Part of Jonathan's MBA Program is an international trip. We hoped we would be able to make it work for me to tag along. We found out in January that his options for the spring trip were France or South Africa. Jonathan figured that we would eventually make it to France, but South Africa wasn't so likely. With the help of our parents, siblings, and friends watching our kiddos, we decided to go for it and booked both of our tickets on our two-week adventure.
We took the red-eye from Salt Lake to New York that was delayed an hour. When you don't have kids with you and can just catch up on watching previous Project Runway episodes thanks to SLC's free wifi, it was no problem at all. Quite enjoyable actually.
Landed in New York and had a three hour layover until our 16 hour flight left for Johannesburg. We went and got breakfast and walked around the airport for awhile then came back to where a large portion of the group had settled. Various people were discussing luggage. Some had gone and picked theirs up at JFK where others had theirs checked through to Johannesburg. We assumed ours were going all the way through; however, when we heard the conversation it made us think twice. We pulled out our luggage stickers and to our surprise it said JFK, not Johannesburg. So we took off down to the baggage claim. When we got there, the carousels had long stopped seeing that we had been in the airport now for over 2 hours, so we went to the Delta office. Jonathan's bag was right there but mine was nowhere to be found. I started to get nervous. When we asked about my bag, the lady said that what was there in the office was everything that was left out on the carousels. Now I was starting to mildly panic. Thoughts of embarking on a 2-week trip with only the few items in my carryon....none of which were clothes...was starting to make me worry. She walked out to the carousel with us and walked around with us. Still...no bag.
The only other people in this baggage area was a family pushing a lady in a wheelchair and a big cart that was piled with about 7 or 8 bags. We saw another Delta employee approach them and then waved us over. As I got closer, I saw the bright pink rope tied to a black suitcase on the bottom of that pile and I knew it was mine. Relief! I was so glad we hadn't waited a moment longer only to have this family walk away with that cart full of bags.
So after that near miss, we checked back in, went through security again, and finally made our way back to our group where we only had about 20 minutes left until it was time to board.
So, after the 16 hour flight, we arrived at 8am in Johannesburg. After getting to our hotel and luckily being able to check-in so early and shower, we made our way to the Lion Park. It's a place where they keep lions that have needed to be rehabilitated for various reasons. They feed them a couple times a week various parts of cows or horses. You stay in your car or bus and just drive around. There were many warnings about keeping your windows rolled up at all times.
These two were fighting over the horse leg.
He won.
Then they had a place you could go in and pet the lion cubs.
Siegfried and Roy kept coming to mind and I thought we were going to be some news story about the stupid tourists who went in the cage to pet the baby lions and then lost their hands or had their faces bit off. Luckily, that didn't happen.
Just a nice little kitty.
After the lion park, we went back to our hotel and tried our best to stay awake as long as possible, but eventually ended up crashing around 8pm.
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