Parental Intermission

I apologize for my long hiatus away from my blog. I promise I am back and the stories will continue to come. My parents came to visit me at the beginning of March (ok I realize it is April and I have still not posted anything) and we had an amazing two weeks together.

We started off our journey by venturing around JoBerg finding it surprisingly vast and not as scary as anticipated. We were lucky enough to have our very own tour guide, a friend of mine whom I met while living in Acornhoek. She was from Soweto, so she offered to take my parents and I on a sightseeing tour. We were lucky enough to experience the city from a local’s perspective perhaps making the place much less scary than all the travel books made it out to be.

We stopped by her parents’ house in Soweto to drop off her children and meet her parents. They were a delightful couple and her father joined us for part of the tour. Her father quickly reminded us of the dangers of JoBerg. He was blind and we soon learned it was because of an attempted robbery where the gun man hit him with the gun in the head resulting in his blindness. It was clear that violent crime in the city saw no color, size, or shape but rather just the end product of its potential success. After a day in JoBerg we headed south to Cape Town, the city in South Africa everyone seems so proud of.

Being a typical Gitomer family vacation we did not hang out in the city long but, rather drove to areas much less traveled. People in South Africa were right, the area along the coast was beautiful. The first night we had dinner on a patio listening to the sounds of the penguins on the beach, which sound much like a donkey braying. Later we traveled to the southernmost point of South Africa, where the Atlantic meets the Indian Ocean. Along the way we stayed at some of the most amazing B&Bs, each with its own unique setting and character. We had a wonderful week driving around the southern coast and into the wine country of South Africa.

We left Cape Town to start our journey to my home in Acornhoek. We arrived at the Nelspruit, Mpumalanga Kruger National Park airport on a fairly cool afternoon. Not typical for the time of year and making my parents question my constant bickering to them about the hot weather. After a short stop in Nelspruit (the largest town near me) we began driving along the Panorama Route to Acornhoek. The countryside by where I live is unbelievably beautiful with rolling green hills and a huge canyon that goes right through the area ( kind of equivalent to our Grand Canyon). After a few small hikes to waterfalls and some spectacular views we arrived at my house on Orpen road.

You could tell my parents were uneasy as they entered not knowing what to expect – I guess I set the bar extremely low so as not to get up expectations. This worked well because they were pleasantly surprised with my accommodations. My parents spent the next week coming with me to meetings and doing some sightseeing on their own. We also did an amazing night drive in Kruger one evening seeing a lion, elephants, rhinos, and buffalo.

Upon arrival home one night, my parents were even lucky enough to see Elle (the 8 ton elephant that frequents our area by plunging through the electric fence)! She was back, pulling down trees and eating as much as her little heart contented. This night however, she was right next to my house. Literally, my parents and I hugged each other as we watched her eat about 10 feet from my kitchen window. She is an amazingly large creature and it made you realize the ease at which she could crush your house if she felt the desire.

After another week in the bush at my humble abode my parents had to head out to the reality of a 15 hour plane flight and work. It was wonderful to have them here! And remember all visitors are more than welcome.