Today our family decided to go to the cape of good hope. We drove one hour south. The cape of good hope is the most southwestern point of Africa. The waves there was very high but in the winter they will be much higher. On our way back we stayed in Simon's Town for lunch. In Simon's Town you can watch penguins and so we did. First they just stood on the beach. Then a big wave came and some of them fell and went out in the water. Then they surfed on the next wave to get back to the beach again. It looked very funny. We even saw some penguins with eggs.

 

In the afternoon the children stayed at the hotel while my parents went on a bus sightseeing tour. According to them there was nothing to see that we havn't seen before so i'm glad I stayed home.

 

This evening everybody felt well and we went out at a nice restaurant. Me and my father shared a seafood platter with lobster, prawns, calamari, mussels and some fish. It was delicious. This is our last evening in South Africa. We stayed up late playing "plump".

 

Philip

After breakfast we decided to go to the Cape Town aquarium. They had a lot of cool fishes. They also had turtles, lobsters, seahorses, sea stars and even penguins. The penguins looked very funny when they walked. The coolest thing at the aquarium was the big sharks.

 

We rested until the evening. Sofia was still sick and I didn't feel to good either. We went out to a restaurant where they had a band playing. They played good songs but it was to loud and we couldn't even talk to each other during the songs. After dinner I went to bed while some of the rest stayed up to play som cards.

 

Philip

Today we had a full day Cape Town tour planned. The bus picked us up at nine o'clock. First we drove through the town and watched some statues and a castle that the Dutch people built when they first came to Cape Town. Then we continued to district six where the white people moved all the black people away and destroyed their houses. When they tried to sell the land nobody wanted it because of how they treated the black people.

We left Stellenbosch the morning and head of against our final destination, Cape Town. It was only 50 minutes to drive and we had some free time before it was time to check in at our next hotel. We decided to go up to the Table mountain. It's a big, flat mountain just next to Cape Town. We went up there by cable car. Table mountain is over 1000 meters high so we got a great view over Cape Town. We had lunch at the top and then we went down again.

 

We checked in at Lawhill witch is a nice five star apartment hotel. Our apartment is huge. We have three bedrooms and three toilets. From our balcony we have view of some other hotels and the ocean. I thought that five stars was the limit, but our neighbor hotel actually have six stars. It must be very expensive to stay there.

 

In the evening we went out for dinner at the waterfront. We went to a belgian restaurant and I ordered belgian mussels. They were very good.

 

Philip

After breakfast we went to another wine yard called Spier where they raise cheetahs and big birds. First we went to the cheetahs. We were allowed to go inside the fenced area and touch the cheetahs. It was awesome to feel the breath of the big animal that we before had seen in action. We actually had a Swedish guid that tought us about the cheetahs, for example that they have about 2000 dots.

 

It was now time to visit the birds. In the beginning we just walked around and watched them. It was owls, falcons, eagles and some other strange birds. Then the fun part began. We were allowed to hold the black eagle. It was very big and I couldn't hold it to long because of the weight. We did also hold the owls, but they weren't as cool and heavy as the eagle.

 

We had a reservation at a restaurant at Spier called Moyo where they served buffé. We ate until we were totally full. When we got back home we played some games and the adults had some wine from Kleine Zalze.

 

Philip

We left Oudtshoorn in the morning and started our longest driving of totally seven hours. The landscape was beautiful with high mountains and deep valleys.  Of course we had a number of stops along the road. We had lunch in Riversonderend and a coffee break in Hermanus.

 

This time we will stay in Stellenbosch at a wine yard called Kleine Zalze. It's a huge wine yard that exports wine to all over the world. Our room is great. Just outside the window we have a nice view over De Zalze golf course.

 

In the evening we tried to get a table in a nice restaurant but almost every restaurant was full booked. Finally we ended up at a small thai restaurant. It wasn't what we expected in the beginning but the food was pretty good. Until tomorrow we'll make sure that we have a reservation before it's to late.

 

Philip

This day started very funny. In the middle of the breakfast my brother Adam's chair broke in to three pieces while he was sitting on it. It looked very funny and everybody laught. We left Knysna and head off against our next stop that would be Oudtshoorn. Before we took in at our next hotel we went to the Kangoo caves. It was huge caves that went five kilometers in to the mountain. There were a lot of stalagmites and stalagtites. A big part of the cave was closed because of destruction.

 

After the caves we went to an ostrich farm. We learned a lot about ostriches, for example that the males are black and white and the females are brown. We patted the chickens, fed the ostriches and we were even allowed to ride them. They ran fast and it was very fun. An ostrich can run up to 70 km/h. In the end we stood on ostrich eggs. One ostrich egg has the same size as 24 normal eggs.

 

We checked in at Fosters Manor, a big old house where Mr and Mrs Foster had their own ostrich farm long time ago. The rooms were huge and I got a double bed for my own ;-). In the evening we went out for dinner as usual. Today's starter was crocodile and mussels. It was the first time I ate crocodile. It tasted like chicken. For main course I had ostrich fillet with red wine sauce. It was really good. After dinner I were totally full and it really wasn't hard to fall a sleep.

 

Philip

Today we had nothing planned. Our family wanted to see the worlds highest bungy jump in the world and the Backlund family wanted to feed elephants. We split up and our family went to the bungy jump called Bloukrans. It was a bridge over an very deep valley. The jumpers jumped 216 meters down before they went up again. It was really cool to watch but I really don't want to try.

 

In the afternoon we went to another beach. We rented small surfing boards made of friggolite and surfed on the waves. It was very funny. In the evening we went to a very popular restaurant called JJ's. Yesterday it was full but today they could squeeze us in. The food was very good but they were out of waffles so we didn't get any dessert :-(

 

Philip

In the morning we were going on a dolphin and seal safari in Plettenberg Bay. We were going by boat and  the first thing we did was to explore the western side of the bay. There we found a colony with thousands of seals. Some of them were laying on the rocks and the other ones was swimming in the water. Seals can hold their breath for 20 minutes and dive 200 meters deep.

 

We went over to the east side of the bay to find dolphins but unfortunately we didn't found any. The safari was over an we were a bit disappointed. We had lunch at a beach restaurant and then we had a bath in the ocean. In the afternoon we went to "Monkeyland". It was a fenced area were monkies that before had been pets or zoo animals  lived. There were 11 spices and we saw all of them. The coolest one was the gibbon.

 

In the evening we went out for dinner. Outside the restaurant they had a sign that showed the directions and distances the major cities. It said that it was 10390 kilometers to Stockholm, so we are very, very far from home.

 

Philip

Today we were starting our driving along the Garden Rout towards Cape Town. We have a number of stops planned along the rode. The first will be in Knysna, where we will stay for three nights.

 

On our way to Knysna we stopped in Plettenberg Bay to take a bath in the ocean. The waves were very high and we had a lot of fun. We had lunch and continued our driving. Before we reached Knysna we had another unplanned stop at the Tsitsikamma National Park where we went on a Canopy tour. We stood on platforms 30 meters up in the trees and threw our selfs out in the air and slided on a steel wire over to the next platform. There were ten wires and the longest one was over 90 meters. It was very fun to swing from tree to tree, almost like Tarzan.

 

We arrived at Bridgewater bed and breakfast in Knysna. we were all to tired to go and have dinner at a restaurant so some of us just went to the supermarket and bought some small pies that we shared.

 

Philip

 

It was now time to leave St Lucia and head off against the south coast. We drove back to Durban and flied to Port Elizabeth. We rented a new car and took in at a hotel called Bayside Guesthouse. It was really nice and the first thing we did was to try out the pool. Unfortunately  we all hurt our selfs on the sharp pool edge. In the evening we went out for dinner. All the houses we passed had very high security with electrical fences and guard dogs. It seemed like if you live in Port Elizabeth you are either very rich or very poor.

 

We went to a very nice restaurant called Squires. It has been the best grill restaurant in South Africa. The meet there was very good. This night we gone to bed quit late cause we didn't need to get up to early the next day.

 

Philip

Today we were going on a half day safari trip. The car came and picked us up at four o'clock in the morning but there was one hour driving to the safari park so we had time to sleep in the car. Early  we found a lonely antelope with only one horn. Antelopes usually stays in groups but this one was kicked out cause it looked strange. But he didn't seem to be to unhappy.

 

Our guide was searching for lions but we didn't found any. Instead we found something much cooler. We were just driving normally, no tracks to follow or so, and then the car suddenly stopped and our guid pointed out to the right. First we didn't see anything but then we did. Four cheetahs were sitting in the grass like 50 meters away. They started to walk against us. Our guide told us that it was a mother with her three almost grownup kids. They passed the car just a few meters away. They where sneaking. Our guide believed that the mother was teaching her kids how to hunt. After a few minutes an impala suddenly ran  in full speed  over the road and after him was two cheetahs. We couldn't see if they cought the impala but I believe they did. Cheetah is the fastest land animal on earth. If it runs straight it can reach speeds up to 140 km/h, but much slower if it has to make a lot of turns. So, that's the only chance for the impala, to make a lot of turn when it runs. The whole park is 100 000 hectares and there are only 40-50 cheetahs. That makes this experience even more awesome.

 

Something else we saw was two giraffes that were mated. Of course we saw a lot of other animals but it would take  forever to count them up. We were very tired when we got home at two o'clock so we didn't do anything special the rest of the day.

 

Philip

 

Today was our first time in three days that we where able to sleep in the morning, and we did. We hade a late breakfast at Lidiko Lodge as this place is called. We had no plans for today until the evening so we decided to try to find some hippos on our own.  We went down to the river and found some hippos laying in the water. We couldn't see anything els but the heads but it was cool when they yawned. The rest on our free time we spend on bathing, both in the pool and in the ocean.

 

At five o'clock a car picked us up and it was time to go on a turtle tour! The guid said that we either would see a turtle lay eggs or see the eggs hatch. But he wasn't sure we would see anything at all. On the beach we drove 20 kilometers without seeing anything special, just a lot of small crabs. We had dinner on the beach and then it was time to go back again. This time we found a turtle nest where a turtle had laid it's eggs yesterday. We couldn't touch it because if an egg moves just a little bit it will die. A turtle lay about 1000 eggs per season, 120 at a time,  but only on the way from the nest to the water 20% of them die. The rest often get eaten by fishes and birds or stuck in fishing webs, just a few survives. We continued and soon we saw a honey badger eating some turtle eggs. Our guid went out of the car and scared the badger away. He brought a turtle egg back to the car and we where allowed to hold it. It was soft and felt like leather. We didn't see any turtles but it still was very cool to hold an egg.

 

On our way back to the lodge our guid stopped and went out in the bush. He came back with a tiny dwarf cameleont. It is the smallest cameleont in the world and can only be found in this forest. We also saw hippos on our way home, But this time on the ground, not in the water.

 

Philip

 

Hamilton told us that they haven't seen any leopards for some weeks now, not even tracks. We had been out for about ten minutes when Hamilton stopped the car and looked at the ground. He had found some tracks and said: It looks like hayena, But it could also be... Leopard!  We still didn't believe it, not Hamilton either, but we followed the tracks for a couple of minutes and there it was. The leopard was walking on the road just in front of the car. We didn't believe our eyes. All hope was gone and then it just stood there, right in front of us. It was so awesome. Now we had finally seen all of the big 5! The rest of the trip we didn't see anything that was compare able with the leopard.

 

It was still morning but it was now time to leave Mohlabetsi and head off toward the east coast and St Lucia. We drove to a city called Nelspruit and flied to Durban. From there we rented a new car and drove to St Lucia. They said that it isn't unusual to have hippos in the garden at night. There is this river with hippos and crocodiles nearby and at night the hippos may come up from the water and take a walk around the houses. It feels kind of scary but it would be very cool to have a hippo just outside the window.

 

Philip

 

We went out on safari early as usual.  We didn't see anything special in the beginning but suddenly we got a call from another car. They had found lions! Hamilton drove faster than he ever had done and it was a very bumpy ride. We reached the lions. It was a couple of females, two children and, hiding in the bushes, one male.  They started to walk against the car and they past only a few meters away.  The male looked very tired. Hamilton told us that lions could be like 10-12 years old but this one was about 18 years old! He probably didn't have much time left. The lion children was very playful and rolled around in the mud together. Now we have  seen four of the big five and it is only leopard left.

 

We went back to the lodge, had lunch, chilled and then it was time for safari again. This time we saw elephants, buffalos, rhinos and lions again, but no leopard.  With only one safari here at Mohlabetsi left, i'm starting to loose hope. If we are ver, very lucky we might see one but I really don't think so. Well, we'll see tomorrow...

 

 

Philip

 

Five o'clock in the morning Hamilton woke us up and it was time to go on our second safari. We saw a lot of impalas, zebras, wildbeasts and giraffes. The highlight was when we found a big group of buffalos. It was like a hundred of them and they all followed the female leader. Buffalo is also one of the big five. Now it's only lion and leopard left. I really hope that we will see lions. On this trip we also got a really close look on a rhino. When we got back to the lodge we had a nice breakfest with scrambled eggs and bacon.

 

Untill the next safari we just chilled out in the lodge. At four o'clock it was time to get out in the bush again. We didn't see anything special for a pretty long time but then we saw the coolest thing so far. It was a group of maybe 15 elephants. They got really close to the car, like five meters and we got some really great pictures there.

 

After the safari we got home and ate chicken that where cooked over the camp fire. Today was my brother's birthday so when it was time for dessert the african women sang and danced for him.

 

Philip

 

 

Today it was time to go to the Kruger Park. We saw a lot of beautiful things along the road such as the blyde canyon. It's the third biggest canyon in the world. We walked on bridges over the canyon. It was awesome! The lodge that we will stay at is called Mohlabetsi. Two weeks ago it rained a lot there so the seven kilometer long dirt road was very rough. I don't think our Honda car felt very good after driving on that road. Sometimes we even thought that the exhaust pip would fall off.

 

When we arrived at Mohlabetsi we where welcomed with some african pizza. At four o'clock it was time for our first safari. Both our families sat on an open Land Roover. Our driver was named Hamilton. We had only drived for about two minutes when we saw the first animals. It was a group of zebras and impalas (antilopes). Hamilton tought us that there are two types of zebras. One kind had three stripes, the third stripe is brown, and the other kind has only two stripes. We saw the one with three stripes. Only a minute later we found a group of giraffes. We lerned that giraffes are very similar with cows. For exampel they also have four stomaches. Hamilton took help from the other drivers and we found rhinos and elephants. These ar two of the big five. I hope we will see the rest of them: buffalo, leopard and lion.

 

We where on safari in three and a half hour. When we came back to the lodge we had south african meet stew for dinner. It tasted like cinnamon. After dinner we gone straight to bed, because we where very tired after the safari.

 

Philip

 

 

We left home at lunch time. We had a long flight in front of us. We are going on this holiday with the Backlund family. It's Fredrik and Sofia and their children Elin and Lukas. We flew with Turkish Airlines and we changed plane in Istanbul before we head off against Johannesburg, South Africa. It took us 16 hours to get there, but it was okey because we slept most of the time. We arrived at the airport at ten o'clock local time which is on hour ahead of Sweden. The travelling wasn't over. Now we had to drive in our rental car for four hours to a small town called Sabie. On our way we saw lots of huge cornfields and we drove through a big mountain area. We stayed over the night in Sabie at a nice bed and breakfest place. Philip