Good day to you all. We woke up to an absolutely perfect day here in Plett. Not a cloud in the sky, sun beating down and a light breeze so as to keep us cool. But, let’s start a couple days back…??On the cooking side of things the braai has been well utilised by the group. Gabbi used her South African inheritance to her advantage braaing for most of the group on one night. Other than that, kebabs with peppers, mushroom and beef, as well as steaks and an adventurous sweet potato from Rob have all been successfully braaid. Having ridden an ostrich yesterday Jack took it upon himself to devour 2 ostrich steaks last night resulting in his stomach not feeling so good this morning. Although whether that was the ostrich or the fact he was about to jump out of a plane is anyone’s guess…??
That’s right, on Tuesday morning 6 of the group went skydiving, with the rest doing it as I type. It takes some time as only 2 fit into the plane and there is an awesome 25 minute scenic flight on the way up to their height of 10 000 feet. During the flight they get to see the area we have been staying in, as well as damage from recent flights which has washed one of the beaches away and they get a glimpse of Bloukrantz bridge which they will Bungy off in the next couple days!!! From 10 000 feet when you jump out attached to an instructor you freefall for approximately 35 seconds, or 6 000 feet before the parachute is released. A serious rush!! The first pair to jump, Milly and Sarah, had a delay in the air and therefore went higher and got a 46 second freefall which resulted in their screams ringing far and wide. Unfortunately with clouds in the sky yesterday, the rest of the skydivers had to wait a day until this morning which as I have already mentioned is a perfect day and have been assured that 4 are down safe. One of them, Oli, defied a prediction that he may fall to his death skydiving and landed safe and sound.??Yesterday, with clouds and onshore winds we decided to go on an inland trip to Oudtsoorn, famous for Ostriches and the Cango Caves. After a long, but breathtakingly beautiful drive through the Outeniqua mountain range we arrived at the caves. These caves run deep into the mountainside and their uniqueness is how beautiful they are inside. With Stalactites, which grow from the ceiling down, and Stalagmites, which grow from the floor up, and other rock formations they can only be described using photos…
When looking at the photos, take into consideration that the stalactites grow at a speed of 1 cubic millimetre per hundred years!!! For those a little more adventurous and not scared of small spaces, not me, there was the adventure tour which required squeezing through the letterbox amongst other small spaces and leopard crawling tunnels. Coming out into a hot sunny day with the clouds having blown away we headed on to find out what these ostriches are all about. ??The talk about ostriches, as a build up to riding them, left most of us fearing these massive birds. If you were in a situation where an ostrich was angry with you, the last thing to do is run as they can run at a speed of 70 km/h for 3 km!!! That is 43.5 mph for 1.86 miles… So, what do you do? Well apparently if you don’t have a thorny branch in your back pocket which will scare them away, the best option is to lie flat on your stomach, protect your head and play dead. The result will only be a couple of broken ribs as it stands on you and sits on you. If you have blonde hair there is of course the chance that it will think your head is an egg and want to sit on it for the next 24 hours… or so they say.
Having discovered this we proceeded to feed some of the ostriches before heading over to the riding ring. Although some felt that it was cruel riding the ostriches, which I will not comment on although they did not seem to struggle under the weight, those who rode one found it an interesting and exciting experience. There were some awesome rides, accompanied of course by some hilarious crashes as the birds were not all that easy to stay on. It reminded me of bull riding as each person took it in turn riding around the arena until they fell or dismounted and then bolted for the benches to avoid being trod on. They are scary birds though, and if I had a choice of transport my first instinct would not be to go and catch an ostrich and try riding it! ??On the surfing side of things we had 2 more days of perfect waves on Tuesday and Wednesday, with light offshore winds, really good sandbanks and a lovely little swell running. Everyone’s surfing has shown large improvement since Cape Town and it will be very exciting to see how things will progress when we get to the world famous J-Bay on Sunday for a 2-week stint.
With Sam and myself having done some filming whilst the group were in the water over the last couple days we will have a braai tonight with John and his coaches from the ISS before watching over the video footage. Sam and myself also scored an epic session in the river mouth lefts after Wednesday’s group session to keep us on our toes and amped. At the moment we’ve got light onshore winds making the waves a bit messy, but with plenty to do and the prospect of jumping off a bridge on the weekend we’ll make sure that when the waves do come we’ll be there to get them… ??Thanks for reading, I’ll keep you posted and put the pics up shortly?Signing out, Chris?