Home!

Finally home. Got in yesterday evening after a slight delay. We missed the flight back to Jersey so had to hang about for 5 hours at LGW whist on standby. The last thing we needed after an 11 hour flight on what I reckon is the worst airplane in the world but out of our control so not much we could do so no point moaning. I wll hoever moan about Virgin. They may have great service but they cram you in like sardines on their planes and I don't think I will ever fly with them again.

On arrival at LHR we first encountered the problem of 1 lost suitcase, quickly resolved, then caught the coach to LGW. Unfortunately there had been a bad smash on the motorway which meant the usual 1 hour journey took 2 hours, and we missed check in by5 minutes. (been there before - Foo Fighters Ash, Lou and Vicki), although our excuse this time was more genuine as opposed to just arived at the airport when we felt like it after having such a great weekend!

Anyway, we're home now, totally shattered and Kieran has gone to his mum's and I am missing him like crazy already having spent nearly every minute of every day of the last 6 weeks with him.

So, to sum up the last 6 weeks.

We stayed in 3 hotels, 7 campsites, 2 backpackers, bushcamped twice and 2 bandhas. We abseiled, sandboarded, hiked, quadbiked, climbed mountains, jet boated (and crashed), kayaked with whales, dived with sharks, walked with monkeys, dined with antelope, dived with crocs, cliff jumped, surfed, mountain biked, caved, white water raftered, tubed, scuba dived, canoed, drove through the most amazing scenery that we have ever seen, seen loads of different wildlife and interacted with some of it too and met some great people. Oh, and we drove 5751 km. We did contemplate driving around in circles n the last day just to make it up to the 6000, but we weren't sure how well our dancing in the street would ahve gone down in downtown Jo berg!

We have all had our favourite moments, whilst Dan enjoyed playing his guitar around the campfire, Kieran liked going to slepp in one place and waking up in another, we all agreed that our favourite places were the Coffee Shack, though Jeffrey's Bay may have just edged it for me. We had too many incredible experiences to list but among the top was, for me seeing humpback whales up close. Kieran said that despite the seasickness he loved diving with sharks and we all agreed that the most fun thing was the quadbiking on the dunes back in Cape Town at the start of the trip. Of course there would be scary moments too. Kieran says his was the near monkey attack in Sodwana Bay, for me it was walking along the ridge after the cliff jump, and Dan said he was really worried when I was stuck in the cave in Swaziland. What I didn't write before was that whilst I was squeezing myself to a near death, Dan, Kieran and all the others were right behind me, all crammed into a very small cave and they were having a hard time too as it was really hot and uncomfortable, and if I couldn't get through, then they were stuck too!

We had some comical moments, I rememberDan opening the door at the Swartberg Pass and the wind blowing it off, and we all laugh like mad when Kieran tried to take a pee off the mountain in Blyde River Canyon. Ever heard the expression 'pissing in the wind' Kieran leaned the meaning if it!

My biggest challenge was the caving, whilst Dan said out of all the things he did, climbing Table Mountain was still the hardest physically. Kieran said the one thing he really found hard was the cliff jump, and thanks again to Billy for getting him through that. It really made his day.

I asked the boys what memory sticks out the most of the entire trip. Dan said his birthday at the coffee shack was the best birthday he has had, and Kieran said the last evening at Coffee Bay when he went body surfing with Billy and Amy in the huge waves was one of his most memorable moments. For me I think it would be Table Mountain, which was the first thing we all did together at the very start of the trip, when we were looking forward to doing all the things that we have done. the day was so good that having had the perfect start I knew it was going to be a great trip, and I was right.