The rest of the tour

Well...the tour is officially done and I have sure forgotten to write in my blog for a good ten days or so... Let’s see what I can remember!

On July 20 we headed off to South Africa. We checked into our AMAZING hotel, The Lord Charles, who was one of our sponsors on the tour. It was like walking into the Hotel Macdonald at home! Holy fancy batman!
After checking in we headed off to Somerset College to do meet Siyacula and do a small rehearsal with them. It was so great getting to see them all again, especially Marijka!
That night we were in for a treat….the World Youth Choir were having a performance in Stellenbosch and we were lucky enough to get tickets for it! It was incredible!! It’s so hard to imagine that all those singers are the same age as us in Kokopelli! They sound SO professional! It was such a neat experience! And it was so great getting to some fellow Canadians in the group as well…Dawn Bailey, who I used to sing with in the Alberta College Choirs, was one of their Soprano 1’s! It’s so neat getting to watch someone you know singing in a group like that!

The next morning we had another rehearsal with Siyacula. We learned some of their music, which was fun and very challenging! We came back to the hotel after to get ready for the Gala fundraiser. I guess they put this fundraiser on every year to help different charities – this year Siyacula was one of them!
It was quite the event (I have never seen so much cutlery for one person in my life…what can you possible do with 4 forks and 4 knives???)
Everyone looked really great too mostly thanks to Amanda!! We set up a little beauty parlor in her room before the fundraiser and did lots of the girls makeup!

On the 22nd we headed off to Spier. I don’t even know how to describe this place…it’s kind of like Fort Edmonton Park except cooler. I think you have to pay an entrance fee...and then when you get inside there’s a fancy restaurant, a cheetah sanctuary, an eagle encounters place, gift shops and picnic areas. For lunch we had a choice of going to the restaurant or just having a picnic. I think most people chose the restaurant but I thought it was a little too expensive (and I wasn’t that hungry) so John and I did the picnic instead. We heading down to the little lake area they had and sat with the ducks. It was really nice and then we had extra time as well to do more of the other things.
We first headed over to the cheetah sanctuary where we actually got to go in and pet an adult cheetah! That was pretty crazy! It even purred for us!!
After that we headed over to the eagle encounter. They had TONS of birds in there including hawks, owls, falcons, secretary birds and of course, eagles. We even got to hold one of the eagles. They put on a little show later too with some of the birds. We got to hold a piece of raw meat on our hands high above our heads and an eagle would swoop down and grab it so fast you barely even notice it! It was really fun!
That evening we all were billeted. I was with a group of 17 people who stayed at what used to be a bed and breakfast (but they are currently tearing it down)
It was SO beautiful there! They live on a vineyard and have a pool and sheep and chickens. The mountains are all around them there. Such beautiful buildings too!

The next morning we did an early performance at Somerset College for an assembly. We just did a couple of songs to get them interested for the concert later that evening.
After that we headed to Lwandle (where Thulani is from) and did a couple of performances there. The first school we visited was HUGE! I think they said they had over 1300 kids (and only 35 teachers! Yikes!) It was an outdoor performance and was a little weird... but still fun.
After that we headed over to a little primary school (like kindergarten age) where Katelyn had been volunteering. There were maybe 30 kids there and they were SO cute! They really seemed to enjoy having us there!
Later that night we had our performance back at Somerset College with Siyacula, which went really well! It was tons of fun!

The next day was a free day where people could do whatever they wanted. Most people decided to go into Cape Town to get some shopping done but John and I decided to sleep in and take it easy! (mostly because I had coughed the entire night and we barely got any sleep!)
So, we stayed at our billets house for the morning watching the rain and reading some Harry Potter. We decided that we would try to walk somewhere to find a restaurant for lunch. We got maybe 10 minutes away when Phillipa, our billet mom, drove by us and said she would drive us to an amazing restaurant. It was a winery called Avontuur Estates that apparently has been voted the best place in South Africa to have lunch. After eating there….I would completely agree! At home we probably would have paid over $100 dollars for what we ate and the service we got but it was so reasonable priced (like maybe $50 cnd) and we both had wine, main course and dessert! It took us just over a half hour to walk back after buying a couple bottles of wine in the store there. We just chilled some more at the house and waited for everyone to get back. We did a little mini performance in the house for Phillipa and her kids.

On the 25th we headed to Cape Town. We went to Boulders Beach where we saw tons of penguins. SO CUTE!!
Later on we headed to the Waterfront Market and did a little performance in the amphitheatre. Then we shopped, shopped and shopped! I think everyone was starting to realize how few days we had left so they needed to get all their souvenirs sooner than later!
The next day was also a shopping day. It was a free day to do what we wanted and unfortunately it was SO rainy again! That was the day we were supposed to go shark diving but they phoned and said it was too dangerous to take the boat out because it was too windy and rainy. Sad :(
But was had fun at the markets again. We also went to the new Harry Potter movie later in the afternoon.

The next day we flew back to Windhoek. We spent 4 days there, which included our final concert with Mascato at the National Theatre. It was a really great concert to end the tour! We also did some recordings with Mascato (and they recorded the concert as well). I’m really excited to hear how those turned out!
For Kokopelli, we had one final celebration at Joe’s Beer House. This place is sort of more for tourists…they have things on the menu like the “bushman platter” which is a kebob of meat like kudu, ostrich, crocodile and zebra. I had that last time we were in Africa and my favorite meat on that was the zebra so this time I just got a zebra steak. Holy cow it is SO good!!! We had a great time there!
Our very last night we were privileged enough to get a workshop with the director of the World Youth Choir. We also got a workshop with Marcelinus, who is a great composer and has worked with Mascato before. He taught us two of his songs.

The next day was our last time altogether. Everyone was to head off to the airport at 4:00. Me, Jenica, Michelle, Ellen and the Mascato boys that stayed behind all left at noon so we could catch a combie back to Swakopmund. That was a long ride back…it’s about a 4 hour drive but it was SO hot! They totally over crowd those combie’s to make as much money as they can. The one we were in should sit max. 11 people. We had 15!! Ew...sticky sweaty people...at least it wasn’t smelly!

So…now we’re back in Swakop and everyone else is in London. Scott, Nigel, Bruce and Erin are still in Windhoek though on their way to Swakop sometime today.
It was a really great tour overall…with lots more adventures and challenges than we had our previous time to Africa. But that’ll just make it all the more memorable.
I have now been in Africa for almost 3 months and have another 1 month and 3 weeks to go. That seems like such a short time!! Wow…it’s been going by so fast!

I’ll try to post pictures as soon as I can! I have lots and lots to upload so it could take a while!!

Miss you all at home! Hope you’re still having a wonderful summer!