Thursday, June 12, 2008

Good times!

Well Barney and Meg have left and it is time to settle back into life here in SA. As we get back into the swing of things I thought I would give you all a recap of our time with the Stichters. Our time started with a great evening out in Cape Town walking Long St and eating dinner at the Africa Café.After a few wonderful days spent hanging around Cape Town doing some work and touristy stuff like wine tasting, great white shark cage diving, surfing, Robben Island and going to the top of Table Mt, we headed up the Garden Route to Jeffreysbaai.

(Side note: on Sunday when Barney and I went surfing, I got super sick and proceeded to throw up out the window while I was driving. I threw up 7 times that day!! Worst day ever!) Along the way to Jeffreysbaai Meg decided she wanted to jump off the highest commercial bridge bungee jump in the world. She checked it from the viewing platform, suited up, cruised out to the jumping platform and dove over the edge to fall 708ft!!!! Didn’t even faze her!!
We arrived in J-Bay and immediately paddled out at Supertubes. We got some decent waves that first afternoon. The following day the surf was flat so we headed out to Seaview Lion Park. This place was amazing!! After a lame self-drive safari where we saw Wildebeest, Zebra, Giraffe, springbok and goat we made our way to the lions. We saw 3 huge Bengal tigers and about 50 lions. The tigers and a few of the male lions you could get within a couple of feet from them, only separated by a small electric fence. These lions and tigers are huge!!!!!! After watching them for a while we hopped in the car and drove through an enclosure containing 6 lionesses. After that we headed to the main building where they had 4 three-week-old lion cubs, 6 two-month-old lion cubs, and 4 seven-month-old lion cubs. We took the opportunity to go into the enclosure with the 4 seven month old cubs. What an experience. These cubs were definitely big enough to cause damage if they wanted to.
Lisa and Meg got to go in with the 2 month old cubs as well.
The rest of the time we spent in J-Bay surfing a great beach break as the swell filled in at Supertubes. We scored some great surf at the end of the trip with the wave of the trip definitely going to Barney at Supertubes on the Armour’s last morning.
We said our goodbyes and left Barney and Meg in Jeffreysbaai for one more day to head back on the Garden Route for home. It was a wonderful two weeks with the Stichters! Josh and Meg, thank you for coming out to visit and spending your vacation time with us! You can see more of our pictures by clicking here