Amazing Weeking

Hello everyone!
This is my first blog, I am sorry I haven't before. This weekend was a very exciting one. We decided to go see a couple of different cities and planned the weekend on Friday, a little last minute but that is how I like to operate. We started out early Saturday morning. We first drove to Tsitsikamma where we rode zip lines over beautiful water falls. Next we headed to Plettenburg Bay where Diana, a member of our group, went sky diving! She is very brave. To end the day we arrived in Knysna. We got a late lunch at a wonderful pizza palor! By the time we reached our Hostel we were exhausted! Some of us slept some of us went back to town. On Sunday we started out even earlier (6:30 to be exact) and traveled to Mossell Bay. Mossell Bay by far was the highlight of the trip. We were on the water by 9:00 and in the cage by 9:30. The 6 of us were the first to get in. Us trying to get the wetsuits on was an experience in itself. The water was freezing but the sharks were soon there to get our adrenalin running. The experience was unbelievable. We could literally reach out and touch them, though none of us did. My description does not do the experience justice. Trey, Alex, and myself went down again later and got to relive the experience once again. We then travelled back to Knysna for lunch and then headed home. I am so tired right now from our weekend so I know my description of the weekend is not wonderful and my grammar is awful but please forgive me. I am sure you will be hearing these stories many times over once we all arrive back in the U.S.

Until next time,
Emelia Wilson

Once again, I only have a limited time to blog this morning so forgive the typos and such.

Yesterday was very interesting. We started the day with a trip to Hankey, a small town near Jeffrey's Bay and home to the originial people of Africa: the Khoi. We were introduced to their ritual and took part in a sort of quasi-service in remembrqance of one of their most famouos ancestors. They were a very diginifgied people and demanded respect; evenso, they were very nice and genuinely interested in informing us of their unique culture.

At our stop we also saw the largest working sundial on the continent, I think, but definitely in South Africa.

This morning, Trey, Virginia, Emelia, Kristen, Dianna and I are starting our weekend adventure. We leave in about 10 minutes for Tsitsikamma for a zip-line canopy tour. After the tour we're going to Mussle Bay to stay the night and tomorrow we're going shark diving! I's really safe (or at least relatively) because we'll be in a cage so no one should worry (epecially you, Mom!).

I miss everyone but know we're having the time of our lives!

Until later...

-Grizzly Adams

Update

It doesn't look like our blogging plans are going to work out as easily as I had thought. Right now, I'm hastily typing considering I only have 20 minutes left of my initial 30 that I purchased for 20rand at a local convenience store. Where to start? The flight over was... well, long. But we all made it safely and are slowly adjusting to South Africa. The food is definitely a plus. You can easily find pizza, McDonalds, KFC, and an incredible steak just about anytwhere you go. Our accents have been a little inhibiting, but for the mosdt part we can communicate well with everyone we come into contact with. Our accomodations are nothing special; however, there is hot water most of the time and the rooms have full kitchens and living rooms. They don't believe in centrail air/heating in South Africa, or don't have the capabilities. Luckily the weather has been pleasant and even chilly and certain times.

Tuesday we went on our first safari at one of the local game parks. We had a HUGE rhino come up to our open van and his horn was literally inches from the tire. Our guides told us he had a horrible habit of puncturing the tires with hias horn. We also saw giraffes,zebras, the spring bock (S. Africa's national animal), water buffalo, wildabeasts, warthogs, and a lot of ostriches. By far the coolest part was our time with the cheetahs... for 30rand most of us went into the enclolsure with some hand raised cheetahs (3 to be exact) and petted/played with them for about 15 minutes. It was incredible and I'm sure you'll be seeing quite a few profile pictures with cheetahs when we get back to the states.

Today was our first day of lectures and I can tell the classes are going to be really interesting. We discussed apartheid mainly and learned about the recently created South African Constitution. I wish i could say more about the academic part but my time is quickly running down.

That's all for now, but I'll try and post in the next few days. Virginia, Trey, and Emelia are all doing fine and miss everyone!

Later!

-Grizzly Adams (thank you Reid)

Well... after a long and hectic night packing (I didn't start until 9:30, went to Wal-Mart at about 11:00 and finished around 1:30) I'm about to leave Madison for the Memphis airport. My bags are very close to the weight limit, so hopefully they'll pass the weigh in.

I don't think that the reality of the trip has set in just yet, but I'm sure it will come fast when I board the plane. We have a flight from Memphis to Atlanta leaving at 3:55, then we fly straight from Atlanta to South Africa (I think). It's around a 15 hour flight...

We are going to three wild-life parks and hopefully we'll get to go whale watching. Trey will have a trusty video camera to record our cooler outings and we'll do our best to post them here on the blog. We should be posting a lot of pictures as well.

Thanks for posting Trey. Virginia and Emelia... I'm dissappointed.

See y'all in about a month!

-Alex (until I decide on a cooler name than Trey's)

The begining

So I guess I will begin the posting saying that I am extremely excited about this trip! Its about time for Trey to get into Trip Mode. Once I get some good footage I will attempt to post some videos. This is going to be a great experience and I can't wait to get there!

We must all come up with writter names btw
I will be the tall one

-The Tall One