I’ve mentioned before that I take a lot of photos. Like, a lot, a lot. Some might consider it an obnoxious amount, actually. Regardless of whether it is or not, however, I make a point of routinely backing up my photos and videos with Amazon Prime Photos because I love the convenient storage and fair pricing (much better than the iCloud, I might add). Well, as I was doing so yesterday, I came across a lot of photos from South Africa that I took and forgot, or just never got around to sharing. Honestly, I have a few more posts yet to share about our most recent trip, but today, I just wanted to highlight the photos. Throughout the last few months of quarantine, one of the saving graces we relied on was the fact that we managed such a beautiful holiday with family overseas before the chaos began, and the reality of that doesn’t escape us.
So, while we’re definitely nose to the grindstone right now, preparing for another TDY, fully immersed in work, preschool, and preparing for Kindergarten, it was kind of nice to lose ourselves in the archives of photos we forgot existed. I guess you’re lucky today because, instead of another wordy post, I’m just going to share the highlights because, let’s be real…that’s what we all really want to see, right?!
Here are some snapshots from our stay in KwaZulu Natal…
I mentioned in one of my earlier posts about our trip that it rained almost the entire first week we were in South Africa. That, coupled with load shedding could have made for a really awful first bit of our holiday, but the sun came out on one of our final days in Margate, and we spent the day at the tidal pool. We swam, we ate great food at the nearby Waffle House (read: much better than the Waffle Houses of America), and played as much as possible. We even took a brief intermission to Durban and treated the kids to a visit to their one-0f-a-kind aquarium. Let it be known, too, that we didn’t let the rain stop us. We played on Shelly Beach nearly every day until we were shivering!
Onto our jaunt down to the Western Cape, where we made visits to Hout Bay, Camps Bay, Big Bay, Simons Town, and more!
Our time in the Western Cape was beautiful. While we still dealt with some load shedding, we had the best little flat right on the beach, perfect proximity to the V&A Waterfront, easy access to Table Mountain, and more. Best of all, we were able to visit all my favorites, like Noordhoek, Simons Town, and more, as well as see great friends around the Big Bay area. To say we’d wished we had longer there would definitely be an understatement. Nevertheless, we heading back up to Pretoria to spend the Christmas holiday with family and spend our last few days in the area, showing the kids and Connor around the old city.
Lest you be concerned about the most tired of tired boys in the picture above, please let me assure you of two things. One, we weren’t moving at the time, and two, car seat laws are more lax in South Africa. We made sure the boys were boostered in whilst driving, and Mieke was always in her carseat.
Honestly, looking through these photos from South Africa tugs at my heartstrings! I know I’m not alone in saying this, but I miss traveling. I miss being able to explore on a whim. I’m not sure when normal will feel normal again, but I do hope that when we finally come out on the other side of all this, we’re able to comfortably explore the world again. These are the things we will always remember, and being able to share these photos from South Africa with them again, listen to their memories of our trip, and get excited for our next adventure definitely makes us happy.
Tell me – have you ever been to South Africa? Would you want to go?
