Figuring solutions for potential obstacles…

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Earl has been visiting each evening. Wildebeests are the only animals that poop in our garden. The rest go out into the bush.

The most imminent topic on our minds right now is getting our passports renewed as soon as we arrive in the US. We’ll arrive at our holiday home in the evening on April 30, hoping to get a good night’s sleep so we’ll be refreshed when we awake on Monday, May 1.

Once we get unpacked and settled that morning, we’ll begin applying for our new 10-year passports. We’ve decided to use a company in Washington, DC, since passport applications are also running behind in the US, again blaming the pandemic for this problem.

One of our kind readers, Cheryl, wrote to remind us by submitting a USA Today article about how the US is behind in processing applications. Although we were aware of this, which contributed to our concern about getting the passports on time for our cruise on August 1, we did considerable research.

Earl and Hal together in the garden.

We decided we needed to bite the bullet and pay for a passport/visa processing company to get them back on time. We will choose to receive the passports in 8 to 10 business days. The cost for this speedy service will be around US $1500, ZAR 27347 for both of us. We know this is an outrageous amount of money for this service.

You may ask, why did we wait so long? We’ve certainly known this date was coming up. If we don’t have the new passports on the sailing date, we wouldn’t be allowed to board the ship. We were informed we could apply in South Africa at the US Consulate. When their website wasn’t working to process our applications, we knew we had to devise another plan.

Then, suddenly, we were informed we had to leave early due to visa extension issues in South Africa, and everything changed. We should have done it while we were in the US in November, but we weren’t there long enough to receive them in time to fly back to South Africa. Ah, the dilemmas of world travel. We accept these realities and our responsibility for sometimes not being on the ball quite enough. Stuff happens.

Ruffles on the right side of the garden.

I can’t believe I managed to do the posts daily, let alone complicated paperwork. Most likely, I blame myself the most since I had a headache for 11 months since we got Covid-19 last April 20, and I couldn’t discipline myself sufficiently to get this done. I spent most days inactive and unmotivated.

The headache now? It’s gone! After a ten-day cycle of Prednisone and ingesting multiple allergy medications, I finally feel free of the headache. However, I am still feeling some allergy symptoms once I tapered off the drug while still taking all of the other meds. I feel confident once we leave the bush, my symptoms will improve significantly when free of all the dust, pollen, grasses, and dust mites prevalent in this area.

When we return in 14 months, it will be winter here when allergies aren’t quite as bad. We’ll see how that goes at that time. Once we return, we don’t plan to stay longer than six months simply when we aren’t interested in dealing with these immigration issues. We’ll do one visa “run” to get a new 90-day visa stamp, but we aren’t interested in doing more.

We’ve been taking our walks each morning after breakfast and are pleased we can increase the distance a little each day. Tom does fine and could walk for hours, but I still have problems with my legs hurting, making long distances an issue. Hopefully, as we walk more and more, this will improve. It feels good to be moving around once again.

Tonight, we’re off to Jabula for dinner. Tomorrow, we’ll have three weeks remaining until we depart, and we’ll continue to go right up until the last night since we leave on a Saturday. It will be unusual when dining out in Florida. Most likely, we’ll dine out twice a week while we’re there with over 100 restaurants from which to choose, all a golf cart drive away. That should be fun.

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, April 22, 2022:

The new watch face on my Fitbit Sense. How appropriate is that? I didn’t walk much yesterday when I took this photo, and we were too busy with other tasks. For more, please click here.

We’re all set to go except for packing…Posting plans for 90 days The Villages in Florida…

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Mom and son, Jasmine and Johnny.

This morning, filling my 28-day pill case with my three prescription meds and vitamins, I started organizing and assessing how many tablets I’ll need to last while we’re gone for 14 months. I still have a little remaining inventory, and when Doc Theo writes me a one-year prescription for the others, I’ll be good to go until we return in mid-June 2024.

I disposed of a massive batch of useless packaging materials and reduced the amount to bring with us, which I’ll do again when I get the years’ worth next week. As for the supplements I take, I will buy those in Florida, most likely from Costco or Amazon. There’s no point in paying to haul those with us.

Each day, I plan to go through a cupboard or drawer to thin out what we’ll need to bring, what we can toss, and those items we’ll leave behind in the black plastic bins in the storage room. Again, there’s no point in paying to bring all the spices and condiments we’ve accumulated in the past 11 months in this house.

This is Jasmine, Johnny’s mom.

We’re trying to use up as much food as possible and won’t be grocery shopping again unless we need a few items for our meals, such as bacon, eggs, and salad ingredients. We’re working our way through all the meat in the freezer.

On top of that, we have lots of wine left from my birthday party, but each time we have sundowners, I have one small glass of regular wine (not light) and perhaps have a second glass of low-alcohol wine with 75% less alcohol than traditional wine. We’ll store the rest of the unopened bottles for our return, along with some items Tom drinks. All of that will stay fresh without a problem.

Also, we’re both leaving some clothing behind. When we return, it will be winter, and we’ll need some warm clothing. However, we’ll need warm clothing for the upcoming cruises to Norway, Greenland, and Iceland, where it will be cool even during the summer months. Also, it could begin to be cool when we arrive in Boston and Minnesota in September.

Johnny was on the other side of the garden while his mom was visiting. He seems to like it better on that side.

One thing I am looking forward to while living in Florida is easy-to-access products we use for cooking and general items one may pick up at a Costco or Target store. Plus, we’ll be able to place orders from Amazon and receive orders while staying at The Villages.

Speaking of The Villages, as mentioned in yesterday’s post and today’s heading, we look forward to sharing the details of what life will be like while living in one of the most popular and desired retirement communities in the United States. We’ll share photos, pricing, and information about many of the venues we’ll experience at our leisure, including dining out, shopping, and entertainment.

Perhaps our expectations are too high for meeting people. We plan to partake in as many activities as possible to improve the odds of making new friends. Plus, we expect some of our readers to live there, and we’re hoping those who do will contact us for dinner or a drink out at our location. How fun that will be! Please don’t hesitate to let us know if you are there and when we can meet.

Jasmine and Gordy seem to get along quite well. Could he be Johnny’s dad?

Even if you live outside The Villages and if it’s convenient, perhaps you could visit us for sundowners on the veranda at our new place. We also have a lot of old friends who live in central Florida, and we hope to get together with some of you while we’re there if it works out for them.

Of course, we plan to see friends Karen and Rich at some point. Karen’s mom Donna lives nearby, so surely we’ll see each other when they get together. Many of our “snow bird” friends will have left Florida for the summer months, and we won’t be able to visit with them. But we’ll see how it goes. Some may stay through May. We’ll be leaving at the end of July.

Once we arrive, we’ll be busy getting our passport applications mailed to the US State Department. We’ve already completed the forms, so all we have to do is send them to the appropriate address. Once we get one good night’s sleep, this will be on our agenda.

This morning, after an excellent breakfast and a few tasks completed, including booking transport from the Orlando International Airport to our holiday home for US $33, ZAR 600 per person, we went for our walk, which we’ll continue until we leave and pick up again, once we arrive and get a night’s sleep in Florida. It feels good to be walking again, but it may take a while to build my stamina after being relatively inactive this past year.

The weather has begun to cool considerably. No longer are we plagued with zillions of insects and courageously high humidity. This could change in a day. After all, TIA and one never knows.

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, April 6, 2022:

Tom’s photos of this morning’s sunrise from the veranda of our bedroom at Karen and Rich’s home in Florida. For more photos, please click here.

New travel plans revealed….Leaving South Africa in 24 days, not returning for over a year…

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Earl has been stopping by for the past several days.

We knew this time would come…that we’d be leaving Marloth Park for an extended period. We do this knowing we’ll be back in about 14 months after many adventures in between. It’s about time we get back out into the world! It’s been quite enjoyable spending the past few years, off and on, in Marloth Park, but the rest of the world awaits us.

When speaking with the immigration attorney, she emphatically stated we have to leave South Africa on or before April 30, or we will be considered “undesirables,” which would ban us from returning for five years. We wouldn’t qualify for another waiver after we’d already used that option after I had open heart surgery in 2019. We have no choice but to leave.

Baby nyala Natalie is so adorable. She’s growing up so fast.

The interpretation of the new dictates imposed by immigration for pending visa extension applications, like ours, is unclear, but we can’t take any chances. One never knows for certain what will happen when trying to leave the country.

Secondly, we have discovered we cannot apply for our new 10-year passports at the US Consulate in Pretoria, which we also planned to do while here. It was entirely doable before the pandemic, but now the phone at the US Consulate doesn’t get answered regardless of when we call and how long we let it ring. The website claims we can apply for an appointment online. This is impossible. The link doesn’t work. TIA.

Mom Nina is in the forefront with Natalie outside the little fence.

I called the US Embassy, and they refused to help, saying that a US passport applicant must go through the consulate. What a mess! We’d have to leave even if we could have stayed longer. Our 10-year passports expired in 2021, and now our 4-year passport expires in January 2024. The upcoming cruises we’ve booked require at least six months remaining until the passports expire to board the ships.

As a result of both of these scenarios, we knew we had no choice but to leave. Since it’s not easy getting US passports in foreign countries unless on a short-term emergency basis, which is not us, we also knew we needed to return to the US to renew the 10-year passports.

So the question became, where do we go in the US for three months? We’ll be spending time with family in Minnesota and Nevada in September after the completion of two of the cruises. Holiday homes are priced out of our budget in Minnesota and Nevada, and since we have three months to fill until the first cruise on August 1, we decided to step outside the box and try something entirely new.

Nina and Natalie usually visit together. From time to time, Natalie hangs out with her dad Norman.

A long time ago, we watched a documentary about The Villages in central Florida and were fascinated by all it offered seniors. Where could we go that would be fun socially, perhaps near other seniors? But, for us, this is merely a stop along the way to fill these three months and not a “look-see” for any potential plans for the future.

To stay in some arbitrary US location and try to meet people and have a social life right away it’s tough in the US and many other countries. It’s not as if strangers try to make new friends when they’re out and about. After living there all of our lives except the past 10-plus years, we know this. By leaving Marloth Park, we are leaving many wonderful friends behind.

Nina and Norman enjoying breakfast at our house.

We had a busy social life in the US, but it had taken years to build relationships, unlike when people were ultra-friendly and welcoming. We thought if we went to a retirement community with lots of activities, we might be able to enjoy a busy social life during those three months. The obvious answer was The Villages for the three-month stint.

We got to work researching at VRBO, our preferred holiday home site, and researched exclusively for The Villages, which was easy to do. When we started seeing very nice golf carts that were often included in the rental, we wondered…was it possible we could avoid the expense of a rental car? Every possible shopping and entertainment venue, restaurant, and more were within a short drive using the golf carts allowed on all streets within the community.

Ruffles has become quite a regular.

Yesterday, we signed up for a three-month rental of a three-bedroom, two-full-bath property with a golf cart that we’ll be moving into on April 30. We’ll be departing 90 days later to head to Scotland for the first of two upcoming cruises on August 1.As mentioned above, we’ll be back in the US in September to see family. Afterward, we’ll be off to South America for many months, including a cruise from Quito, Ecuador, to the Galapagos Islands.

We booked our flight from Nelspruit to Johannesburg to Atlanta to Orlando for April 29. The journey will take about 30 hours, with the long overnight flight of 16 hours and 50 minutes from Joburg to Atlanta, a flight we’ve become very familiar with. We no longer anticipate it with dread. We know what to expect…lots of movies, little sleep, and terrible food. We don’t like to eat in the middle of the night anyway. Oh well.

Tomorrow, we’ll share details of our posting objectives during the three months. This will be an entirely new perspective for our site that may be of particular interest to seniors, with many photos included.

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, April 5, 2022:

Not a lot has to be said about a beautiful sunset. It speaks for itself. This is in front of our friends Karen and Rich’s Apollo Beach, Florida house. For more photos, please click here.

Busy booking into the future…Details coming tomorrow…Routines…Delilah’s new baby…

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Only moments ago, these three giraffes zipped through the garden so fast it was hard to take a photo.

We haven’t felt this excited about booking into the future in a long time. Although we’ve left South Africa several times since we arrived in January 2021 during the pandemic, most likely, we’ll be gone for one year, returning with much enthusiasm at the time. Today, we’re finalizing the details and will get back to you in tomorrow’s post, outlining everything we’ve booked and why we’ve booked them.

A lot will transpire over the next year, and soon, we’ll update our itinerary to post here. This morning, we were busy researching and handling bookings since I find once I’ve uploaded the post, I want to be off of my laptop and have less motivation to research than I do first thing in the morning.

I’ve always been a morning worker, with my mind fresh and alert, allowing me to zero in on important projects. But, by early afternoon, my interest fades, and lighter work is more appropriate. Also, this morning, I baked a double batch of my flax and coconut bread, which I have every morning with two fried eggs and keto barbecue sauce, a weird combination I’ve come to love.

Delilah’s new little boy.

Tom always has four eggs and about five pieces of streaky bacon, all of which I cook for him, making my meal simultaneously. I’ve gone a good routine and can knock off the two plates of food in about six minutes. I cook Tom’s eggs in a large skillet and mine in a little non-stick pan. He likes his eggs over-easy, and I like mine well done.

Tom gets up a lot earlier than me and usually has keto blueberry bread with coffee when he first gets up, and we have breakfast a few hours later. The bacon cooks on a plate (no paper towel) for 5½ minutes on high in the microwave while the two pans of eggs are cooking on the gas stove top. The single piece of keto bread is popped into the toaster and is done when the eggs are done. It’s all a great start to the day.

Today, we did our walk before having breakfast since Vusi arrived to clean earlier than usual, and we thought it would be nice for him if we were out of the way. It all worked out. When we returned from the house, Vusi was just about done.

Please zoom in to see his adorable budding horns.

The keto bread loaf is out of the oven, and I’ve already sliced it into 24 pieces, placing them into sandwich bags of three and freezing them. I take out one bag every three days and use one slice daily, keeping it in the refrigerator. With the humidity here, it keeps better in the fridge for a few days rather than sitting out. Toasting makes it taste perfect.

Oh, I love the simplicity of our daily lives. The routines are rewarding and familiar, while the amazing interspersed travel experiences and adventures are a welcome break from that routine, often making us appreciate it all the more.

Each step of the way in our travels is cherished for its uniqueness and opportunity to expand our horizons, our knowledge, and our vast experiences over these past 10½ years since we began, totally oblivious to what the future held. Now, all this time later, with many tumbles along the way, we feel more in touch with our lives, each other, and the world around us than we ever imagined.

Ruffles, due to her ruffled ears, stopped by again this morning.

Sure, sometimes it’s tough, and sometimes decisions are hard to make, as you’ll see in tomorrow’s post. But, somehow, we always manage to figure out our next best move and carry on with love and hope in our hearts for a full and rewarding future, for however long we’re granted to continue in this dream of ongoing world travel.

We’ve even surprised ourselves that it’s been so long. We never imagined we’d travel for more than a few years, let alone for as long as it’s been now.

Oops, I just had to jump up to take the main photo today, three giraffes walking through our garden. What could be more heavenly?

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, April 4, 2022:

Tom hadn’t eaten baked beans in years. Along with the chicken and ribs, green beans, and salad, it was a perfect meal at Karen and Rich’s Apollo Beach, Florida home. For more photos, please click here.

Busy Monday…Time to do passport renewals…

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An adorable young male kudu was resting in the shade. Notice his tiny spikes of budding horns. Cute, eh?

We have a lot of work to do today. Today’s post will be short and to the point, as opposed to my usual chattering on and on. We’ve already had breakfast, gone for our walk, and I’ve made a fresh salad for tonight’s dinner. Last night, we thoroughly enjoyed my slow-cooked lamb neck (I ate half of it) and Tom’s separate big pot of roasted short ribs; it was all finger-licking good.

It’s not easy to eat those two types of meat without using one’s fingers when the meat is tender and falling off the bone. When meat in South Africa is butchered, they leave on a lot of fat that locals savor as a specialty. As Americans, we’re used to well-trimmed meat with little fat and don’t quite have a taste for the fatty portions.

As a result, as we ate, we used our fingers, me more than Tom, to ensure we got every delectable portion of the meat minus the fatty parts. It was one of the tastiest dinners we’ve had lately, although many have been quite good. Louise and Danie introduced me to lamb neck when they invited me for dinner at their home while Tom was away. I loved it!

When Tom returned from the US, we went to the local meat market in the Bush Centre, and I was able to buy a lamb neck. It was ZAR 150, US $8.38, enough to feed me for two nights, unlike when I dined with Louise and Danie, and I ate the entire thing in one sitting! For me, it was like eating candy.

After dinner, we sat outdoors for a while until the mozzies got bad and then headed indoors to stream a few shows and call it a night. Since today, I took the last dose of Prednisone; my sleep has been fitful the past ten days since I started the medication. It tends to cause insomnia. Last night, I slept through the night for a total of 7 hours and 38 minutes, according to my Fitbit. This is the most sleep I’ve had in weeks.

Nina, Norman, and Natalie have been in the garden several times each day. Note the two kudus in the background.

This morning on our walk, I noticed I had more stamina for the first time, and we went a little further. After being immobile this past year with this head and sinus thing, I spent too much time lounging, never getting much exercise. I feel more confident walking fast and getting my heart rate up after knowing my cardiac condition is excellent after Friday’s stress test. Gosh, peace of mind is worth everything.

For many, a spiritual aspect of our lives is vital to our sense of well-being. We always say if one has their health, they have everything, but as seniors who’ve lived long and full lives, we know this is only true in part. Many other life circumstances make us feel like we have everything; good relationships, financial stability, an active social life, mental health, physical health, and well-being.

If one of these above areas is lacking, we can find ourselves unhappy and distraught, even if we have good health. Occasionally, any of us may be wrought with sorrow associated with the loss of any of the above. As resilient human beings, we have it within our power through love, support, spiritual resources, and sheer will and determination to overcome such sorrows in time.

It’s not easy, by no means, but we all possess the ability to learn, to grow, to recover. and eventually, to move on. When I think back to times when the challenges felt like they were too many to conquer, somehow, most often out of a sense of responsibility, I muddled my way through, as all of you have done at different times in your lives as well.

Now, we’re off to work on the passports, and we’ll be back with more tomorrow.

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, April 3, 2022:

Tom and Lois (who visited us in Marloth Park in October 2018) and the two of us at the biker bar, Nav-A-Gator Bar and Grill, in Arcadia, Florida. For more photos, please click here.

A new day, a new dawn…Great relief and peace of mind…

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This is Chevy, an impala who spends most of his time in our garden. We try to avoid giving pellets to impalas since there are too many to feed. But Chevy often gets in on the action with the other wildlife.

Waking this morning with a smile on my face made me realize how important it was to have those medical tests done and receive such good results for both of us. Then, I thought of the new immigration ruling that allows us to stay in South Africa until we leave for the cruise at the end of July, almost four months from now.

Of course, we’ll confirm this with the lawyer tomorrow, but based on the wording in the new document, it appears to be accurate information. Knowing these two unique aspects of our lives, we’re able to sit back and relax for the remainder of the time we’ll be here.

Sure, we could leave early and go to Scotland a few months before sailing out of Edinburgh. Still, after considerable research, we were dismayed over the high cost of spending the summer months in Scotland, a country with a short summer season of warm weather.

This is bushbuck, Tulip. Tulip is probably pregnant again. Her calf, Lilac, now visits on her own without her mom.

It would have been fun to spend time there, but we always like to live in a lovely house, and we’d have had to sacrifice too much to do so. Since the onset of our travels, and after a few holiday decisions we later regretted, we’ve come to a place where the property we rent must fulfill our objectives.

As a result, we have to consider the cost of holiday homes before we start booking flights and other events. It was the same reason we decided against staying in England in the past few years…the UK, in general, is pricey these days, much more than when we visited in the past.

This has been the case with many holiday rentals worldwide since the pandemic. Yes, if a tourist takes a one- or two-week trip to anywhere in the world, they can typically find suitable holiday homes via companies such as VRBO and AirBnB or even affordable hotels.

Big Daddy, on a mad dash to catch up with a female he’s been sniffing.

At this point, after our extended stay in Mumbai in lockdown for ten months, we have little interest in long-term hotel stays. Although, we’ll always stay in hotels in the US when we visit family in Nevada and Minnesota and during short stays in specific countries as part of our ongoing itinerary.

When we arrive in Scotland at the end of July, we’ll be staying in a hotel for a few nights, preferably close to the cruise terminal. After checking hotel prices in Edinburgh during that time frame, it appears that hotel prices close to the terminal average of around US $300 per night, not a price we’d be willing to pay for longer than one or two nights.

We’d love to share new adventures from our original departure date of June 8, leaving us about seven weeks until embarking on the cruise. But, based on the cruises we’ve booked for the future and those increased costs, it makes a lot of financial sense for us to stay in Marloth Park during those additional weeks.

He can’t help himself. Nature calls.

Last night was another fun night at Jabula. This morning, I am focused on making a special Sunday dinner; roasted lamb neck for me and short ribs for Tom with whole carrots, whole mushrooms, and onions, all well seasoned. We have everything roasting in the oven until no later than 3:00 pm,1500 hrs. We are unable to use the oven during load-shedding.

Before load-shedding begins, everything will be done, and I’ll take the pans out of the oven to eat later on. Most likely, as hot as it is today, the pans will retain the heat, and we won’t have to reheat our plates to eat our meal, with rice for Tom and salad for both of us.

Have a great Sunday, and be well.

Photo from one year ago today, April 2, 2022:

A small buoy must have been attached to the tail of the frequent manatee visitors, making it easier for the tourists to spot. For more photos, please click here.

Immigration changed the rules again…Oops…Tom spilled iced tea on his laptop…Medical test results!!!…

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A lone zebra stopped by, but a short time later, a few friends joined her.

Based on a new document posted in the past 24 hours, it appears that Home Affairs will allow visa extension candidates who filed before March 31, 2023, to stay in the country until December 31. I forwarded the new document to the attorney and will speak with her on Monday to verify the amendment to the last agreement stating we had to clear out by April 30.

Hopefully, they don’t make any further changes impacting our preferred departure dates, which are up in the air right now. What a relief this would be if this new document is accurate. We’ll report back here accordingly.

Tom spilled his entire mug of iced tea on his laptop a short time ago. It’s supposed to be water-resistant, so we’ll see how that goes in the next few hours. I looked online, and if necessary, he can replace it at Takealot.com and have a new one in four or five days. He’d be lost without it.

Zebras are heading down the driveway to continue on their pellet search.

Yesterday morning, we met with Doc Theo for Tom’s aortic aneurysm screening and blood test results, followed by his cardiac stress test. Theo was delighted to tell Tom he was in tip-top shape. His tests were all normal. He did fantastic on the stress test. Theo couldn’t believe how Tom was so young for his age, taking no medication and having no known medical conditions.

I was a little anxious as Tom was having his stress test on the treadmill. I hadn’t had any cardiac tests since the surgery four years ago. I knew that at some point I’d have to be tested but put it off, justifying it with the fact I’ve had no cardiac symptoms.

When Tom was done, after the glowing reports from Theo, Tom stepped out to the waiting room, knowing I’d be a little more anxious with him watching me perform the test. I was worried that since I had Covid-19 last April, suffering from the headache, facial pain, and allergies, I had been relatively inactive over the past year. I was fearful I wouldn’t be able to handle the required pace on the treadmill.

A few giraffes quickly moved through the garden.

Other than running around the house performing household tasks and cooking, I’ve spent the better part of each day sitting. It was hard to feel like exercising, although I tried many times when I had the darned headache and couldn’t seem to get motivated.

But, once I got going on the treadmill, all wired up for the EKG, comforted by Theo that he wouldn’t push me too hard, I took off and could keep up without an issue. He pressed me to do the test up to my maximum heart rate for my age. All the while, he kept reassuring me I was doing great and that the results printing on the machine were all looking perfectly normal.

When all was said and done, he gave me a clean bill of health. There wasn’t a single issue during the test or after during the cool-down period. I was pleased and so relieved! Theo said there was nothing on the printout that indicated I’d ever had heart surgery or had any issues at this time. Maybe I’ll be one of those lucky heart surgery patients that never need more surgery or stents down the road.

This Big Daddy stops by every day.

Tom is willing to walk with me twice a day, once in the morning and another in the afternoon. Theo suggested we both start exercising regularly to maintain our good health. This morning, we took our first walk out on the dirt road, watching for lions or any other wildlife who may be out and about. After I build stamina, most likely, we will do one long walk in the morning after breakfast and be done with it for the day. We’ll see how it goes.

Last night, we had a fabulous time at Jabula. David always reserves our two usual seats at the bar. Our food was perfect, and the Cheers-like bar occupied every barstool. We knew everyone there. That’s what makes it so much fun, but we always love meeting newcomers.

We were back home by 8:30 pm, 2030 hrs., bellies full, and we were ready to hunker down for the night. We watched a show, but I fell asleep at the end. After that short nap, I had trouble sleeping and was awake for a few hours. A nap may be on the agenda later today, before or after the second walk.

We are very grateful for the immigration news (if it doesn’t change again), the results of our medical tests, and to be enjoying our lives more than ever with this new peace of mind.

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today,  April 1, 2022:

This was the first shot of one of the manatees in the warm waters by the Tampa Electric Company in Florida. For more photos, please click here.

Conversation with immigration attorney…Not good news…

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Little Johnny, again this morning.

Late yesterday afternoon, I received a return call from the Cape Town immigration lawyer we hired to assist with our extensions. Keeping in mind, Tom has a 90-day visa he received when returning from the US weeks ago after his brother’s funeral. He can stay until June 15 without incident.

After yesterday’s post about new rulings, which may be found here, a recent ruling from South Africa’s Home Affairs (immigration) stipulates entirely new guidelines for visitors who’ve applied for extensions, such as us. We requested we could stay until our planned departure date of June 8, 2023.

Big Daddy seems to appear each time we see Norman.

That’s out the window now with the new rulings, which are vague and unclear, as admitted by the lawyer who clearly understood our concerns and confusion. She, too, is confused by the lack of clarity regarding dates we need to exit the country. Unless some clarification comes through in the next ten days, we must Africa by April 30, 2023. That leaves us one month to make travel plans and to clear out of this house.

As it turns out, there are 7000 visa extension applications, such as ours, in the works. Based on staffing issues after the pandemic, there is no way they will be able to process all of the applications. Hence, we fall into the category of having to leave by April 30 or be considered “undesirables” if we go one day later.

Initially, when we filed, the rulings stated we could stay without issue until the extensions were granted. At that point,  three months ago, the lawyer felt confident we’d have our approval in plenty of time, based on history. Filing earlier wouldn’t have helped since they don’t allow earlier applications.

Our boy Norman waits for us every morning.

So now, we are facing April 30 as our departure date. As the lawyer explained, our only option is to leave the country, not to a bordering country, and try to get back in, as we’ve done many times. Right now, we are discussing our options and will report back here what we decide sometime in the next ten days; when we commit to each other, we’ll make a decision.

Last night, I contacted Louise and asked her if we left the country would this house be available for us upon return? No matter our plans, we have to be in Edinburgh, Scotland, by July 31, the day before we sail away.

Here we are once again, trying to figure out immigration issues when we’d settled into peace of mind that the extensions would work out well. I guess we were wrong. Unless the South African government clarifies its rulings in the next few weeks, no matter what, we are leaving here on April 30.

Gordy and Norman were sharing pellets peacefully.

The lawyer explained that if we continued to stay and wait to see if they ever get to our application, if we had to leave and it wasn’t approved, again, we’d be considered “undesirables.” We’re not willing to go through that again when it occurred when we overstayed after my heart surgery four years ago.

Many would say, “Why bother? It’s too complicated to stay for longer periods in South Africa.” The reasons are many. Those of you who have been reading our posts for years certainly understand, but I won’t get into that again today.

Soon, we’re off to Koomatipoort for our appointments with Doc Theo. This will be my first cardiac stress test since the surgery, and I will be glad when it’s over and done; praying for good results. Tom is having the same test, and we’ll receive his test results from the past week. We’ll report back tomorrow.

Be well.

Photo from one year ago, March 31, 2022:

A marina in Apollo Beach, Florida. For more, please click here.

Notice from attorneys…What???…Makes no sense…

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Two hornbills take turns eating seeds from the feeder ledge.

Late yesterday, we received this letter from our attorney handling the visa extensions. It reads as follows:

We hope this finds you well.  

  1. “This email is to inform you of the attached Circular, which was published today.  
  2. The Circular as published does not appear to uniformly apply to all categories of applicants, nor is it clear with respect to the abandonment of applications on departure.
  3. Since the declaration of a national State of Disaster in 2020, various Directions, Directives, and Circulars have been published, often requiring careful interpretation of their language as applicable to individual circumstances.  In some instances, as in the current case, interpretation must be deferred until after we obtain specific clarifications from the DHA. 
  4. While we always invite all our clients to communicate with us directly should any query arise in terms of delays, their status and/or ability to travel out of SA rather than relying on hearsay and information distributed on social media and/or unverified sources we anticipate and acknowledge in advance that some questions will not be answerable by 31 March 2023.”

From there, the entire attached document from Home Affairs was included, which may be viewed by clicking the link below:

DHA Circular 29 March 2023

What we are supposed to do from here is vague. The question we have now is: Do we have to leave by April 30? Or can we stay until the day our extension may have been approved or longer? The answers are totally unclear. I copied and pasted the sections in question directly from the documents as follows:

“b) Applicants whose visa applications are still pending: Long–term visa holders (Work, Business, Study, Relative, and Accompany spouse) who form part of the 62692 visa backlog applications be granted a temporary extension until 31 December 2023 of the current visa status. Applicants are not allowed to engage in any activity other than what the visa conditions provide for. For those who wish to abandon their visa applications and depart from South Africa when able to do so, they should be allowed to exit at a port of entry before or on 31 December 2023 without being declared undesirable in terms of section 30(1)(h) the Immigration Act, read with regulation 27(3) of the Immigration Regulations. Non–Visa exempted applicants who traveled out of the country with a receipt are required to apply for a visitor’s visa, which will allow them entry into the country to await the outcome of their visa extension. 

c) Short-term visa holders whose visa validity was issued for less than 90 days and who have not received their visa extension outcome by 31 March 2023 must please make the necessary arrangements to depart on or before 30 April 2023 to avoid being declared undesirable.”

Little Johnny is such an adorable young male bushbuck.

Leaving by April 30 creates unplanned added travel expenses along with any other issues relative to leaving early. Our rent and rental car are paid until June 8. It’s good that we haven’t prepaid any bookings yet and have been dragging our feet to see what happens before committing to anything.

So, all we do from here is wait to hear back from the law firm as to how this confusing situation applies to us and proceed from there. Whatever the outcome, we will figure out a plan that works for us. Sure, were could go to Scotland and wait it out until the cruise in August.

Little Johnny was standing by the veranda table, waiting for us to come outdoors.

But, we’ve found it to be so expensive there, we’d definitely be stretching our budget. Most tourists who go to the UK and Europe stay for short periods, not months. All we can do from here is “play it by ear” until we hear back from the law firm on their interpretation of these vague and uncertain requirements.

By no means are we stressed about this, but we would like to be able to know where we may be going 30 days from today if that’s the case. If we can stay until December, most likely, we’ll stay until July if Louise has a house for us. We won’t bother her with questions until we know exactly what we must do.

Lilac, of Tulip and Lilac, resting in the garden.

Today, I’m busy with laundry and prepping tonight’s dinner, along with both of us reviewing potential options once we know more about our timetable.

Tomorrow, we’re off to Komatipoort to Doc Theo for our cardiac stress tests. I’ll be glad when this is over, and hopefully, we both get good results, along with Tom’s test results.

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, March 30, 2022:

Another beautiful sunny day in Florida! For more photos, please click here.

Lots of visitors in the garden…Second beautiful sunny day…

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Four antelope species in the garden, impala, bushbuck, duiker (hidden behind the impala), and nyala (Norman). A fifth, a female kudu, was standing outside the fence (not shown in the photo).

No words can describe how enjoyable it is to experience these more comfortable days in South Africa. The sun is shining, and the high today will be 93F, 34C, but the humidity is low at 25%, although the dew point is high at 78. With the lower humidity, there seem to be fewer mosquitos buzzing around my head as I sit outside preparing today’s post. What a relief after all these months.

That’s not to say we won’t have many more hot and humid days in the near future, but for now, it’s ideal. This morning, we had our usual breakfast of bacon and eggs. The bacon here is excellent and turns out perfectly made in the microwave. This morning I made extra bacon for tonight’s dinner of bun-less burgers on the braai topped with purple onion, tomato, lettuce, and homemade keto ketchup, along with a side salad and rice for Tom.

We decided to make the same meal tomorrow since we’ll return to Jabula on Friday and Saturday evenings and didn’t need leftovers from Thursday.

African morning dove sitting atop the birdseed trolley.

On Friday, we go to Doc Theo, where both of us will have cardiac stress tests. I am a little nervous about having this test since I haven’t had any heart-related tests since surgery four years ago. I don’t have any heart symptoms, but I can’t help being apprehensive about having this test which Theo says is more accurate than most scans. So, we’ll see how it goes for both of us and report back on Saturday.

Tom had numerous blood tests and an aortic aneurysm screening test yesterday in Nelspruit. We’ll know the results of all the tests by the time we leave his office on Friday.

Two female kudus staring at us for pellets.

Yesterday and this morning, we had dozens of wildlife visitors, including the fun main photo of four different species of antelopes in the garden simultaneously. It was exciting to see them all together. Speaking of antelopes, Norman, often accompanied by his family, has been here no less than six times a day over the past several days. It’s always such a joy to see him and, of course, Nina and Natalie.

We realize we are taking a significant risk by not booking where we’ll be staying in a little over 60 days when we leave Marloth Park for a year. But we have so much to deal with before we go. Once we get my visa extension, we can apply online for our US passports. If anything goes wrong with applying in Pretoria, we may have to fly to the US to do the renewals.

Pleeeeease!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tom got his visa renewed for a new 90-day period when he left for the US for his brother Jerome’s funeral weeks ago. We can’t apply for the US passports until we get my visa extension; otherwise, it appears I am here illegally, and we’d have trouble getting the passports renewed in South Africa if I appear to be an illegal alien. Thus, we’re leaving everything up in the air until we have the visa extension.

In the worst-case scenario, if we can get the extension and the passports, we can easily plan a trip to a preferred location while we wait for the next cruise out of Edinburgh in August. We are confident it will all work out. We no longer feel we need to plan far in advance as we had in the past, especially since we don’t want to risk losing deposits or prepaid venues.

That’s it for today, folks. We hope you have a fantastic Wednesday! We’re planning on it!

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, March 29, 2022:

The sideyard view of Karen and Rich’s Apollo Beach, Florida property. For more photos, please click here.