Well, I obviously never got around to the “Where To Drink” blog that I intended about Barcelona, but that’s okay – I’m pretty sure that anyone who travels to BCN can put that together for themselves. (Although, I’d like to give particular, if belated, shout-outs to La Cerveteca – the ONLY place to drink beer, as far as I’m concerned! – and Hook, a.k.a. The Pirate Barrrrrrrr, which is a great, exceedingly kitschy place for late-night mojito).

So, YES, I’m in South Africa!!! It was weird and somewhat heart-breaking to leave Barcelona (all those good-byes to all of those awesome, awesome people, uuuggghh) but luckily, I was able to hit the ground running when I got here, so it was nice to be so immediately distracted. My friend Keyren has a brother here, and happened to be in town visiting with her pal Jerrod, so I was able to tag along for dinner two nights in a row and start meeting people right away – which, needless to say, was fabulous. Not only is it nice to start meeting people, we went to great restaurants and the company was tremendous – it’s always a treat to see Keyren, and a bonus to meet cool new folks. The icing on the cake is that her brother owns a wonderful little boutique hotel in Cape Town that prides itself on excellent service, which they do extremely well, and I was able to stay there. I highly recommend it to any travelers coming this way!!

After my amazing first two days, it was off to Jo’burg to meet up with Megan and David and a new friend, Leigh. They picked me up at the airport and we headed directly to Kruger Park, where Megan’s folks had generously donated their timeshare. I have little to say on this topic that isn’t some variety of “AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME!!!” Stunning, diverse landscapes, giraffes in their native environment (as well as hippos, zebras, elephants, babboons, buffalo, warthogs, a mongoose, a zillion beautiful, exotic birds, a million impala/kudu/antelope, etc), gorgeous waterfalls, great times with friends – all in all, an AMAZING encounter. But better if I just demonstrate a bit in pictures, right?

Anyway, I got back to Cape Town on Thursday and have been settling in nicely. My house is incredible, my roommate is fabulous, there’s an awesome grocery store around the corner, and my street ends two blocks away, at the ocean. So far, so good. Of course, I’m a bit adrift now, as I don’t have school until next Monday and have nothing of import to do – and oh yeah, I don’t really have any “friends” yet, per se. So I’m thinking I’ll spend the week looking into a local gym, try to buy a bike to ride to/from school, and maybe start hammering out that business plan. However, I think it’s safe to say that I’ll be back on the blog, while I’m here. I imagine I’ll have a lot to say about Cape Town, when I get to know it a bit better. For now I’ll just say: it’s beautiful, it’s exceedingly foreign, and I fear I’m in grave danger of falling madly in love with it. I’ll let you know how that goes.