HeCTiC

This week has been absolutely crazy.  Monday, we had the opportunity to visit a township school.  Due to the school being at end of term, most classes weren’t in session.  Students came to get a meal and have a place to be, but most teachers were just marking.  We were able to see one class; Grade R was in session.  Grade R is like our Kindergarten.  There were only 15 students in the class that day, but she has 40 students on her class list.  It was interesting to see the school.   Wednesday we had our class party at my cooperating teacher’s house.  Her house is absolutely gorgeous.  She has a pool, so the students swam and played games and ate snacks.  Wednesday evening we had the Grade 7 Leavers Dinner.   This is the goodbye dinner to the students of Grade 7 for high school starts at Grade 8.  Also at this Leavers Dinner, new students and teachers are “knighted” into Kingswood College, so the other student teachers and I were knighted.  It was awesome!  Thursday was the last day of school and we had an end of the school year staff meeting and then lunch at the Headmaster’s house.  It was nice spending that time with the other teachers and also it gave us the opportunity to say goodbye to everyone.  Thursday evening we had our traditional goodbye dinner for April, Nichole, and I with our supervisor and her family.  We made chicken fajitas and they were delicious!  It is unbelievable that our time here is coming to an end.

Friday morning we headed for our two week vacation!  We started off by stopping in PE for breakfast; we had “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”.  After PE we headed to Jeffrey’s Bay and laid out at the beach and then went to Storm’s River and went to Tsitsikama.  It has been one of the most beautiful places I have ever been to.  We had a gorgeous view of the ocean and mountains.  We stayed by Storm’s river at a very interesting backpacker’s place.  Saturday morning we went back to Storm’s River at Bloukrans Bridge.  This is Africa’s largest bridge and the World’s Highest Bungee Jump.  Nichole and I joined another girl from her school back home (a COST student placed in PE) and we Bungee Jumped! It was absolutely the craziest thing I have ever done.  It is the most surreal experience.  I was absolutely petrified, but I am so glad I did it!  I have a CD of pictures and a DVD of my jump!  After bungee jumping we went to Plettenberg Bay to the beach and then headed to Oudtshoorn.  This is where we spent Saturday night.  On Sunday we went to Cango Caves, and went on the adventure tour where we crawled through the cave, it was absolutely gorgeous.  After Cango caves we went to Cango Ostrich farm.  Oudtshoorn has the most ostrich I have ever seen.  At the Ostrich farm we learned a lot about Ostriches and Nichole and I rode an Ostrich!   After Oudtshoorn we headed to Paarl where our friend Maryke lives.  Maryke is the one who is driving us to Cape Town, she has been absolutely amazing!  We are having the best time!  I will try to blog again soon!

This is my supervisor, Jean!

Tsitsikamma National Park, absolutely GORGEOUS!

Plettenberg Bay

Road Trippin'

Cango Caves

Hanging out with the Ostrich - this isn't the one I rode - I don't have pics of that yet

The bridge I jumped off! CRAZY!

Right before I bungeed! He was so nice in making me relax!

Oh my, I still can't believe I did that!

There are SOOO many more pictures I would like to post, but I can't because there are too many!  Traveling is so great! We just arrived in Cape Town!