I am in love with Lesotho!!

I just got back to cape town after a week long trip to lesotho and I am so completely overwhelmed. This was probably the best week of my life. It was the most amazing trip I could have imagined and I can't even begin to articulate how I am feeling right now. When I wanted to come to Africa, this is why I wanted to come. I will try my best to summarize everything...and apologies for spelling errors because I am on my german roommates computer with no enligh spell check :)

We flew from Cape Town to Bloemfontein, which probably has the smallest airport in the world. Just one building, no gates, one security line and that's it. We had quite an adventure getting to the lodge because we took public transportation the whole way, which, in southern africa, consists of a 20 year old run down bus that is supposed to hold 15 people max but actually generally carries about 22 people plus all their stuff, and potentially their farm animals as well. It took us about 6 hours to do what should have probably been a 3 hour drive because the mini buses stop constantly to let people off and on and rearrange to pack more people in. But when we arrived at the lodge, it was dark so we didn't get to see the scenery until morning. We stayed in very basic huts with no electricity except between 5 and 10 pm, and no heat...and it was freezing! But we bundled up.

In the morning we headed out on an overnight pony trek. I can't even begin to do the scenery justice. Endless vallys, gorges, and snow-capped mountains with villages dotted in between. Completely untouched and gorgeous. We spent six hours on the horses and neither Emily nor I had ridden before, so our guide was extremely patient with us. The horses went down and up some really steep parts and over rocks and mud, so it was actually pretty scary at some points. When we reached the village that we stayed at, we hiked to a nearby waterfall which was amazing. The village was on a hill in the middle of the mountains, absolutely no electrcity, but plenty of cows, sheep, dogs, and cute kids! And since there is no light pollution whatsoever, the stars are like nothing you could imagine. We stayed in the chief's hut for the night and headed back in the morning to the lodge. I know I am leaving so many details out, but I don't even know where to begin...can't wait til I can put pictures up.

The night we got back, we saw the children's choir from the village and a local band that plays with all homemade insturments. The next morning we went on a tour of the village, went to the school and talked with the teachers, went to a museum in the village and had one of the local women tell us all about the culture. We also tried wine that they make right in one of the houses and bought some of the crafts that they were selling in the houses as well. There was also a group of Irish guys on a trip with their high school doing projects in the village and they had organized a soccer match against the local village team and we joined in! It was so fun to run around with the kids from the village and to play in the game with the back drop of the mountains. I don't know why, but it was one of the best parts of the trip. Although after the game, one of the Irish guys tried to sell me into marriage for 20 cows...seriously. Needless to say, I turned down the offer.

That night over 40 Afrikaans bikers came into the lodge with their obnoxious loud bikes after traveling off-road from bloemfontein to stay the night. Thankfully they were only staying for the night, but they took over the bar (which was the only place in the lodge with space heaters). And I just can't imagaine what a horrible invasion those bikes are to the peacefully countryside. Ugh.

The next day we went on a really long hike to another waterfall and to see some bushman paintings in the caves. They were interesting, and our guide told us a crazy story about how they used to smoke marajuana when painting them, which is why some of the pictures are half-man and half-animal. Not sure if I entirely believe him, but it made for a good story. When we got back we visisted the village sangoma, which is a traditional healer. We through bones on the ground and he told us our fortune and all about us. He said that my health is excellent, that I am a strong women, that I will travel a lot and have many important works to do in the future. He also took one look at me and told me I was still single, which I thought was pretty funny. He predicted that I would be a teacher some day and have 4 kids...not likely!

It was soo hard to leave in the morning, but we had to catch the mini bus for a six hour excursion back to bloemfontien, where we spent the night in a backpacker place before our flight this morning. Emily and I were just so overwhelmed and couldn't stop thinking about our trip and how surreal it felt. After I have some time to reflect back, I think I will hopefully be able to articulate everything better, but I honestly could not have asked for a better experience. It was really unbelievable.

One more final to take (yeah...kinda forgot about those) and then I leave Cape Town on the 17th for a huge trip of a lifetime. I'm not sure if/when I will have internet access, but I'll try to put up an update at some point. Otherwise, back in Chicago on July 26th!!

I just took my first final and I think it went pretty well...it has been absolutely beautiful weather for the last week and I just counted and I only have nine days left in Cape Town if you take out the Lesotho trip, so the first priority has definitely been doing lots of things around the city. One day we drove around the peninsula, which I hadn't done since our first week here. We saw the nicest little quiet beach with a couple houses and it looked like you had to take a zip line down to the houses. We also climbed table mountain one last time (sniffle), and went cage diving with great white sharks! Well, at least I did in theory. We had to drive two hours to get to the place where the boat left at 5:30 in the morning. Then we made the huge mistake of eating the giant buffet breakfast before getting on the boat...which was the roughest boat ride of my life. We ended up anchored down in huge waves for four hours and I'm pretty sure that every non-crew member of the boat got sick except Zoe. We saw a lot of sharks very VERY close up (think Jaws "we're gonna need a bigger boat") but when it come time to get in the cage, I could not even think about moving I felt so awful. The crew kept saying that you feel sicker in the water than on the water and I didn't know if that was possible but that idea was not appealing. I know it sounds like a bad excuse for being scared, but I honestly didn't think it was that scary to get in the cage and I don't think anyone else really did either. It was more just amazing to see them up close and you could tell that they really weren't interested in the cage. So I'm disappointed looking back on it that I didn't get to dive, but that's easier to think now that my stomach has recovered. I think it was worth it to be so sick to get to see the sharks so close, but that's also easier to think with two feet on immobile dry land.

Anyways, in between the two more finals I'm going to cram lots more in and spend a lot of time with the roommates. It's going to be very strange not to see them everyday, cause this has really become a second home and family...even though I miss home. We've been trying not to talk about leaving, but I think it's starting to become unavoidable. Since I'm leaving on the 6th for Lesotho and Liv and Jan will be gone before I get back, we only have a couple more days to all braai and be together. It's going to be very hard to say goodbye!