Mr. & Mrs. Vandebilt + kids

We’ve been in Pretoria now since Saturday evening for the final leg of this journey. Sob. To say I’m not looking forward to going home is a serious understatement. Of course I never want a trip to end so this was expected.

We have really enjoyed our time in Pretoria. We’ve been staying in an amazing AirBnB apartment in Waterkloof in basically our own little rain forest. We had a great braai here Saturday night with Wendy, Christo and Wouter and again last night with the Rixs. We have incredible friends here which makes leaving even more difficult.

No trip to SA is complete for us without a trip to the Lion and Rhino park. We make a point to visit at least once while here because we are always so impressed. It’s quite close to where we have normally stayed (Krugersdorp) and not terribly far (under an hour) from our apartment this time. It’s a perfectly sized game reserve for C. You are guaranteed to see animals immediately after entering the park, they have a scheduled lion feed so you can always get quite close to them AND they have a nursery where you can pet baby lions, tigers and cheetahs. Not to mention the restaurant where you can feed the giraffes. It makes for a lovely day.

We had some brunch at the Neck and Deck with the giraffes before heading into the park itself. We caught the tail end of feeding time for the lions which is fine, C got to see them and we just didn’t have as much company. En route to the rest of the predator camp (they also have white lions, cheetahs and wild dogs) Wendy and Christo got a flat tire. Now we know that flat tires aren’t a problem for Jacob, but it does pose a bit of a challenge when the flat happens about 300m from a pack of lions. We radioed the park attendants and they got them straightened away.

While we waited for Wendy and Christo to sort out their tire we headed into the animal nursery so C could spend some time with the cubs. He chose to visit the two month old baby tigers. It probably wouldn’t have been my first choice since they are always a little more excited than the lions and this time was no exception. C’s hat became their new chew toy. With quite a stroke of luck we got the hat back relatively unscathed.

Monday we headed to the Safari Garden Centre for another great family outing. We both commented while we were visiting that it’s rather unfortunate that nothing like this exists at home. We’ve filled a good portion of our days in SA visiting parks, wine estates, farms, gardens all geared towards family. Note that I didn’t say kids, but the whole family. There’s always a nice restaurant serving great coffee, wine and food alongside great play areas.

We ended Monday night our favourite way with a lekker braai with Wendy and Christo. I am so going to miss these two. We sat out in our little garden enjoyed some wine, a fire and some great conversation.

Our final day was pretty chill, we drove out to a rose farm for lunch so C could have some more outside play time before we headed home to winter (sigh). Johann came for one last visit (tear). We had dinner with Wendy and Christo before we headed to the airport (ugly cry).

This marks the end of our third trip to SA and while I joked about not coming home, it wasn’t that much of a joke. We really had a hard time leaving this time. SA doesn’t feel like a foreign place to me, it honestly feels like home. I’m sure it’s in part because of our people here. They were our family for our time in S.Korea and we immediately pick up where we left off every time we see each other. I’m sure this won’t be our last trip; see you soon Africa.