Namibia: Spring break of a lifetime

I am lucky enough to be here during the Spring Semester of UCT, therefore I got to enjoy 10 glorious days of Spring Break.  There were 14 of us - quite the crew - that decided Namibia was calling our names. It is about a 7 hour drive from Cape Town to the border, and then we made our way about halfway up into Namibia and came back down. 

We started our journey on Saturday by only going about 2 hours away from Cape Town to a music festival called Alien Safari.  However, right when we got there my car's trunk broke, which resulted in a week of inhaling sand and dirt, and all of our things being layers in inches of it. It wasn't very fun. Alien Safari is a psy-trance party - which is music similar to dub step, kind of a techno feel. It was absolutely crazy and a complete blast. Everyone was covered in glow in the dark paint and was just dancing all night, it was great. It was held at a vineyard in the mountains and was breathtaking. We camped the night and headed for Namibia at about 8:30 Sunday morning.

Alien Safari- still going strong at sunrise

Sunday was a day full of driving and was incredibly hot and uncomfortable in the car. We got through SA immigration fine, but no one at Namibian customs stopped us, so we didn't get our passport stamped, this caused problems later on. After driving all day on dirt roads, we arrived in Ai-Ais at a hot-springs resort where we ended up camping for 2 nights. We were able to set up camp and sit in the hot spring pools all night and it was exactly what we needed after a long day.

We woke up the next morning and drove to Fish River Canyon about 30 minutes from our campsite. It is the 2nd largest canyon in the world after the Grand Canyon. It was completely gorgeous and we hung out there for a few hours, and hiked down part of the canyon and explored a little. Day hikes are prohibited however, and we discovered why with its loose rocks and steep slopes, but it was still doable. After the canyon we relaxed at the campsite for the night.

Fish River Canyon

Tuesday morning we woke up early to embark on a '5 hour' drive to Sesriem. This 5 hour drive turned into a 10 hour drive - all on horrible dirt roads.  Along the way our tire/ rim/ hubcap got completely destroyed, along with one of the Land Rovers also getting a flat, in the middle of nowhere. But the boys changed the tires and it turned out fine. We arrived at our campsite, made some dinner, and ended up seeing my roommate Roger and Carl and the bar, so it was a fun night.

We woke up bright and early at an attempt to get to the Sand Dunes by sunrise, but that didn't happen. We still got there extremely early, and it was the best morning of my life. We were in the middle of dunes, just surrounded by mountains of sand. It was so incredible and very peaceful. I took tons of pictures, I think it may have been my favorite part of the trip. After the dunes we got back on the road towards Swakopmund, a coastal town we stayed at for the rest of our trip. We got there pretty late and ate our first real meal of the trip! I had a greek salad and it was so delicious. We then went back to the hostel and had an amazing night sleep, in an actual bed.

Sand Dunes

We woke up the next morning and went to the beach for a few hours before going quad-biking through some sand dunes. It was one of the funniest things I have done in awhile. We were going as fast as possible up and down the sides of huge dunes, it was so awesome, everyone loved it.

Friday was a day of relaxation, with exploring the town, going into shops and to the open market, and hanging out at the beach. It was a much needed day of no stress and no driving.

Saturday morning we woke up early to head back to Cape Town - it was a 19 hour drive, arriving back home at about 3:30 am. On the way home we had one little issue- we had been in Namibia illegally all week. They threatened to arrest us, we freaked out, and ended up bribing them R3,000 to let us through. It was stressful and we were so happy to not be in jail. However, my roommate had the same issue but they said it "happens all the time" so we think we got played. But there has been students jailed for it in the past, so I guess it depends on the immigration officers mood that day.

Overall I had an amazing spring break that I will never forget.
I will try to post pictures this weekend!

A few photos...

My pictures refused to load yesterday with my post, but today it was cooperating, so I thought I would put a few on:

Bungy!!

Tasty treats at Old Biscuit Mill

Roommate lovin' - out to eat at Taste of Madness 

Recent Happenings

Much has happened since my last blog post. School is in full swing, and I am now writing papers and studying for tests, it is no longer vacation. But right after school started we got a little break, and on our three day weekend my roommates and I and a few other friends went on the Garden Route - a coastal stretch of road with many popular destinations along the way.

We drove to Oudtshorn on Friday night and stayed at a really nice hostel. We meet up with Pierre, a 50-something gay democrat that befriended my friends David and Andy on their early travels during the World Cup.  We just hung out with him at the hostel for the night, sat by a fire, and drank a few beers.

The next morning we woke up quite early to go to the Cango Caves.  We went the on the "adventure tour", and the adventure aspect is that you need to squeeze through alleyways of the caves that are very small and intimidating. I, of course, was not as nervous about this as everyone else, but we all got through them just fine. And I now love caves, it was so crazy being completely inside the earth looking at beautiful rock formations. That night we went to Pierre's house for a good ole South African braii and it was so so so delicious. You don't even understand. We had the most delicious lamb and ostrich you could ever ask for. We also had potato salad, some veggies, and lots and lots of whiskey and wine. It was a great night with great company. Pierre is quite the host.

The next day we had another early morning, with waking up and driving to the Blourkans Bridge, the highest bungy bridge in the world. It was Natalie's birthday, and what a birthday it was. Most of the group did the jump. It was absolutely insane. Words cannot describe it. I wasn't nervous until looking over the edge right before jumping, but it was such an adrenaline rush you can't even think about being scared. It was definitely an experience that I will never forget.


We then headed straight to Jeffery's Bay, commonly known as J-Bay. It is one of the most popular surfing spots in the world, with many many dreadlocked surfers wandering around. It was fantastic. And being Nat's 21st, we partied at our hostel all night, with making a quick stop at a hostel where some friends were staying. The night consisted of a lot of foosball, whisky, fish bowls, and flame throwing. Overall Natalie had a great birthday.

The next morning we woke up and headed home. My car made a pit stop and Monkey land, where you can take tours through a cage in the forest with monkeys all around you. But the weather was horrible so we decided to save it for another trip.

Apart from the Garden Route, I have had a few other adventures recently. I finally got to Old Biscuit Mill, just a 20 minutes walk from my house. It happens every Saturday morning, and it is similar in concept to farmers market, but it is all food. Delicious, amazing food. Anything you could ever want they have, from bagels to gyros to falafel and even belgian waffles. This place is amazing, with also little shops outside that sell clothing and furniture and even one that is all photography related. It is the perfect start to a Saturday.


This Friday I was able to attend a soccer game at Green Point Stadium, which is where the Cape Town World Cup games were held!! It was a good game, Cape Town won! There were tons of people and tons of vuvuzelas, it was blast. After the game we walked further downtown to Long Street, which is a very popular area to go out. It kind of reminds me of Bourbon Street, with tons of crazy people everywhere going in and out of the bars, and also the street itself is jam packed with taxis until about 5 am. We went to a few bars and they were all a blast, plenty of dancing happened that night.

I also recently played beer pong for the first time since I have been here! It was so great, my roommate Roger and I did Madison proud with going undefeated at 6-0. I have really missed beer pong, they do not have plastic cups available here so it's hard to play.

I have also been extremely busy with school, I had a paper due last Friday, another due this Friday, and an exam right when I get back from spring break (which is this next week). So I have finally been studying like I should and it is kind of depressing. But I will have a nice little 10-day break, with spring break coming up. Some friends and I are road tripping to Namibia, the country on the West coast directly above South Africa. We start our trip with Alien Safari, a psy trance party which will definitely be interesting. From there we are heading to Namibia and have many activities planned.
I will do my best to get pictures and a post up relatively soon after break:)

Hope everyone has a good first week in school!

Epic Weekend

So I have now been in Cape Town for three weeks. I really can't believe it. It has gone by so quickly and I'm constantly on the run doing as much as I possibly can, these 5 months are going to fly by.

This weekend was quite an exciting one. On Friday, I attended my first rugby game! It was very entertaining, but it was just the South African league, and not a very big game so it wasn't too crazy. I am planning on seeing the Springboks, which is the international team, sometime soon.

I slept for about two hours that night because I was picked up at 4 am to go shark cage diving!! It is prime season for seeing sharks, and I went to an area where they are densely populated, right next to and island that is COVERED in seals. Literally covered, it was awesome. So we took a boat about 30 minutes out into the ocean and went at it. The cage is connected to the boat, and you hold yourself out of water until a sharks comes near you. I was lucky enough to have a shark attack a tuna right in front of me, it was terrifying but soooo awesome at the same time. By the end of the day we had seen 6 different great whites. It was quite the day.

On Sunday, a few friends and myself made our way to Muizenberg via train. Muizenberg is a very popular surf spot in Cape Town, so we thought we should give it a try. I did indeed attempt to surf, pretty unsuccessfully but it was very fun. I will definitely be going again soon to try to improve my skills. My roommates boyfriend is now obsessed and only talks about how big the swells are each day. It is hilarious. After surfing we rode the train to Kalk Bay, and ate a delicious dinner at Kalky's. It is a restaurant right on the bay that serves the fish that was caught in the morning. It was amazing, and very cheap for being fresh fish. I had salmon and it was quite tasty.

Now I'm going to mention some of my classes, basically for my mother's benefit. I am taking 4: Psychology of Religion, Religion in Africa, 'Race', Class, and Gender, and African Dance. They are all going to be great, but Psych of Religion is really challenging but I know I will learn so much. African Dance is also amazing! We are having so much fun and learning tons, so I'll have to come home and show off all of my new moves. I am loving UCT, the campus is gorgeous and there is such a diverse faculty and student body. It is refreshing to learn from a different perspective, and I have been learning a lot about racism in South Africa in my sociology class, and it is great to hear it from people who experienced it.

This weekend may even out-do the last. We don't have school on Monday because it is National Women's Day (which is bad-ass, the states should take some lessons) so we are going to do some of the Garden Route. It is a stretch of coastal towns from Cape Town to Port Elizabeth and it is known for it's impeccable beauty. There are many places to stop and stay along the way, with a variety of activities. It is my roommates 21st on Sunday, so we are going to go bungee jumping in celebration, off of the highest bungee bridge in the world. Pretty excited for that one. We are also going to monkey land, where you walk through a cage and monkeys are everywhere around you, kind of the opposite of a zoo. It is supposed to be great.

I will fill everyone in next week on my Garden Route experiences, and hopefully get some pictures up sometime soon. There are too many things to distract me here and I have been slacking, but it will happen.

Have a beautiful week!

Cape Town!

So I am finally in Cape Town! It is definitely a relief after a stressful two days of traveling, but the long plane rides weren't as bad as I was expecting. I have now been here for a little over a week.  My house, simply put, is the shit. It has 3 bedrooms, mine has doors that are all windows and open into our backyard and garden. We also have a cute living room and kitchen.  I have two roommates, one from Boston and the other from Amsterdam and they are great. We then share a backyard with our neighbors, who are all coincidently from Madison and everyone gets along very well.

The neighborhood I live in is called Observatory, commonly known as Obs. It is a fun little neighborhood, but has a reputation of not being the safest place around. But I feel completely safe during the day, and there is so much to do on Lower Main St. which is just a block away. It reminds me of a mini State Street, with lots of cafe's and bars and little shops to go into. But at night it is crucial to walk in a group or take a taxi, but we have all been very safe thus far.

Orientation week just ended and it was a lot to take in. There was pre-registration, registration, and then signing up for classes, then waiting in very long lines to put it in the computer. But I am finally enrolled in classes, but haven't quite figured out how to use my email and things like that. Everything is much more laid back in terms of organization and access to information, especially compared to UW. But it is a nice change because it helps me to be more laid back about school as well.

During orientation we were taken to Cape Point, which is the southern most part of Africa where the Indian and Atlantic oceans meet. I have seen tons of picture, but none of them did justice to the beauty of this place. It was breathtaking. I had to tell myself I was really in South Africa, and really seeing these mountains, and the oceans. It felt like a dream. We then traveled to a township called Ocean View, and they told us about their history of being transported out of Simon's Town to the township during Apartheid. They fed us amazing food and put on some great musical performances for us, including two young boys that danced in memory of Michael Jackson, they were amazing and completely adorable.

A few days ago some of my roommates and few friends decided to hike up Lions Head, which is one of the peaks of Table Mountain. It was about a 2 hour hike up, it was tiring but so so worth it. The views were to die for.

Another recent adventure was that of hiking up Platteklip Gorge, which is one of the hikes up to the top of Table Mountain. It was incredibly steep and exhausting, but it may have been the best day of my life. I will eventually put up pictures, but they don't do it justice at all. It was the most amazing place I have ever been. These two hikes have helped me decide that I'm going to join the mountain hiking club at school, living in Wisconsin gives me no to opportunities do something like this so I'm going to take advantage of it.

On Sunday, we went to a place called Mzoli's. It is basically a gigantic braai, the South African version of a barbeque or cookout, and it's most popular day is Sunday. It is huge party with dancing and lots of drinking and eating.  People usually come in groups, and a few people from the group have to wait in line, today for about an hour, to order the meat you want them to cook. You then get a number, and about 2 hours later you get a huge bowl full of meat with Mzoli's sauce and every digs in. It was completely delicious, so delicious that a friend who has been vegetarian for 5 years tried a little bit of it. Meat is the only thing they serve though, so people bring coolers and other food, but there is also a liquor store down the road that gets a lot of service on Sundays.  I would say there were a couple hundred people at the braai and it was great.

Tomorrow I start school, which I am actually very excited for. We have been with a lot of International students, because school hadn't started. I'm really looking forward to experiencing a South African University and hear different perspectives than I'm used to from both students and professors. It will also be nice to have more a routine, and it will set in that this is life for awhile. At the moment I feel like I am just on vacation, with a lot of going out and exploring the city. But I will still have plenty of time for both when school begins.

Thats all for now, but next weekend I am going to the Rugby game at the new stadium, and then on Saturday I am going shark cage diving!! My roommate went today and absolutely loved it, so I'm very excited, and will write about how it goes.

Countdown: 4 days

So I'm off to South Africa in 4 days time, and it is definitely a strange feeling. I am surprised at how relaxed I've been about the whole thing and thought I would be worrying much more than I actually am. It is definitely a good thing, and I think it just hasn't quite hit me yet. Hopefully it will stay that way while I am trying to get the last of my things together. I also hate saying goodbye, and tend to get very emotional, but my excitement is overpowering those feelings right now which I am appreciating greatly.

When thinking about what I want to accomplish in South Africa, a lot comes to mind. I am hoping to grow as a person and learn a little bit about myself. But there are also some other goals that I would really love to achieve while over there. This goals have come from experiences of friends, some prior knowledge of South Africa, and books on South African travel:

1. Swim with the penguins at Boulders Beach. Boulders Beach is right in Cape Town, and I think I will be accomplishing this goal during orientation week for UCT.

2. Visit Robben Island. You can't visit South Africa without visiting Robben Island. I have read books on Nelson Mandela and he is such an incredible man and it would be a sad but important experience to see where he was for 18 of his 27 years of imprisonment.

3.  Hike up Table Mountain. UCT is located and the bottom of Table Mountain, so I will have ample time to accomplish this goal, but would like to do it a few times during my stay. Here is a picture of the mountain:

4.  Learn how to scuba dive. This one is very intimidating to me for some reason, but I'm sure I would love it once given the chance.

5.  Surf. Probably not too often, and I'm sure I will be terrible, but it is something I have always wanted to try. And what better place to try it than in Cape Town?

6.  Go bungee jumping. Terrifying, but I really really want to do it. It would be such an adrenaline rush.

7. Sky diving. Also terrifying, but it would be an amazing experience.

8.  Go on a safari. Hopefully at Kruger National Park.

I need this to happen to me.

9.  Visit Victoria Falls, which is the largest curtain of water in the world. It lies between Zambia and Zimbabwe. 

10.  Drive the Garden Route. It is a stretch of coastal plain between Mossel Bay and Storms River Mountain. It has a legendary status of being South Africa's paradise.

11.  Learn about South African wines. I also want to visit some vineyards for wine tasting, and hopefully will be able to do the Stellenbosch wine route.  

12.  Visit the sand dunes in Namibia. Sand dunes are crazy, and I want to be surrounded by them.

13.  Lay on the beach in Mozambique. It is supposed to be paradise, and it sounds and looks simply amazing:

14.  Picnic at Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens. It is right in Cape Town, and was the first botanical garden to grow only indigenous plants, which is wonderful.

15.  Visit Lesotho, Swaziland, and all South Africa's bordering countries. This may be a little far-fetched, but I would like to see most of them.

16.  Watch both a soccer and a rugby game. I have never done either, and I think it would be a blast.

17.  Volunteer with young students promoting education. This is my life's passion, and a big reason I am going to South Africa. Ideally I will be teaching abroad after I graduate, and this would be a great experience for me.

18.  Learn some Xhosa, and also Afrikaans.  Both are widely spoken in Cape Town, and I would like to learn a little of both.

There are many more where this comes from, and I will be adding on when I get there. But I am going to try and do as much on this list as possible.  Unfortunately, I don't think I will have to funds to accomplish everything I would like to, or the time for that matter (I sometimes forget that I have to go to school while living in Cape Town), but a girl can dream. And an experience like this won't happen again anytime soon, so I am going to do it big, and come home broke.

Let me know if you have any other recommendations! And my next post will be written while sitting in Cape Town, which is so exciting. Hamba kahle!

Blogs are strange

Making a blog is not something I would normally do. However, I am less than a month away from leaving for Cape Town for the semester, which is also something out of the ordinary. So I thought a blog would be a good way to keep my friends and family updated on my life while abroad, and also something to look back on when I come home.

The first wave of stress is over, with having my housing arrangements taken care of and also applying for my Visa. However, I feel as though another wave of stress may be coming soon. I have been busying myself with work and seeing those I love and reading up on everything South Africa related and have felt no nervousness thus far. But I am sure it is coming. There is still so much to do before I leave but I am just ignoring it at the moment. Everything will come together in the end. But I am getting very anxious to start my adventure and simply cannot wait.

My future campus