Summertime Sunshine

Two weeks ago, Blair and Alex finally got out of St Francis and came to visit Chida and I in Grahamstown. After barely leaving St Francis since they arrived in South Africa, it was exciting for them to see a new place and meet new people! They immediately got along great with our friends here, and enjoyed their first Friday night out in a university town in SA, experiencing the infamous Rat & Parrot as well as Friar’s.

On Saturday, we travelled to Kenton-on-Sea to spend a day at the beach. Our friends took us to a remote cove that was sheltered from the wind (it was a particularly blustery day) and we had a blast playing baseball, rugby, and cricket (I’m slowly starting to understand that crazy sport) as well as exploring the rocky shore, relaxing in the sand and swimming in the water. We capped the day off by watching the Spring Boks play Scotland at Jerry’s, a pub that served incredible pizza.

Our beach hideaway (not my photo)

The next day we went for a hike at the Assegaai Trails, about 30 minutes from Grahamstown. Based on the website I wasn’t expecting much, but when we spoke to the manager he told us we might see giraffe and other animals – and sure enough we did!

Glenfield Cliff

There are always interesting things to be found in the wild...

Sand baths - a new fad?

Assegaai was badly hit by the floods earlier in October, and the roads around the grounds were pretty rough and full of potholes. We parked the car and hiked down to Rock Bottom, a camp that previously would have been pretty nice to stay at but is now covered in debris and sand. On our way back up the hike, we encountered a few warthogs and even a couple baboons whose noisy grunts alarmed us to the point where we were all carrying small rocks as protection! Luckily we made it out unharmed and drove out of Assegaai, but not without another hello from our giraffe friends.

Monday November 19^th was Chida’s birthday, which we celebrated raucously with a modified version of porch climbers. On Wednesday, Alex and Blair headed back to St Francis, where Chida and I will be joining them at the end of the month. 

Celebrations & Smoke

Most of our week was spent getting the St Francis Sustainable Sea Centre ready for the big opening on Friday November 9^th. We painted, decorated, organized, and most excitingly set up a large shark display that was donated to centre for the summer.

After months of work (on Rob and Sam’s part), the centre was launched with a formal event that attracted nearly 150 guests. It was really fun to get dressed up and meet SST’s trustees, different donors, as well as many St Francis natives. After a lovely dinner, extreme sportsman Pete Van Kets regaled us with tales of cross-Atlantic rowing races and adventures to the South Pole. He was very inspiring, as was his wife, Kim Van Kets, who has carried out a number of her own extreme adventures.

Alex, Chida, Sam, Rob, me, Blair, and Luke

On Saturday, the centre was buzzing with families. There were all sorts of activities – slip n slide, ice sculpting, snorkeling, demonstrations by NSRI (the equivalent of the coast guard), a big braai, face painting (by Chida!), bike polo, a sidewalk chalk competition, and more! It was a beautiful day, and I was even convinced to partake in the chilly willy swim, a 400m swim around the harbour. Alex and I managed to take 1^st and 2^nd place in the race!

NSRI Demo

At the end of the day, Blair and I started a massive snowball fight with the leftover shredded ice from the ice sculpting competition. It was SO much fun, and felt like we were bringing a little bit of Canada to South Africa. Overall, the opening of the SSC was a huge success, and I can’t wait to work there over the summer!

Post-snowball fight

Click for more photos and info about the fire

Unfortunately, the day after the opening there was a massive fire in St Francis. Nearly a quarter of the homes along the canals (which are required to have thatched roofs by city regulation) were completely destroyed. The area where we’d competed in the Quadrathlon the week before went up in smoke. It was hard to believe that this could happen to a community that was under water just a few weeks earlier due to massive rainfall and flooding – but luckily no one was hurt. The fire will likely affect the SSC’s revenue this summer (approximately 1000 people will no longer be vacationing in St Francis), but we’ll just have to get extra creative. 

Here Comes the Sun

It’s November, and in the Southern Hemisphere that means school’s almost over. Subsequently, that means it’s exam season at Rhodes, and Grahamstown has started to dull down significantly. With students buckling down to get work done, Chida and I escaped back to St Francis where the holiday season is starting to amp up.

On November 3^rd, Chida, Blair, Alex and I formed Team Canada and competed in St Francis’s annual Quadrathlon (kayak, bike, swim, run). We had a bit of a rocky start when Alex fell out of his boat, but managed to recover and place 4^th out of 15 teams in our category. We had a blast, and were pretty impressed by our result since we’d all only started training the week before.

After a night of well-earned celebrations, the next day we went for a walk on the wild side (feel free to sing the song…) where we explored some beautiful tide pools, breathtaking rocky shores, and saw lots of wildlife!

Land tortoise

Every day in South Africa amazes me. One afternoon, Blair, Chida and I walked along the beach (literally two minutes from the apartment) and up into a huge dune system. We played around a bit before heading back toward the apartment. As we walked, several whales swam by – one even held its tail out of the water and wiggled it back and forth as though it was saying hello! It makes me feel so lucky and so incredibly happy to experience things like this every day.

C'est l'halloween, hey!

Unfortunately, South Africans don’t celebrate Halloween quite like Canadians do. After years of dressing up in crazy costumes, it was pretty depressing to have no Halloween parties to look forward to. Luckily our coworker Viv was keen for us Canadians to spread some Halloween cheer into her family. Chida and I helped her two kids carve their FIRST PUMPKINS EVER!! Hopefully we started a tradition in their family. Trick or treating isn’t big either – Viv told us she had to warn her neighbours and give them candy in advance in order to take her kids to certain houses!

I spent Halloween in a long business meeting in East London. The Sustainable Seas Trust is taking on a large project developing Science Centres in two malls in the Eastern Cape. The meeting went really well – there were lots of amazing ideas, and I think the Centres would be great for math and science education.

The drive to and from East London was pretty terrifying; in certain places, one lane was under construction, and instead of alternating traffic, cars (and trucks) were driving head-on in a single lane. I was gripping my seat in constant fear of a collision while our boss Tony casually talked about all the accidents that occur roads like these, and how common it is to see cars without side-view mirrors, covered in scratches. Not my cup of tea.

On our way home we stopped briefly at the East London aquarium, which was a little bit dreary, although the ocean views were pretty nice.

Into the Wild

On October 27^th, Chida and I volunteered with WildREACH, a student group that takes underprivileged children on field trips into the wilderness. We got up nice and early to meet up with the WildREACH team on the Rhodes campus and set off to pick up a bunch of food and supplies.  At around 9:00am we picked up the 18 children coming on the field trip (9 girls and 9 boys). The girls piled into the minibus with us and almost immediately began to sing – I wish I could have recorded their voices … they sounded incredible. They were belting out song after song with amazing harmonies, fascinating rhythms, and beautiful lyrics that were completely foreign to me. It was an awesome ride!

Originally, the trip was supposed to be an overnight at a game reserve that bordered the ocean, but due to all of the road damage from the floods, the plans changed and we were heading to a small reserve about 45 minutes from Grahamstown. It was a bit of a disappointment for these kids who were hoping to see marine animals! However, we still managed to have an awesome day hiking around the Mansfield Private Reserve. There was even a pool, and despite the fact that it was freezing cold, the kids spent over an hour splashing away (some of their jumps had me cringing – I was the only lifeguard in the group, and it was a terrifying guarding experience!).

During the afternoon, we had a massive braai and played a bunch of games. I led Huckle Buckle and Buggies Up – both were a riot! It was difficult to explain to the kids, who spoke isiXhosa as their first language, but eventually they understood and we had a ton of fun.

We headed back to Grahamstown late that afternoon, exhausted after a fun day. We made it just in time to catch the end of the Currie Cup Final, one of South Africa’s biggest rugby games. Although I had no loyalties to either team, it was entertaining to see how invested our friends were (there were many bets riding on the game – the losers had to get ear and belly button piercings!).