You wouldn’t think that a hurricane heading up the Atlantic seaboard would affect us here 12,000 km away in Africa, but this storm caused a huge problem for us. On Saturday, it became evident that Irene was scheduled to arrive at JFK the same time we were on Sunday. Unfortunately, the airlines noticed this coincidence as well & cancelled our flight. Actually they only pretended to cancel it, they reinstated it 12 hours later as a freight flight – but more on that later. So how do we get home? I guess that’s not so easy when you are halfway around the world! South African Airlines supposedly has 3 flights a day to NY, but the next flight that we could get on was September 11th! Unbelievable! As much as I am loving Africa, I really miss my dog & my bed! Also, that would mean my kids would miss the first TWO weeks of school. Talk about starting off on the wrong foot. Illana talked to every rep on the phone, plus every travel agent in Cape Town – very confusing & time consuming! We tried to fly through Dubai, London, Ethopia (truly!), but one, this made for really long flights & layovers in not so nice places & two, will cost lots of extra money. SAA was going to give us a full refund, but Illana did such a good job of getting the cheapest fare that anything outside of SA -> JFK on SAA would cost us extra. Finally Rich & Illana sweet talked a SAA agent to send us to DC on September 4th for no extra charge – thanks! So we will arrive in Dulles on Sunday morning 9/5 & then we rented a super cargo van (remember 8 people 16+ bags!) to drive us the 5 hours home.
So on Sunday morning we were glued to CNN watching Irene hit NY/CT. It really didn’t look that bad so we were hopeful that JFK would re-open quickly & we could have our flight back. Well, SAA never told us that our flight was switched to a freight plane & not cancelled, so 2 hours before it was supposed to leave one of the many travel agents we talked to noticed that we were still on that flight. We thought about taking it, but JFK was still closed and the idea of taking off for a destination that wasn’t accepting arrivals was a sketchy one. Add in a freight flight with no in-flight entertainment (4 kids + 17 hours) with an unspecified layover in Dakar and we decided to skip it. Later we found out it landed Monday afternoon in JFK (our limo driver was there to meet us too!) Ouch. Oh well. Next problem, were to stay for the next 6 days. Susan & Johann, our hosts, were heading out to vacation on Tuesday morning. They offered to change their plans or for us to come with them. But we didn’t want them to do that & the place that they were going was supposedly very beautiful, but it was 6+ hours away. I wanted to get closer to home, not farther away. Also we needed to have an internet connection since Rich, Leonard & Illana all needed to work (no more vacation time!) Leonard’s aunt to the rescue! She offered her family’s beach house in De Kelders for our use. One hour from Cape Town, right on the coast, plenty of room + good cell access! Problem solved.
Once all the plans were finalized Monday afternoon, we packed up our bags & loaded them into the poor VW van (crammed full!). The kids said their tearful goodbyes to Susan & Johann, as well as all the neighborhood kids they had befriended. We chugged up over Sir Lowry’s Pass with hangliders flying over us and down onto the Whale Coast. De Kelders (the caves) is between Hermanus (whale watching capital of the world) and Gansbaai (shark cage diving center) on Walker Bay. The house is beautiful & right on the water. You look out the window & you can see whales playing in the water! They are everywhere. Haven’t seen any sharks – which is fine by me!
Anyway today is Ryan’s 11th birthday. Didn’t think that he would celebrate it here, but a birthday is a birthday, so we made a cake (not much choice in cake mixes here!) and went to Spurs for dinner…again! I felt so bad because we didn’t have any presents or cards for him, but he has been a good sport about it & I promised him a party when he got back – so I think it’s been a good day for him. At least it is a memorable one!
So Happy 11th Birthday Ryan! Love, Mommy, Daddy & Rachel!
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