Friends and hikes

Last Saturday I went on a nice hike with my friends David and Crawford. David used to be the computer technician at JL Zwane, but left to pursue another opportunity. He is from China and is here with his daughter who is in high school ("matric"). I have gone hiking with him a couple of times now, and am making friends with his American neighbors with whom I went to the soccer match last Wednesday. Crawford, as I mentioned before, is from PTS, and we have hung out a few times now since we connected a couple weeks ago. Two more PTS students, Rachel and Elizabeth (lovely people) are flying in from Johannesburg this week and will stay until the weekend. I am considering whether it is worth the effort for me to go out to Jo'burg, and I will seek their advice, since they live there and all.

Back to David and Crawford, we took one of the many routes up to the top of Table Mountain, Skeleton Gorge, although we turned back at the waterfall pictured (you can see me at the top). At that point the climb was quite literally up the waterfall, and looked a little dicey. Crawford and I may try it again soon. The trail was through thick forests all the way up the gorge, and it looked like a North American forest for all you could tell. The climate in the Western Cape, as I have probably mentioned before, is temperate, ranging from a California to Pacific Northwest type landscape and weather pattern. South Africa is a very diverse country in terms of terrain, with desert, subtropical, tropical, veld (grassland), and mountains. I have really enjoyed being able to get out in nature on my days off. I do that so little back home in the States, and it is nice to live somewhere with city and nature both an easy drive away. By the way, as you can see, I got my camera fixed, and it's now working brilliantly. For pictures forthcoming.

Off to a meeting now!