braii, biltong & jaaaa!

Since our last blog post, we have made it to Port Elizabeth. Our last day in Durban was spent walking around the neighbourhood where we were staying to get a better feel of the place. We managed to have a lovely cooked breakfast in a florist (quite random but cool) which only cost 2 pounds...we were chuffed to find such a good deal! we enjoyed a lovely walk round the botanical gardens & saw the most amazing flowers ever, also a hilarious looking bird which was flourescent orange & fluff - we must look up what type it is!

On Wednesday we caught the bus to a quiet beach town called Port St. Johns for a few nights - about half way between Durban and PE. It was so calm and peaceful - largely due to the fact that all the backpacker staff were totally high on weed & all other types of stuff, the majority of the time! So although we were in a stunning & tranquil place, we think we probably inhaled enough smoke for the whole of the uk-so watch us coming back extra chilled out still recovering from the after effects!
Andy had a surf lesson by local sufers who were so good, which was fun. lui enjoyed watching whilst riding the waves on the borrowed body board.
we did a hike (bare footed!) to a nearby waterfall...absolutely stunning. Jumping off the rocks into the pool was such a refreshing feeling after the very very hot hike.
We are so thankful to God for keeping us safe once again, because all round the beach there were signs saying 'beware of sharks'. We thought that it was a bit strange to have such signs & 6 full time life guards on site, but loads of people were swimming in the water anyway, and anyway if you spot a shark when you're in the water, it's probably gunna be too late? so we carried on surfing & bodyboarding, but today we found out that the day after we were surfing on the beach, a surfer tragically got killed by a shark - one of the friends of the guys we went surfing with. we can't quite believe it, as it happened on exactly the same stertch of beach we were on, and it shows just what a risk it was. crazy. the little community is mourning the young sufers life, which is just so tragic. it is only now we have discovered that this stretch of coast is notorious throughout the world for it's shark attacks, eesshhhh!

After Port St. Johns, we took an 8 hour bus journey to Port Elizabeth.
Since being here, we have been made to feel so welcome once again. It's been a very special time for lui, as she's been meeting the same amazing people from all the those 7 years back when she visited SA for the first time. Being welcomed back into the same family who hosted her then has been incredible & once again we feel overwhlemed by God's blessings.
We really enjoyed going to both church services on Sunday at Fountain Vineyard & loved the sense of family/community at that special church. we loved the service so much we're extending our time here just to go along to the church this sunday too! we had a lovely braii in the afternoon & experienced the famous PE windy wind!
we've been to another national park...addo....saw lots of elephants, buffalo (so so big!), tortoises (mavis' distance relatives we think), Kudu's, warthogs, ostrcihes, jackals, dung beetles which we weren't allowed to drive over?!...it was lots of fun.
we've shared lovely meals with such lovely & inspiring people & are looking forward to what the rest of our week in PE holds.....

love you allxx




(photo of Port Elizabeth)