Blogs from KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, Africa - page 17

Hi all, hope you are all well, here we are still enjoying the outdoors and putting up with the funny weather, some real hot summer days and then storms, but all is well.We recieved our new tent and am verry happy with it. We are staying here at Mac nicolls till the end of the of the month and then to salt rock carravan park for a week , then we are off on a well deserved holliday to Mauritius for a week, as some of you know we were planning on attending our caravan clubs nagm in Bloemfontein but due to a mixup with our flights we will no longer be able to do that. Mac nicolls is still a great park and really enjoing it here, thay have a heated pool and Wanda and ... read more

St.Lucia was my next destination after Durban. St. Lucia is a small beachside town, which is situated by an extremely unique estuary where crocodiles, hippos and sharks all live. It is also at the southern tip of the iSimangaliso National Park and is close to Cape Vidal, inside the NP, which is an incredible stretch of coastline. However, getting out of Durban proved to be quite a challenge. After getting some wrong information from my hostel (Happy Hippo – to be avoided) about, which bus station to go to, it took me 3 minibus-taxis and about an hour and a half to find a bus going to the wonderfully named Mthubathuba. From here I got another minibus (one of the worst and most packed I had been on in all of Africa) the short distance to ... read more

When I eventually prised myself away from Coffee Bay, I took the shuttle bus back up to Mthatha. There I found a minibus going to Durban. This was the first time in South Africa I had gone back to the traditional African way of finding a minibus, taking my seat and waiting for it to fill up before we got to go. It took about an hour for it to fill up and, perhaps not too surprisingly, I was the only white person on it. It really could have been any country in Africa. It took about 7 hours to get to Durban after we were delayed a couple of times for over half an hour each time because of some works they were doing on the road. It was 9 o'clock on a Friday night ... read more

I’ve had a fantastic and particularly rewarding week on projects. I had asked if I could be more involved in the HIV education, instead of working at a crèche in the mornings, so from Monday to Wednesday I’ve been teaching at Ubuhle Bemvelo Primary School with some of my fellow volunteers! The girls (and a few boys) we’ve been teaching are aged between 11 and 14, which may seem scarily young to be teaching about HIV, but it’s really important that the younger generation here are educated on the risks, how to protect themselves, and know that they can still live a healthy life even if they have the virus. Our days started at Snenhlanhla Crèche, where we were dropped off with the volunteers who were teaching at that crèche for the morning. We then spent ... read more

I have had another great week here (although it’s pretty hard not to!) Monday was an emotional day, as we had to say goodbye to a big group of volunteers. It’s amazing how quickly you form a bond with people here, even after only knowing them for a week or two, and there were lots of tears as we waved goodbye. On Monday afternoon we welcomed the next group of volunteers, and all had a lovely evening down at the river jetty where we had sunset drinks and started to form new bonds! I started working at a Ndabenhle Crèche this week. It’s been great, but challenging and a very different experience from Inkanyezi Crèche last week! There’s a much greater range of ages at Ndabenhle, from babies to 5 and 6 year olds. Many of ... read more