While researching the Middle East, we stumbled across a site that stated that Tel Aviv in Israel was voted one of the best cities in the world… So we decided to cross the border from near Amman in Jordan and spend a few days in the holy land before moving onto Tel Aviv.

Continuing our travels through the Middle East, our next stop was Jordan. We looked into the various ways we could get from Sharm el Sheikh to Aqaba and although flying was quicker and easier, we opted for challenging and cheap. This meant a one hour (very fast) taxi ride from Sharm to the Ferry Port in Nuweiba. The ferry then took approximately 4.5hours.

News about Egypt’s Revolution in January almost deterred us from visiting this country, however by early May, things seemed to have calmed down considerably. So we boarded a flight from Johannasburg to Cairo allowing 7 days to fit in as much as possible in this country – which isn’t long as there is so much to see and do.

We returned from our island(s) adventures to mainland Africa and caught up with a great friend of our, Fi Royds, in Johannesburg. Johannesburg has come in leaps and bounds from the occasionally dangerous and not so pretty place we saw it as in September 2007. It seems a lot more safe and friendly and there are some really nice areas to visit. It is also the biggest Man-Made Forest in the world!!

After  our hard work in Madagascar we decided to have a relaxing beach session in relatively close by Island of Mauritius off the south east coast of Africa. This is the beautiful holiday resort island that Elissa wanted to have our honeymoon on but it never eventuated so this was her time again. Relaxing by the pool and having all our meals prepared for us was great, and it was a change from beans and rice.

Volunteer Project 2 – Madagascar

THANK YOU!

Before we provide an overview of our experience volunteering in Sainte Luce, Madagascar, we wanted to firstly thank all those that donated to this cause. Madagascar is one on Africa’s poorest nations and endangered ecosystems. The life expectancy for men is 52 and women is 55. Roughly 12% of people die before the age of 5.

65% of the population in Madagascar fall below the recognised International poverty line of $1.25USD per day.

Cape Town is such a beautiful place nesting between the backdrop of Table Mountain and the stunning Waterfront, and for a tourist there is so much to see and do here. Having spent a week here back in 2007, we had already enjoyed so many beautiful sites so this time around we were fitting in a few new things.

The South African Diary.... (is much shorter than the others) Day 27: Crossing the border into South Africa was pretty exciting for a couple of reasons. The first being that we were getting closer to our final destination - the very beautiful Cape Town. The 2nd being that we would be taking the road through the ...

The Namibian Diary….

Day 20: Today was another border crossing into Namibia so basically a long drive day…. The first part of the drive was in Botswana and provided some interesting viewing – there were donkeys lining the roads. A few breaks along the way and we arrived in the late afternoon at Rainbow Lodge Campsite. This campsite was situated on the banks of the Kavango River? Tents were set up well away from this though as signs alerted us to:….

The Botswana Diary …

Day 15: Waking at 5.30am, we jumped on a safari 4×4 and drove into Chobe National Park. The game drive however had started well before we entered the gates. Just as the sun was coming up we were lucky to see some beautiful elephants on the side of the main road. By 6am we had entered the gates and spent the next 3.5 hours in hope of seeing more cats. However it wasn’t to be. Not that we are complaining as there were plenty of hippos in Chobe River, so many impala and warthog, banded mongoose, chapma baboons, ground squirrels, giraffe, crocodiles, buffalo and plenty of different bird species. At this point everyone was probably too spoilt because although this is a huge amount of wildlife in one morning, we had really hoped to see Lions or Leopards (N.B there are no rhinos in Chobe NP).