Travel

SA Sunday: Heart of Cape Town Museum

Posted on November 2, 2014 | Last updated on November 2, 2014 | By Chelsea | 4 Comments

READ THIS BEFORE YOU SCROLL.

HEY. YOU. STOP. Read this first!

There are some pictures in this post that look potentially graphic at first glance. They aren’t actually. This is just a museum, I was definitely not in the room while any surgeries took place. That would be super weird. These photos are just of wax models set up to recreate a significant event. But, if you get the heebie jeebies when it comes to medical stuff, here’s your warning. They really aren’t all that graphic, though.

Aaaaaand now you can scroll to your heart’s (TOALLY INTENTIONAL PUN) content.

Fiance and I spent a day at the Heart of Cape Town Museum because we love museums and this one is very close to our neighborhood. It’s a museum commemorating the world’s first ever heart transplant that took place right here in Cape Town, South Africa.

The story goes that many hospitals around the world were ready to perform a heart transplant, but none were quite “brave” enough to pull the trigger. Conditions for a heart transplant had to be so perfect- a healthy, brain dead person whose family was willing to have her or his heart donated in the same hospital as an eligible recipient- that doctors usually didn’t feel like it was the right time to take the plunge.

And frankly, while these hospitals had the ability to actually perform the transplant procedure, medicine had yet to provide a safe and reliable way to prevent rejection of the transplanted organ in the recipient. Yes, the transplant could be performed, but doctors couldn’t predict how much time that would give their patients.

In perfecting their methods, doctors around the world practiced heart transplants (and other heart surgeries) on dogs. In fact, Christiaan Barnard performed more than 50 heart transplants on dogs before performing the first ever on humans. In the museum, they put together a recreation of a dog in surgery. The museum is in the hospital in the same suite of rooms that hold the surgical theaters that the actual surgeries took place in.

On December 2nd, 1967, a 25-year old woman named Denise Darvall and her mother were hit by a drunk driver while crossing the street after picking up a cake from a bakery. The mother died instantly, but Denise was taken to the nearest hospital, Groote Schuur Hospital, in Cape Town, South Africa. Denise sustained serious head injuries and was declared brain dead. This was controversial at the time because she could technically survive on life support, but she would never regain consciousness. However, her father did give consent for her heart and kidneys to be donated and for her to be taken off life support.

The recipient of the heart was a man named Louis Washkansky. Although he was very active and healthy early in his life, he became diabetic in later years and suffered three heart attacks that led to congestive heart failure. He was hospitalized at the time Denise had her accident.

Denise was in perfect health other than the injuries from her accident, and because she was brain dead but still had a beating heart, she was the ideal donor. After getting permission from Denise’s father and asking Louis if he’d like to be the recipient, to which he very quickly responded yes, Christiaan Barnard went ahead and performed the world’s first heart transplant. Regarding Louis’s no-hesitation response, Christiaan later wrote, “For a dying man it is not a difficult decision because he knows he is at the end. If a lion chases you to the bank of a river filled with crocodiles, you will leap into the water, convinced you have a chance to swim to the other side.” The donor and recipient were in adjacent surgical theaters so they only had to move the heart a few feet. There’s a recreation of this surgery in the museum.

These recreations were seriously lifelike. To the point of being incredibly creepy. I was just a little nauseous through most of this tour.

The surgery took nine hours, but was a success! Christiaan said seeing the heart beat in its new home was one of the proudest moments of his life. Less than two hours later, Louis woke up and was talking with his doctors.

In order to prevent Louis from rejecting his heart, Christiaan and his team gave him powerful immunosuppressants drugs and, although he was kept in an carefully sterilized environment, he came down with pneumonia and died 18 days after the operation. Despite this, the transplant was almost universally regarded as a milestone in medical history.

Christiaan, undaunted and eager to perform another transplant, would have more success with his next patient who lived for 19 months following the surgery. A later patient of his would set a record by living 23 years after her heart transplant. Here’s a photo of the recreation of Christiaan at his desk:

The first heart transplant transplant was major international news. It’s thought that this surgery gave other doctors the courage they needed to start performing it themselves. Just three days later, a heart transplant was performed in Brooklyn, New York. Unfortunately, most patients did not survive long due to negative side effects from the immunosuppressive drugs, and the surgery became very uncommon until better drugs came along.

Although this first heart transplant was mostly celebrated and well-received, Christiaan certainly had his share of critics. Many of the letters he received, including the not-so-nice ones, were on display at the museum. This one made me giggle a bit. Short, sweet, and to the point.

A related story that got a small feature in the museum is of black laboratory assistant named Hamilton Naki. He ended up taking on a lot of responsibility in Christiaan’s laboratory during the time of the first heart transplant, which was a big deal since it happened under the apartheid regime in South Africa. Despite several magazines and newspapers claiming so, he did not actually play a role in that first heart transplant. He got his start doing laboratory work with animals for a man named Robert Goetz. He started out doing tasks like cleaning the animals’ cages and helping to care for them and eventually was administering anesthesia. He even assisted in a surgery on a giraffe “to dissect the jugular venous valves to determine why giraffes do not faint when bending to drink.” Eventually, he began working in Christiaan’s laboratory, where he became the principal surgical assistant. Christiaan said that if he’d had the opportunity to study he would have been a brilliant surgeon. Later, he even did some teaching.

The museum was incredibly well put together. It consisted of a two hour tour that featured two videos and the guide was very knowledgeable. A few things not pictured here were a recreation of Denise’s childhood bedroom and the recovery area for Louis. The fact that it was held in the same rooms where the surgery took place made it all that much more special. I highly recommend making a stop to this museum if you’re in Cape Town! I think it’s pretty cool that this city gets to claim the title “Home to the First Heart Transplant.” Then do what we did and make a stop at Curry Quest in nearby Mowbray to get some seriously tasty bunny chow. If you’re stomach’s doing okay after all the surgical scenes, that is.

SA Sunday: Soccer at Cape Town Stadium

Posted on October 26, 2014 | Last updated on October 26, 2014 | By Chelsea | Leave a Comment

We saw a rugby match and a cricket match pretty quickly after arriving in Cape Town because those sports are not very common in the US and it was fun to watch what I had deemed “kind of football” and “kind of baseball”. Luckily, now I know both sports pretty well and understand how they are distinctly different from my favorite American past times. In fact, while watching a rugby match at our favorite local restaurant, I won 100 Rand (about $10) by giving the closest guess to the final score!

The next big sports thing we wanted to catch before leaving Cape Town was some kind of event at Cape Town Stadium, preferably soccer. Cape Town Stadium opened in 2009 in preparation for the upcoming World Cup that was held in South Africa. The 55,000-seater stadium has very unique, bowl-shaped construction. It’s located near V&A Waterfront, where Fiance and I spend a lot of our free time.

So, we caught a match between the Ajax (pronounced eye-ax) and Kaiser Chiefs! This was a surprisingly popular match because the Kaiser Chiefs have such a huge fan base. Even though the Ajax are Cape Town’s team, probably 70% of the fans were supporting the Chiefs. Traffic was horrible and parking was confusing, so we ended up in the stadium about 10 minutes before half time. You buy tickets to sit in a section, not individual seats, and our section was completely full when we arrived. We had to wait for it to empty a bit at half time before poaching a couple of seats.

Luckily we did sit down in time to catch the one and only goal of the match! Courtesy of the Kaiser Chiefs.

It was a fun match and more competitive than we thought it would be going in. The Kaiser Chiefs are very good.

I really do consider myself to be a sports fan. I enjoy watching football, soccer, and tennis. I absolutely love going to baseball games, but generally don’t like watching them on TV. I think we can all admit they’re pretty slow. And hate me if you like, but I find basketball to be somewhat boring. Really, I mostly just like football. Love football. I will save you my sob story about how we’re missing getting to watch the Ducks play every Saturday and how listening to the games on the radio at 4 in the morning just isn’t the same.

But I didn’t really get into soccer until this year’s World Cup. With the US having a real opportunity to advance, I found myself with a vested interest in the matches and came to really love the sport. Previously, I thought soccer was a bit slow, too. Not so! So this match was pretty fun.

That being said, I also had a lot of fun watching the fans. There were four boys in front of us who clearly played on an Ajax-sponsored youth team next to some incredibly enthusiastic Kaiser Chiefs fans. The poor Ajax boys had a tough day.

The gentleman with the construction hat and the blanket cape had so much enthusiasm and was incredibly fun to watch.

Are you familiar with the noisemaker called the “vuvuzela”? They are long, plastic horns and they are incredibly annoying. Somewhat fun within the context of a soccer match- they make the whole stadium sound like a beehive. But when your fiance gets his hands on one that he blows as hard as he can when you least expect it, they are incredibly unpleasant. And you resort to hiding said vuvuzela or smacking him over the head with it.

Well, some fans next to us had GIGANTIC vuvuzelas! I approve of those beautifully decorated horn things. Outside of my home, that is.

Even with the complications actually getting to the stadium and stealing ourselves some seats, it was a really fun match and Cape Town Stadium lived up to the hype! We even got beers for R20 each, or about $1.50. I have never seen ANYTHING sold so cheaply at a sporting event in the US, let alone a beer, so this alone won me over to sports in South Africa.

Just kidding, American football! You still hold my heart.

SA Sunday: A Day in Rondebosch

Posted on October 19, 2014 | Last updated on October 19, 2014 | By Chelsea | 5 Comments

This post is LONG overdue, especially considering the fact that we’ve been living in our wonderful South African neighborhood of Rondebosch for almost eight months. <<< WHAT?! That still doesn’t feel right. This post is mostly for our moms who really care about the minutia of our lives, but you might find it interesting, too, especially if you’re curious about what day to day life is like ’round here, not just safaris or gorgeous beach after gorgeous beach.

Okay, let’s establish some context. We live in what is known around here as the “Southern Suburbs”, about a 15 minute drive south of what you’d call “downtown” Cape Town. We chose this neighborhood because Fiance can walk to his school, the University of Cape Town (UCT), and other reasons you’d choose a place to live, like it’s regarded as a safe and friendly neighborhood. The neighborhood’s history was powerfully shaped by apartheid. Under the Group Areas Act during apartheid, Rondebosch was declared a whites-only neighborhood. See that mountain-y thing in the picture above? That’s Devil’s Peak, a part of Table Mountain National Park. We live right in the main commercial area of the neighborhood, which is awesome because the grocery store and my little gym are only about 500 feet out our front door.

We live in a really, really big complex that’s only a couple of years old. We ended up here through UCT’s website. Most of the other people who live here are also students. This is just one corner of our giant building:

Among many other things, one huge culture shock for me when we got here was the intense level of security people put around their homes. Just look at that fence around our complex! Not only is the top spiked, but there are six lines of electric wire. To get into our building, you have to use a fingerprint scanner:

Excuse the blurry picture, I had a heavy bag of groceries in my other hand. After the fingerprint scanner, you walk into the lobby with a security desk that’s manned by two security guards 24 hours a day. From there, I walk to a door to a stairwell that has yet another fingerprint scanner, then up to our flat. Our flat has bars on all the windows and doors and a phone that we can use solely to communicate with the security desk.

And this isn’t unusual. In fact, most of the complex’s in our neighborhood, also occupied largely by students, feature similar intense fencing and 24 hour security guards. Stand alone homes feature fencing with at least spiked tops and often electric wires along with signs warning intruders that they have a security system.

South Africa’s private security industry is the largest in the world. There are more registered security guards than the South African police and army combined. Security is provided in the form of big security companies, like ADT; neighborhood-watch-type organizations; and self-employed car guards, who watch your car when parked in a public area in exchange for a tip when you return. This level of investment reflects widespread fear of violent crime in South Africa.

Yes, there is a lot of crime in South Africa, but for the most part, this crime is not taking place in the Southern Suburbs. Even in central Cape Town, the crime that is taking place is the type of crime you see in most big tourist cities: cars being broken into, purses being stolen, tourists being preyed upon.

Although apartheid has been formally disbanded for twenty years now, its effects linger. Under the Group Areas Act of apartheid, much of Cape Town was deemed a whites-only area, making it illegal for non-whites to live there. Instead, non-whites were “relocated” mostly to what is known as the Cape Flats, made up of several townships. Although the government has made an effort to install more formal housing in these townships, you’ll still mostly see houses constructed of tin. It’s these low-income peri-urban areas that are most affected by South Africa’s crime. Remember how I said apartheid effects are still lingering? By that I mean now-integrated neighborhoods like Rondebosch are only 62.7% white. Khayelitsha, a local township, is 0.1% white. Cape Town is 15.7% white.

Those kinds of statistics remind me that South Africa is an incredibly unique place. I live in a bubble here in Rondebosch. In many ways, South Africa is just comprised of a bunch of socioeconomic and cultural bubbles. The process of integration is still in relatively early stages.

Alright, back to my Rondebosch bubble. Most mornings, I start my day off with a trip to the gym. During this short walk I get to see the local library from inside our complex, a gorgeous, old piece of Cape-Dutch architecture.

From the little parking lot outside our complex, I can see Devil’s Peak peeking out from some of the trees planted along the streets.

I jaywalk across the street as safely as I can, as is the custom around here, and walk past a little flower stall setup and the 5 Rand store (that’s equivalent to about $.50).

Then up to my gym, which I quite like. I especially like the incredible views I get to enjoy from my treadmill.

We’ve become attached to a little restaurant in our neighborhood called Lyra’s. They have a really nice outdoor seating area that has two TVs setup, so we’ll often go over there to watch rugby and cricket. In fact, the last time we went we paid R5 to enter a pool to correctly guess the score of a rugby match, and yours truly went home with the loot! I’m a rugby master, in case you didn’t know.

The public transportation setup in Cape Town is frankly kinda not good. I come from Oregon, the land of bikes, pedestrians, and a pretty comprehensive public transit system, so living in a cars-only city was a bit of an adjustment. There are a lot of people who walk, and they literally weave between cars in the middle of the street. This was so incredibly stress-inducing for me when we first came, but now I’ve learned to do it myself. Still more safely than residents of the neighborhood, though. You might spot an occasional bicyclist, but there are no bike lanes to be found here.

The train and bus systems are improving and getting more attention, but they’ve still got a long ways to go. Since many people commute from the townships on the outskirts of the city into Cape Town and its suburbs, a mini-bus taxi system has popped up to fill this need. These aren’t your traditional cabs. Traditional taxis are here, too, in fact we take them regularly, but this is the kind of taxi I’m talking about:

And as a hyper rules-conscious, polite Oregon driver, these taxis drive me absolutely nuts. They’re great in many ways, because they can affordably transport several people at once and are a great small business for the driver. But. For me, one of the most stressful things about living in South Africa has been driving. Drivers here treat the rules of the road more like guidelines and are more likely to practice risky maneuvers to get from point A to point B more quickly than at home. These taxis just have a whole different set of rules they choose to follow. First, people are constantly yelling the taxi’s destination out the window, supposedly for the benefit of those walking on the sidewalk who may need some transportation. In our neighborhood, we constantly hear taxi drivers yelling “WYNBERG!” and whistling and honking, adding to the sense of chaos that is South African roads. Sharing the road with the mini-bus taxis is even more difficult. They frequently stop in the middle of the road with little warning to pick up and drop off passengers, change lanes or swerve into neighboring lanes recklessly, make random u-turns, and run lights. My safe-driving self just cannot deal with this, which is why Fiance drives most of the time and I stare wide-eyed at the road, clutching the door and pressing my imaginary brake.

ANYWHO. To combat the lack of public transportation and make sure we see the city, we’ll occasionally use traditional cabs. It’s incredibly inexpensive. A ride to the airport, which is well-outside the city, is about R170, or $15. A cab ride from our apartment in Portland to the airport, about the same distance, is at least $35. It’s great to be able to use them so affordably because there is a lot of good wine to be had in South Africa, and if we know we want to indulge a bit, we can safely take a cab to and from.

Most of the time, though, we have a rental car that we use. I HIGHLY recommend renting a car if you visit South Africa. Cities like Cape Town and Johannesburg are sprawling and driving is the only way you’re going to get to see all that these cities have to offer. We’re using a long term rental company that gives good deals to students, and although it’s very affordable, the cars are… special. Very old Mercedes, typically. They will run, but they just struggle with things like hills. And being idle at stop lights (called robots here, which is AWESOME). This is our current beaut:

Overall, I absolutely love our neighborhood and am so glad we chose it. If you’re going to be a student at UCT, I highly recommend this area! Grocery stores are easy to get to, it’s right next to highways so you can get to and from the city easily, and you can walk to campus.

Rondebosch has some incredible things to offer, including Rhodes Memorial, which I wrote about, and the University, also featured in a post on this blog. Thank you for indulging me by reading about the many things I love about Rondebosch!

SA Sunday: Victoria Falls

Posted on September 21, 2014 | Last updated on September 21, 2014 | By Chelsea | 5 Comments

Fasten your seat belts. You’re in for a really long, picture-packed post. But I promise it’s totally worth it because I think I can safely say this is the coolest thing we’ve done since coming to Africa.

After spending a night in Gauteng, Fiance and I went to Victoria Falls. Victoria Falls is a massive waterfall, I’m talking 355 feet high, twice as high as Niagara Falls, on the Zambezi River, which is the border of Zimbabwe and Zambia. David Livingstone, the first European to see the falls, named them for Queen Victoria (as so many other things in Southern Africa are), but its indigenous name is Mosi-oa-Tunya, which means “the smoke that thunders”. It really does thunder! Although Victoria Falls isn’t quite the tallest or longest waterfall in the world, it is the largest sheet of falling water.

Now that you have the background, here is a recap of our adventure!

We left Gauteng after a slight delay to our flight (heads up to others visiting the falls: our flights both to and from the falls on Air Zimbabwe were delayed) and landed in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe in the late afternoon. We had to purchase visas at the airport before entering Zimbabwe. Another tip for other travelers: Zimbabwe is currently using the dollar as their national currency and you have to pay for your visa in cash. They do have an ATM at the airport. We got double entry visas, since we planned to visit Zambia, which were $45 each. Get a lot of cash out because it’s pretty much a cash only city. Most places will accept the dollar, rand (South Africa’s currency), and kwacha (Zambia’s currency). The ATM gave us our cash in hundred dollar bills, not twenties, and we had a LOT of trouble breaking them. If you can, stop by one of the banks in town to get small change (don’t forget to tip!).

Victoria Falls airport is a tiny little airport. We stepped out of the plane right onto the tarmac! Even better, there are only two international gates.

We booked our entire trip through KDR Travel and Tours, who were easy to work with. They arranged for a shuttle to pick us up from the airport and take us to our hotel. We stayed at the Rainbow Hotel on the Zimbabwe side of the falls. It was a gorgeous hotel and the perfect mid-range option for us. There are some pretty elaborate resorts in the area, but we were only staying two nights and didn’t spend much time at the hotel. Here’s a picture of our room:

After we got checked into our room, we went to the pool bar for a drink. Even though wine dominates Southern Africa, there is some pretty good beer, and Fiance fell in love with yet another lager: Zambezi Lager. He even got a t-shirt at the airport on our way out. Don’t worry, Oregon, they still don’t got nothin’ on you when it comes to brews.

We knew we wouldn’t have time to go to Victoria Falls National Park that evening, so we signed up for a dinner cruise on the Zambezi to do that night. After a few minutes of waiting for our shuttle to take us to the dock, we started to get worried. The shuttle was supposed to pick us up at 5:15 and the cruise was going to leave at 5:30- not a lot of wiggle room. We mentioned it to the activities coordinator at the hotel who immediately looked panicked and said he’d make some phone calls. About ten minutes later, a car finally showed up.

We got to the docks late to find that the cruise had left without us. I was immediately disappointed, thinking we’d have to get a refund and go back the hotel. But our driver and another guy at the dock walkie-talkied the boat and waved them back. This might sound like something that should have brought me some relief, or made me happy. And it kind of did. But in that moment I was just mortified because a dinner cruise packed full of people was forced to turn around and come back for little ol’ us, which took at least five minutes. This is an open boat, so every single person was quietly staring at Fiance and I as the boat re-docked. My face was the color of my hot pink dress the entire time.

Once we found our seats, which were of course in the middle of the boat, and I got a glass of wine, people lost interest in our late arrival and I was able to forget my humiliation (which I’m sure was so much worse in my mind). This is me calming down:

Fiance was only mildly embarrassed and was mostly just laughing at my distress. He’s kind like that.

We saw some hippos right away. We actually saw hippos every time we were near the Zambezi River during our trip.

We also saw elephants! Three different times. Unfortunately it was so dark during these sightings that it was really hard to grab a picture and this is the best I’ve got for you.

The sunset that evening was absolutely gorgeous. We came at the perfect time of year. It was sunny and mid-80s during our whole visit.

We got back to the dock after dark, and luckily there was a shuttle to take us back to the hotel (I was definitely worried). Fiance was thrilled to have nine sports channels at his disposal in our room, so we watched some TV and went to bed before a seriously big day the next day.

We got up bright and early to start our adventure across the border. After breakfast at the hotel, we asked the activities coordinator about getting a taxi to the border, and this turned out to be a bit more of an ordeal than we expected, but we made it. On the Zimbabwe side, they stamped our passports to indicate an exit, then we started the 15 minute walk to the Zambia border. Part of that walk included crossing the Victoria Falls Bridge where we had an incredible view of the falls.

People were kayaking in the water below! I am way too anxious of a person to kayak and white water raft. I really wish I wasn’t. There were also people bungee jumping off this bridge! Again, no thank you.

After the bridge we passed by Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park. The sign should give you some idea of the wildlife in the area.

We finally got to the border post on the Zambia side, where we had our temperature taken as a check for ebola and bought our single-entry visas (fellow travelers: $20 each, pay in cash). There were baboons all over the border post! This particular one had a baby on her back:

We’re used to seeing baboons in South Africa. They lose their appeal and cuteness pretty quickly once you realize how badly they want your food and that you have to guard your bag or they’ll totally snatch it. They didn’t harass us too much, though.

From here, we found a cab to take us to the Royal Livingstone Hotel, where we were meeting a group to do the scariest thing I’ve ever done: swim in Devil’s Pool. Oh, just you wait and see.

This is perhaps the most famous hotel in Victoria Falls. When we’re real grownups and have all the money we could ever want to travel the world (which WILL happen if I wish it into being hard enough…), we’ll bring our kids back and stay in this hotel.

There were zebras grazing in the lawn like it was no big deal. So of course we snuck up on them and got some pictures.

Around the time we were supposed to get picked up to be taken to Livingstone Island, where we’d swim to Devil’s Pool from, we went over to the dock where we met two other Americans from California who we’d be doing the swim with. One of them was as nervous as I was about the whole thing which oddly made me feel braver. In the meantime, we enjoyed the view of the river and watched a group of hippos in the water a few hundred feet away.

The boat came to pick us up and the guide split us into two groups of six. We were with the other two Americans, a woman from Colombia, and a man from Spain. We took a small boat over to the island, about a five minute boat ride. A boat on which we of course took some selfies.

We could see the spray of the falls from the boat, which didn’t exactly ease my growing fears about the swim I was about to take.

Then we got to the island, which is named for David Livingstone. He saw Victoria Falls for the first time from the island. There’s a plaque at that viewpoint, where we got to stop and take pictures of the falls. The falls are breathtakingly beautiful and the rainbows made the impact even greater.

From here, we moved on to a spot where we ditched all our stuff, crossing our fingers that a baboon wouldn’t come by and snag our bags which had our passports. We got to give one camera per couple to another guide, who was brave enough to dance around the falls and take our pictures. Then it was time for the swim. Honestly, I was more nervous about the swim from Livingstone Island to Devil’s Pool then actually swimming at the edge of the falls. The current was really strong, and although I’m a fine swimmer, it’s only something I’ve ever done recreationally. Our guide was awesome, though, and told us exactly how to swim to fight the current and kept us all safe. A lot of it was shallow enough to walk.

And then… we went in to Devil’s Pool. Devil’s Pool is a pool of water literally at the edge of the falls. It’s created when the water is at a certain level, usually between September and December, and a rock formation creates a barrier at the edge. The current is still incredibly strong, and you have to be really careful, but it’s totally doable. I say that now, sitting safely in front of my computer in Cape Town, of course.

Here we are with our guide:

And me gazing in awe and terror straight down 350 feet at the cascading water around me:

And Fiance looking the happiest he’s ever been, striking a Superman pose:

Look closely at the upper righthand corner of this photo. See the people? That’s us in Devil’s Pool.

Here’s a video of our adventure to really give you the full effect!

Fiance actually signed us up for this activity without consulting me first. Instead, he signed us up, showed me a video, told me to “think about it”, and when I finally decided we should do it, he said, “Good, I signed us up last week.” Rude.

I am really, really glad we did this, though. I felt excited and good about it after I decided we should, then we showed a video of it to our moms who panicked, and I started to question whether or not it was worth it. Our guide was fantastic and took really good care of us. As long as you’re smart and follow the guide’s directions, you will be totally safe. I have never, ever experienced anything as thrilling or awe-inspiring as swimming in Devil’s Pool. You are never going to get a view of the falls like that (really, literally) anywhere else and there’s something about swimming in the same water that is incredibly cool. Not to mention that a good adrenaline rush is always fun!

We swam back, which was a little harder since our muscles were tired from fighting the current on the way over and we were starting to lose some of that adrenaline, then dried off and got dressed. After that, they served us a delicious breakfast on the island with a view of the falls while we ate. I loved getting to calm down and relive the experience with other people in our group right on the island.

On our boat ride back to the hotel, we spotted some elephants on the bank! Elephants and rhinos have been by far my favorite animal sightings since we’ve been here. They’re such majestic creatures and I’m wowed by them every time.

We decided to have a drink on the deck at the Royal Livingstone Hotel and enjoy the view before heading back to Zimbabwe.

The Royal Livingstone Hotel had all these adorable little white monkeys running around and one decided to pay us a visit!

It was a little jumpy though and panicked every time it realized we were looking at it.

It did hold still long enough for one good photo, though.

We got a taxi back to the border post where we had to get a stamp in our passports that said we were exiting Zambia. This taxi driver drove us back to the other border post, which was great since we were a little tired from the morning adventure and had a lot more to do that day.

At the Zimbabwe side, we had to wait in a much longer line to get back into the country. It was a little chaotic, but eventually we go our passports stamped for our second entry into Zimbabwe. Make sure you get vaccinated for yellow fever and get malaria pills before visiting these countries. You’ll need to present your “yellow book,” a small book with records of your vaccinations, when entering Zimbabwe.

I had to get the ultimate tourist photo with this sign on our walk from the border to Victoria Falls National Park:

Then we went to the park. This park offers incredible views of the falls from the Zimbabwe side. So here is a series of photos that speak for themselves:

After gawking at the beauty that is Victoria Falls for a long, long time, we made our way back to the beginning where there’s a statue of David Livingstone.

After several hours in the park, we grabbed a slushy on our way out and found a taxi to take us back to the hotel. The taxi driver asked what we were doing for dinner that evening, and we told him we’d planned to just eat at our hotel’s restaurant. He said, “No! You have to go to Boma” and passed us a brochure. It looked like quite the restaurant, so we said yes. He made our reservations for us and came back to pick us up from our hotel at 7:00 p.m.

We had so much fun! It was definitely a very touristy experience, which we don’t typically go for, but we embraced it for what it was. They dressed us in wraps when we got there, then had us dance with them for a few minutes before getting our faces painted.

Then we were sat down for dinner, where we were served their traditional sorghum beer, Umqombothi. It had a really strong flavor that I actually kind of liked, but I ended up going for wine for the rest of the meal, and Fiance got another Zambezi. We were served appetizers that we ordered, but from there it was buffet style. We had veggies, bread, steak, warthog, peanut butter rice, maize meal, fish, pumpkin soup, and plenty of other dishes. It was delicious! After dessert, they taught the entire restaurant different songs on drums. We had a great experience and I recommend it to other people visiting Victoria Falls.

We got to the airport where we found out our flight had been delayed an hour and a half. We had a connecting flight from Johannesburg to Cape Town, but luckily I had insisted on a big window between flights because I am the most paranoid traveler ever (FIANCE LOOK! My travel paranoia really does pay off!). We made our second flight with a just enough time to spare.

This was a seriously incredible vacation, only second to our trip to Vegas, where Fiance proposed! I highly recommend this trip to anyone that can do it. There is nothing like Victoria Falls and it’s a great way to see two African countries in one trip. Not to mention, there are countless activities like safaris you can do while in the area.

Thank you for reading what might be my longest post yet!

SA Sunday: Johannesburg & Pretoria

Posted on September 14, 2014 | Last updated on September 14, 2014 | By Chelsea | 2 Comments

Fiance and I saved enough cash for one other adventure in Africa during our stay in Cape Town. After some serious thought and maybe a little debate, we ended up deciding to go to Victoria Falls (posts to come!) because it would allow us to see to more African countries, Zimbabwe and Zambia, and the falls are one of the most gorgeous natural landmarks in the world.

On our way there we had to fly out of Johannesburg, so we decided to make the most of it and spend a night there and see a few of the sights. Fiance had the foresight to look into cab costs, and we ended up deciding to rent a car. Since our hotel was in Johannesburg, we wanted to visit Pretoria, and the airport is super far away from either of those places, we really did save a ton of money. If you’re visiting any city in South Africa, I highly recommend looking into a rental car and bringing your own GPS. Public transportation isn’t very widely used and isn’t recommended for tourists. Europcar was really great for us during our short visit!

Straight from the airport we went to the Union Buildings in Pretoria. Another bonus about a rental car- you have a place for your luggage until you can check into your hotel! Especially important if you’re doing a 24 hour excursion like Fiance and I.

South Africa has three capital cities: Pretoria, Cape Town, and Bloemfontein (BLOOM-fawn-teen). Pretoria is the executive capital of South Africa, so where the president works. The buildings where he and his staff work are called the Union Buildings. The Union Buildings were built in 1913.

They sit on top of a large hill in Pretoria called Meintjieskop, giving the buildings an excellent view of the city.

In 2013, this giant bronze statue of Nelson Mandela was erected. We’ve seen a lot of Mandela statues since we moved to South Africa, but this one might be my favorite!

For some scale, here I am standing with the statue.

The Union Buildings are so beautiful and I’m really glad we chose to make this stop. I let Fiance pick all of our activities in the Johannesburg area, and he did good!

Our next stop was to the Voortrekker Monument in Pretoria, which we could see from the Union Buildings. There’s actually a law that says any building built between the two can’t be so tall as to obstruct the view.

The Voortrekker Monument is one of the more interesting (and controversial) landmarks in South Africa, so we knew we had to stop and see it. South Africa is a very multicultural place and this monument represents a very specific version of part of its history. The monument is a huge granite structure dedicated to the Voortrekkers who left what was then the British-controlled Cape Colony (which includes the Western Cape, where Fiance and I live) to settle in the northern and eastern parts of what is now South Africa in the mid-1800s.

The bronze statue you see in the center is of a woman and two children. It was built to commemorate women’s efforts to what they called the Great Trek.

You enter into a huge domed room called the Hall of Heroes. There are relief sculptures all along the walls that tell the story of the Great Trek, starting on the left and wrapping around the entire room.

The sculptures depicted some of the more significant events of the trek, including battles, as well as daily life.

The floor underneath the Hall of Heroes holds a cenotaph (an empty grave) dedicated to those who died during the trek. On December 16th at noon, the anniversary of the Battle of Blood River which was called the Day of the Vow until 1994, a ray of sunlight shines on the cenotaph from a hole in the ceiling. The Battle of Blood River was a battle between the Voortrekkers, who were Afrikaaners, and the Zulus, which the Voortrekkers won. In 1994, at the end of apartheid, it was renamed the Day of Reconciliation in the hopes of creating a national unity day.

The Day of the Vow refers to a vow made by the Voortrekkers to God the day of the Battle of Blood River. The Voortrekkers promised that if God helped them win the battle, they would build a church in his honor and forever honor the day. Here is the text of the vow outside the monument:

The room that held the cenotaph was lined with flags of the different Voortrekker Republics as well as tapestries depicting the Great Trek. The tapestries were reminiscent of depictions of westward migration in the US (the Oregon Trail) I encounter at home.

The lowest floor was a museum with some artifacts from the trek. After we explored that, we went all the way to the top of the monument, which Fiance insisted on taking the stairs to instead of just hopping on the elevator. I guess it’s good for me. The stairs may have given me jelly legs, but the view was worth it. You can stand on the roof of the monument and get a great view of the city.

In the fields surrounding the monument, we spotted a few zebras and wildebeest, which was fun! Wildebeest really are the ugliest African animal.

From there, we headed to our hotel in Sandton, a suburb of Johannesburg. After getting checked in and Fiance spending half an hour trying to figure out how to park our car (which he claims wasn’t his fault… Just kidding, Fiance!) we went to dinner at Mandela Square.

After exploring the shops a bit and getting a few drinks at a worldwide restaurant chain that shall remain nameless because I’m too ashamed to say it, we got dinner at The Butcher Shop and Grill. Great wine, good food, although I keep getting undercooked steaks every time I order them. Sorry, dad, I’m going to have to start asking for medium.

Overall, it was a great quick trip to Gauteng! There’s obviously still so much we could see there, but we got to take in some fantastic cultural sights. Next week, I’ll be sharing our trip to Victoria Falls!

SA Sunday: Dinner at Addis in Cape

Posted on August 24, 2014 | Last updated on August 24, 2014 | By Chelsea | 1 Comment

Our friends from Portland came to stay with us here in Cape Town for two weeks last month and we had an absolute blast. We got the weather to cooperate for most of their stay despite it being winter here and did tons of fun touristy things. Like get our picture taken with the Cape of Good Hope sign:

Awesome friend 1, awesome friend 2, me, Fiance

In case you missed it, we also went on a safari! Which might just have been the coolest thing of my whole life.

But among those very big tourist things, we did some of the neat local stuff, like go down to Long Street. Before we explored the many bars lining the street (which included enjoying the musical stylings of a high school metal band), we had dinner at the Ethiopian restaurant Addis in Cape! It was a delicious culinary adventure. We sat on low seated chairs around a small wicker table.

You’re going to have to forgive the less than stellar photos. I was armed with just my iPhone and the restaurant had very low light. Here’s a pretty picture of the food before I dive into my photos:

Okay, now you know what you SHOULD be looking at. Moving on.

We did a three course meal that started with an appetizer of fried injera. Injera is a spongey, very thin bread made from ground teff. It soaks up all the flavor of the stews and sauces. And deep friend is even better.

Our main course was another huge piece of injera with several different dishes piled on top of it. We had doro wat (spicy stewed chicken), kai sega wat (very similar to the key wat I posted a recipe for yesterday!), yebeg alicha (slow cooked lamb), prawns addis in dar (prawns in a tomato sauce), misir wat (spicy stewed red lentils), kek alicha (stewed yellow chickpeas), gomen (spinach similar to collard greens), and a tomato salad.

Utensils aren’t needed for this! You’re given rolls of injera to scoop everything up with, in addition to eating the injera the food is served on.

For dessert, we had baklava. One of my favorite desserts of all time.

Then, to top this wonderful meal off, they served us this incredibly rich Ethiopian coffee and what might be my favorite food: popcorn. Few things in life have made me happier than this surprise.

It was an incredible meal and really fun to try new foods. They make the whole thing a great experience without it being overly touristy. I highly recommend a stop here if you’re in the area!

If you AREN’T in the area and want to try making some Ethiopian food at home, try my recipe for Key Wat (spicy Ethiopian stewed beef). It’s pretty simple and totally delicious!

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