Five days is a week of work back home. Five days of teaching high school students the dynamics of writing. Five days of encouraging the love of literature. Five days of bells ringing, instructing me to begin a new period of instruction. So before we began our trip, I wasn’t sure that five days of actual safari was enough to experience an adventure of this magnitude. And of course, it wasn’t for safari is more than the animals; safari is experiencing another way of life which celebrates life under every shepherd’s tree, around every corner of sweet thorn, and at every moment in a spec boom forest. Safari is a life far removed from the ringing of bells, but a life lived close-up to nature, a life lived in a constant state of epiphany, and a life lived celebrating the constant new surprises which await each day. And I didn’t want those surprises to be over!
So when we left the Eastern Cape headed toward Cape Town, a part of me – the part crying to stay! – assumed that the best was over. I knew from my friends who had been there that Cape Town was fabulous, but for crying out loud -- which I did a lot of by the way -- it wasn’t the amazing game reserves of Kwandwe and Samara that I had become so infatuated with. But our surprises were far from over as we soon discovered when a driver appeared at the Cape Royale Hotel to pick us up, a driver wearing a black jump suit with orange trim, a huge smile, and a helicopter embroidered on his back.
I had already been blown away, not just by the wind at the reserves, but by the pilot who materialized to fly us from Samara to Port Elizabeth in a small four-seater aircraft, a surprise Reid had arranged for us instead of the three-hour drive, but this one was beyond! Ian kept repeating, “Boy, Boy, Boy,” a favorite term of endearment he has for our two sons now 29 and 32, and I kept thinking, “Beyond, Beyond, Beyond,” my new favorite term of endearment for our South African experience. And this new surprise was certainly beyond what we expected.
After a brief weigh-in, which we won’t discuss as my collar bones have disappeared in the ten days we have been gone, and another too-brief instruction on emergencies including how to tie the life vest 
Just in case!around your waist and how now to walk into the blades, we practically pounced in the helicopter, strapped ourselves in, and fitted the headphones on our head so we could talk to each other and listen to the pilot. And then we were off in a lift barely noticeable to me as the pilot made it seem effortless. And as we hovered slightly and lifted gently, the spectacular view of Cape Town was -- not surprisingly – breathtaking!
Circling past Table Mountain we saw the famous cable cars moving slowly toward the top, the majestic mountains of the Twelve Apostles and the stunning ocean. Well, two actually, for at one point we could see where the Indian Ocean and Atlantic Ocean merged. I missed that as I was too preoccupied with the Table Mountain cable cars. Then there was a view of Robben Island where Nelson Mandela spent many years of his life, and the place where we are visiting today. Gazing from on high, the beaches, the waterfront, the sites of the bustling city -- a city known for being one of the best in the world -- overhwelmed us just as our safari adventure had done.
Everywhere we went for the past week, we spent time admiring the sky – the beautiful sunsets and sunrises, the rainbows and clouds, and the birds, the birds, the birds. And now, we were soaring through the sky over Cape Town, looking below, another surprising treat in our adventure beyond what I thought it would be.
And now we’re off once more, not by helicopter but by ferry, and I can’t wait to see what surprises this day brings!
View of Table Mountain from the Robben Island ferry