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Longest Trip Ever
This is me planning the rest of the trip from a Madrid McDonalds. Damn, getting to Africa is a long trip. Sorry for the delays in posting some details. Like Europe, I will be
typing all blogs from my BB. However, unlike my past trips to first
world countries, South Africa (while being quite modern) has sparse
internet access and some on and off cell service - but more on that
later. Sorry for the delays... But the first few blogs will be posted at
the once and incrementally thereafter. As of today, June 7, Heather is
still alive. And we're off...
We finally made it! 50+ hours and 3 continents later we arrived in South
Africa. Both of our bags weighed in at 14.2 kg, which is only about 30
lbs for 3.5 weeks. We also realized this is the first time that either
of us have been south of the equator.
My trip started at 9AM Wednesday from VA. I drove to Lititz and my dad
and Julius drove me to JFK in NYC. We flew from NYC to Madrid, Spain and
had a 13 hour layover. It quickly became evident that everyone on our
flight from JFK was on our flight to Jo-burg the next night. Everyone is
on their way to the World Cup (even more than a week before it begins).
We left the Madrid airport with what we thought to be a nice American
woman and her Slovakian friend, but quickly realized that she was OCD
and although she lived in South Africa for 6 years and traveled
regularly - she knew absolutely nothing about South Africa, could NOT
read a map or buy a metro ticket. Her Slovak friend looked fairly
suicidal, it really put Heather's quirks into perspective.
We were able (thanks to being from the US) to leave the airport and
check out the city. We quickly found out that everyone from our flight
has the same ideas - go downtown and sleep in a park. It was a bank
holiday in Madrid, so there were thousands of people up taking 'siestas'
in the park. After 4-5 hours of rocky sleep on the plane and the
prospect of a 1:30 AM departure from Madrid to Jo-burg, we were quite
tied, but determined to limit our sleep for the 11 hour flight to South
Africa. After the heat and humidty (probably 85 and humid) started to be
too much, and since we had already been in the same clothes for 24 hours
and had 24 more in the same, we decided sweating was a bad idea and took
the city bus tour.
Madrid was an interesting city, but its no Barcelona. Nonetheless, it
was great to see. After spending 10+ hours in the city, we headed back
to the airport around 8 PM to eat, read and wait for our flight.
We met tons of other interesting US and other country fans in the
terminal who were on their way here. From what I could tell, there were
few if any South Africans coming home. All World Cup visitors. A hippy
doctor and his wife who was high on Ambien, a crazy guy from Oklahoma
with bright yellow headphones who had thought through none of the
logistical or safety concerns of his trip, and said he planned to "go to
Mozambique and hang out for a week and figure it out from there". Good
luck with that master plan.
A sleep-filled 11 hour flight (thanks Tylenol PM) to Jo-burg and we
arrived in South Africa. It was an extremely long flight, but I think it
will be well worth it.
I thought this trip was off to a better start than the last. Everything
seemed to working out well and according to plan. When Mike and I
traveled, we had to sleep in the Ireland airport, and then when we got
out of the cab in Prague... The door got hit by another cab. Couldn't be
that bad this time right?
Right. But it definitely didn't go according to plan. Heather's friend
from the States, Kokie, was supposed to pick us up from the airport and
then show us around Pretoria that night and the next day. We had our
bags by noon and off we went to meet up with her. 3 hours later, 6 calls
for a legit cab (regular taxis in SA are deadly and should never be
taken. Some estimates put your odds of an accident over 60%). After
multiple calls to the hotel and vice versa - we FINALLY found our cab,
verified it was him (to prevent kidnapping and dangerous cabs), and took
the hour drive to Pretoria, the capital of SA. There was tons
construction and lots of new infrastructure being built. When people
said SA wasn't quite ready for the World Cup - they were probably right.
A couple of notes. It was futbol Friday, so I would say that 85% of
every single person we saw had a bufana bufana (our boys, our boys)
South African soccer jersey on. World Cup fever is definitely in full
effect.
We arrived at the Town Lodge, which is like a Hampton Inn in the US. We
finally got a shower and let's just say that 2 days in planes, airports,
and humidity in Madrid make you feel like scum. The hotel was nice,
secure, and comfy - we fell asleep by 6 PM (which is when it gets dark)
and didn't wake up till morning. 3 days in... And we have nothing. Ha.
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