Happy Birthday Sweet Hubby

Today is my sweet hubby's birthday! I hope you have a GREAT day babe! I am so glad we get to spend the day together! You are so special to me. You are my best friend and always will be. Thank you for all the fun times we have together and for being there to cry, laugh and smile with. I am so glad we get to go through this life together. Thank you for being such an amazing man. I am so proud of you. I hope your 25th Birthday is a GREAT one! I love you so much and I am SO thankful for you! HAPPY BIRTHDAY LOVE!

Capetown

Our final stop in South Africa was Capetown. It is a wonderful city. We stayed at the Cape Grace which is on the Victoria and Alfred Waterfront. The area is amazing. It has cute shops and great restaurants all right on the waterfront and all within walking distance.
This is our hotel and Table Mountain in the background
Cape Fur Seals
Our hotel the Cape Grace
Our lil sisters at the aquarium that is on the V & A Waterfront. It was a very neat aquarium and a nice afternoon outing

This is in the wine country. We took a tour one day to Franschoek and Stellenbosch. These are two cities outside of Capetown that have tons of wineries. We went to a couple of them and got to have a wine tasting. There were some amazing wines and the vineyards are just beautiful.

An old cathedral. The buildings in these towns were just amazing. Most of them were old buildings that had been renovated with cute little gift shops, coffee shops and restaurants. It was great to just be able to walk around and shop here.
We also went to the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point. Very cool to think about the history that is here and when the Cape of Good Hope was found.

These are South African Penguins. There is a colony of them at Boulder Beach, which is outside of Capetown. They are the cutest little things! We had so much fun watching them play and swim. There little waddle was so funny.

The ones that look like they have fur on them are babies. Once they get into their "teens" They lose the furry-ness (is that's a word) and just have the soft feathers.
Cute little babies
The whole fam

The girls with Table Mountain behind them
Getting ready to get on the gondola to go to the top of Table Mountain
The view from Table Mountain. It was so pretty to see the city from here and to be above the clouds
Us on the top of Table Mountain

Our time in South Africa was just amazing and I cannot wait to get back. There are so many things to see there and so many things that we don't have. It was a wonderful trip

Shamwari Pt 4 of Africa

We then as a family went to Shamwari. It is a big game reserve that has the Big 5 ( Lion, Elephant, Cape Buffalo, Leopard and Rhino) This was the first place that we had been that had cats. There are a couple different places to stay at Shamwari, we stayed at the Riverdene Lodge. The Riverdene Lodge had a kids area, game room , indoor and outdoor dining area and a pool. The Born Free Foundation is also at Shamwari. This is where they take cats that have been living in poor conditions such as circuses, zoos, parks and private homes and these cats are brought to Born Free Sanctuary to live in the most natural environment for them. Most of them can't go back in the wild b/c they aren't able to protect themselves and get food for themselves. It is a really neat program. We went there and saw some of the cats and got the history of the foundation.
The view from dinner outside

The infinity pool

The beautiful flowers

Vervet monkeys

A jackal and wildebeest in the background

Hippos

A baby cheetah. There were two babies. They were so cute and playful

The two babies with their momma

Three lion cubs. There were 5 cubs and their mom together.

Sitting in the game drive vehicle waiting to go look for animals. When we went on the game drive in the morning our guide had put hot water bottle heaters in our seats with a blanket over them so our seats were SO warm! It was such a nice touch!

Leopard. It was crazy trying to find the leopard. They guide said that someone had seen it in this area so we drove around and around for probably close to an hour looking for it. We saw a giraffe and admired it and took pictures and drove around more. And then the giraffe spooked and ran off and then looked back at this location, so the driver went back to where the giraffe was looking and the leopard was laying right there. A place that we had just went by minutes before. They are so hidden in the grass and trees it is crazy! It also was crazy how close to got to the animals. I kind of was freaked out!


Such a beautiful animal. Her eyes were amazing!

The giraffe that let us know where the leopard was. Thank you pretty giraffe!

A warthog! or Pumba as we called them!

Back to Africa, Pt 3

After our stay at Oceana we wet back to a hunting lodge with the guys! This one was closer to town so us girls got to go shopping and to the beach! Oh and we went on a river cruise that was just great. Most of my Africa blogs are pretty picture heavy, but that is just the best way to show what all we did and what we saw! So here we go:
This is part of the lodge we stayed in. I loved the thatch roofs.

Dinner one evening. The outdoor/indoor dining areas where amazing and the dinner set-up was just as great at every meal!
My cute and awesome hubby on the beach

We went to a Mohair Store, where they take the sheep hair and dye it and then make it into yarn and then make scarves, blankets, jackets, hats etc. It was such a neat experience to see it from start to finish and the owner was just the sweetest lady!

The yarn outside drying after it had been dyed.

A lady making a scarf

All of the yarn.

Making the yarn.

The next set of pics are from the camp we stayed at while we were there. We went on a River Cruise and then had dinner at this small little old house right on the river. It was such a great meal and a wonderful atmosphere.

The dining area

L and I on the river cruise

The beautiful sunset on the river

The house and firepit from the river

Looking towards the Indian Ocean