Well it's been quite a while since I last updated this thing, but it's because i've been busy enjoying my last few weeks here. That's right only one week to go! It's absolutely nuts to think that in less than one week i'm going to be back in Oregon and that this whole experience is going to be over. When I first came it seemed like 10 weeks was forever. I just had no idea what to expect. Now I'm starting my last week and It's amazing to think that how fast it has goinge and how well it has gone. On one hand i'm ready to go home and start moving my Oregon life forward and on the other i'm extremely sad to see the new life that I created here end. I've made great new friends and find myself feeling like a local. I have my regular coffee guy, my grocery store and my regular hangout spots. It's just like living a life anywhere else and it's going to be hard to leave all of this, but in many ways it's good to leave at this point. I would like more and i'm extremely happy with my experience here and that's the memory that i'm going to be left with and I think that's a good thing. Anyway enough babbling about leaving on to what's been happening here!

So two weekends ago I took a road trip along the garden route with 3 good friends. I took friday and monday off giving us 4 days to travel and see as much as we could. Friday morning, the four of us piled into bodo's beetle with all of our stuff crammed behind the back seat and two surf boards on top. We left around 7 and it was a full day of driving. After about an hr, we got stopped at a road block where they wanted to see a drivers license. Bodo was driving and apparently left his license at hom, why I don't know, but they wouldn't let him drive any further and asked if anyone else had there license on them. Luckily I had brought mine. So off we went with me behind the wheel on the left side of the road for the first time. It was great to not only be driving again , but it was great to be driving and aircooled VW again :). So 5 hrs behind the wheel and we finally pulled into wilderness and stopped at our first backpacker. This place was awesome.

It was called the beach house and it was just far enough off the beach to give some of the most epic views I've ever seen. There was a second story balcony where you could see for miles. There is a photo of bodo and I from that balcony in the album that gives a great idea of how nice it was up there. We also met up with our old roomate luidwig and his friend andre who were travling as well along the garden route. They told us that we were going to met a guy who lives in a cave the next day and he was going to take us to a waterfall and that you had to swim up the river. What? Swim up the river? Remember I could bairly keep myself from drowning in a bath tub before I came here let alone swim with some hippy up a shark rive (or so I thought). They also told me tories about how wierd the cave was and how bizzar the guy was. They promised a boat but made jokes about how they guy probably stayed up all night widdiling the boat out of a small tree. Yeah this sounds like a GREAT time. Anyway we went the next morning and it all turned out fine. The cave was suprisingly nice, he had electricity, water and hard wood floors. I was totally shocked, yeah this was bizzar but nothing wierder than hangingout in Eugene. So we went to the waterfall and we did have a boat for a couple of us and it was amazing. I swam out to the waterfall (I CAN swim now!) and others jumped off of it. Just awesome.

Later in the day we went back to the beach and the two who brought boards went surfing. After my swimming, I thought maybe it would be fun to go surfing. So I asked to borrow one of the boards and try it out. So I took bodo's board and bodo came out with me and gave me a couple of tips on catching waves. At first I just got slammed by waves and it sucked, but soon I caught my first wave. AWESOME. I really don't know how to describe it, when you catch a wave and feel the power of the ocean carrying you in it's just awesome. I'm hooked. I didn't get up on the board that day, but it really didn't matter it was great. I've been surfing a couple times since I got back to cape town with a longer board and I've been standing up almost everytime I catch a wave. It's pretty cool and i'm thinking about braving the cold pacific to go surfing when I'm back in Newport.

We then moved on to buffallo bay where we stayed at a more rustic backpacker. Not much but a large beach, we went surfing in the morning and moved on to the t***ikama national park.

The backpacker we stayed at there was in the middle of the jungle and you had the most epic view of the forest. Just as nice as the beachouse but completely different. We hiked down to a waterfall where we went swimming and hungout for a while. On our last day we headed up to the worlds largest bungee jump, 216 meters! I was NOT going to jump, but Bodo and Elena were ready to do it. Elena was not very nervous, but Bodo was really scared. He chain smoked and drank beer to get himself ready for the jump at 9 in the morning. Regardless of fear, they both jumped and said it was the time of there lives. I was shaking just watching them do it. It was insane.

After that we pilled into the beetle and headed back to cape town. About a 9 hour drive and we made it home without any problems. It was an awesome trip and probably the best thing that I have done here. It was great to spend this kind of time with my friends before I leave. It was a good chance to really talk with everyone and bond before we all leave. It was also cool to leave and come back to cape town. It felt just like coming home. Anyway this may be my last blog entry from here because I will be home so soon. I'll see you all within the next couple of weeks and I'll have many more stories and pictures than I can put on here.

Eric