Weekend Adventures

Friday night the kick off to our weekend was a blast at Mr. January’s as I have already stated and this was just the beginning of a wonderful, fun filled weekend!

Saturday morning we woke around 8:00, a little early for a Saturday morning, but we were not even thinking about how tired we were because we were so excited about the adventure ahead. Today was the day that we were going to Addo Elephant Park! We went excitedly to breakfast where we meet our tour guide for the day. His name was Mike; he was an older gentleman, who was very kind to our group and very knowledgeable about the park. We were off after breakfast to what I like to call our safari. It was not exactly like I had imagined it, but I could not have asked for a better day! It was about a 30 minute drive to the 400,000 acres of land to we would view many animal in their natural habitat that day. As we entered into the park it felt like we were Jurassic Park! The gate opened and we were off. About 15 minutes into the drive Mary spotted two elephants in the trees and you could feel the enthusiasm in the bus. It was going to be an awesome day! As we continued our drive, about thirty minutes into the trip we came upon two lions sunbathing in the grass! This was an awesome sight and our tour guide said that we were lucky because he had not seen them in about two weeks! We saw many great animals that day including; a rhino, antelope, warthogs, a tortoise, dung beetles, zebras, buffalo, and many different birds! “The big five” is what they refer to the five animals that they always look and are the most popular in the park, which includes elephants, rhinos, buffalo, lions, and leopards. What a privilege it was to go and see 4 out of the 5!

After the race! Check out the medals!

On Sunday morning I participated in an event that I could have never imagined I would be writing about in my South Africa blog. I normally get out of bed early on Sunday to go to church, but this Sunday was very different. A few weeks prior some of the girls had seen a poster for a 5K that would be taking place on the beach! They were immediately excited and decided that this was something they must participate in! As they talked they decided that it should be a group thing! In my mind I was very hesitant; I wanted to participate in all activities, but I am not a runner and there was no way I was going to run a 5K on the beach! However, as we continued to discuss this activity some of them decided they would walk it and I decided that this was an achievable goal for me! At 7:30 Sunday morning we were off to the race! It was a beautiful Sunday morning, I was a little apprehensive, but excited at the same time to complete my first 5k in South Africa! We definitely stood out in the crowd with our matching T-shirts and hats on given to us by President Zuma’s wife. It was a little difficult walking in the sand, but with the encouragement of my partner Emily we made it across the finish line! We had many laughs along the way and I enjoyed the experience.

The rest of the day was spent relaxing and preparing for what we would do on Monday with our sweet children!