Making plans for England…Yesterday…a fun and varied day!…Photos of Komatipoort…

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Rita and I each had this fantastic smoked trout salad at Stoep Cafe. I can’t wait to return to order it once again.

Yesterday, the plan was for Rita and me to go to lunch while Tom and Gerhard drove to Nelspruit to return the last rental car before we depart Marloth Park in 27 days. Yesterday, knowing that Rita was picking me up to go to lunch at 11:30, I was determined to get in as much walking before we headed out. I managed to do 6000 steps before Rita and Gerhard pulled into the driveway.

It was great for Tom to have company for the over three-hour trip, and of course, Rita and I enjoyed the quiet time together, when in a few weeks, they will be leaving Marloth Park for a while. They aren’t sure when they’ll return, but hopefully, we’ll see them sometime after we return in December.

Tom stopped at Mohammed Moussa shop to get his Cole Haan shoes repaired. The total cost was ZAR 80, US $5.26.

Initially, we’d planned to go to lunch in Malalane, but Rita changed her appointment, so we decided to head to Komati, which is half the distance. It’s an excellent little restaurant where we’ve had many breakfasts, but I’d never been there for lunch. We decided on lunch at Stoep Cafe, a favorite haunt of ours and other locals.

Kathy got us all excited about Stoep when she often stopped there for coffee and a light breakfast a few times a week. In 2013/2014 and again in 2018, Tom and I often had breakfast there before grocery shopping. But, this time around, he and I hadn’t been there at all.

The shoe repair guys sit outside the general store waiting for customers who may need repairs.

However, before Rita and Gerhard returned to Marloth Park on New Year’s Eve, Kathy and I often got together at Stoep for breakfast and lively chatter. Once Rita arrived, the three of us would go, and she and I continued the ritual once Kathy and Don returned to the US a few months ago. We all miss them terribly. We are fortunate to have such good friends all around.

The lunch continued longer than we’d expected, and finally, by 3:00 pm, 1500 hrs, we were back at the house. A short time later, Gerhard and Tom arrived in the same car we had rented earlier. Budget Car Rental was low on vehicles and based on our excellent pricing. Tom didn’t hesitate to re-rent the exact vehicle.

Another strip of shops with vegetable stands in the parking lot.

With much for Rita and Gerhard to do back at their house, as they prepared for friends from the US visiting in a few days, they took off. It was too hot to be standing in the kitchen prepping for a meal. With nothing chopped and diced for dinner and the awful heat, I suggested we go out to dinner at Giraffe Cafe, a short distance down the road, and Tom agreed.

Before we headed out the door, friends Linda and Ken called, and we wrapped up plans as to when we’ll be seeing them in England around the first of May when they return from visiting the tulips in Holland. Gee, we should do that someday! That sounds like something we’d love to do as well. Most of our friends are world travelers in one way or another. They may not be homeless like us, but they do get around the world!

There are countless vegetable stands on the side of the road.

By 4:30 pm, 1630 hrs, we reached Giraffe, running into a few locals we know and making our way to the bar where we chatted endlessly, sharing the details of our partial day apart and discussing plans for the future. Based on the information we’ve read online, it appears all of our cruises should sail as planned.

I ordered a small salad with grilled chicken, and Tom had the chicken schnitzel, which he’d ordered there in the past. The food isn’t as good as Jabula, nor is the atmosphere quite as lively. But, we had a pleasant evening and returned home to get into comfortable clothes and watch an episode of Billions on Showtime and “1883” (my new latest favorite show) on Paramount Plus on Amazon Prime,

Huge bags of onions are sold at cheap prices.

After a reasonably good night’s sleep, we were both ready to tackle another day. Time is flying so quickly right now; it’s astounding.

Yeah, the power just came back on! That certainly changes my attitude about walking today. At least I can turn on the air-con from time to time to cool off.

Many locals’ only source of income is from selling vegetables and fruit from local farms.

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, February 24, 2021:

There were no photos on the post from one year ago today, but there was a video from Garage Logic, a podcast Tom has listened to for years on which he is mentioned every day! To listen to the video, we posted one year ago, please click this link. Now, one year later, Tom continues to be mentioned each day. They usually mention him toward the end of the podcast. If you’d like to hear more mentions of Tom, please click here.

Hot today!!!…103F, 39C…Fantastic dinner for eight at Amazing Kruger View…Seven days and counting…

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The view from Amazing Kruger View, where eight of us gathered to say goodbye to Rita and Gerhard for dinner.

Once in a while, we dine at other restaurants besides Jabula, where we dine every Friday night and will do so as long as we’re in Marloth Park. We feel it’s essential to support the business of our friends, Dawn and Leon, owners of the popular, loved restaurant for its great food, playful ambiance, and exemplary service.

Last night, eight of us gathered at Amazing Kruger View (formerly known as Aamazing River View) as Rita and Gerhard’s previous dinner out in the bush before they depart for the USA tomorrow. They won’t be returning to Marloth Park until after we’ve left on January 23, 2022. Of course, we will miss them but will stay in touch via Whatsapp until we meet again.

Including in the group of eight beside us and Rita and Gerhard were Kathy and Don and Louise and Danie. What a perfect group we are. As always, the conversation flowed with ease. The food was quite good, and we may go there again on any day but a Friday.

It was sweltering last night as it is today. While we were at the restaurant dining outdoors, they used water misting pipes which helped keep it much cooler. Once we were situated at our table, we never gave the heat another thought. But today, it’s different and already darned uncomfortable already at 10:49 am. It’s 94F, 34C, and it’s expected to rise to over 100F, 38C, by 2:00 pm, 1400 hrs.

The glare of the sun made it challenging to identify these birds. They may have been some bee-eater.

We have our central air conditioning running, cooling the entire house, a huge expense in the summer months in our old lives. The only aircon is in the bedrooms and is very expensive to run, although it quickly cools the room with the door closed. Last night, we kept it on all night except when we had load shedding between 1:00 am and 3:30 am, during which I never slept a wink.

Supposedly, load shedding is suspended for an unknown period as of today. But, with this heat, I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s instituted again in the next few days when considerable power is utilized during heat spells. Often, as described by local property owners/managers of holiday houses, some holidaymakers leave on the aircon in their rental, on full blast, while they spend the day in Kruger. It’s frustrating to hear about this since it impacts all of us when Eskom decides to stop power “to catch up” (So they say).

Ah, it’s the nature of the beast. Yesterday it was almost as hot as today, and we did fine all day. It’s much cooler inside, so we may sit on the sofa in the living room with the veranda door open, allowing us to see if any visitors come easily. If our wildlife friends come to call on such hot days, we certainly don’t ignore them. We have fresh water in both levels of the bird feeder, water in a bit of cup for Frank and The Misses and the chicks, and food it offered freely.

This morning I got up early to use the oven to bake chicken breasts for tonight’s dinner, hoping the house would cool off a little before the worst of the heat kicked in. Now, as I sit here next to Tom on the sofa, while we listen to Garage Logic, his favorite podcast from Minnesota, Frank and The Misses are eating the seeds and drinking the water. It always makes us smile to see them.

Three birds on a branch over the Crocodile River.

Yesterday morning when I got up, I noticed Frank was in the house once again. He loves coming inside to see what’s going on. He scurried under this sofa when he saw me and headed out the door, which was still ajar from when he entered. We never stop laughing over Frank coming indoors.

The only other time we had a bird walk into our house was in Australia when a magpie loved walking around the kitchen, looking for morsels of food that may have dropped onto the floor when we last cooked a meal.  We call such activity “crumb patrol.” In many countries, windows and doors are left wide open without screens, as is often the case here in Africa. Whereby in the US, if our kids left the door open, we’d holler, “Shut the door!”

You’d think that where there are many insects, both harmless and venomous, there would be screens on windows and doors in most countries. But both in Africa and Australia, where we have had the most insects, it would be different. Even In Italy, there were no screens, and we constantly were fighting off biting flies and horseflies. A bite from one of those flies lasted for days.

Geese in flight on the river.

Oddly, we don’t see a lot of flies here in Marloth Park. You’d think with all the animals and their dung, flies, would be prevalent. Instead, its bees, hornets, and other flying insects, along with multitudes of crawling, walking, and slithering creatures, more so as we rapidly approach summer in Africa.

We’re used to all of this. That doesn’t mean we don’t get hot and sweaty. We do, but the more hot days we experience, the less we notice them. It’s the same with insects. In our old lives, I’d scream if I saw a “bug.” Now, I hardly pay any attention unless it’s venomous and needs to be removed from the house. We’ll do what we can to get it safely outdoors if we can.

In one week from today, we’ll be on our way to Zambia, and we’re looking forward to a pleasant trip. On Wednesday, we’ll go to Komati to get a PCR test and have the results the following day, before we leave. Louise will print a copy for us along with a copy of our rental agreement when we re-enter, which is also a required document.

That’s it for today, folks! Have a fantastic day!

Photo from one year ago today, October 14, 2020:

This photo was posted one year ago while in lockdown in a hotel in Mumbai, India, on day#205. Unable to get as close as we’d like due to the rough terrain in the Serengeti in 2013, we did our best to zoom in for this and other photos on the remaining wildebeests at the tail end of the Great Migration. For more, please click here.

Scorching heat… Scenes in Henderson, Nevada… Sweet photo from one year ago in Cambodia…

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Massive homes overlooking Las Vegas, located in Henderson, may easily be valued in the $10,000,000 or more range.

By the time I took my sister’s dog Owen for a walk in the 108F (42C) heat, plastic baggie in hand, I was sweating up a storm. However, the ultra-dry heat evaporated the sweat on my clothes in a matter of seconds. 

Many homes are nestled into the man-made terraces to offer good views of the Las Vegas Strip from afar.

A few days ago, I laid out a nightdress I’d laundered to dry on a chaise lounge by the pool, and within 15 minutes, it was scorched. Other than the time we spent in the Middle East in Egypt, Dubai, Jordan, Morocco, and the United Arabic Emirates, we haven’t experienced much dry heat in our travels.

Climate data for Henderson, Nevada
Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year
Record high °F (°C) 75
(24)		 86
(30)		 91
(33)		 97
(36)		 111
(44)		 114
(46)		 117
(47)		 112
(44)		 110
(43)		 100
(38)		 90
(32)		 78
(26)		 117
(47)
Average high °F (°C) 54
(12)		 59
(15)		 67
(19)		 75
(24)		 85
(29)		 95
(35)		 101
(38)		 99
(37)		 91
(33)		 78
(26)		 64
(18)		 54
(12)		 76.8
(24.8)
Average low °F (°C) 41
(5)		 44
(7)		 49
(9)		 56
(13)		 65
(18)		 74
(23)		 79
(26)		 78
(26)		 71
(22)		 60
(16)		 48
(9)		 40
(4)		 58.8
(14.8)
Record low °F (°C) 11
(−12)		 12
(−11)		 25
(−4)		 31
(−1)		 37
(3)		 41
(5)		 56
(13)		 59
(15)		 43
(6)		 30
(−1)		 4
(−16)		 9
(−13)		 4
(−16)
Average precipitation inches (mm) 0.70
(17.8)		 0.96
(24.4)		 0.57
(14.5)		 0.23
(5.8)		 0.11
(2.8)		 0.11
(2.8)		 0.46
(11.7)		 0.72
(18.3)		 0.42
(10.7)		 0.36
(9.1)		 0.49
(12.4)		 0.60
(15.2)		 5.73
(145.5)

As we’ve often mentioned, humidity is the toughest to endure of all non-storm-related weather conditions. It wears out everything we own from the zippers on our luggage, leather products and wreaks havoc with our digital equipment, especially cameras and smartphones. It’s no wonder we often need to replace these items.

Sure, we chose to seek out warmer climates, and in doing so, one can hardly avoid humidity which often goes hand and hand. Without a doubt, humidity is the most difficult to physically endure, especially in locations where we’ve had either no AC or limited AC, for example, only in the bedrooms.

We were surprised to see some grassy areas, which required a lot of watering.

In many hot and humid locations, we’ve had only a fan over the bed, in which most cases seem to move too slowly to be of many benefits. Also, when there’s mosquito netting encasing the bed, the fan benefits are limited, seeming unable to penetrate the fabric of the net actually to provide any relief.

Here in Henderson, Nevada, the heat is constant and relentless during the long summer months. At 7:00 am this morning, the temperature was already well in the 90F’s (32C). Now, as I write, at 8:50 am, it’s already 97F (36C) with an expected high today of 111F (44C).

The entrance to many high-end developments incorporates the utmost of landscaping to attract new buyers and maintain a level of appeal for the existing homeowners.

Yesterday, when I returned from visiting Susan and after a stop at Smith’s market for a few grocery items, I almost burned my finger pressing the keys on the metal keypad when entering the code to access the gated neighborhood.

Terracing under construction in Henderson.

On the short drive from Smith’s to Richard’s home, I thought about my groceries in the trunk. I remember grocery shopping in Minnesota in the cold of winter, wondering if my food would make it home in the -20F (or lower) without freezing.  

Many new homes back up to the hills and mountains.

In our days of eating bread, I easily recall a loaf of bread being nearly frozen when I reached home. Yesterday, I wondered if anything would spoil in the 15 minutes it took me to get back to Richard’s house. 

Foolish me; nothing would spoil in that short a trip. However, a shopper should be mindful of not making any extra stops on the way home after grocery shopping in these hot climates. Bacteria could easily manifest on a package of chicken or ground beef if one stopped at Walgreens pharmacy and got distracted for a few minutes.

Most homes are built with stucco exteriors and tile roofs that appear to withstand extreme heat.

As we drive around the area exploring our surroundings, we’re amazed how so many manage to live in such a climate in the summer. In the winters, it’s often cool enough here to wear a warm jacket. Obviously, as we’ve shown here over this past almost five years, we decided against it in 2012.

As we continue on our many year’s long world journey in only 16 days, heading to the tropical climate of Costa Rica, where the average high is 85F (29C) with humidity around 70%, it will feel normal to us and most likely, even with the moist air, certainly feel cooler than here in the middle of summer in the Nevada desert.

Las Vegas/Handerson doesn’t have a historic building since it didn’t begin to attract a population of any significance until the 1950s.

Today, we plan to try out Richard’s pool for the first time, now that we’re a little acclimated to being outdoors. Perhaps, we’ll even get a little dose of Vitamin D!

Wherever you may be this season, enjoy your days and nights to the fullest.

Photo from one year ago today, July 15, 2016:

When we visited an orphanage in Cambodia, this young girl’s smile took our breath away. For more photos, please click here.

Not a perfect day in Paradise…”Keeping it real”…

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This bird appears to be a Blue Kingfisher. Please correct me if I’m wrong.

“Sightings on the Beach in Bali”

Yesterday, Tom took this distant photo when he spotted this peculiar boat which appears “sunken” in the middle. We had no idea what type of boat this is.  Any comments from our Indonesian (or other) readers who may know?

As previously mentioned in other posts, most tourists traveling to Bali (and other countries we visit) are staying in a resort or hotel of some sort, not a private single family home. The conditions for comfort are very different. 

Also, they may ony stay only one or two weeks and challengingconditions may not present themselves during the shorter period. Today, is aday, where weather and other conditions are challenging, to say the least. 

The heat and humidity is as high as we ever experienced in Africa on the worst of days. On these hot and humid days and nights, especially after its rained there are lots of flies.

It’s too hot to shoot the wall of glass doors, but, with the many flies already in the house, even that would do little good. The only safe respite is in the master bedroom where we keep the door shut constantly, where’s there’s AC if we finally decide to hide away for an hour or two. 

At the moment, I am sitting outdoors, unable to get online due to the poor signal and there are dozens of flies hovering around me. I am covered with 30% DEET, the only possible product I can use to keep me from getting many fly bites.

And yet they still find a way to attack any unreached spot on my back or behind my legs. None of the “natural” repellents (I’ve tried many) actually repel flies or mosquitoes from biting me.  om, on the other hand, seldom gets bit.

With mountains in Java obstructing the final setting of the sun, we relish every sunset photo we see.

Since we couldn’t get online as I wrote this, I’m using “Live Writer,” a MS app that enables me to write and then, once able to attain a signal, I can upload it to the Internet.  Thank goodness for this option.  Otherwise, I could spend the entire day trying to get a decent signal. We’ll have only a few photos today due to the poor signal.

When the sun comes out, we’ll have a reprieve from the flies. They seem less bothersome on sunny days. We imagine the number of flies is certainly due to the rain we’ve experienced over these past several days.

We continue to spend time figuring out the visa situation for July’s upcoming cruise. It appears we can get a visa for Cambodia online.  But, on Viking’s Mekong River cruise documents, it states we cannot get and use an
e-visa for this particular cruise. We must use a service to apply which requires snail mailing our passports which we will not do. 

In the past 24 hours we’d been attempting to reach Viking but with the huge time difference and poor signal it had been difficult.There’s a 15-hour time difference. Finally, this morning, we got through on Skype before they closed for the day. 


Explaining our situation they agreed we could apply for the Cambodia visa online. Only a few online services offer this option, one we’ve used in the past, VisaHQ.com which is located in Washington, DC and is safe to use. 

I asked Viking to send us an email confirming they’ll accept the e-visa for Cambodia so we won’t experience any issues when we present the e-visa at the time of boarding in Hanoi. We’ve since received this confirmation email
Which, if necessary, we’ll present at boarding.

There are many visa companies out there in cyberspace that are scams.  One could easily be giving their personal passport information to a scamming visa app company. Please beware in doing so and feel free to contact us for names of valid companies we’ve used.

The reflection on the sea is particularly appealing.

Today, we’ll apply for the Cambodia visa and once we arrive in Singapore we’ll only have to apply for the visa for Vietnam (not available as an e-visa), a plan we can easily accommodate. If we’d had to apply in person for
both visas while in Singapore it could have taken a significant amount of time during the one week stay. Most likely, in this case we won’t lose more than a single day.

Enough about flies and visas. We share these details not only to express that at times, traveling the world is not as easy as it may seem but also for those who may consider this lifestyle, to use a little of which we’ve learned in the process. 

It’s easy to become stressed on hot, humid, fly infested days such as today when there are tasks we need to accomplish in the background that add to the frustration. Surprisingly, both of us remain calm and determined to figure out solutions.

Now, as the sun begins to peek out at almost noon, I’ve begun to feel confident that we may have comfortable day after all. 

May your day be comfortable and relatively easy.

Photo from one year ago today, May 12, 2015:

Locomotive and coach formerly used for tours at the Kilauea Sugar Plantation, now closed for many years. For more sugar plantation photos, please click here.