Gobias
Erin and Andrew Joined: March 27th 2007
Logged in: December 21st 2011
Logged in: December 21st 2011
Travel Blog Posts
the stunning Austrian Alps
On my return trip back to Kramsach in my favorite area of Europe...Tirol...my beautiful wife Erin was able to join me. We had a three day weekend, and the way my current work schedule allowed me to leave early in the day (kind of a recurring theme). Since we already shipped the RAV-4 back to the states, we decided to rent a car (even though my 1995 4-cyclinder leather-interior Honda Accord is really tough, it lacks speed) in order to expedite our 5.5 hour journey down to Austria. Unfortunately, even having a European-spec car (granted, it was French) didn't help lessen the impact that 7 hours of driving does on one's butt. We failed to realize that May 28 was a European holiday, hurdling an unprecedented mass of metal in the direction of the Alps. ... read more
Hout Bay
Today was yet another beautiful day (as was yesterday). However, I will start from yesterday (as it was pretty uneventful). We went down to the waterfront early in the morning on Wednesday (2 May) to buy tickets to Robben Island, but they were all sold out for the day...so we bought tickets for Friday the 4th of May. The rest of yesterday was pretty chilled out. We walked over to Long Street (basically backpacker central, and lots of clubs, bars, restaurants, and craft markets). We did the rest of our shopping there for friends and family (yes, friends and family, you are getting presents). In the evening time, we called our friend Bar, whom we met in Oudtshoorn a few days ealier (I think he is of Indian descent), for dinner on the waterfront. He is ... read more
Hanging Out
Today we arrived at the final leg of our journey...the beautiful city of Cape Town. I'm not a city person, especially big cities (which I think Cape Town is, since it has over 1 million people), but I was drawn to Cape Town by friends, pictures, and dreams (okay, dreams sounds a bit cheesy, but I couldn't think of a third thing...I wanted to say penguins, but we haven't seen the penguin colony yet). After leaving our comfortable guesthouse in Stellenbosch this morning at around 10am, we drove over to the BP in order to get our car washed finally (2.5 weeks traversing South Africa, our car looked like a whole bunch of nastiness...not to mention our resident ant colony that seemed to have an infinite number of members which loved crawling around on the ... read more
Beautiful!
We were on the road from Oudtshoorn to Stellenbosch a little later (as we didn't get back to our hostel until 11am...due to Meerkat Magic) the morning of the 29th. The drive was beautiful, as we drove up Route 62 through some small wine towns. The road took us through canyons with streams, and by large boulders and rock formations...very similar to Highway 6 around Golden, Colorado. The drive turned out to be about 5 hours, so upon our arrival (since it was a Sunday), all of the wineries were already closed for the day; not to worry, as we would more than make up for it on Monday (30 April). Our guesthouse (de Oude Ryneveld--don't ask me what that means) was very lovely. Our room had a high vaulted ceiling with wooden beams mixed ... read more
View from inside the forest
After leaving Skankolies Hostel (see the previous journal entry), we drove to Grahamstown for the night. Everything that we read about it said that it was an unassuming (and boring) type of place. We basically wanted to just break up the driving. I'm glad that we did, since we underestimated our drive on the 25th of April. We left the hostel at around 8:30am and didn't get to Grahamstown until 5:30pm at night. Most of the road (a national highway) was single lane, torn up pretty bad, lots of semis, some pretty hostile-looking towns, and animals wandering randomly into the roads. We were a little nervous, since we wanted to arrive before darkness fell (another common rule that we try to abide by on our trip). Grahamstown pleasantly surprised us. It was a nice university town ... read more
Skankolies Tree House
Today was a bittersweet day, as we had to bid farewell to Pops (aka Highlight, Keefus, Monkey man, etc.) as he left Africa. We dropped him off at the Durban (or Dooban) airport in the late morning. It was sad to see him go. I hate dropping people off at the airport, especially curbside--unload their luggage, time for a quick hug, and a wave farewell as you're driving away from the sidewalk before your car gets towed. No time to lament. Five minutes prior, it was a regular car ride. It's hard to say everything you want to say, and feel everything you want to (or will) feel in a regular car ride. Enough lamenting. We all had a wonderful time together, and are very happy that Pops was able to come along. Erin writes: After ... read more
Crossing into Swaziland
The past 3 days (after leaving Kruger on 21 April) were spent relaxing in beautiful St. Lucia on the Elephant Coast (South Africa's NE coast to the layman). Driving from Kruger to St. Lucia was quite the experience--lots and lots of sugarcane fields, people walking, hitching, and selling pineapples, eucalyptus syrup, and avocados (which apparently grow like weeds), cattle, goats and sheep grazing right alongside (and crossing) the roads (another reason not to drive at night), the mainstreets of run-down, mostly black cities with their markets selling anything and everything, and the occasional checkpoint for foot and mouth disease (mainly when we drove through Swaziland). Seeing the differences in their way of life, and the poverty that encompassed it was overwhelming. We arrived in St. Lucia (part of the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands--a UNESCO World ... read more
Baby lion and mother
Animals still haven't seen: Leopard, Rhino We left Talamati right when the gates opened at 6am, and drove our final leg of our Kruger circuit to Byamiti Bushveld camp in the very south (and game-rich) part of the park. Along the way we saw lots more of the same animals--giraffe, zebra, baboon, elephant, etc. After an early afternoon brai of chicken and farmer's spicy sausage, we went on our last night drive in the park. Little did we know that this was going to be the grand-daddy of them all. Our guide Jerry (great name!) was a real nice guy, and the only other people on our drive that night was a very nice young South African family from Johannesburg. Within 45 minutes, we sawy two rhinos. And as soon as darkness fell, we saw ... read more
Cheetah sighting
Still haven't seen: Leopard, Rhino, Cheetah We left Satara rest camp at about 7:45am (a little later than I had hoped, but it paid off) and started our drive to Talamati Bushveld camp where we would be spending the night. Bushveld camps are basically a lot smaller than main rest camps--no shops nor restaurants--and much more remote, emphasizing the true African bush experience. Before I digress too much, let me go back to that morning leaving the camp and what has been one of the highlights of our trip (although Pops claims that he is the highlight of the trip). 30 minutes after leaving Satara's gate, Pops miraculously spotted a large cat and tels Erin to stop and back up. Sure enough, after backing up a little, we realized Pops' eyes hadn't failed him--there was ... read more
Coughing up a Hairball
We decided to wake early and go for an early morning drive right wehn the gates open, figuring that we might see some cats out before it got too hot. We were right. About 8am we came upon a male lion lying down about 50 feet from the road. I was able to get quite a few pictures of him, including when he yawned and scratched himself. We even watched him long enough to hear him roar a few times. That made the day. The rest of the day wasn't too exciting. We divided our time doing laundry in the sink, hanging it in the trees, reading, swimming, and ultimately waiting for our scheduled night drive, which kind of turned out to be a bust (in my book anywayY. We had some newbies to the ... read more
