The year our family traveled the world: Our last days in (South) Africa...

Well it had to come to an end sooner or later... but for all of us, it was much too soon! If you haven't been able to tell by now, we loved Africa. One of my (and Jen's and now Shawn's) favorite authors is Wilbur Smith and Wilbur's always written that there is something about Africa that calls you back... and I strongly believe it now... its unlike any other place that I know of. It is so unique, and yet at times also very familiar. It is often dangerous... but also very relaxing and peaceful. We loved every minute of it - even when the big elephant was chasing us!

After the last Safari at Nambiti Private Game Reserve, we headed back into Ladysmith and then down the N11 to a little town on the North end of the Drakensburgs called Clarens... it is very much an artsy little town that has a bustling B&B scene with lots of crafts shops to keep the kids interested. As we went to get to it we drove through another park (Golden Gate National Park) which had some amazing vistas... and to my surprise, we also passed two cloaked up 2013 Mercedes Benz CLS test mules out for test drives on the twisty roads! When we passed the first one (head to head), I exclaimed "that looks like the new CLS under all those blankets" and then moments later we passed another one and I was sure.

Then we pulled into a gas station to fill up and one of them came in after me. They were obviously VERY skittish about me with my camera out so I put it in my pocket and wandered over to have a good look at it. They were Germans and not at all comfortable about me looking at it and wouldn't answer any of my questions... even when I told them I owned the current model. One of them did say that's why they cover them up. It didn't have a finished interior but I could see that the have changed the seats so that each of the 4 seats is now a sculpted chair with fixed head rests. This one also must have been the souped up AMG version because it sounded like it had a turbine engine - that's the supercharger. I've read that it's got nearly 600 horsepower (versus the nearly 400 in mine). The whine was VERY loud... you couldn't hear the engine over it and everyone at the gas station looked up to see what was making the racket. it whined like a jet not roared like a car... Not that pleasant actually. They had a nice new E class as a chase car and they had lots of electronics and laptops in both cars taking all the measurements. I managed to snap a couple of pictures from a window when I got a chance. I'm not sure that I like the new design from what I could see but I've seen pictures that also look very nice... so we'll see I guess. It seems to be the most copied car around now (the VW Passat CC, the Audi A7, Porshe Panemera, and even the Hyundi Sonata all steal design cues from it) so they had to change it. I caught word of them telling the gas station attendant to only put 25L in it as they had to load it on the plane the next day and it couldn't have any gas in the tanks for that. It was a beautiful location to test it... I'd love that job!

Anyway, enough about the car (I although I have missed mine with the great roads in the South African mountains). We spent the night at a nice B&B in Clarens which we found by meeting a Canadian couple at one of the lookouts in the park. They were a very friendly couple from Vancouver. He's a Child Psychologist and she runs medical clinics and had been running one in a very rural area of South Africa and were doing their own car trip up to Botswana and Namibia before going back to Cape Town so essentially starting our trip again! I was a bit jealous! He's 67 and she's about 60... they had a little Honda CRV 4x4 so were well equiped for it. Anyway, they'd told us about this backpackers place in Clarens that was in their travel book so we went there together to check it out... it was a bit too rustic for our tastes but we split a home (they got the bottom apartment and we took the top). Total cost to us was just over $50 for the night... our cheapest room yet! They are also heading to South East Asia so we sat on our balcony for a bit with some Gin and Tonics and swapped plans/locations. Then we walked to a nearby restaurant (just the 4 of us) and had a nice dinner of Pizza's and Chicken Pot Pie.

Next morning, it was back into the car for the 4 hour drive to Johannesburg. Great roads, big plains and then LOTS of traffic. Typical crappy road signs so we spent a few minutes finding our B&B but we arrived in the early afternoon and the kids spent the rest of the day swimming in the pool, playing on the trampoline or with the dart board while Jen and I arranged the packs and threw out anything we didn't need anymore for the long flight to Singapore the next am.

We had a nice breakfast the next am and then filled up the car and returned it to Budget at the airport with 4200 more kilometers than when we got it... that means we drove over 10,000 Kilometers since we got to southern Africa 5 weeks ago. It WAS a lot of driving but we really feel like we got a good OVERVIEW of this end of the Continent. We really know where we want to come back and spend more time... Jen would put Plettenburg Bay up there because of the best beaches, and Oudtshoorn for its variety. I'd like to see everything we missed. - the Wild Coast, Kruger and the interior. We'll definitely be back!

Our flight was departing at 1:40pm so we had lots of time to hang around the shops in the airport where Jen hemmed and hawed about spending a few hundred for a beautiful hand woven table runner before finally deciding it wouldn't fit size wise. I wasn't overly concerned as I figured this is one more thing that I could use to drag her back to Africa with! We did see LOTS of things that we'd have loved to buy here but with our schedule (and budget) there was no way we could do that. Next time, we'll make sure we can bring back lots of stuff.

On to Singapore after our last batch of Africa pictures...