Mauritius

Only here for one day, so in this port we had to pack it all in! Since Mauritius is known for its water, five groups of 40 kids rented catamarans for the day. Back when SAS was crazy, and they actually weren't strict about EVERYTHING, this port was the "spring break" of SAS. Well, one day was enough of a spring break for me. It was crazy. These catamarans we got into were open bar and had an open BBQ. We sailed out around 10am onto literally the clearest water I have ever seen. Mauritius was a beautiful place- very green, high buildings near the water, and it felt like the people were a mixture between Indian and African. The water though was unreal. The kids that didn't do the catamaran went scuba diving becasue Mauritus is one of the best places to scuba in the world. I would've loved to do that too, but how could you pass up a catamaran with 40 other kids! We sailed out to this island about two hours away and anchored all five boats next to each other. We were given snorkels and we basically just had fun in the sun for the rest of the day. Jumping from boat to boat, exploring the side of the island, and well it was open bar... so ya very fun day! My body though is legit falling apart after such a crazy Capetown and now probably the most intense single day ever. So I am currently in need of water and sleep pronto!

Capetown, South Africa

This city is singlehandedly the most amazing, beautiful, cultural, and friendly city that I have ever been to. I have decided that if I didn’t do Semester At Sea that I would 100 percent be studying abroad here. All the people were so amiable, the food was spectacular, the city was so much fun and I loved everything I did here. Now of course being the extreme “packer-in-er” that I am… I didn’t sleep for three days (no joke) and my body is now falling apart! I have bruises all over me, my entire back and neck are sprained (oopps?) and my left knee might be broken… but you know what? IT WAS SOOOO FREAKIN' WORTH IT!
Starting from Thursday- we actually couldn'’t dock when we were supposed to because the winds were too strong. This is typical of this port because the winds around Capetown are incredibly strong- probably having to do with the mixture of the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean? So everyone was so depressed on Thursday, people missed $2000 safari flights, and everyone honestly was plain miserable. But I wasn’t because I wasn’t missing anything, and I just tanned all day on the front deck ☺ But ya, it kind of sucked. Anyways- a little prelude to Fridays activity- we have these “families” on board which are called our extended families. I met this man and woman the first day in Dominica (both around 50?) who are on the boat and I absolutely fell in love with them. They are from San Diego, extremely worldly and totally awesome. They “adopted” about 20 of us to be a part of this family thing we have on board, where we sometimes eat together and do different activities on and off the ship. Well, Bonnie and Hans (the couple) put together this wine tour for the family on Friday. Now this was no ordinary wine tour (not only because I didn’t have to pay for it) but because we took a party bus into wine country and went to the two best wineries in all of Capetown. The area was called Stellenbosch and the wineries were called Kanonkop and Wickenry. We had private viewings of each and private tastings. These were both so beautiful- one on a lake with the greenest grass you have ever seen, and one in a beautiful wooden barn. It felt good to dress up and be clean for once! Once we finished, Bonnie and Hans took all of us out to a very nice dinner on the waterfront in Capetown for steaks. This was such a generous offer, and Mom and Dad- I seriously cant wait for you to meet them! Right after, a group of us went back to the ship to change and got ready for our first night out in Capetown. We went to a club called Fez and stayed out till around 4:30am!
So around 4:45 (that is 15 minutes later) a group of 12 of us met outside the ship. See I wasn’t kidding about the no sleep! We got in a little bus and drove about two and a half hours away with our tour guide Cristo (total South African hottie). He brought us to a little breakfast place and explained to us the logistics for SHARK DIVING. Ya… what?? So we went onto this little boat, got in wet suits, and saw the cage we were driving into. This was a tad freaky. About five at a time we lowered ourselves into this legit cage (in 30 degree Atlantic ocean), with a snorkeling mask and that’s it. Once in the cage they shut the top and when the guide saw sharks we just went underwater and peed ourselves. No joke, scariest thing EVER. I was an arms length away from these 12 ft long great white sharks. At one point there were four circling our boat all ranging from 8-16 ft. It was terrifying (especially being somewhat drunk still)! Remember in Finding Nemo, the shark Bruce? Well I literally felt like Bruce and I were in a staring contest at some parts... it was crazy. After the shark diving we went back from lunch and drove another two hours to a very famous mountain in Capetown called Table Mountain. It’s called this because the top looks exactly like a table top- duh. Well Cristo  literally pushed us up this mountain so fast I couldn’t believe it. The normal hiker takes about three hours, we did it in one and a half. It was unreal… literally stair stepper for an hour. But it was so worth it when we got to the top because the views were incredible. A full 360 of what it felt like all of South Africa. I can’t wait to show pictures! The walk down was brutal though- we thought we could take the cable car down but the winds were too strong, so instead we hiked down through a huge cloud and this is where I hurt my knee ☹ But anyways it was worth it and we got back to the ship just in time to go out with everyone! We went to a street this night called Long Street where there were bars after bars of locals and SASers. We went to two bars here and ended at Fez again. This night I got home around 4:30 to wake up at 8 once again (so a little more sleep here)!
We thought we were going to go on a safari today but the guide changed the times and we missed it ☹ This was actually a good thing however because everyone kept talking about this all day BBQ in a township called Mazoli. Now, outside Capetown there are these townships, which are kind of like ghettos. They are really colorful, made of what it looks like aluminum, and completely destroyed looking. There were clothes hanging outside of the little shacks, and trash everywhere. It was really sad and kind of scary in some parts. Well, we drove into this one township and up to this open area with a little shop that sold meats. Yes, this was sketchy. But once you walked into the open area there was live music and around 300 people all enjoying themselves. There were locals, SASers, and a bunch of Americans who were studying abroad in Capetown. Now, the meat was ridiculous. You walked into this shop and all this raw meat (chicken, sausage, beef, ribs) was just lying there ready to be BBQed. Well, since I don’t normally eat red meat… I was very skeptical of this part but I did it anyways, and man was it worth it. They brought out literal barrels of BBQed meat and people just destroyed it. It was the best thing I have ever tasted. I think I ate a two ft long sausage (no joke). We partied all day, and met a ton of locals- it was one of the best days of my life. Around 3 pm we got in a cab to drive about two hours away to a famous beach called Boulder Beach. What was so cool about this beach was that there were natural penguins running around the beach! It was awesome. We played with penguins for the rest of the day on these huge boulders until returning back to the ship. We went out this night to an area called Camps Bay (a local beach with bars and clubs along it). We went to a bar called Café Capris and then to a club called St. Ives. This night felt like spring break in Acapulco- absolutely crazy! And yes, I pulled an all nighter.
Bad idea on no sleep because at 6am we were picked up by Cristo to go kloofing! What in that name is kloofing might you ask? Well, this was something recommended to us by previous SASers, and man were they right. By the way, kloofing is essentially just cliff jumping. It was seriously OUT OF CONTROL! We hiked over boulders, streams, and yes more mountains till we got to our first cliff. All of the cliffs we jumped off of were located basically in between two mountains where water passed through. So these weren’t really cliffs they were more like waterfalls. It was unreal. The views were amazing, everything was so green, and beautiful. We jumped off eight waterfalls in total, the lowest being 7 ft, and the highest (and last one) was 65 ft. Made a check off the bucket list on that one! We literally walked from 8 am to 5 pm that day, after already being sore from Table Mountain. It was brutal, and I was trying not to complain too much ;) After kloofing, we went to a local place to eat, and I tried a local dish called springbuck pie (AKA antelope!). It was amazing, but I felt like red meat overloaded. This night out was the best. We went to a club called Mercury. Which was an old warehouse where they played house music. And guess what? Another all nighter. UH OH!
On our last day, just the girls decided to walk around Capetown and really understand the city. Ps- my friends on this ship are amazing and we really have a core group of girls and guys. Most of them are from California and some from Colorado. The group of girls are all blonde and all the guys are really crazy. We went back to Long St. where we walked around, shopped, and went to a market to buy traditional African souvenirs. After we were shopped out, we went to a recommended Monkey and Bird reserve in Haut Bay (another beach community near Camps Bay). This was the largest bird reserve in all of Africa and man were they not lying. I think I've now seen every bird in the world. It was awesome- they were flying around us and all so beautiful. At the end there were the monkeys! I love monkeys, so this was a real treat. We saw every species of monkey, and went into a cage to play with the squirrel monkeys! They were so cute, and had such soft fingers! Making our way back to the ship, we still had some time so we went to the mall to get some necessary items. Had 100 rand left over (about 12 US) so we went out for sushi. BEST SUSHI I EVER HAD or so I thought… it was probably the lack of sleep. Getting back to the ship around 6pm, I immediately passed out and slept for 16 hours. Amazing city, and best four days of my life.

Ghana

So when we first arrived to Takoradi, Ghana on Sunday I had to stay on the boat for three extra hours. This is what SAS calls “dock time”- kind of like a time out for doing something bad? Anyways, I got dock time for eating from the mini bar in Rio which carried onto this day. Needless to say, it was ridiculous and Semester at Sea is way too strict about things- I mean eating from the mini bar? Really? I even paid for it! Anyways, I didn’t miss much because people didn’t leave the ship until around 11. A couple of us decided to go to a local beach called Africa beach which was supposedly the nicest beach in Takoradi. When we first left the boat, I was very scared at what I saw and smelled… it smelled like burning chocolate mixed with cement and B.O. We had to walk about 15 minutes to get to a taxi- and this walk was brutal. It was hot as anything and smelled sooo bad! Great introduction to Ghana right?! Once we got to Africa Beach we met up with some people and just hung around the ocean with some locals. I met the cutest family and spent sometime talking to the kids and taking lots of pictures. The children here don’t see digital cameras that often so showing them the photo of themselves after I took it rocked their worlds! On our way back to the boat, we got harassed by locals to buy their stuff.  They asked us our names and on the way back into port they had made us bracelets with our names on it- crazyyy.. feeling bad, you buy them - its such a scam. Anyways, this day was pretty relaxed we went back to the boat for dinner and then all went to the same local bar called Ocean bar which was a great time. A ton of dancing with locals and I ended up out till 4:30am!! Lucky for me, I had already packed, so when our village drivers picked us up at 5:30am, I was already ready!

My friend Natalie on the ship had a connection with this Canadian woman named Linda who was married to an African man named Abraham. Abraham lives in a village about 4 hours north of Accra (the capital) and about 8 hours away from the boat. Linda and Abraham told Natalie she could pick 12 people to come with her to the village for 3 days and 2 nights. We had a group of us go- all soo hungover… but we made it. That morning we all got into this small bus with barely any air conditioning and started on our journey into Ghana. We stopped for breakfast (an egg on a piece of this sweet bread) in Abraham's brother's village, met his family and kept on driving. We stopped mid-day in Accra on our way. In Accra, the streets were bustling with people. The streets and buildings all looked like they were falling apart, they were dirty, and all the shops looked kind of out of business. Men and women lined the streets with huge bowls on their heads of different items such as plantain chips, African chocolate, gums, and random things such as pencils? It was bizarre (I made one of the woman put the bowl on my head so I could try holding it hehe).   If you put a dollar out the window, they would literally run up to your car and run with you even if you were going really fast. It was crazy! 


We went to the local market here and did some shopping/ had lunch. This market was the most amazing market for me because I literally turned into a celebrity. These people have never seen red heads before so I was a hot commodity... if I may say so myself! I had guys flocking around me trying to sell me stuff and giving me marrage proposals? Haha it was great! The best was this one man Sici who gave me his necklace and told me I should remember him forever. He was full of positivity and life- I will forever remember his smile. Literally, throughout my time in Ghana, I got 3 marrage proposals, 4 free items, and a ton of looks from women.. Once we left Accra it was a lot of uncle wiggly had for breakfast and 20 questions in the car. We arrived at the village around 8pm to Abrahams aunt dancing - she as so excited for us to come visit. Since it was relatively late, everyone was sleeping and we couldn’t really see anything (no lights anywhere) but it was okay- they fed us dinner (some local dish called foofoo and chicken) which was delishhh and we went to sleep in our bunkbeds.

6 am wake up by the roosters- we woke up to this little village and walked with the children to their school. The school was about half a mile away and had about 6 classrooms. There were 608 kids there, who all fell in love with us immediately. I think I had 7 kids on me at all times- especially this one girl, Manuella, ohmygosh was this girl a cutie!! I wanted to pack her up and take her home with me! Everytime, I got up she would follow me- ughh so precious! We taught some classes (aka played hangman with words like apple), played in a soccer game (I watched... duh), and just simply played with the kids. Oh, I also got a group of girls to Bat Mitzvah dance - it was hilarious! This was so rewarding and they loved having us. 


After our time with the kids, we went back to the village, where 6 men (good looking mind you) were ready for us on motorcycles. Two to a motorcycle, we scooted all around Ghana, we saw rice farms, went on canoes into the river, and saw some of the other villages (and met their chiefs!)- it was a great time and an amazing way to see the area. When we got back, we were surprised by the whole village coming to together (about 100 people) with drums and these crazy outfits all singing and dancing their local traditional tunes. The men would beat on the drums to these crazy beats and the women would dance (their moves kinda looked like chickens pulsating?)- it was great. We all put on their traditional skirts and danced 'till the sun went down.

Another 6 am rooster wake up call and we sadly had to say goodbye. We got in the car with Linda and Abraham and started on the 8 hour bus ride once again. Oh and one of the chiefs of the village came to wave us off- so I thought- nope, he came to say goodbye to ME ya. Ghana men - all about the redheads! Not too many stops this time but a lot of games! Once we got back to the boat, we were all dead tired, but we mustered up the energy and went to a local bar called spike. About 30 minutes into the bar, I all of sudden started getting the worst cramps ever! I immediately started throwing up and needed to go back to the boat... bc I was in desperate need of a toliet. Now of corse it’s the night that Semester at Sea decides to conserve water and they shut off the water sources on the boat. REALLY??? This was a huge problem. My body was getting rid of what ever it had in it in multiple areas including my nose (if you get what I mean) and I couldn’t FLUSH THE TOLIET. Needless to say it was probably one of the worst nights of my life and it continued for about 24 hours- water turned on at 6am thank god so I could rinse my mouth off and flush the toliet. Sorry for the TMI, but ya it was painful. This kinda sucked for me because the last day in Ghana I literally was stuck in my room puking and pooping (at least I was pooping!!)... but yea I still don’t feel 100% better but its okay, I'm paying for my Ghana experience, I guess.   Overall great trips and were all so pumped for Capetown!

Oh and my yoga classes are a huge hit- they have hired another teacher to teach beginner classes and there was like 40 people there today! Also I have mastered how to walk around instead of just showing the positions- this is a huge step and I am really proud of myself :)

Thats all for nowww

xoxo- QOS