The photos we’re posting today were taken during lockdown in a hotel in Mumbai, India, for a long ten months. We still can’t believe how we got through that, managing to keep our spirits up, staying calm, and maintaining a cheerful demeanor with one another.
Part of what maintained our positive state of mind were two things: 1. The hope each day that we’d get out the next day. 2. Having a sense of humor. And that we did with aplomb. Many times each day, something made us laugh, whether it was a comment we made or a situation we encountered from being stuck in that hotel room.
For those of our readers who didn’t have an opportunity to read about our ten months in that hotel room, please search our archives from March 2020 to January 2021, when we finally could leave and head to South Africa to wait out the pandemic.
That decision to return to South Africa proved to be the best decision we could make, although we couldn’t get the vaccine when it became available, and we had to return to the US to get it there. We did so when it was time to get another 90-day visa stamp which, in the end, worked out well.
We had a wonderful time during those 2½ years we stayed in Marloth Park, including the times we had to leave for a visa run, of which there were many. Unfortunately, when we went for a cruise in 2022, we both contracted Covid-19, the Omicron strain, and became very ill for several months, still impacted when we returned to South Africa a month later.
Other than that awful experience, those 2½ years left us with wonderful memories spent with friends and wildlife, neither of which we ever lost interest in. Our day-to-day lives were fulfilling with one exciting adventure after another. Now, in The Villages in Florida, we’re experiencing a different lifestyle that we’ve found appealing and enjoyable.
We hardly notice the hot weather here, except we venture out on the golf cart. Generally, we go out later in the day. While in South Africa, I often wrote about the heat, humidity, and dew point since we had no aircon other than in the bedroom. We spent our days in the summer months sweating in the heat.
In The Villages, Central Florida, we stay indoors other than on our morning walks and going out in the golf cart. But the heat here in the summer is not unlike South Africa in the summer (it’s winter there now). For example, today at 3:00 pm, the temperature will be 95F, 35C, with a dew point of 83 which is more humid than we experienced in the bush. Thank goodness we don’t have to be outdoors all day here. It would be tough.
On another note, yesterday, it was one month until we’ll leave Florida to fly to Edinburgh, Scotland, for our first of two cruises in the month of August. We look forward to these cruises and pray we’ll be safe from any potential illnesses on the ships. It’s hard to avoid being near people, but we’ll do our best to stay healthy.
Today, we’re staying in. We have leftovers from last night’s Grubhub order from Sunrise Asian Restaurant, that we enjoy about once a week. We always purchase enough to last two nights and thoroughly enjoy it for dinner. It’s nice not to have to cook for the nights we takeaway and go out to eat, mainly on the weekends.
Tomorrow night, we’ll head out to Brownwood for the late afternoon and evening, and if the weather holds up, we’ll go out again on Saturday.
Be well.
Photos from ten years ago today, June 29, 2013:
