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OUR TRAVELS

Adventures outside our borders
Jan 28
1

Be Still My Beating Heart

By | Our Travels, Parks | No Comments

I was in two minds as to whether I wanted to write this post. Sometimes things can resonate on such an intimate level, that you want to keep them secret, hidden away from the rest of the world. That’s how I felt when I arrived at Redwood National Park. I didn’t even have to set a foot on the lush, earthy mulch to know that that was a place I would happily get lost in. A place my soul at once wanted to stake a flag in and reserve as a serene retreat for me, and me alone. Ok, I would take people there, sometimes, but only if their hearts wanted to burst from their chests and break into song, knowing there is possibly no more beautiful place on this earth! I know I have often on our travels, gushed over how beautiful a place is, how incredible the National Parks are, and how they make you feel closer to the ethereal, while at the same time making you feel so tiny and insignificant. While I stand by all I have previously written, no place captured my soul more than this magnificent forest. Firstly, it was green. Not just any old green, but the bright ‘heavens pouring golden light between the thunderclouds after a storm’ kind of green. The foliage looks iridescent and you can smell the earth and the dew and the trees. It was lush and moss covered, and had the most beautiful delicate ferns covering the forest floor. Although forests can often make you feel closed in, the epic height of the trees raised the canopy to an extent that, although surrounded entirely by glorious vegetation, you don’t have that feeling of restriction and limited view. I have always loved Knysna forest for similar reasons… this forest is Knysna on steroids! If I could bring anything back from the States with me, it would be a little corner of the Redwood National Park. It was without a doubt, one of my favourite places of this trip, in fact, any trip.

 

Thinking with hindsight why this National Park was so much more enjoyable than all the others, I would say a large part is due to it being significantly less touristy. It is common knowledge that the tallest tree in the world is in the park, but it is not listed – about the smartest thing the Americans could have done. There is no ‘have to see’ spot. No tarred paths through the trees. No throngs of tourists. There is just incredible forest… and quiet. Plenty of it – when the children weren’t squealing with delight while throwing themselves and their bikes down the nearest forest path that is!

In the time between San Francisco and the Redwoods, we spent 2 days enduring Napa Valley. It is torment sitting in a place almost like the wine lands of home, but not quite as beautiful, and yet about 4 times as expensive! I’m not sure what we were expecting, but this didn’t blow our socks off. It could have been the budget wine tasting, or the winter fields, but I think it had more to do with our being spoilt in Cape Town – with what we have right on our door step. We Capetonians live with our bums in the butter (and our noses in the vineyard). Napa has world-class restaurants and boutique shops but unless you go there with a rather large and lavish cheque book, I’m not sure it’s worth it.

We did a whole lot of bad planning on our way up to the Redwoods, and for the first time on our trip… we ran out of petrol. (Truthfully, it was very nearly our second. In Mexico we almost ran out in the middle of nowhere, so we were thankful it was the US and not there!) We were saved by lovely country folk more than happy to cart us around to the nearest gas station, and what could have been a disaster turned out to be a lovely morning in the country, shooting the breeze with locals and hearing their stories.

 

I have often wondered how boundaries between States were decided on, but after now driving through 23 of them, you can often notice a sudden change in scenery or vegetation. Frequently an accent change goes hand in hand with it. There is no doubt that people are different too. Although we enjoyed California, we found ourselves relieved to be through it. The American belief that they have everything bigger and better, has its headquarters in California. We found people to be a whole lot less friendly, with their heads wedged more firmly up their own backsides. No disrespect (we have some very good friends who are from California). It is a beautiful State, no doubt, but there definitely seems to be a vibe that they are somehow better than everyone else. Of course this could just be their dislike of us Africans sauntering about insulting their drought, while simultaneously lapping up their good weather. While I would dare say that the mid-upper West Coast has been my favourite area in the States thus far, not having at least one hefty hound, and being a straight married couple with 2 children, did not count in our favour.

Obviously, California was not all bad (I hope that’s not the impression I’ve given). We spent just over a month in the State and it certainly has a bit of everything going for it. Redwood National Park, you most certainly stole my heart though. After a hike (bike in the kids case) through the forest, I wished we had hurried through the first part and spent a bit more time here. The kids l.o.v.e.d it! The paths through the forest are perfect for mountainbiking, and Shaun and I found ourselves wishing yet again, that we had bikes with us. Had we known this winter would be so mild and devoid of snow, we would have without a doubt made a plan to cart our bikes around with us too – we have missed them! We can’t believe it’s the end of Jan and we have yet to see snow falling. We have stood in it, played in it, lay in it, skied in it, but still never seen it fall, not more than a few flakes anyway.

A very busy month it has been, and it is clearly taking its toll, a very dear friend said to me the other day that she has never seen me looking so tired. That is saying a lot when I have had 2 children a year apart! So next on the travel agenda is ‘Get more sleep’! So with that, I bid you all farewell, so I can try and sneak in a few hours before tomorrow’s adventure. XOXO

Jan 22
1
Our beach day near Golden Gate Bridge

Appreciating the Good, Learning from the Bad

By | Beaches, Musings, Our Travels | No Comments

When the going gets tough, head to somewhere you know you’ll be happy! Or in our case, be lucky enough to have that on the cards anyway! San Francisco… the Cape Town of North America… you could not have showed up on our itinerary at a better time. The Prius driving, dog toting, hipster capital of the world. Wow. I did not expect to come across a city so full of hipsters that even I would be tempted to grow a beard just to fit in. Shaun tried desperately to get his 10 chin hairs to grow but all the Bob Martins in the world could only get those bad boys to grow while simultaneously dipping his chin in fertilizer. He did however have the headphone wearing computer staring look about him as he was buried in work while we were there, a good thing too or we would have gone out to far too many awesome restaurants and only worsened our now distinctly diminishing travel funds. Running out of money (as we always seem to do at the end of January, travelling or not) sucks rather more harshly when you find yourself in Napa Valley. This is not a place for you if you are travelling on a budget. We are doing what we must but it would be a lie to say it is not stressful and downright hard. Why do I mention this depressing tidbit you might ask?.. just so that you know we are not floating along on our 6 month trip on a bed of $100 notes and being fanned with enormous cheques. Shaun and I are already discussing how we will redo this trip when we are grown ups (and taking daily swims in our money like Scrooge McDuck). Mail me if you want tips on how to do America in style, we have some great ideas 🙂

But trying to be the ‘family focused less money driven’ travellers that we are (or lets face it we wouldn’t be doing this trip to begin with), we found ourselves a sunny apartment near Golden Gate park in San Francisco and thoroughly enjoyed the outdoor city vibe that ‘The Bay Area’s’ got going. The city is open, full of parks and beautiful old-school buildings. Obviously, the bridges are something special, and those along with the ‘cable cars’ and other public transport that runs on electric lines is something unique to this city. Riding on the cable car feels like you’re on a roller coaster in the middle of a suburban street – it’s awesome! I was thankful for the automatic car we were driving because doing hill starts on those hills in a manual, would give me some proper wiry grey hairs. There are laws on ‘curbing your wheels’ when you park, totally understandable when you look down the hills, and going to the twistiest street in the world also happened to leave us standing at what felt like the steepest!

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In true Wuth fashion, we decided to undertake the impossible – keeping a 3 and 4 year old happy, quiet, and in their seats for a 2 hour (near black tie) performance of Beethoven’s ‘Mass in C’ by the San Francisco Symphony and Choir. It is comical how badly it went, starting with our seats being next to the orchestra and looked upon by thousands of others. We were virtually on stage for 2 hours. Lincoln wasn’t so keen on the idea. And he was tired. Great combo. The trifecta was that we couldn’t secretly feed them to keep them happy because everyone could see us! Anyway, to cut a long and embarrassing story short, I ended up carrying a very tired, just pre-tears Lincoln out in the middle of the second half and in the middle of one of the soloist’s performances. I wanted to die. We will freely admit that it was ambitious, even for us, but the performance was magnificent!

Lincoln seemed to take a real liking to the floors in San Francisco and made a habit of falling off his bike and or scooter and or flip flops on a regular basis. How he isn’t covered in bruises baffles me. Lola is ‘Driving Miss Daisy’ to Lincolns ‘The Fast and the Furious’. She thinks it’s Sunday, everyday. Strolls are gentle and when we take them biking she often circumnavigates the same lamp post numerous times, looking at all the flowers, testing a grass patch for mud and seeing if her bike will fit between poles. Lincoln is now so fast on his bike that when we head to the park one of us has to be dressed for a run. We sprint next to him for at least half the way and yell at him to move over when there are oncoming pedestrians. It can be very perilous when gaining on a runner who has earphones in, it becomes a game of chance, will they stay on their side of the path or veer in?!.. The time has come for some proper brakes, pedals and potentially a skills lesson or two! I’m afraid teaching him caution is something that has at least thus far, been totally lost on him.
All this is what made our morning hike to Lands End on our last day in San Fran more endearing. There is a rock labyrinth at the point which the kids spied, and made a dash for. You can walk through it in a couple of minutes, but Lola rather quickly lost interest and mozied on out to climb the rock wall next to her. Lincoln walked the whole thing, then walked it backwards, repositioning every stone that was even slightly out of place, leaving a far more beautiful and precise maze than the one he walked into. Shaun and I were swelling with pride watching our special little speed demon, who seemingly races around not noticing a thing, take so much time and effort perfecting a rock path he never broke to begin with. It’s like you unknowingly put your child in a box, and one day they climb right out that box and do something you didn’t think in their character at all. I love those days. Challenging what we think we ‘know’ about someone, about who we think they are. Lola has done it countless times on this trip too. Maybe it’s being so far away from what is ‘normal’ to them, maybe it’s just growing up and who they always were, but it is fascinating to watch them emerging as interesting, deep individuals, sometimes in the way you expected, and sometimes in the most beautifully unexpected ways.

 

I recently read some words of wisdom that I thought really applied to our family at the moment;

‘To love a person is to see all of their magic, and to remind them of it when they have forgotten’.

This journey, as incredible as it has been, has also been rather overwhelming at times. There have been hard days. There have been days where we haven’t all been wonderful people, and there have been times we have needed gentle reminding of who we are and why we are on this journey. Reminding each other of their magic has been more necessary on this adventure than ever before in our relationship. We’ve had to build each other up and bolster confidence. Sometimes we can’t see the wood for the trees, or beyond the obstacle right in front of us, but knowing we’ve got someone there to encourage us has shown a quiet strength and gentleness I’ve never noticed, or needed to see, until now. We have learned a lot about being the confident support for each other, even in the midst of our own fears and anxieties. It is something that arrived quite unexpectedly, and something I am immensely grateful for.

Jan 16
1
Standing in front of a Giant Redwood in Sequoia National Park

General Sherman… Sir!

By | Hikes, Our Travels, Parks | No Comments

I’ve always found the thought of saluting someone rather peculiar. It is not something I have ever done, nor something I intended doing. As both my father and Shaun can attest, men pulling rank just doesn’t sit well with me (although to be fair I don’t think Shaun would try). Then I stood before the General. So majestic, so stately, that I almost couldn’t help myself! My meager 31 years did nothing against his near 3 000, I practically felt a curtsy coming on.
Standing in a forest full of trees this size can really put your life in perspective. There is no doubt you see things differently, maybe not forever, but certainly while you are standing there. The world seems different, enchanted and full of magic. I almost expected to see fairies nestling amongst the fallen branches and frogs singing “We All Stand Together” in chorus. It’s like stepping into a different world, one in which we are so tiny and insignificant, nature shows you how resplendent and grandiose it can be when it feels like it.
The whole of Sequoia National Park, from the incredible Giant Forest and Moro Rock, to the heartbreakingly large tree stumps that could make you cry just imagining someone benumbed enough to cut them down, scream with magnificence.

 

Yosemite National Park is no exception. Although lacking the girth and height of Sequoia’s trees, it most certainly leaves you floored with its astonishing natural display. We were lucky enough to hike on both days we were there, we seem to be dragging warm African temperatures around with us, and this meant that the normally snow covered National Parks were little more than mildly icy with sporadic patches of dirty white snow. Screaming in unison with the National Parks, were Lincoln and Lola, although less with magnificence and more with delight. So happy were they to be allowed back on their bikes after 3 weeks in the snow, that anyone within a 2 km radius would have known the kids were on their bikes, and thrilled about it! We naughtily disobeyed ranger rules in favour of our sanity and let the children maraud down the almost empty tar track to one of the waterfalls, where we then took them bouldering up the riverbed to the waterfalls. Shaun loves to climb; I prefer to hop around anything I have to climb. Shaun loves to teach the children to climb; I prefer to rock myself quietly in a corner while he does it. My feet sweat, my heart thumps, and every time one of them stands up straight I yell at them to sit down. It is just better if I follow at a distance, and yes, let Shaun be a Dad. I feel like mothers are not welcome when their paranoia and needless hovering is more likely to get their children hurt than simply not being there. So this allowed me the opportunity to hang back and take some pics, the far less painful option.

The following day’s hike was up a somewhat steeper mountain. Great day, great mountain, not so great Lincoln. He decided this was the day to be grumpy and refuse to walk (ok, he’s only 3 I know, but really, of all days?!) so into the backpack he went. Roughly 6km’s, largely made up of tar path and stairs, alerts you to how America does things differently. If that trail were in South Africa, it would undoubtedly be dirt trail with markers pointing the way. Being in such incredible natural surroundings, yet having to walk on such a man made trail really detracts from the hike. It feels like it would be more authentic if you had to rough if up a little, rather than be constantly reminded of how many people had been there before you. It did lead up to an astonishingly high waterfall and no help would have made this one tough baby to climb, but a bit of natural trail wouldn’t have hurt either. There was Lincoln’s blood (he’s always falling) our sweat and Lola’s tears (she tried to climb the railing and someone other than us grabbed her – she doesn’t take kindly to strangers touching her). It was a great hike but man were we exhausted parents when we got to the bottom.

It was sad we didn’t have time to hike through the Giant Forest too and spend days lost in it’s size and fairy-tale ecosphere, but with time marching swiftly along we had to drag ourselves down possibly the twistiest road known to man, and into the dustbowl know as California.

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The California dustbowl Jan 2014

 

Saying California is in the middle of a drought would be the understatement of the year. We were gob smacked! I had it in my head that it would be green, lush, full of farms and chirping birds, land of milk and honey if you will. Granted it is the middle of winter, but ‘milk and honey’ notions aside, nothing could have prepared us for the barren land that awaited us. There were warnings on TV about the unhealthy air conditions, and as we descended into middle California we understood why.

Hundreds of kilometers of dry, desolate farms, windswept land you can see hadn’t been farmed or used for anything other than walking cattle across in years. Cattle ranches disturbing enough to make me consider becoming a vegetarian – almost, and then plane old nothing – just hills of dust. It was more than a relief to crest the rise that eventually gave way to dry vineyards, and finally the Californian coastline. Shaun and I had bets on as to who would see the sea first, it felt like we had been away from it for months, not weeks, and as we climbed out the car Lola smiled and said; “It smells like home”. It sure did. Man did that bring a tear to my eye. 12 500 km’s later and we were being rewarded with a beautiful reminder of home. It really was special – thank you California. xxx

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Our trip to date. October 2013 – January 2014

 

Jan 12
1
Lola and Lincoln on their first skiing trip Jan 2014

Polar Vortex vs. California Drought

By | Our Travels | No Comments

As most of North America was covered in more snow than they knew what to do with, those of us in the South West were left to ski on the last few snow flakes we could scrape into a pile. As Shaun found out, twigs and scruffy bushes on a ski run can be rather hazardous, and definitely don’t make a very soft landing. It was however, more snow than we are used to having in South Africa during December, so good fun all the same! As it turns out, South Africa is in the Southern Hemisphere and experiences the season of Summer over the December period, much to the surprise of the family we rented from. Africa is interestingly enough also made up of Countries, and not States, a strange concept for some oh-so-cool-Californian-folk to grasp. All that aside, we had a very awesome stay in Lake Tahoe!

It wasn’t a complete surprise, but watching a 3 year old learn to ski and a 30 year old learn to ski, is like watching two different sports. The one is performed with joy, excitement and a daredevil sense of speed. The other is performed with fear, shaky legs and wet clothes from constantly falling in the snow. I of course, was not that 30 year old. When I fell, I did it properly and found the only pile of mud at the bottom of the ski run, covering myself in brown sludge instead. It was however a blessing because if I didn’t meet the mud under the bunting at the bottom of the run, I would have had a very close encounter with an SUV in the parking lot a meter in front of me. This was done with all the skill of previously having ski’d of course. My incompetence when I learnt to ski 7 years ago will go unmentioned here.
Shaun on the other hand, dived back in like he’d been at it all his life. Rather annoying. I like to think I’m better at some sports than he is, so I insisted on 3 days of X-country skiing, which worked out fantastically! Turns out Shaun and I go a similar speed (yessss!) and it allowed the kids to get the feel of moving around on ski’s before sticking them at the top of a hill!  They took to it surprisingly quickly and we had a blast skiing through the beautiful forests around Lake Tahoe (before it all turned to sludge and ice).

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Then it was time to get the kids on ski’s… up a hill. Aside from the cost of hiring ski equipment and buying ski passes, there is the cost of lessons. For anyone who hasn’t done it, it is extortion! So after one too many shots of our Mexican tequila, we watched some online tutorials, and decided to teach them ourselves. They made it so easy for us (thank goodness). By the time we left they were skiing (with confidence) down the same slopes I was, they may have been in ‘snow-plough’ position and not parallel skiing, but they loved it, and their desire to do the bigger runs with Daddy blew my mind (you would understand this if you knew the Lola who left South Africa with us).
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Much to my surprise, we all managed to leave in tact, with only minor injuries. The kids most painful accidents were slipping on the ice as they hopped in and out the jacuzzi fetching ‘ice biscuits’ to eat while sitting in the hot water. Shaun left his ski’s half way up the slope a few times while he filled his jacket with snow and cuddled some bushes, but other than that was left no lasting memories. I on the other hand was given quite a beating. Not by the bushes, not by the slopes, not by my ski’s, but by the staircase I was doing some stretching on. Yes, my own stupidity I know. But it does still feel like the staircase opened a can of whip-ass on my shins. So other than a very mild side of pain, our skiing was very successful, despite the snow drought and pleasant temperatures the Sierra mountain range is experiencing.

 

It is sad that we had to leave all that behind us, but more because we had to face the reality of work again, and juggling our epic travels with something as tedious as earning money. Way to go real life.
But with a new year under our belts and some ideas on how to not let it get the better of us, we are diving into the second half of our travels with renewed energy and an appreciation of all we have back home. Man we miss Cape Town, and braai’s, and Woolies, and duvets, and real closets, and friends, and reasonably priced delicious wine, and and and …. !

Jan 07
1

Our ‘American-Style’ Christmas for One

By | Our Travels | No Comments

Ok, so one family, but still. When you’ve grown up as one of 6 kids and celebrated Christmas with no less than double that number, Christmas for 4 just feels mighty small. That said, it had to be done at some point. It’s not that I’m not used to playing Father Christmas, or preparing the big meal, it’s just that I’ve always grown up with the mentality – ‘the more the merrier’. My mother never turned anyone away for any meal, let alone Christmas. She made a concerted effort to invite anyone she thought might be alone, over for Christmas eve dinner or lunch, and somehow always made sure there was enough, no matter how short the notice was. There was always at least 1 of my 4 brothers picking food out the kitchen while a meal was being prepared (of which Shaun has now joined the ranks), and the delicious smells emanating out the kitchen in the build up to Christmas could make the most discerning food critic’s mouth water. We used to make cookies to hang on the tree, bake Christmas cakes, puddings and mince pies, and my favourite, ice the Christmas cake with the sweetest, whitest, most delicious icing I can remember!

Being just the 4 of us this year, it would have been a waste to over cater, and quite frankly, we can’t afford to waste right now, earning rands and spending dollars is physically painful. So we decided to only make what all of us would eat. The menu:
NO… turkey (too dry), NO brussel sprouts (too revolting), NO peas (Lola wont touch them unless they frozen), NO butternut (Lola won’t touch them full stop), NO salad (Shaun thinks it’s a useless excuse for food), NO ham (couldn’t find a normal size, only American sizing!), NO pumpkin pie (Shaun doesn’t approve of vegetables in his desert), NO Christmas pudding OR cake (fruit in cake is just not on!), NO mince pies (couldn’t find them anywhere)…
What we did manage was a super delicious roast chicken with roast potatoes, about 17 heads of broccoli (between Shaun and the kids I can’t seem to find enough in the store), cauliflower, honey carrots, and home-made chocolate brownies, with Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream for desert. Not a bad combination of foods for a Christmas lunch actually, and we tried our best to be American and over eat… which we did rather well too.

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The only thing missing in our ‘wintery wonderland’ Christmas… was snow! We came half way around the world, found a cabin in the mountains, and waited in anticipation for those first dazzling snow flakes to fall. Instead, unseasonably warm weather was hovering around the Sierra Nevada mountains, making our ‘white Christmas’ rather warmer and more colourful than we had expected. It was a win in that we didn’t freeze when we ventured out doors, but sad to not wake up to a snow covered land on Christmas morning. Being fairly high up in the mountains there was plenty of snow to be found up the road, just not on our doorstep, so our Christmas’y photo shoot happened in the snow park up the road, instead of our backyard.

 

After spending most of Christmas eve and Christmas morning on Skype chatting to friends and family (I should have called this a ‘Very Skype-y Christmas’) we weren’t left all that much time to feel lonely, I thank God everyday for who-ever invented Skype! I thought I was going to spend most of the day wishing we were in SA and pining for our family, but spending the day just the 4 of us, walking in the forest and playing around the house felt normal, and lovely. It wasn’t the big festive, crazy group with noise (ok the children did actually supply a good level of that), or witty banter with loved ones, but it was calm and sweet, and a chance for us to decide exactly how we wanted to spend our Christmas, make our own traditions and choose our own path. It was a good experience, despite my fears leading up to the season. That said, there is no replacement for wonderful friends and family around the table at Christmas time. We missed you all, each and every one of you.

As lovely as a quiet Christmas was, I can’t wait to have a big, noisy, raucous, sensory-overload style Christmas with as many friends and family as we can squeeze into one place! I guess no matter how many times I swear after another crazy Christmas, that we will be calm and keep it simple the next time round, I am always pulled back to ‘the more the merrier’. You couldn’t have set a better example for me growing up Mum, thank you! Here’s to Christmas 2014 – back to the crazy!! 🙂