Hellos from South Africa,
Last few months I have been mostly on the road or in a plane. I have travelled up and down from Finland to SA 3 times since beginning of February, with 3 different groups. Lucky for me I love travelling, but.... the flights are quite long and it is not such a joy, especially if Im not having a good night sleep on the flight and starting the tour following day...but luckily all guest are as tired as me that first day:) I always wake up so easy on the planes, and even if Im not scared of flying, when there is turbulence I always get a bit nervous, and that wont change even if I fly often, its nothing I get used to, so I do envy people who can get on the plane, close their eyes and sleep till they arrive at the destination, wish I had that gift.
On this last tour, a wine tour with 14 nice guest, starting beginning of March, Nico&the girls joined me, and then I also had Tomppa with me, who is a winespecialist, as it was a winetour. We had a great tour and it worked well having the girls with, Nico and the girls joined up along the route every now and then, they travelled separately in a rental car, and I must say, it is very cheap to rent a car in SA at the moment, about 150€/week for a basic car with aircon that seats 4 people comfortable and has luggage space.
During the tour we also visited
Nambiti game reserve and Nico got to see his best friend Desmond, he and his wife Elizke are running the cheetah breeding project there ,
Kwa Cheetah, and we got to spend some good time with the cheetahs, also the girls where very excited about that, and our guest on tour did a walk with the cheetahs. There was one cheetah that was pregnant and the day we left she gave birth to 5 healthy baby cheetahs:) The cheetah is an endangered species and there is only about seven to ten thousand cheetahs left in the world, so Kwa Cheetahs goal is to repopulate cheetahs into the wild.
After the tour was over we spent a few days in Johannesburg with Nicos sister Elizma , and did some washing as we had huge piles of dirty clothes and needed clean clothes for the next part of the journey startiing the following day, that inluded
Rovos Rail and then up along the east coast to
Rocktail Beach Camp and further to Timbavati Games reserve , before our final destination Thabazimbi, to visit Nicos family.
Rovos Rail was a joy as it was such a relaxing experience, and even with children it worked well, the girls loved to dress up for the evening dinner:) And they had their own delux suite and where quite proud of that. I was a bit unsure before the trip with Rovos Rail what clothes to pack with me, not sure what I could wear during the day, but no need to worry, it is quite relaxed in the daytime, so I was fine with shorts and a top, or a more casual dress and sandals,and it was of course interesting to see how everyone else was dressed:) And the same with men, they had shorts and a short sleeved shirt or smart t-shirt on, and sandals, so no need to worry about this, and I know many people worry about just this, how to dress for the traintrip. But for evening dinners it was more strict, then everyone was dressed up and that creates a nice atmosphere, I liked it:).....and so did the girls..and Nico I think...but what matters is that I liked to see him in a suite and tie:)
And here follows an example how the service onboard the train works: you have a minibar in your suite with some drinks that are included and then you can order to your suite from a list, also inlcuded. I had just opened the sparkling wine and had a few sips from my glas when we heard it was time for lunch so I put everything back into the minibar and thought I enjoy it later, and when we came back, my glas of sparkling was gone and replaced with a new unopened bottle of sparklling wine, so that is how the service works on the train, you just relax and unwind and everything is done for you before you even think about it,and snacks placed out at different places so you never need to be hungry. We did some excursions also included in the journey, and it makes a nice combination with the traintrip,I went to listen to the story about the battle of Spionkop, always good to learn some more about the history of SA.
Lunches and dinners onboard are all three course meals, and nicely presented. It is a very relaxed atmosphere on the train, no rush anywhere, no tv or use of phones in public areas, just like in the old days:)
After our 3 day journey on Rovos Rail we got off in Durban and rented a car for our journey onwards, first we stopped in Ballito as I needed to check out an accommodation I will use in future,
Meander Manor
, a very stylish,comfortable and exclusive guest house, with a beautiful, open view over the indian ocean. It is not directly by the sea, about 5 min walk from the ocean. It has a lovely swimmingpool and the girls loved it here. And the rooms are tastefully decorated, a place where one can unwind a few days.
We only stayed one night at Meander Manor as we where on our way up north, so in the morning when we got up the sun was shining and it was warm , we got a few towels from the reception and went down to the beach and jumped in the waves, the water is so much warmer on this side, Indian Ocean, compared to the waters of Cape Town, Atlantic Ocean.
Liina has home schooling during our 6 weeks journey as she is in first grade and do need to keep up with rest of her class, and we are also writing a diary about her journey, so when we come back she will have a presentation about her African trip:)
After Ballito we travelled for about 6 hours to get to Rocktail Beach Camp. We drove trough some local zulu villages and it felt like stepping into a different world, cows all over the roads and kids coming from school walking along the side of the road with the school uniforms, out there far in the countryside on a warm summers day.
I couldnt find my bikini in the morning when we left so I we had to stop in one of the towns to try to find a bikini for me, a few places where I went in to ask just laughed and said : winter is coming, no bikinis anymore... and I thought it is still + 30 outside, let me tell you about winter:) Finally I found a shop with all kind of things and there I found one that I thought was the best I would find and I paid 3€ for it, you can just imagine the fit of it:)
We could not drive the whole way to Rocktail by car,as the last 20km is only 4x4 drive, and pick up times are 3 times a day from the parking place, a cashew farm. We arrived in time and 4pm our pick up came and it took 45min to get to camp. It was in the middle of the forest, we could hear the sound from the waves, it was about a 20min walk to the beach, and we did walk once down trough the trails in the forest, the waves where big there and too strong for the girls to swim in, but we built sandcastels there, and the swimming the girls did in the swimmingpool by the lodge. We did a trip to an area suitable for swimming and snorkeling, and there it was sheltered and the waves could not cut trough, there girls swam and me and Nico did some snorkeling, and we did see fishes:)
Rocktail Beach Camp is tucked in the forest and has that beach feeling over it, they arrange divingtrips every day and boat trips and in season turtle tours. It is a comfortable, ecofriendly camp, and the accommodation is in comfortable and spacious tents apart from each other, and then there is the main area where the swimmingppol is and restaurant and bar area. Girls enjoyed it here and 3 nights is a minimum stay here as 2 nights only gives you one full day to enjoy.
From Rocktail our journey moved on towards Timbavati, trough Swaziland, but I will write more about that journey in my next update, following in a few days:)
Until then, enjoy !
Love Jannika
Here a few pictures from Cape Town,
Gold Restaurant where we had dinner, I do recommend highly, and Cape point and Table Mountain in background of the two other pictures.
