Orlando

We went to Orlando, Florida for 5 days for a mini family reunion. Neil, Sandra and Charles had not all been together for 10 years.We stayed with Sandra and Dylan in a great apartment about 20 minutes from the Disney Parks.Greater Orlando is soulless and sprawling and evidence of the property crash is still everywhere;half-completed condos, foreclosure signs and vacant land for sale.Of course, once you get to the theme parks,you leave all the doom and gloom behind. And it's really a lot of fun to visit Disney with kids. We went to Sea World on the first day, then to the various Disney parks for the next three days. We enjoyed the stunt shows at Hollywood Studios and the kids liked the parades.It is a handful keeping track of twelve people amidst the crowds of Memorial Day weekend at the Magic Kingdom, but Sandra is a good tour guide when armed with a map and plan. The "fastpass" system works well if you time it right and means you don't have to queue more than a few minutes for the most popular rides. On the fifth day Neil and I escaped to St. Pete's and visited the Dali Museum there;definitely the best Dali collection outside Spain. We had a few great braais - Gary is a good cook and Charles makes good cocktails - and on Charles' request we hunted down a few "Fine Dining Establishments" amidst the strip mall,chain restaurant mecca that is Orlando.

DC and NC

Our East Coast road trip began in NJ and our first stop was lunch in West Chester, PA, with Karen and Gary. On through Delaware and Maryland and into DC for the weekend. We stayed with Claire and had a great day at the brilliant Newseum and National Gallery. On Sunday we had a picnic at the Potomac river and spent the night with the Rouxs. We headed out through rural Virginia and onto the Skyline drive through the Shenandoah National Park, hundreds of miles of wonderful scenery. We spent the night in Galax, supposedly the world capital of Blue Grass music, but it is a bit of a dump and nothing happens there on a Monday night! We drove into North Carolina and stayed with Joan and Raymund on Lake Norman. We went boating on the Lake and visited Charlotte.We also went to the famous South African Shop to buy boerewors and biltong.
Our journey continued through South Carolina and Georgia, with a stop in Savannah, before getting to Florida.

NJ and NY

We only had about 6 days in SA before heading to the US. This was enough time to celebrate Paulet's 40th and Mother's day, though.
It really was great to be back in the US. We stayed with Sandra and Robert in NJ for a week, and spent most of our time shopping!! You really do forget how much bigger, better, varied and cheaper everything is in the US. By a long,long way!
Neil's other US vice is fast food - I kid you not - MacDonalds, Burger King, Wendys, Dennys, Waffle House, pizza. Of course, we have also had some excellent meals at real restaurants!. Neil declared the best burger he has ever had was at "5 Napkin Burger" in NYC.
We drove up to Albany with Sandra to see Paul and we visited Peggy in Upstate NY. I had lunch with friends from Westfield and Neil had drinks with his ex-colleagues from BOC.
We spent 2 nights in Manhattan and walked a lot, eventhough it rained quite a bit. We saw a Broadway Show, went to the Natural History Museum and the Guggenheim, ate in some fabulous restaurants and saw live music in the Village. Our plan to someday spend a few months living and hanging out in Manhattan was re-ignited and thanks to Terri and Fred we got a little insider knowledge!

Vilankoulos and the Bazarruto Islands 2

We drove up to Vilankoulos and stayed at Zombie Cucumber, a great Backpackers Lodge, with a festive bar and a good menu. The Crab Curry was specially ordered ahead of time for everyone. By now my shellfish allergy was making me just a little envious.The Spag Bol was good too, but not as good as I make it.
Planning a last minute dive trip turned out to be a really good idea. We traveled out to the islands by speed boat and then did diving and snorkeling at 2 mile reef. On one of the dives we saw the biggest turtle I have ever seen; probably 2m long.
The next day we did a Dow Safari to Bazaruto again. We had excellent snorkeling and the guides cooked us a fabulous fish braai on the beach. It was great to be out on the boat and of course the dow travels very slowly, so going back in choppy seas took about 3 hours. I realised that day that the little sailing experience that Neil and I have, has taught us to have patience with the sea and sailing journeys.
We spent a night in Maputo on the way back to SA.