We have a list of places to visit and things to do while we are in South Africa. One of these locations is Bush Babies Monkey Sanctuary. The monkey sanctuary is located in Hartbeesport which is about an hour drive away from our area of town.

Whenever we visit a ‘new to us’ area I am a little nervous due to safety concerns. It is especially concerning when driving by very poor areas of town or past signs stating “smash & grab warning” or “hijacking area!”. As white people we are automatically made potential targets for crime and also racism. It has been really interesting being on the flip side of prejudice, profiling and racism.

As it turns out we were safe and the drive to bush babies was really beautiful. It was so different from the city and really reminded us of the Okanagan area of BC. We had to cross the top of Hartbeesport Dam which was controlled by a traffic light and only allowed one-way traffic through a tunnel which led to the Dam. It was really cool to drive over. The monkey sanctuary itself was neat. We saw lots of spider monkeys and walked for an hour along winding wooden pathways. The highlight for me personally was the Magaliesberg mountain range that the sanctuary is located. They are really stunning especially with all the tall trees we walked through on the wooden walkways. Claire & Rhys were pretty tired during the guided tour so we carried them most of the way. They did have fun though and liked the little play area at the sanctuary entrance. They were happy kids on the drive back with their new monkey stuffies.

On our drive back home Jimmy spotted a new skate spot at the local highschool. We stopped and had a run about the sports fields. The kids and I always like watching Jimmy skate so we had fun observing too. Once we got back to our home safely Jimmy realized there was an actual skatepark in a resort at Hartbeesport so we are making plans to go back and spend a night. There are so many other places to visit in that area including the elephant sanctuary and the world heritage site- ‘The cradle of humankind’ which is the world’s richest hominin site & home to around 40% of the world’s human ancestor fossils. Lots of caves in this area to visit too.

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Johannesburg features some spectacular thunderstorms. They are an almost daily occurrence this time of year. We read on many expat blogs prior to our move that when a storm hits to unplug your TVs, computers, and other electrical equipment. So far so good…no electronic meltdowns.

The storms are quite something. The thunder is so loud. Because the storms hit in the evenings and our kids sleep with a rainfall sound machine they haven’t woken up to the loud noise. Here are a few pictures of our latest thunderstorm….

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While I was away on my third work rotation in Botswana Jimmy did some further park and playground reconnaissance. I am always amazed at how adventurous Jimmy is while I am away. While it could simply be his intuitive search for skate spots, the end result is most often a fun new place for our family to play.

Rhodes park was a recent discovery of Jimmy’s and it’s a great sunny day location. There is a huge pond with ducks, numerous sports fields, a few playground areas, pretty rolling hills and various water features. One of the neat things about Joburg parks is the play equipment takes us back to our years as kids in the 70’s and 80’s. They are partially unsafe at times but still plenty of fun!

In general, sport is such a huge part of life in South Africa. There are soccer games or rugby games in progress at all the fields we drive by. It’s really great because the kids are really interested on what is going on. We spend most evenings at a local sports field running around with soccer balls. We had fun at Rhodes park watching a game on this day.

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Rhys really into being a cowboy- yeehaw!: