There are those who declare rugby the South African religion, the Springboks being the current reigning world champions with 4 World Cup titles earned in 1995 (hosted and won by South Africa), 2007, and consecutive wins in 2019 and 2023. They have won half of the World Cup tournaments they have participated in! The next […]
Category: Interesting Facts About Africa
Getting to the Point
Just to be clear, and not confuse visitors to our blog, yes, we really are on a mission. The entire temple staff and workers were locked out for two weeks for maintenance so what are us missionaries to do?!?! No trip to the Cape is complete without a trip down the peninsula. As you can […]
Cape Town (where everything works)
If you want to see a South African face light up, ask about Cape Town. They all are so proud of the beauty, attractions and efficiency of this beautiful city . There are 2 temples already operating in South Africa—the first in Joburg and the second, our temple, in Durban. The plan is to bring […]
Ushaka
We’ve always wanted to live near the beach and Umhlanga is a dream come true! One thing however—there are several varieties of sharks in the Indian Ocean!! A shark can swim easily in knee-deep water. There used to be fatal shark attacks every year in this area. Solution: Sharks Board. Nets and drum lines are […]
Midlands Meander
Lunch at the Piggly Wiggly Our awesome tour guide, the amazing Tina, showed us the sights. There are endless places to dine and stay overnight . This was a brief day trip this time just to introduce us to the foothills of the Drakensburg mountains. Tina has a farm here in the Midlands, as do […]
Most Beautiful Tree in the World
We definitely timed our visit just right as when we returned a couple weeks later, there was only a few flowers left on the tree. It really wasn’t that beautiful anymore — physical beauty is such a fleeting thing! Durban Botanical Garden We’re definitely not in Dubai! Vishnu, our tour guide driving us around the […]
Heading to St Lucia
Our first excursion outside of Durban, the LoveLayNels headed off to explore South Africa. Two and a half hours drive north along the Indian Ocean from Umhlanga is St Lucia, a smaill , safe surf town on the Eastern coast of Kwa Zulu Natal. Hluhluwe is the oldest of South Africa’s game parks and we […]
The Ugly 5
Humor is very much a part of South African culture. While we like to think of these animals as not ugly, but more ‘cabbage patch”, the Ugly 5 is a thing: hyena, vulture, wildebeest, wart hog and marabou stork. We only saw 2 of the 5 on this game drive. A grand daddy wart hog […]
The Great Safari
Cheetah sighting-There are two cheetahs in this picture, just chilling in the shade and not worried about us at all. We got lucky to see them. The success of every safari ride depends on your safari driver. Jabuloni was a good one! He said we got very lucky today seeing 8 white rhino, 2 cheetahs […]
Bucket list ✅
Really it was 2 bucket list items, 1) get Doug to Africa on a safari and 2) see a rhino, my last of the Big 5 to marvel over on safari. Something about seeing an animal in the wild that takes my breath away! Some people say: oh, I’ve seen a leopard, elephant, lion at […]