Zipping Around South Africa

Last week was American Thanksgiving, which meant that school was out for an extra long weekend. I quickly learned when several of our friends became teachers over the past couple of years that teachers are even more excited than their students for the arrival of holidays.

Laura is no exception. She planned for us a great long weekend in South Africa.

One of our first activities was an aerial cable trail near Hazyview, South Africa, which featured us being strapped to cables suspended high within the forest's canopy, zipping along from platform to platform for 1.2 kilometres. As Laura excitedly shared our plans for this activity with her Mozambican teaching colleagues, she realized that not everyone shares her sense of adventure.

The aerial cable trail experience wasn't entirely unique (but it certainly was fun!). I once had a summer job as the head instructor on a similar sort of course. I was even trained to conduct high-altitude emergency rescues using climbing gear. Having this background meant that I knew what I was looking at -- and that I was pleasantly surprised with the quality of their equipment. I knew that we'd be safe, which isn't always the case in Africa.

And we couldn't help but feel at home. The forest felt very much like the Canadian Shield. Nearby tourist shops even sell amethyst, Ontario's provincial rock.

We experienced greater fear at the Moholoholo animal rehabilitation centre, where we stood a (thin) chain link fence away from a roaring lion, and were able to pet a leopard (again, thankfully, through a fence).

The rehabilitation centre exists to care for animals that are injured or otherwise unable to live in the wild. They're not always there for their own protection, but for the protection of humans. The cats, for example, were raised as kittens by humans, so they have lost any fear of humans that they might have had in the wild. They are more dangerous now, not because they are ferocious, but because they would play rough and accidentally kill. And their instinct to attack weaker flesh is their basis for survival.

It's true that a leopard can't change its spots!

We also spent time touring around the mountainous Drakensberg area of South Africa, exploring such wonders as Berlin Falls, the "Potholes," and a view so magnificent that it is known as "God's Window."

Africa really is a beautiful, albeit abused, continent. Our weekend adventure serves to remind us that God did create the entire world and everything in it.