Weekend in Graaff-Reinet with with Freewalkers!

You may have heard me talk about the Freewalkers previously but I feel like I need to explain who they are and what they're about a bit more! The Freewalkers are a group led by founders Murray and Jordy. Murray grew up on a farm in a small town in South Africa. Jordy is actually from Illinois and came to South Africa to continue her studies in college. Long story short they both met while volunteering and began dating. They came up with the idea of Freewalkers for people who enjoy volunteering with an added South African adventure experiencing all South Africa has to offer. They're website is very informative, so I strongly encourage everyone check it out! (www.freewalker.co.za)

Our adventure began Friday right after school! Murray came to pick us up at our apartment at about 14:30 (2:30), we went to pick up the girls from the UK we invited that teach with us and headed west into South Africa to Graaff-Reinet. Graaff-Reinet is a small town that makes you feel like you have gone back in time. Its beautiful, full of history and the only town in South Africa completely surrounded by a game reserve. The drive was a beautiful 2.5 hour drive through the mountains, farms, and in the middle of nowhere.

Nicole, Liz, and I's room.

We arrived at Murray's sisters house/inn she owns called King Fischer Lodge which were absolutely beautiful! There were about seven little guest rooms all connected to the house and kitchen separated by a pool and patio in the middle.

 As soon as we arrived Murray's sister Pips, her friend, Jordy and three other volunteers were there waiting to greet us with drinks and snacks. We chatted and introduced ourselves to the other volunteers which included one American student from Oregon, Austrailain student, and a student from Germany taking a year off to travel and learn English.

All of us enjoying the drinks, snacks, and conversations!

The beautiful views of King Fischer from our room.

 All 10 of us girls!

At about 5'o'clock or so we all got cleaned up and headed through Camdeboo national park up into the mountains to the valley of desolation. We walked around, took lots of pictures, and ended on some gorgeous cliffs where we watched the sunset go down over the valley of desolation. Jordy and Murray brought up two bottles of champaign for all 10 of us girls to toast with at sunset. As you can see, Nicole and I had fun trying to pop the bottle.

Me taking a photo of the "Brit" girls (Shannon and Rachel) :)

looking over Graaff-Reinet

   Nicole and I struggling to pop the champagne

 As you can see we had LOTS of opportunities for GREAT photos up on the mountain looking over the Valley of Desolation!

Click on any photo to see it bigger!

After getting a ton of great photos over the Valley of Desolation, it was time to go to the Gentleman's Club for food and drinks! The Gentleman's Club is like a country club where farmers used to stop by to get a drink back in the day and leave their poor wives in the car because women were not allowed in. Now days women are allowed in and the older farmers loved us 10 beautiful girls! We all ordered our food as soon as we got there and waited at the bar area with all of the farmers talking about where we were all from and why we came all the way to South Africa! Everyone was very nice and welcomed us to their small town.

Left: Some of us girls talking to the farmers

 shot glasses=shotgun shells

One big fun dinner party!

Since there were 15 of us eating dinner it took almost an hour for it to be ready. It didn't help that almost everyone of us ordered the meat trio platter which served up filets of ostrich, springbok, and steak. Nicole and I split one because there was no way we could eat one of those each to ourselves!

Our meat trio!

After dinner a couple of us went to a little pub called JJ's and Murray's sister tried setting us up with some South African men as dance partners and us US girls were not ready for that! They kindly approached us and asked us to dance, with Pips okay we went on to the small dance floor and tried to follow their FAST moving feet! Even though the gentlemen kept reminding us "Follow me!" "Follow me," us American girls couldn't keep up! We sweat off our meal trying to keep up with them and Pips took us home just a little after that! Whew what a Friday!

We woke up around 9:00 Saturday morning knowing we would have a long day today! We were in the car and ready to go at 9:30 and headed off to an even smaller town called New Bethesda. Once again we drove through the most beautiful scenery in and around the mountains. Once we got to New Bethesda we slowly drove through the townships.












The townships are the poorest areas outside of every down and sadly what most people picture when they think of South Africa. Some houses in the townships are built by the government and most are built out of steel sheets and bricks. It was a sad but happy feeling driving through them; sad because its disheartening to see that people live that way but happy because everyone in the townships is so happy and smiling. There were tons of children standing outside their houses waving at us, they loved the attention.

We left the township and drove to the other side of the valley where we walked around the old fashion town (more photo ops).

Swazy (Jordy & Murray's dog) sitting on my lap driving through the townships

South African beetles

 All of us girls walking through New Bethesda streets

 being goofy as always!

 

Jordy and Murray's dog Swazy following them over!

We took a donkey ride across a river to The Brewery where we would be eating lunch. The Brewery is owned by a man Murray knows, the man used to live in the city and work in the corporate world until he realized he did not want his kids to grow up in a place where they couldn't run and play free so he quit his job and moved to what I would call the smallest town ever and open up his little restaurant called The Brewery.

Murray pouring us some honey wheat beer

the entrance into The Brewery

The Brewery serves meat and cheese boards as well as fresh brewed beers. He makes everything from scratch using the animals, grass, and crops on his small farm to make every single product. He produces feta cheeses, hard cheeses, Kudu salami, fresh bread, fresh olives, pickles, and spices as well as home brewed ginger beer and honey wheat beer.

 jumping on the trampoline waiting for our food!

 inside The Brewery

 had to take this for Joey's dad :) Hand painted steins

Bottom Right: getting our beers!


Bottom Left: all us girls checking out the three meat and cheese boards just served to us! YUM! 

 

one of three meat, cheese, and bread boards!

There were twelve of us girls sitting on three picnic benches and out comes three HUGE meat and cheese boards! Holy Food!!

Some of the girls waiting for our food and hanging out the Swazy (the dog) as she hangs out on the table!

After our delicious meal we realized what was hanging out above our heads in the trees!! South Afriican grasshoppers! These things are HUGE!! The size of a mouse in America! GROSSS!!

 me jumping into the damn

After stuffing our faces with meat and cheeses we headed back to King Fischer Lodge to change into our bathing suits and head our for a boat cruise on the dam. The boat cruise was a giant pontoon boat on choppy dam water. This sounds gross but the water was dirty as the Ohio river. When it was time to jump in everyone hesitated because the water was pretty choppy and dirty but Murray kept challenging people to jump in and make the biggest splash possible and I couldn't pass on a challenge! The Australian girl jumped first, then Jordy, then Murray, then myself, and last but not least Nicole! It definitely wasn't Lake Norris water where you can see you feet, but we had a lot of fun treading water.

some of us girls enjoying the sun

 all of the girls and our ship captain Steve (I called him Scuba Steve)

After our super fun and relaxing boat ride we headed back to our home at King Fischer and took showers to get ready to eat again at Miemie's Kitchen.

Miemie's Kitchen is sponsored by the Freewalkers. Miemie and her husband Richard used to work on Murray's farm and when his family lost the farm they moved to the townships looking for ways to support their family. The Freewalkers built tables, covers, and a little cooking area in Miemie's backyard at her house in the townships. Any chance the Freewalkers can they bring people to Miemies kitchen to help support her and her family as well as spread the word and advertise Miemie's delicious food!  

 the country club/golf course

We showered up and stopped at the local country club to pick up Murray's sister and some friends then headed to Miemies right down the road. 

Miemie and Richard baking bread like champs!

We arrived at Miemies and the smells coming from that backyard were amazing! Jordy introduced us to her and Richard and we began watching and helping them make homemade bread and carry things for her. Miemie was cooking a stew like meal in a large black kettle and baking homemade bread on the grill. Murray was teasing me saying I needed to keep my Italian eyes on the bread to make sure it was cooked enough and not burnt. 

 me trying to keep the bread from burning!

 Our mouths started watering and it was finally time to serve up the food! Murray and his cousin Mark served up the food on all of our plates. We all took our seats at the picnic tables and began to stuff our faces! Shannon (one of the "Brit" girls) literally stuffed her face because she randomly decided she didn't feel like using utensils and made it a personal challenge to eat her entire plate without them.

 (from left to right: Rachel (from UK), Katharine (from Alabama), and Shannon (from UK) eating her meal with no utensils)

 Emily (from Alabama) and I eating with our utensils :)

  

 my huge plate of food!

After our bellies were full for the second time today we cleaned up and began dancing off our meals! Jordy and Pips began showing us girls some African dance moves and after awhile Miemie stepped in to show us girls the ropes! Miemie was so sweet and happy to have us all there! After a good half hour of dancing Miemie came out with bowls filled with a rich caramel custard dessert served with fresh creme. It was so rich and delicious, almost too rich to finish after the full meal we had but I scraped my bowl just like everyone else. After rounds of food and dancing Miemie ended the evening with a big thank you to everyone and handed out personal thank you cards with hand-written personal messages on the back to each one of us. It was such a sweet gesture I almost teared up thinking about how we made her night by just coming to eat in her kitchen and support her business. We all hugged Miemie, wrote our thank yous in her personal thank you book, and packed back up into the vans and headed back to King Fischer. 

Everyone trying out South African dance moves.. keyword TRYING ;)

 all of us girls after stuffing our faces!

 Shannon and Miemie's grandson became best friends by the end of the night! 

 Murray tapping the eggs. 

        You'd think our weekend would be over with by now but we still had Sunday left! We woke up around 10 Sunday morning and all sat around the pool talking about how much fun we have all had this weekend when Murray comes over to Nicole and plops a HUGE egg into her lap! He tells her to feel how heavy it is then tells us it is going to be our breakfast! It was an egg the size of our heads and he said the egg inside was equivalent to 24 chicken eggs! He ended up telling us it was an ostrich egg and that we would be eating two for all 10 girls for our breakfast! He began showing us how to crack them by tapping them with a spoon until a hole forms on each side then blowing the egg out the bottom hole by blowing the top hole. After tapping holes in each of the eggs Nicole and another girl blew out the egg inside and it was time to cook some breakfast! We ate ostrich omelets, toast, and sausages! It was delicious!

                                                                                          

 Nicole blowing out the egg

Our breakfast!!

 Nicole, Emily, and I enjoying breakfast in the kitchen/dining area!

 Graaff-Reinet Museum

 After breakfast Murray took us to his great Grandfathers house which is now turned into a town museum. It's called Graaff-Reinet Museum and you can walk around and see all of the history of the city and history of the house. We walked around and took some pictures, climbed an Australian tree that was in the middle of the backyard, and got an old fashion water mill to work!

Liz, Katharine, Nicole, and I sitting under wine vines

 backyard of the museum

 

After the museum it was finally time to go home. On the 2.5 hr drive home we stopped at a cheetah farm where they breed spotted cats, lions, and other endangered species. They had mere-cats, cheetahs, baby lion cubs (which were not baby size at all), and leopards. We actually got to go into the huge cage where one of the female cheetahs was and pet her. We took lots of photos with the cheetah and got face to face with a leopard! It was really cool to pet and get eye to eye with animals you only see far away at the zoo's at home. The cheetahs fur was really dry and scratchy kind of like my old malamute dog. It was interesting to see the animals so closeup.

The trainer with the leopard

The female leopard close up !

After the cheetah museum we finished our drive home and not long after we got home we walked to the grocery to stock up for the week and not long after that we all passed out in bed! What a long weekend! I stayed up a little later than everyone else and skyped my family (which I had not done for over a week). My family had a family dinner with my sisters, Grandma, mom, dad, Joey, and my dog Halle so this way I got to see and talk to everyone in one skype session! It was a great way to end my weekend!