More Passport stamps, this time Namibia

One of the places we really wanted to see was the country of Namibia, which is famous for its desert and giant sand dunes right off the Atlantic Ocean.  To drive all the way to the famous dunes from Pretoria would be a long haul and we weren't sure our kids would make it, so we cheated and flew to the capital city of Windhoek, rented a truck and drove four hours to the coast.

We crossed through the Namib desert and made it to the old German town of Swakopmund.  What a neat little place, really felt like Germany with little old buildings.

A view from the car window, coming through desert towards the coast.

Top of my list was a catamaran tour out of Walvis Bay, about 30 minutes to the South.  It was called a Seal and Dolphin cruise, we managed to find tons of seals, no dolphins, but lots of pelicans.

Our first pelican on the dock before we got on our boat.

You can bet Charlie moved away pretty fast!!

Kids got to lay in the nets in the front of the large catamaran, they gave Charlie a bag of candy & plastic toys...what else could a 7 year old want?  For adults they brought morning coffee, sherry, the local beer to sample (Tafel) and later with lunch we had Namibian oysters and champagne...you couldn't go wrong on this boat!

 We were boarded by this guy, that is Greg's knee in the photo, he came on right next to us, pretty cool!  They drove us out to see the Cape Fur Seals in their nesting grounds, very loud as the boat got close.  They also showed us the oyster beds where they "farm" Namibian oysters.

This guy came on later and was trying to figure out how to get on the other side of the railing!  Namibian flag flying!

We then tackled Dune 7...which is the tallest dune in the area.  We parked at the base and climbed straight up to the sky!  Greg flew to the top and smoked all of us, Katie and I were straggling at the back and I said to her, "I didn't know I was married to a mountaingoat!" She said, "You don't find out everything at the wedding!".  I couldn't stop laughing.

Katie and I trying to catch up to the mountaingoat!

 We finally all made it to the top and walked around a bit, running down was really fun, but the climb was tough!!

 It really is cool to just be standing on giant dunes!

We booked a sandboarding trip for the next morning.  Charlie was the only one that opted for "snowboarding" style, standing up with big boots and a board.  The rest of us did the lying down method on a thin piece of 1/4 inch plywood-that really cheap type of wood they would use to line a bottom of a cabinet drawer with.  We "waxed" the smooth side of our board before we went down.  You bent the top part of the board up, held your arms up and went.

I can say there is room for improvement here..they could learn from the snowtubing places and some tough bottomed tubes would make this a great experience!  I sure felt every bump on those boards! We also had to carry our boards up...would have loved a strap to drag it behind me like the tubes.   Climbing the dunes was SUPER hard, it made you contemplate each run to be sure the climb back up would be worth it!

Kelly was the champion boarder, she outdistanced the rest of our group every time!  She decided perhaps she should try the Olympic luge!

Charlie stuck with his boarding pals and ended up joining a group of American girls who were eating up this little American kid that likes to snowboard!  The guides loved him too.

One of our guides was telling us about all the movies filmed in Nambia, they recently filmed the new Transformers there and he was an extra in it.  We sadly forgot to take a picture with him.

We checked out the National Aquarium which happened to be a block from our place, was tiny but really cool because you could go up and look down on the big tank, or go under it in a walkway or kids could climb into a bubble shape and see the fish swim all around.

Sundowners were at the tug restaurant, there really was an old tugboat in the center.  Cool glass deck where we watched the Atlantic, even saw a seal swim up on the beach.

We decided to do a message in a bottle in the hopes it could go from one side of the Atlantic to the other...so the Leary family should be on the lookout the next time they are at the beach...here was the note from Charlie...

So all of you East Coasters...please keep an eye out for a floating bottle the next time you are walking along the beach!

The least fun part of the whole trip was the early & long ride back to the airport to head back home...you can tell we left early because all the kids were asleep!

We did see a few cool animals from the road, lots of baboons, warthogs, and finally Greg spotted about three giraffes, with his eagle eyes! (I wasn't quick enough with the camera though)

Again, we felt very lucky to have gotten to see such an amazing part of the world, Charlie was sad the next day because he was asking to go sandboarding and I had to tell him there are no dunes close by!

Two Big Productions!

Kelly is in tenth grade here which is referred to as her "Debs" year.  This stands for Debutantes, I never thought my Massachusetts girl would be a debutante!  (sounds like something out of the Old South) All year they did fundraising as a group and all groups competed to see who could raise the most money for charity.

Kelly put all of her Girl Scout training to work and we sometimes feared she was spending too much time on Debs and not enough on school work!  The conclusion of the year of work was a big ball attended by Kelly, her date Dario (who plays on her hockey team) and her parents.  Lucky for her she has the coolest parents so she was thrilled to have us there...not really but as the blog author I can write what I like!

 The whole Debs group, as you can tell for the big night they must wear white!

 Kelly was voted by her group as the hardest worker, and she won a special necklace, these are all the other winners with their jewelry bags.

Kelly and some of her friends.

 Kelly with the Headmaster of the school, Father Patterson.

Kelly with her Deb's teacher... Here is a question for the O'Brien Family readers, who does the teacher look like??? That's right, like a double of my brother, Joe!

Charlie also had a big production, his first grade performed the Lion King.  Charlie was Fred the meerkat and he had some big lines to deliver with his best buddy Rhogan, who played Ned the other meerkat.

 We didn't realize his baseball tshirt underneath would show through the costume when he was onstage!

Here is his minute of fame!  Parents told me they loved his "accent"...

 Here was the picture of him at the entrance with his own quote.  Deep thoughts...

After the show with Rhogan.

All the school activities have been keeping us hopping, we look forward to the half term break starting tomorrow!

Our first Springboks Game

Prior to coming to South Africa we watched the movie Invictus and learned about South Africa winning the rugby world cup and how the sport of rugby brought a nation together.

We have seen rugby matches here but never the national team the Springboks play.  They played at the stadium right in Pretoria, right near the Embassy on a Saturday afternoon.  So we got together a crew to tailgate and cheered them to victory over Australia.

 Our tailgate crew on the Embassy lawn, look at the beautiful Jacaranda tree blooming in the background!

 This guy was attempting to come in to the stadium and they wouldn't let him-can't imagine why?
I knew he was "blogworthy" as Kelly and Katie say!

Right before the national anthem, the best is the photo bomber guy and Kelly's reaction!

 A beautiful night for a game!

 Charlie lining up to catch one coming through the uprights, one actually came right towards us, I got a hand on it but the guy behind me ended up catching it.

Springboks win!  Such a cool experience to see a Springbok game in a packed stadium! 

 (even Katie didn't read a book and watched the game-progress!)

Super 7 September!

September was a blur, it began with a countdown to Charlie turning 7 (and getting his first pocketknife to be like MacGyver)  and ended with a countdown to his "movie" birthday party.  (which the entire class of 24 boys and families attended)  His party was such a success he cried on the way home because it was over.
Fortunately we could have the party at the American Community Center where all the boys could RUN!

 The brick pile was very popular...

The game on the stage turned into seeing how many of your friends you could hit with empty plastic soda bottles! (guess they are ready for college!)

 
 There was an entire playground, food, etc, and what did they play with?? Traffic cones of course!

 The sun sets early here so by 6:30, we were watching "Secret Life of Pets" on a beautiful South African night!  Kelly and Katie ran the projector and the sound.

One kid complained that he had to wait "forever" for his popcorn...I must admit the chef was a bit slow!

Everyone very excited for the cake!

September was also crazy busy for ice hockey, we had a million games and I had my coaching debut...not bad for having never played ice hockey!  The best was when we arrived they were cleaning up the ice after a "foam party".  Ice rinks here are all in malls and built for entertaining teenagers on weekend with public skating-not ice hockey!  Here is what the ice looked like when we got there- I thought it was melted-

Can you believe they do that voluntarily to the ice??  After we played they set up the fans & foam for another foam party-crazy!!

 Sunflower day at Charlie's school where boys could wear "Tubes of Hope" bandana type things, amazing what they came up with!!

You can give the kid all the presents in the world, but what does he want most?  A box...painted & tricked out with help from his sisters & Dad.