Life in Botswana: Travel

More excerpts from my parent's journal, Life in Botswana.
 

 

We take the opportunity to travel as often as we can. We bought a new Toyota Hatchback when we arrived and drive to Johannesburg about every three months (so much for Nancy's statement that she would never set foot in South Africa!). We go primarily to shop for clothing, certain food and wine, and camping and photographic gear. Also for "R&R", to experience life similar to Fairfield County in the high-rent districts. We usually stay in the Sandton Sun, which is a Hyatt Regency type hotel, attached to an enormous shopping mall, where Nancy feels in familiar surroundings. Unfortunately everything there is made of polyester. She manages to cover her disappointment at various nurseries in the Johannesburg area. Ed bought a 19' keel boat at the nearby Vaal Dam and trailed it up to our Gaborone Dam.

Last year we flew to Capetown area for a week and fell in love with the place. Ate seafood at every chance! We rented a car and drove to the Cape of Good Hope (Cape Point). A lovely drive down one side of the peninsula and back up the other, through Simonstown, the main naval base. 

We had breakfast in an old colonial mansion which still produces wine. Another day we had luncheon in the fancy Boschendal estate, also one of the oldest, and which is still a major producer of fine white wines. 

 

We stayed two nights with an old business friend and his wife in their summer house on the beach about 60 miles east of Capetown. Hermanus is an old fishing town which now is one of the most exclusive summer/retirement communities in South Africa. The flora in this one area is fynbos, which is unique, and found only here.

Other travel: On the trip back home in September we stopped off in Athens for a day, two days in Rome and three in Florence. Simply wonderful, everything we saw and did!