A Weekend on the Farm-Day 2 & 3

Saturday and Sunday on the farm, were as adventurous and eventful as Friday on the farm was. My camera battery died midway through the weekend, now making it a bit challenging for me to remember every different thing we did on day 2 and 3. I'll try my best to remember everything though!

The day started out with breakfast at Fransoice and Aurelia's farm. We had breakfast sandwiches and juice/coffee/tea. Wrangling up some deer like animals was one of our tasks for the day. The animals we were wrangling up were being sold to a farmer, so we needed to round up the 5 that were being sold. Needless to say, we wrangled up 1, and then left it to the farm hands to wrangle up the other 4 while we moved on to other things.

To capture the animal, the herd had to be chased to a corner area. Once they were grouped against the fenced area, we formed a line with a net. The animal was chased towards the net and captured with only the net between us capturers and the charging animal. I was glad that the animal did not make a dash into the part of the net I was holding. When it leapt into the net, the people that were on the net where the animal jumped into were yelling and jumping back from the excitment/scariness. I think it was Max who tackled the animal and held it down, so that it could be loaded into the pen, and eventually the trailer.

A visit was paid to Fransoice's trophy room, an impressive collection of African animals he has hunted (seemed to be 15-20 different trophied animals in the room). The giraffe is the highlight of Fransoice's trophies, and he is in the midst of building a large trophy room with vaulted ceilings, so the giraffe can be displayed to scale, in regards to its height.

Shooting lessons were another activity of the day. We had a target we were shooting at. The person with the best shot on the target got to go out on the land and shoot an animal. I held my own, with the best shot through the first few rounds of shooters. My shot was eventually surpassed by a better shot, although I was still glad I could say I actually hit the target. I was nervous right before I pulled the trigger, not really knowing what to expect, as far as force, noise etc. When I did pull the trigger, I was surprised at the volume of the sound of the gunshot. It messed with my hearing for a few minutes, but was nothing major. Shooting was a positive experience, and something I would try again.

A lot of time was spent cruising around in the back of the truck, checking out what was on the land, and going between the two farms. Bumping around the mountains with about 15 of us in the back of a truck was an adventure in itself!



The region where we were for the weekend was absolutely beautiful. There really is a lot to be said for how relaxing and freeing it is to be out on the open land.

After a lunch of sandwiches, homemade desserts and tea/coffee, Winnie and Aurelia took us out hiking up one of the mountains. It was a really nice afternoon, and felt great to be out moving around in the sun. The first male and female hikers to the top of the mountain got a prize, which I can assure you I was not the winner of! I had to hike back a bit from the front line of the race and catch people in case they tumbled back down the mountain.....ahahahahahaha

After our hike, we went back to Fransoice and Winnie's farm to relax, watch rugby and sit outside conversing. Supper was another scrumptious spread, again leaving us feeling like it was Thanksgiving. Steak with homemade mushroom sauce was definitely enjoyed by all of us, who do not regularily dine on steak in Annie's Cove.

After supper, we loaded up into the truck and went on a nightime game drive, looking for animals. While we did not see much on the drive (we didn't stay very quiet, which probably didn't help much), it was an enjoyable way to end a good day.

Sunday morning we had breakfast at Manus and Winnie's. We had breakfast sandwiches and juice/tea/coffee. After breakfast we loaded into the truck with Manus and went out to hike down to the river that runs through Manus's farm. The area which we swam runs between two really large rock structures, so it was really scenic. The water was freezing, a temperature I barely adjusted to while swimming through the water! It was warm outside though, so I had no problems warming up once I got out of the water.

After our hike/river adventure, we loaded up the shuttle and started our trek back to Port Elizabeth. The weekend was really enjoyable, made so awesome because of the gracious and welcoming hosts we had. It was really great to spend sometime out in the mountains, in good company, getting a taste of the family experiences that we all miss at moments during our time abroad. Thank you Manus, Winnie, Fransoice and Aurelia for a great South African farm experience! 

A Weekend on the Farm-Day 1

“Travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living.” – Miriam Beard



Sheep on the farm. We started back far from them, and moved all the way in close, chasing them down along the fence, where we then were able to pick them up.



Manus, one of the farmers that hosted us, herding the sheep into a group so we could try and pick them up.



Gotcha! The sheep were really soft and seemed to enjoy being held once we were able to get at them and pick them up.

 “We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm and adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open.” – Jawaharial NehruIn mid-October, I spent a weekend at a farm in the Winterburg Mountains, about 3 hours out of Port Elizabeth. It was a trip that was organized by the NMMU International Office. Myself and 13 other students, went with Divinia (International Office) and Shaddley (Bus driver-also in March). We were hosted by 2 families, who were related to each other (cousins), at each of their farms. The farms, in the mountains of South Africa, were just a quick truck drive down the gravel road from each other. Manus and Winnie, and Fransoice and Aurelia, were our host families for the weekend. They were absolutely great hosts, and welcomed us so fully into their homes and onto their farms. The guys stayed the weekend at Manus and Winnie's farm, and we ladies stayed at Fransoice and Aurelia's farm. From the time we arrived Friday at lunchtime, until we left Sunday afternoon, our group spent a lot of time between both farms learning, trying new things, relaxing, and enjoying great food and company.

When we arrived to Manus and Winnie's farm Friday afternoon, we had lunch (sandwiches, homemade desserts, tea/coffee) and then got busy exploring around, learning of the different aspects of Manus and Winnie's farm. Feeding was one of the first things we did. The animal we are feeding below is a big one. I am going to struggle to remember the names of some of them, the pictures will give you a good idea of what they are though, generally speaking :D  (blesbok, kudu, angora sheep/lambs, goats etc.)

nom nom nom nom

corn fed

I really enjoyed seeing the chickens and turkeys. Something about them totally intrigues me. One of those things I just can't quite put my finger on.

This chicken was up to something, hiding out under here, we just knew it....

You've got to chase the turkeys, if you want to catch them. I tried it, got close, but couldn't bring myself to go for the grab. These turkeys are BIG, with thick tough necks!

Milking the cows in the milking barn was another activity on the roster for Friday afternoon. We each took a try at hand milking, as well as tasting milk straight from the cow. The trench which we stood in to milk the cows, was between 2 rows of cows, a cement basin to catch you know what from the backs of the cows (not milk). That made it a bit more risky business, standing down in the trench where the cows do their business, shoulder to shoulder with 15 people. All went well though, and nobody got "blasted" or kicked.  



Removal of the sheeps tail, as well as castration of the male sheep, was another skill Manus taught us. The tail of the sheep is clipped to keep that area of the sheep clean. If the tail remains in place, maggots take over the area because it is unclean, due to bathroom excretment. The male sheep are castrated to prevent sheep from breeding within the same family. Much to our surprise, Manus needed to use his teeth as part of the procedure of castrating the sheep. With the castration pictures below, you will note that, as well as noting the resulting product as a delicacy on a cracker.



After a busy afternoon full of adventure, we enjoyed a tasty home cooked supper at Manus and Winnie's. There was a variety of dishes, reminding me of Thanksgiving, and filling us up similarily. After supper, we enjoyed a fire outside, leaving us nice and toasty, ready for a great nights sleep.



Day 1 at the farm was awesome, as was the rest of the weekend, two more days which I will cover in my next blog.



Addo Elephant Park-Video Blog

While Grandpa Gary and Grandma Connie were here, we made a trip to Addo Elephant Park, a national park about an hour outside of Port Elizabeth. We were pleasantly surprised that is was National Parks Week, so our admission into Addo was free. The original elephant section of the park was proclaimed in 1931, when only 11 elephants remained in the park area. Today, the sanctuary is home to 450+ elephants, cape buffalo, black rhino, a variety of antelope species, as well as the unique flightless dung beetle and a variety of other animals. The 2 videos below are from Addo Elephant Park. Port Elizabeth is known as The Windy City and my camera really picks up the wind, so your volume on your computer may need to be turned down while viewing the video footage. Enjoy!

A day in the life of me

Picture on bottom: Grandpa Gary and Grandma Connie at the Addo Elephant Park watering hole. (*2 elephants at the watering hole between them in the picture.)

Picture on top: Grandpa Gary, myself and Grandma Connie posing in front of the Port Elizabeth World Cup Stadium.

Now that Grandpa Gary and Grandma Connie have left back to the States, I will have to push myself a bit more to come up with blog topics and to keep up on the blog. Having them here kept me really busy, showing them the sites and travelling around. We had full days planned everyday, which always left me with plenty to write about at the end of each day. We had a really great time, and I am glad to have been able to be a part of their first African journey here in South Africa.

So now that Grandpa and Grandma have departed S.A. and I am back to work at my internship, I decided to take my blog topic ponderings out of my head to seek feedback from my Facebook friends about what I should be writing about in regards to my experiences here in South Africa. I have decided to take on the challenge of writing a blog about each suggestion made. The idea for this particular blog about what a day in my life in South Africa looks like, came from my aunt Lori (loyal supporter of my blog), as well as my friend Ashley, who I consider to be a blog diva! Ashley has close to 700 blog followers and is generating income from her blog. She might not know it, but I have adopted her as my blog coach. Thanks for the inspiration Ashley! To read Ashley's blog, Confessions as a First Time Mom, go to: http://myconfessionsasafirsttimemom.blogspot.com/


So, a day in the life of Lexi in South Africa:





Well, it depends on if it is a weekday or weekend. I'll start with weekday. I work at my internship Monday through Thursday, some weeks I also work Fridays, if there are special events or a heavy workload.


I wake up in my flat, which I affectionately call my hut, in Annie's Cove. Annie's Cove is pictured in the picture below:






I am awoken by my faithful South African Nokia cell phone alarm. My Brookstone travelling alarm clock sleep sound machine ran out of battery juice and because we prepay for electricity, I too cheap to plug the alarm clock in. My workday starts at 8 a.m., so I should be up and at it by 6:30/7ish, although I seem to be notorious for pushing it until as late as 7:30. If I can be out the door by 7:30 a.m., I can walk to work, but if I leave much later than that I need to catch a minibus taxi to work. Minibus taxis will have their own blog, because I have plenty to say about those! The pictures below are of minibuses at the minibus lot halfway between Annie's Cove and campus.

After getting ready, making breakfast for work and packing my lunch, I head to work. If I walk, it is about a 20 minute walk. A straight shot down one road, take a right, and a straight shot down that road and I am pretty much there! The picture below are of the final stretch of my walk leading on to campus to Embizweni, the big tall building where I work.




























Once I am at work, my workday can look a variety of ways. When I get to my office, I check my email, eat my breakfast and make my coffee. Water for coffee, which is instant coffee-VERY common in S. Africa-is boiled in the "tea kettle", an electric water boiler. I am very used to instant coffe, and enjoy my daily cup of joe, but will still enly getting back to the States to some strong brew! A workday can be any given combination of facilitating workshop, attending meetings/supervision, covering reception and developing events/documents.


Tea time (10:15 a.m.) is customary in South Africa, although I tend to work through tea time and drink tea whenever I feel like it. Lunch time is at 1 p.m. and lasts 45 minutes. I pack my lunch and eat in the main meeting room with my co-workers who are also on a lunch break at that time. Depending on the day, lunch may not always happen right at 1 p.m.

The afternoon, from 2ish until the end of my workday at 4:30 p.m. can be any given combination of the various tasks and activities that my internship encompasses. Once I get off work, I either walk home, or take a minibus, depending on the weather, as well as how tired I am and how quickly I want to get home from work. Once I get home from work, I make my rounds through Annie's to say hello to the ladies. On any given day I see Ethelyn, Aleschia, Neelu and Alexandra. After hanging out, catching up and unwinding, I head over to my flat to make my supper, which can be eaten either in my room, or with one of the ladies. After supper, I either hang out and catch up some more, or watch a few episodes of any given television series that I have downloaded on my laptop.


At any given time between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. I lay down in bed to unwind, which could be anything from Facebooking to surfing the web to blogging.


Randomly, at any given point, random things can come up that would then be inserted into the above schedule. If I need groceries, I get my duffle bag, round someone up and we make the 20 minute walk to the grocery store, Spar. I don't mind the walk to and from Spar, but I do have to be careful to not buy more than what will fit in my duffel bag. If we are getting close on running out of energy, I round up the money from my roomates and go to the petrol station (gas station) to buy energy. To get energy, I need to bring the serial number for the energy box that is on the outside wall of my flat. When I get home with the energy voucher, I enter a pin number into the energy box. The pictures below are of the energy box. Take note of the bird's nest in the right corner of the box. We had hatchlings to welcome in spring for us!

Robben Island

The picture above is of a community cell room on Robben Island. This is a close up picture of the end of the room. This room held 30-52 prisoners. The prisoners initially only had 2 straw-like material mats to sleep on. They eventually got the beds shown in the picture. Windows also were not initially on the windows, leaving the prisoners exposed to the elements of hot summers, rain and cold winters.

Saturday 10/3/10

Glad I could make Robben Island the title of this blog, because Robben Island almost did not happen for us today. (Robben Island is where Nelson Mandela and many other political prisoners were kept.) We booked it for today, first thing, when we got here a week ago. There was space on Monday, otherwise the next available time was today. Because Monday was our first day here, I decided we should wait to go to Robben Island, in case trading in the car and acclimating to the city took longer than expected on Monday. When I booked the reservation for today, I was a bit nervous that it was scheduled so closely to our departures. I figured what can go wrong though?? I couldn't really come up with anything, and figured as long as we made it to our reservation we would be set.

Well, when we left our B&B this morning, Peter-B&B owner, informed us that the newpapers were reporting that the Robben Island Ferry was broke down and people were unable to go. We left, figuring we needed to go there and check out the situation. When we got to the Robben Island ferry station, there were signs on the doors saying that tours had been cancelled for the day due to problems with the ferry. As soon as I read that, my heart sunk, knowing that this was something Grandpa and Grandma really wanted to see. The sign said refunds could be given, or trips could be rescheduled at the next available date, which I pretty much figured would not be before Grandpa and Grandma leave on Monday. I told Grandma to go over and watch the Robben Island video that was playing because it may be all she would see of Robben Island. The ticket agent took our information and got to work on the computer. Next thing you know, she handed us 3 tickets, and said we were set!!!! Yay! Thankfully, an independent boat had been hired to take people out to Robben Island.

Not wanting to risk any chance that something may come up, we got in line for the tour immediately, which was an hour and a half before departure. It was along time to stand in line, but we did not want to chance not being able to go. Grandma said this was the first time she was first in line for something.

The ride out to Robben Island was a beautiful ride. The ferry usually only takes 15 minutes, but this boat took an hour, which was fine by me, because I enjoyed the view from the top deck of the boat, as well as the sun on my face. Once we were on Robben Island, we started the tour in a bus with a tour guide. The bus took us around the island to see the different aspects, including the Lepers graveyard and the lime quarries where the prisoners were forced to work. The Lepers graveyard is the burial place of people who were sent to Robben Island to live in the early 1900's because they had leprocy, and at the time there was no cure.

After the bus tour, we took a tour of the prison facilities. The tour was led by a guide who was a former prisioner at Robben Island. He had served 5 years at Robben Island because he had fought against his university back during apartheid times, because students were expected to learn in Afrikaans, which was not his language.

The tour was very informative, and being on Robben Island helped paint a more clear mental picture of who Nelson Mandela had to be, what he fought for, and some of what apartheid was like for South Africa and the people who fought for equal rights.

Table Mountain and Wine Country

Today was a day of great scenery and some relaxation too!



We started out at Table Mountain, a Capetown staple. Table Mountain is best known (and named for) being VERY flat across the top, like a table top. When the clouds set in over the top of the mountain, it is referred to as the tablecloth. Table Mountain is 3,564 ft high above sea level. Table Mountain is flanked on one side by Devil's Peak, and Lion's Head to the other side. Grandpa and I rode a cable car up to the top of the mountain, where we stood with stunning 360 degree views of the city and ocean.



The cable car ride was an interesting experience, beyond just the stellar views. Cramming 20+ people from around the world into a cable car that has a revolving floor can make a person a bit clausterphobic. For all of the polite and respectful people in the world, we know there has to be a few others in every bunch (or cable car). The ride is brief though (and enjoyable, pushy people aside). It lasted approximately 5 minutes. Once at the top, the city, Table Bay, Robben Island and the Atlantic Ocean all lie before you to be viewed from the eagle eye view atop the mountain! While a person can choose to hike both up and down the mountain, Grandpa and I felt the cable cars were the most adventurous route :D



After Table Mountain, we met up with the manager of our B&B, Renalta (sp?), and went to Stellenbosch for a wine/chocolate tasting, an experience that I of course enjoyed. Stellenbosch is famous for it's vineyards, and subsequent wine options. Stellenbosch is the 2nd oldest town in South Africa (Cape Town is the oldest). The vineyard we visited was the Waterford vineyard, which was was both grand and inviting in it's presentation. We sat outside on the patio and enjoyed the mild, sunny weather. Informative presentation plates were brought to each of us, with 3 different types of chocolate on them. Each chocolate had a wine pairing, all of which was described on the presentation plate. I have the specifics recorded, of what each of the wines and chocolates were, so I will be following up this blog with another blog about the wine and chocolate tasting, once I am back in Port Elizabeth.



After the wine and chocolate tasting, we went to a Garden Cafe, Romanse, and enjoyed a lunch in a garden setting patio. We all had coffee and sandwiches. Grandma and Renalta had chicken sandwiches, and Grandpa and I had gypsy ham sandwiches. The sandwiches were very flavorful-toasted french bread, rocket, blue cheese crumbles, home made mustard mayo, tomatoes, jellied onion and ham for mine.



After lunch, we came back to the B&B, at which point a took a very restful 2 hour nap! The rest of the evening was spent hanging low, and of course playing cribbage!

Tomorrow is my final day here in Cape Town (fly out Sunday morning), enjoying the vacation and company of Grandpa and Grandma. Grandpa and Grandma leave for Minnesota on Monday. I sure have enjoyed my time with them, and hope they have as well enjoyed their first African experience here in South Africa!