The very brief holiday report

Today, I am taking what has now become a bit of a traditional day. Just after we return from holiday and before I go to work, I leave the kids with Lucy, take the car for a good clean and polish, and take some time for myself. I just saw Spud - it was brilliant, and now I am sitting at the Mugg and Bean, doing this post and attempting to catch up on some blog reading.

I am definitely going to do a whole series of blogposts about our holiday, but to summarize, in terms of time and distance travelled:

• On the 17th of December we left in our bakkie for the little town of Mtunzini in the North coast of Natal. On the way we  met Dr Ian Player, a dream of Hunter, and we pitched camp after 10 the evening. The kids were total troopers in our little adventure. (566 km / 352 miles)
• We spent a lovely couple of days there filled with sunshine, friendly people and the sea, the sea...
• On the late afternoon of the 23rd of December we traveled back to Pretoria to be home for Christmas Eve. We celebrated with a snoek braai with my mom. On Christmas day we had my cousin Ananda and her 3 grown children over for lunch. This year I made my gammon the German way - in beer. It was good.
• On the 25th we once again packed the car, including the two puppies and left for a farm outside the little town of Bethulie.(681km / 423 miles) where we spent a lovely evening and morning.
• On the 26th we left the farm and traveled to Port Elizabeth, Hunter's home town ( 454 km / 282 miles).
• We spent some great time visiting with friends and family and got the chance to see Hunter's great grandfather - now 90 and not well at all. 
• Hunter also drove my mom down to Groot Brak rivier (she flew to PE) - another 750 km /466 miles trip.
• On the 31st of December we headed out to friends of us on a farm near Kirkwood and on return visited Hunters aunt in Uitenhage. (144 m / 90 miles)
• On the 1st of January we returned to a very wet Bethulie (on another farm) and back home on the 2nd in heavy rain an traffic.

In total, we traveled 3546 km (2203 miles), all of them with 3 small kids, and most with two dogs as well. Hunter's tally for the holiday sits at 4296 km (2670 miles). These are very conservative calculations and do not include the little side tips and roads less traveled that we love to take.

In all honesty, both the kids and the dogs were troupers-and I think I can now classify us all good travelers. Or as Hunter and I love to call ourselves - adventurous travelers or traveling adventurers. I guess as he kids grow up the adventures will grow too.