---

South Africa

The trip to South Africa is easily the one that has taken the longest time to come to fruition.

My great-grandfather went to South Africa as a missionary {I don’t know what sort, I discovered quite recently that the family may have been Quakers}. My grandfather and a few more children were born in Cape Town but my great-grandfather died when my grandfather was five years old. My great-grandmother then decided that the best thing to do was to take all her children back to Britain and settle in Stoke (!!!).

When I was a child my grandfather often talked about visiting Cape Town and had promised to take us children there. It never happened. Previous generations of the family have always talked about visiting Cape Town but have grown old before they did. Myself and my sister aren’t going to let that happen again! We are both quite happily spending our children’s inheritance and had no hesitation in jetting off to Cape Town. We’ve already had one failed attempt a couple of years ago when I had to pull out of the trip; now it’s all booked and we’re on our way.
For a long time I thought that I would be another generation that didn’t make it. I never thought that political change would come as quickly as it did in South Africa or that apartheid could have ended without the whole country collapsing into chaos and civil war.

At the moment we haven’t got any great plans to research any family history. We have a couple of addresses to try and find but really we just want to be in Cape Town. We’ve rented an apartment for 2 weeks for myself, my sister and her husband and we are going to take it from there. As we are flying as far as Cape Town I thought I’d make the most of it and see some of the rest of Southern Africa while I’m here so I’ve signed up for a couple of organized tours.

I intend to travel up the western side of South Africa, through Namibia and Botswana, up to Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. From here I’ll come back to Cape Town and rest up for a couple of weeks with my sister and her husband. After they go back I’ll head off on the eastern side of South Africa, including Mozambique, Lesotho and Swaziland.

---

Comments

[Lynette Stainton]

Hope it all works out!
I was born and bred there and have just returned from a nostalgic trip there. I can't wait to hear your comments and see your photos!

[Joseph]

Good luck Steve
I too was surprised that S Africa did not collapse into chaos, so it shows that peaceful change can take place. Hope the trip goes well. Joseph