Gracious and the Pole in the Faculty/Staff/Life Long Learner Lounge

Hey Newburger Kids - See Your Mom the Pole Dancer.  This was one night when we celebrated Fernando Opere's 64th birthday in the Glazer Lounge on our way from Cape Town to Mauritius.  I have a video but can't seem to upload it.  Here is one of the pictures.

Grace on the Pole in the Glazer Lounge

Well, Newburger kids, your Mom is the life of the party.  She is loved by everyone.

Will add Mauritius soon, but maybe not until after India because we are celebrating Mom's 75th birthday tonight in the Special Dining Room.


Waited too long to publish so here is a picture of Mom's birthday party with our extended family.

Clockwise from Grace - Megan, Ken, Abella, Carole, Kristin, Chris, Tristan, Elizabeth, Lauren, Thomas, Christine

As you can see we have "adopted" a 10th child - Abella.  She is just as terrific as our first nine.  Anyhow, Mom had a great time. 
And then there is Olympics day which was on Mom's actual birthday.


Below some pictures. Mom was a judge in the Synchronized Swimming and the Lip Sync competition. Wow!

Grace Judging the Synchronized Swimming




Grace Judging the Lip Sync Competition

Ken thinks he did okay on his International Business exam this morning.
On Friday, October 22, we arrive in India.  It is now the 29th so you can see I am behind in my work.

South Africa - Kariega Game Reserve

So, we went on safari for 3 days.  On October 6 we flew out to the Eastern side from Cape Town to Port Elizabeth.  Only a one hour flight.  A guide with a bus met us at the airport and off we went on our "1 1/2" hour drive to Kariega Game Reserve.  As usual the time was 2 1/2 hours.  But the drive was pleasant through Port Elizabeth and the subsequent country side.  When we arrived at Kariega we already had seen many of the animals either before the entrance or as we went into the entrance.  We were traveling with and were in the same cabin with our new friend, Marillee Carroll.  This section is full of many, but not all, of the animals we saw.  We have tried to identify them correctly but there are many that look similar.  Not all of the pictures are ones we took as there were two young ladies who took some pictures better than we. 

Grace at Check-In



One or our first sights - Blue Wildebeest on the Range

Blue Wildebeests with Eland (I think) in Between

Giraffe

Giraffes eating the leaves

Impala



Impala Herd

That night we went to our Chalet, which had 3 bedrooms and 3 baths, a living room, a kitchen, a fire place, a deck and a swimming pool all to its own.   Then we had dinner in the lodge with the whole group.  Most of the faculty and Life Long Learners had their own Land Rover.  You will notice from the pictures these vehicles have the top cut off and accommodate approximately 11 seats uncluding the driver/guide.   There were 10 girls from SAS in one vehicle, 7 boys in our vehicle with Marillee and 8 LLLs in the other.

On the back deck of the Chalet looking for a sexy animal

Girls in their Land Rover

New Friends - Fernando Marillee Bob



New student friends - Andres and Stephanie

The next day we saw many more animals. 

Blesbuck

The next set of pictures are the elephants which really captivated us.  Including young elephants, a nursing elephant and a video of two younsters fighting.

Elephant

Elephants

Nursing elephant

                                 Two Young Elephants Playing

                                    Two Young Elephants Playing

And the lions were right in the middle of the road where we came upon them.  The guide keep the Land Rover about 15 feet away as the mother lion was nursing 4 cubs.  Wow!

Lions



Another shot at the lions

Then we came on the White Rhinos one with a baby.

White Rhinos

In the road we found a dung beetle pushing some elephant dung back to his lair or wherever.  He pushes with his hind legs from upside down.  When the dung rolls he just stays attached so it doesn't run too far.  No telling how he knows where he is going.

Dung Beetle

The next few pictures are of animals who look somewhat similar.  That is what makes them so hard to remember which name goes with which animal.

Nyala

Impala

Kudu

Of course, this guy is easily recognizable.

Burchells Zebra

Late in the afternoon we ran across the hippopotamus and the cape buffalo. 

Hippopotamus

Cape Buffalo

Water Buck

Water Bucks

Vervet Monkeys



Vervet Monkey

On the way back to dinner we had a very good seen at dusk.



Silhouette at dusk

Our Land Rover group

Grace and Marillee stayed up late by the fire talking and the next morning we headed to the Kariega River for a short spin down and back on the river.

Ken Terry and Grace on the Kariega River

Kariega River

It was a cold morning.  After the river we saw some more animals and then headed back to Cape Town and the MV Explorer.

Painting in the Reception area that Grace liked

The animals were beautiful and we have many more pictures.  However, the scenery was just as spectacular.  See the video below.

This shot was taken near the end of the day on the day before we left.  Just as beautiful as the river.

Next stop is Mauritius.

South Africa Day 2 and 3

On our 2nd day in South Africa we took the hop on-hop off bus around the Cape Town pennisula with our fellow LLL, Pat Lawrence.  Our main goal was to see the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens.  We were able to see much of the Gardens but we only had until 5:45 PM to catch the last bus back to the main terminal in Cape Town.  We ended up with 2 1/4 hours in the gardens.  There was a clivia show and a show of the plants that the Kirstenbosch had in the Chelsea Flower show a couple of months before.  The gardens are full of protea as the pictures will show, including some giant protea.  During the first part of our bus ride we saw the roundabout where Cape Town had built a fountain with soccer balls to commemorate the World Cup this past summer.



Soccer Ball Fountain




Red Clivia
















We stopped at a sculpture in the garden of a Cheetah chasing an impala.

Pat Lawrence and Grace

Giant Protea

Pat among the Protea

We went past several beautiful bays on the last part of the hop on-hop off bus tour and two are shown below.  Hope we got the names right.  Cape Town has more pretty bays then one can count.

Hout's Bay

Camp's Bay

We had a lovely day and the next day we went to the wine country and bought 5 bottles of wine.  We went to 3 vineyards - Buitenverwachting, High Constantia and Groot Constantia.

At Buitenverwachting -



Grace, Carrie Douglass, Marillee Carroll, Ken

Good White from Buitenverwachting Vineyard

It seems that a movie, Blood Diamond, starring Leonardo DiCaprio was partially shot at Buitenverwachting vineyard and the dog there was in the movie.  Below the movie star dog.         

Here is the closest thing to a movie star we have seen

Next stop was the High Constantia vineyard, which is owned by David van Niekerk.  They make bubbly in addition to white and red.  Behind the vineyard is a nunnery.  Pretty interesting - making wine and nuns must mix okay.  As you know Ken always wants to know how things work.  So, he had to get involved with corking and sealing a bottle of bubbly.  

Grace and David with the Nunnery in the background

Here we also had a catered lunch.  The food was delicious.  It included some of the best oysters we have ever tasted.


Ken compressing the cork approximately half way into the bottle.

Ken pressing the seal onto the cork

After putting the seal on top of the cork you then turn the wire that holds the cork on.  After that you put on the various labels.  This bottle that we took back to the ship says, "Vintage 2007, Disgorged 2010, Alc 11 %Vol, Quantity 6000 of 8000".  The underlined is what Ken wrote on the label from instructions from David.  Ken was beaming he had such a great time.  The label also says, "ALCOHOL IS ADDICTIVE".  Duh!  Anyhow we are saving this bottle for Grace's birthday party with our extended family and a couple of friends when we meet in the Special Dining Room.  This trip was not an SAS sponsored one but was arranged by the assistant executive dean, Kathy Poole.  Kathy is with the University of Oregan and was an advisor to Oliver Hagen some years back and helped him do a year abroad at the University of Camp Town.  Oliver never left and he arranged with his partner, Shaun (or Sean) the trip to the vineyards.  Anyhow, Kathy is super lovely and a pleasure to be with.  We are lucky to have been included on this vineyard trip of 11 people.

Kathy Oliver and Shaun

Coming up next - the safari to Kariega Game Reserve.