Cari and Cristina come to visit!

In mid November my friend and former coworker Cari came to visit and she brought along her friend and now mine, Cristina. First of all, I want to say that I LOVE having visitors! I love sharing our lives with our friends and family and think it is awesome to show them some of our favorite things about Africa. I also love seeing Africa through their eyes. Seeing their excitement when we drive up upon a heard of Elephant or when holding a baby lion makes me happy! I enjoy so many things about this country it's fun sharing it with those back home. Cari travels a lot and is quit adventuresome so I knew she would want to see as much as possible during her two weeks here. Thankfully, I hooked her up with a local travel agent who could help her plan part of her travels in Cape Town and Victoria Falls and I played tour guide in Pretoria and on Safari. I am not sure I would have the stamina to do all the amazing things she did while in the country!
The day after their arrival I loaded the girls in the car and drove them to Ukutula Lion Park and Lodge. I took Chase's family there back in February so I was due for a visit and some snuggle time with baby lions. On the drive up to Ukutula we were about 5K from the turn off when I looked at my gas gage and realized it was sitting on empty, OOPS!! I had a moment of panic as we rolled into the Ukutula gates and the the computer started counting down my "cruising" range, 5K, 4K, 3K, 2K, 1K... uh oh. We read the signs as we coasted in, "Do not step out of vehicle, roaming Lions may be present". We all started saying a little prayer and thankfully coasted right into the parking lot. I embarrassingly told the front desk what happened and they responded with "Oh, Don't worry, It happens all the time". I had a huge sigh of relief, and we were ready to see the lions. We walked with the juvenile lions and had play time with the younger ones as well. It was a fun start to the day and a memorable experience for girls! When it was time to leave a kind gentleman siphoned some gas into my tank and we were good to go to the nearest gas station! That evening we enjoyed dinner at the local Mozambiq Bar and Grill and I told Chase our car story after he had a few sips of beer! :)

The next day I took the ladies to a new spot for me. Glen Afric Lodge, in Hartsbeesport, where we could have some one on one time with Elephants! This experience was much different from my other experience with Ellies at the Elephant Sanctuary. At the Elephant Sanctuary they had many what seemed to be strict rules on how you interacted with the Elephants. The rules, though I am positive were there for our own safety, made me feel nervous around the elephants and I was scared to  go and touch them, I didn't want to make a wrong move and get stepped on! At Glen Afric it was  a much more laid back experience. They had rules but they were presented more as guidelines. We walked with a group of people down to a creek where we were to "greet" the Elephants who were getting a drink in the water. We were encouraged to approach them, touch them and take pictures. We then walked with the Elephants for about 10 minutes down a trail to a group of trees. Once at the trees the Ellies started eating away and we were again encouraged to touch them, get close to them, and take pictures. It was totally different from my experience at the Sanctuary. I will say that at the Sanctuary we go a lot more information about Elephants, here the handlers and guides offered information, but it was much more on a question basis. Once we were done at the trees a group of people were going with the Elephants for an hour walk, but we decided we were good with out that part.  That evening we took the ladies to one of our favorite restaurants The Tin Roof, where they got to meet several of our expat friends and enjoy some fine dining!

Day three we headed to a local Arts/ Organic Market and enjoyed a morning shopping for gifts and souvenirs. The Markets are some of my favorite things to do in the area and I was happy I got to share them with the girls as both of our families missed out on this experience. That evening we had a traditional braii at our house where I gave the girls a taste of South Africa with Kudu, Ostrich, Pap, and Chakalaka sauce!

Finally, the next day my good friend Mandy, joined us and we headed off to Madikwe Game Reserve for a safari girls weekend. Madikwe was another first for me, so I was super excited to experience it with them.  We stayed for three nights at the Madikwe River Lodge, and though the lodge itself wasn't super fancy the drive experiences where amazing. We had a fantastic guide, and we got to see everything and more! Some of the highlights for me were the Cheetahs, Wild Dogs, and the Leopard!

Cheetahs: Day two of our drives our guide, took us to see three male cheetahs. I hadn't seen cheetahs in the wild yet, so this was really awesome for me. I love how peaceful they seem and it was cute to see three guys just hanging out together walking around and napping!
Wild Dogs: Our wild dog encounter was cool too, we cam upon three dogs who had recently killed a Kudu. The Kudu was pretty mangled by the time we got there they had eaten the important parts. The dogs left for a bit and there was a Hyena near by who kept coming in to eat off of their kill. It was interesting to see the dogs eating and to learn from our guide about which parts of the animals the dogs will eat first.
Leopard: From the beginning of our game drives we had told our guide that we wanted to see a leopard. Leopards are sometimes hard to spot on drives because they can be skittish, and are very reclusive. They also spend their days high in trees, or deep in the brush.  So on our last evening game drive our guide got the call that there was a male leopard spotted. Before we knew it, he was telling us to hold on tight and his foot was on the gas as we were speeding across the park to see the leopard. It was pretty intense for a few minutes! We then were able to approach the leopard and cruise next to him as he walked through thick thick brush. As we were following him the other truck had left and we needed to keep following him until another truck arrived. The guides in the park work together this way to get the most sightings for their guests. As we were following the leopard we got a flat tire and had to move out of the brush. This flat tire was one of three we got over our three days of drives!
After the leopard sighting I asked our guide to take us to his favorite spot for sun downers and he took us up to a high cliff to look out over the park, it was gorgeous and a great end to our safari experience.

Chetahs just hanging out

Wild Dogs eating Kudu

The Leopard!

We got to see lots of baby Elephants too!

I had a great week with Cari and Cristina, Thanks for visiting ladies!! Now, the question is, Who is visiting in 2015?

Mitchell's Sun City Birthday

For Mitchell''s birthday this year we took a weekend trip to Sun City. Sun City is about a 2.5 hour drive from Pretoria just outside of Pilanisburg National Park. Basically, its a large resort with 4 different hotels, a casino, several restaurants, and a wide variety of family activities.  We stayed at The Palace of the Lost City Hotel, and I think the name says it all. Every detail of this hotel was based off of a lost African palace. Though Chase and I have never been at the theme hotels of Disney or Atlantis in the Bahamas we imagine that they are similar to this. It's clear that every inch of the hotel was carefully thought out. Sun City's latest claim to fame is that it was used for filming the Adam Sandler, Drew Barrymore movie Blended. The hotel they shot most of the movie in was actually The Palace. After returning from our trip we had to rent Blended to see how it looked. They change several things for the movie, but for the most part the hotel is the same and a lot of attractions with the exception of riding an Ostrich... that was not an option for us, but it was in the movie!

Main Lobby - standing underneath the large dome of the hotel

Large Elephant statue on the way to the water park

Staircase leading from The Palace to Valley of the Waves

View driving up to the hotel

around the hotel were various walking paths with small waterfalls. One evening we went for a walk and took pictures for our Christmas card.

This is the fountain at the front of the hotel. I was obsessed with it! 

We spent most of the weekend poolside either at our hotel or at Sun City's water park Valley of The Waves. Valley of the Waves reminded me of many of the water parks back home, they had a large wave pool three water slides, a lazy river, and a great area for younger children.  Mitchell had just met the height requirement for the slides and didn't think twice about going down them. Once he went a couple of times he was hooked. He probably would have been happy to ride the slides all day had we let him! Chase and I enjoyed the slides also, but we were both to chicken to do the tallest slide a 98ft sheer drop entitled the "Temple of Courage".

First day at the pool and the place was empty

View of the Hotel from the pool

View from hotel to the pool

We found the food at Sun City to be just okay nothing really over impressed us.  We ate at several restaurants around the resort, but everyone agreed that the breakfast at our hotel was the best! Our buffet breakfast choices included everything from fresh waffles, omelets, prime rib, and sushi! To top it all off they handed me a mimosa as I walked in. Technically, they gave me the choice of fresh juice or champagne and I asked them to mix the two. I haven't seen a mimosa on a menu yet here in Africa, apparently they don't believe in ruining their sparkling wine with juice!  It was by far the best "complimentary breakfast" I have had at a hotel.
One of the perks of Sun City is that they have a sitting service that will come to your room in the evenings, a few friends who have been there tried it out so we weren't too nervous to give it a go. This gave Chase and I the opportunity to go out to dinner just the two of us. We had thought of checking out the casino as well, but decided we were both too tired to scope it out.

Boys having dinner in the room

enjoying a drink at the bar

Since it was Mitchell's birthday weekend we really let him choose what we all did. While there were various activities to check out we ended up making it to the arcade a couple of times and to the Crocodile Sanctuary. The Crocodile Sanctuary located at Sun City is home to over 300 Nile Crocodiles. I had injured my foot the day before we left for this vacation so I didn't mind staying close to the hotel, as walking all over the area would have been a bit of a nightmare.

Boys with their arcade prizes! 

Over all it was a great little getaway! I asked Mitchell if he was sad he didn't have a party this year and he said "Not at all, this weekend was AWESOME!"