Mandela, were detained here. This prison was for men and women and the conditions were horrible as you can imagine. Overcrowding was a common theme here. Examples of imprisonment, is if you did not have a pass to be in a certain part of town, you were sent to prison for an average of 3 months. Yes, a pass to travel from town to town. Walking around freely was not an option. If you ever get a chance to visit South Africa you should visit this site, it is a great experience, for that matter all of South Africa is a great experience. The culture and people are some of the nicest people on the planet. It is an experience and feeling, I wish all could experience.

Heading Back to the US Now.

Back To JoBurg

We finished our Namibia tour and had a great time, but now we are heading back to Johannesburg. We have one day left before our long flight back to the US. Our good friends here are having a gathering to wish us off. I tell you everyone here is so friendly and the treatment is awesome. Our good friend Mary, put together a party to send us off. I tell you Mary is always planning something for us. There were people from Atlanta, Chicago and Columbus, OH along with some locals. It was a great time at the party. I am glad we have a late flight back, because I need all the rest I can get.

North to Namibia

About a year ago our friend Sadhna transferred to work in Namibia. Naturally, we took her up on her offer to visit once we were in the area. I mean, one country away is in the area enough, right? There'll be many more Namibia photos later, but here are just a few of the sights we've been lucky enough to gasp at while visiting Etosha National Park here. It's dry and dusty, we're ashy and so are the animals. The desert-like terrain makes it ideal to see animals moving in big groups, especially as they head to watering holes. The lions were indeed there and these photos were taken from a healthy distance. Hence the grainier appearing quality here. It's just amazing seeing these animals up close.

Primates, Penguins and Petals

Head north of Cape Point, back to the big city and you'll be treated to several highlights. Among the first things you'll notice are the endless signs warning you about the baboons. Don't feed them, don't leave your things unattended, especially food. Don't have thoughts about food while looking at them because they'll probably try to rip your face off. They're everywhere and there are baboon crossing signs to testify to this. Keep heading north and you'll find the penguins. Lots of them. They're cute but OMG do they stink. Think several barrels of rancid crabs and you'll have an idea of the stench. The photo here is of just a few of them because a photo of a multitude risks transmitting the smell. Keep heading north and you'll get to Kirstenbosch, the National Botanical Garden. This place is amazingly beautiful. We'd like to think that its beauty stands alone and we were in no way biased by the stinky penguins. In the photo of the garden, you'll some Bird-of-paradise flowers on the right. Notice they are not the usual orange variety. These have purple and blue hues. This one was actually renamed "Mandela's gold" in honor of Nelson Mandela.

The South in South Africa

So if you're on this southern side of the world, you gotta head as far south as you can, right? That's just what we did on this day. Cape Point is just the place to do that. I suppose more precisely it's the most most southwestern tip of the continent, but that's just splitting hairs for goodness sake. Again, the drive there was kinda spectacular. Here we are cheesing it up for the mandatory photo-op once you get there and there's a nice view of the "point" for you as well.

A Whale of a Time

What do you do when you've eaten like a whale? You go find the real whales so you can feel better about yourself. This day of our journey was one to head down the coast to Hermanus, which is "the place" if you want to see whales do their thing. This time of the year is remarkable because the whales head to the warmer shore areas to have their babies. Otherwise they tend to chill in deeper and colder waters. The photos here include the drive to Hermanus, which was pretty spectacular. Not having one of those 10 ft telephoto lens cameras with nanosecond shutter speed, the whale photos with some random woman's head in it is all I got. Enjoy. We did.