Colleen and Paulette are flying to Nelspruit from Cape Town…

It’s hard to believe Colleen and Paulette will arrive around noon today. We’ve been looking forward to their visit, and now it’s finally here! Tom’s sister, Colleen, and his niece, Paulette (another sister’s adult daughter), will spend the next couple of weeks with us in Marloth Park. It should be a fun time, and we’re looking forward to sharing our little piece of paradise in the bush with them.

I arranged for Wayland, our local driver, to pick them up at Mpumalanga/Kruger/Nelspruit Airport (MQP) when their Airlink flight arrives from Cape Town at 10:10 am. We don’t usually pick up guests from the airport because of our small car and, more importantly, the awful N4 drive. However, given the current road construction and the outrageous delays we’ve experienced lately, it’s well worth the expense to have someone else make that drive.

The driver’s fare for the two passengers, one way, is US$90.18 (ZAR 1,500), which I don’t consider a bad price for what can be an almost two-hour, harrowing drive. With all the construction delays, traffic backups, and frustration along the way, we are happy to leave that drive to someone else. It will also let us stay here and get everything ready for their arrival without spending several hours on the road.

I’m not sure if they’ll want lunch when they get here, but I can always whip something up in no time. One of the little challenges we face when having guests is figuring out what they might like to eat, especially since we have gotten used to eating only one meal a day. Since we follow our usual eating routine, we don’t typically keep breakfast and lunch foods on hand, other than bacon and eggs. Of course, we want to make sure they have plenty of choices while they’re here.

We bought a few items from the list they sent us, but some familiar US products aren’t available here in South Africa. Bagels are one example. We can find plenty of wonderful foods locally, but some products people are used to eating in the States are harder, if not impossible, to find here.

In the next few days, we’ll go to the Marlothi Shopping Center so they can pick up more groceries and other items they enjoy. We also didn’t know what kinds of snacks they prefer, and many familiar packaged products from the US also aren’t available here. Besides, we don’t generally eat packaged snacks ourselves, so we aren’t accustomed to keeping them on hand.

Instead, we usually eat biltong and hard natural cheeses if we need something to tide us over until dinner, both of which we keep in the refrigerator or freezer. We don’t buy processed sliced cheeses, which many Americans enjoy using for sandwiches. Our preferences have changed considerably over the years, especially since we adopted our current way of eating. But that doesn’t mean our guests have to eat the way we do!

I’m sure we’ll figure everything out as we go along. That’s part of having visitors when living in a foreign country. We sometimes have to be a little creative, make a few extra shopping trips, and learn what our guests enjoy. It’s all part of the experience, and we’re happy to do it.

We still have a few things to take care of before Colleen and Paulette arrive, so I’m keeping today’s post short. Once they’re settled in, we’ll have plenty to share about our time together, including meals out, visits to our favorite places, and, of course, the wonderful wildlife that makes Marloth Park so special.

We’re excited to have family here and look forward to making lovely memories over the next couple of weeks. Let the fun begin!

Oops! Looks like their flight is arriving late, at 11:10, instead of 10:10. We’ll be waiting anxiously.

Be well.

Photo from ten years ago today, October 30, 2016: