Finally Cape Town/Stellenbosch Here We Are

---

---

And we land in South Africa, all be it a little late.

Upon our arrival in Cape Town we were picked up with the other Stellenbosch students that had been on the plane with us, but of course Arcadia being what Arcadia is we had a completely different game plan than they did. It involved us (being Vanessa, Liz - another Arcadia study abroader, and I) getting into a sketchy white van with some Afrikaner student who didn't speak English all that well, being driven in the dark through the outskirts of Cape Town and dropped off in the neighborhood of Observatory. All the while having no idea what was going on until we got there and were greeted by Alex (who's a full year study abroad at the University of Western Cape) who got us all settled in with phones, dinner and showers.

The next morning we were finally off to Stellenbosch with our amazing driver Ivan (whom Arcadia has hired to truck us all over the Western Cape - along with his son Cobhan and sometimes his wife), and we started a marathon week of orientation after moving into our apartments in Academia. Which are made up of a large central common room with table and chairs surrounding by four separate little "modules" that each have one kitchen that connects two bedrooms, each with their own separate showers. A very nice setup actually.

Orientation involved everything from Congolese drum circles, to town tours and our very first braai (BBQ). Meant lots of people from all over the world and enjoyed the glorious weather - which has only been not sunny three times and ranges in temperature from 70 to 98. An all around glorious place to be.

More pictures will be forthcoming - we have however acclimated to the much slower 'Africa Time' so it may take awhile.

Until then,
Kaitlyn

---

Photos

Staircase at Observatory
This is where we stayed our first night in Cape Town

Our First South Africa Bedroom
Watching the stars out through the skylights was awesome.

Observatory Commons
Our single night Observatory common room with benches that gave me a ridiculous bruise.

Laying on the Grass
This is what the Academia complex looks like from the grass outside the window of my room.

Stop looking at my trashy romance novels...
...you're embarrassing me. Becky, Vanessa and I have quite the collection going.

Stellenbosch Mountain
This is probably early afternoon since the clouds haven't burned off in the heat yet.

More Mountainous Views
This is from the sidewalk on the way to center campus.

More Landscape
So green and so blue

It's Real, I Swear.
Although there are days when I wake up and think that someone's dropped a painting backdrop behind the city.

Botmanskop
Yeah so that's the other mountain we see all the time and crazy Becky and Gjilke went and climbed it - 'cause they're nuts.

Academia Row
This is what all of our little buildings look like all in a row.

Becky in a Tree
This tree is HUGE!!!

The Hanging Bits on the Huge Tree
I'm pretty sure these have a scientific group name that sounds like trilophyte or something like that. *shrugs*

Our Road to Campus
I probably walk this three or four times a day at the least.

Pretty Flower
There are so many!

Becky and the Bush
More crazy beautiful flowers.

The Most Wonderful Flowers
They grow on a tree and smell wonderful, but we don't know what they are. If you do - please let us know.

Comments

[Aunt Kathy]

Love your photos
I love the photos, especially the mountains. I don't know what kind of flowers those are. Do they smell good? They look like they could be in the orchid family. They grow on a tree or a vine on the tree? Lizzy comes home tomorrow for a week of vacation. Leenie and I have been emailing each other a lot. Love u lots, K

[Stacey]

Frangipane Flowers
they're called frangepani flowers here - but they're not natural to africa, they just grow here cos its humid enough. search wikipedia for *plumeria - you'll see them there... hope you had a good time here - I was on exchange in Denmark last semester as well... Cheers, Stacey