Adventures in April

The last week in April was an time for another adventure.  Josanna, Elizabeth, Bilen, and I drove from Gabs to Rustenberg, spent the night at a cute bed and breakfast and had our customary sushi dinner at the Cape Town Fish Market in Rustenberg.  The next morning we drove to Joburg arriving with plenty of time to sort out where to leave my car.  We ended up giving the car to Jacob a guy who works for a valet service at the joburg airport.  They have a business where they pick up cars at the departure terminal, take care of them (including washing them) and return them to the arrival terminal upon your return.  They came highly recommended by the owners of the Bed and Breakfast in Rustenberg.  Though I was still pretty skeptical of giving my car to a total stranger in a city known for car theft, it worked out!  He drove us from the airport to the bus terminal and was there with the car when we came back and it was cleaner than it has been in a long time!  Our bus was 1.5 late so we left Joburg at 11:30 pm and arrived in Maputo at 9:30 am the next day after an uneventful bus ride where we were able to sleep a bit.  From Maputo we got a ride to Bilene a beach town about 3.5 hr away.
Bilene was a really tranquil place.  Not too touristy.  We stayed at a place about a 45 min walk from town which was on the lagoon beach.  We spent three days relaxing at the beach, snorkeling with sea horses, and hanging out at a great local bar.  Chichunga's became our home away from home.  Each day we bought fish from women whose husbands had caught it that morning and Chichunga marinated it during the day and cooked it for us that night.  It was the best fish I have ever had (as you can see in the pictures, we did not leave any behind).
After 3 days, we rode back to Maputo and met up with Gelane (who had been to Cape Town with plans to run the 1/2 marathon - though those plans were thwarted by shin splints she still had a good time there). Maputo is a much busier city than Gabs, and a lot dirtier.  We took tuc tucs around the city, explored an old fort, ate at the fish market, and did a fair amount of shopping.  At night we found a great bar/club which had live karaoke and the following night a reggae band.  We had a minor run in with the police since we were not carrying our passports on our way to a club!  They pulled us over during a random stop (when we happened to have 6 people (including the driver) in a cab which is apparently not allowed, though many more unsafe modes of transport seem to be just fine) and told us that we were supposed to have our passports with us at all times.  After much hemming and hawing (I think they were just looking for us to bribe them), they finally agreed to accompany us back to the backpackers where we were staying so we could show them our passports and then they left us alone. There were also several run ins with giant rats everywhere we went, not the best when you are eating!
After another overnight bus ride back to Joburg we drove to the Drakensberg mountains (a mountain range on the border of South Africa and Lesotho).  It was gorgeous.  We stayed at a great backpackers where there happened to be the "Smoking Dragon's Women's Music Festival"that weekend.  48 hours of music from woman performers. It was great fun though we will have to go back to actually explore the Drakensberg since we didn't get to do any hiking.
Here is the trip in pictures: )