All Tuckered Out

I have more thoughts percolating in my head, but they've yet to make themselves into a coherent post, so it will just be a little bit longer until that goes up. Today is, I guess, my last day of vacation (or my last day before going back to site at least) and after a few days of decompressing in Pretoria I will be more than glad to get back. I have a lot of plans and projects for my last two terms at school, and I can't wait to see just how many we can pull off before August 21st. In the meantime:

Me and Bhutazwa at Amazing Grace on Christmas Day. I may have to smuggle him home at the end of service. (Also, if anybody could explain to me how to rotate pictures on blogger I'd be very happy).


Mom goes on Safari*.


Dad goes on Safari too.

Hippos! What you can't see is the 27 car pileup (plus one very impatient minivan) as everybody tried to get up and down a rail-less one lane cement bridge to the main rest area/lunch stop while simultaneously trying to get as many yawning hippo photos as possible.



And giraffes. Which are very tall. And also very funny looking.


Lions. A whole pride of them came right up to our safari truck (yes, safari truck. With real tourists and everything. I preferred to think of it as a different aspect of wildlife spotting).


An elephant hanging out in Kruger. We saw lots of these. They don't seem to worry about people too much.


Dad looking deeply concerned next to the crocodile ("flatdog") warning sign in Swaziland. We saw a wildebeest body dissapear in less than 2 days.



Mom cooking in my kitchen in Steenbok. We made delicious spaghetti for my family. We thought it was delicious, at least.


Mom and Dad on a hike in Swaziland. Aww.


There were also some very precarious bridges on the way. Fortunately there were not too many crocodiles at this particular bend in the river. (I would also like to know how to rotate this one.)

Dad is king of the mountatin.

New Years dinner in Cape Town, yay! Note the all-tequlia margaritas on the table, and the fact that I wasn't given fair warning in the look on my face.

Long Street in Cape Town on New Year's eve. Its like Mardi Gras, but with more Afrikaans.

An African Jackass penguin. Really. They live in Cape Town on the beach and swim in the Indian Ocean all day. I think this pretty clearly proves that these are the smartest penguins in existence. None of that freezing their tails off March of the Penguin BS for these guys.


All in all, it was a long, tiring, and very satisfying trip.

The parents should theoretically be posting all the rest on snapfish sometime in the near future. When they wake up from their naps.




*Random trivia fact for the day: 'safari' apparently translates to 'walk' in Swahili (which is not siswati, for those of you who may have been confused). This is why you have to go in the biggest, and most petrol intensive vehicle that you can find.