I’m glad to be back.  My first day back at work has been extremely productive…..and now I have managed to find some time to actually post a blog.

Feels like a month on holiday although it was only a 4 day official leave …I really scored 9 days continuous leave…ahhhh!

First off it was packing up on Thursday evening – then we finally hit the road at about 330pm on Friday afternoon.  So strange to be travelling with my Angel Girl and not Jaded Son….anyhoo…with granny and Pretty neice travelling in their own car, I managed to do a detour through Stellenbosch before reaching Somerset West!! and face the back up of traffic, of which, by my guess, only about 5 cars were headed over the mountain, the others looked like they were heading home to Somerset West.  By this time I had the “are we there yet?”  question repeated about 10 times already……

We arrived in Napier after a beautiful journey through the mountains and rolling hills…and only another 20 “are we there yet’s” just in time as Angel girl needed a number 1 and a number 2 desparately!!  We offloaded the kids and granny went to take a peek in on then-preggy (now popped) SIL while I had a glass of wine with my fave darling youngest SIL and her lovely partner.  Good by to the kids and then we were off….

After a brief on directions from SIL’S I followed granny in here little bright yellow car, and we drove into the dark night another 60 kms across the countryside, now I ask you how cool a MIL is she?  With all the detours in Hermanus I was very surprised when we found our way out!  While driving I glanced up and noticed an eerily beautiful half-moon.

We arrived at the Western Cape Arabella Spa in Kleinmond around 8.45pm, and from the look on granny’s face not a moment too soon….we got to our room and all she said was I need that glass of wine now!  Luckily I had brought a good bottle of wine with me

While waiting for room service we ventured out onto the patio – we jumped up and down a squealed like two teenagers…..what a beautiful view at night with the “blue” pool lighting, unfortunately none of my shots came out (too dark) so here is a shot taken the next morning…

Next on the menu was food……..we decided on room service as we were travel-weary and just because we could!!!  granny said don’t worry if you not sure if you want dessert, just order the main and we can get dessert at our leisure…that’s what I call living the life!  So we ordered up some melt-in-mouth grilled steaks with sauteed potatoes and veg…just thinking about it now makes my mouth water……Divine….AND then we ordered up some dessert to die for!

We ended the night by having a divine shower and watching that ridiculous “Scary movie” on satellite before drifting off to sleep……..

Well it’s off home for me now…got to collect the rest of my antibiotics, and then it’s prep for Aqua and off for a 45min session there……..

By the way for those of you interested in the progress on “Eat for life” challenge – the scale at Walk for Life was a bit off, sadly….according to my last jubilation at cracking the 100kg mark…..but I weighed in at the doc on Friday at 101.1 kg which means a 2.1kg weight loss over a period of 1 month (including all my extra treats at Arabella)…so progress is slow, but steady…..and it is weight I will never see again hooray!!!

For those of you sticking with it….keep it up, you will get to your goal!!

Saturday

Although embedded in the most comfortable bed, bedding and pillows the first night in a strange bed is difficult.  After a night of tossing and turning,  getting too hot and then too cold, which was interrupted by the blo0dy airconditioner, which I am not used to.  For the life of me I could not find the f@cking OFF switch in the middle of the night, not wanting to wake granny I stumbled about in the dark pressing all the switches I could find with no luck.

For some reason we woman feel that we are different from our male counterparts in that we are not designed to fart.   I was paranoid that I should not fart in front of granny!!  Crazy hey?  Also perish the thought of making a number two in closely shared quarters, no matter the luxurious bidet (which I actually used for the first time, albeit back to front!! LOL!)  —aside:  no matter who you are – we all have to take a dump sometime – “a dump” the great leveller

Neurosis aside, on waking, granny so graciously made us some coffee (we discovered the kettle hidden in the bottom cupboard)

All things considered, she appears to be a cheerful early morning person, unlike myself who takes at least an hour to register that I am conscious.  We sat on the patio and had our coffee and smokes…

….then realised we only had an hour in which to consume our breakfast before heading off to the spa for our African Rain forest experience (see link to granny’s hilarious post on this)

We showered and dressed and headed off to the Jamani restaurant down a flight of stairs.  We found our place and lo and behold as we sat down at the table I spotted a hair in the milk!!!  After piling up on a great selection of Muesli, yoghurt and fruit – just to try and start off on a good fooding…(pun intended)  I decided “bugger it” and added a Biltong omellette with mushrooms, smoked chicken an cheese with a slice of the “to be avoided at all costs”  Bacon … into the mix followed by a delicious cup of filter coffee — when the bill came for me to sign (even though it was included in the package) my eyes nearly fell out of there sockets….there is NO WAY someone could even eat R180 worth of food in one sitting  — including all the fancy norwegian fish ‘n all!!  Two breakfasts R360.00 wapaaa!

Back up to change into our white robes and complimentary slippers…first we checked as to the dress protocol at the Spa and were told nudity was optional, but we could put our bathing costumes under our fine white, thick towelling gowns (which by the way as granny mentioned weighed a ton!)….see here for granny’s take on the African Rain Forest Experience.

Of the 15 steps my favourite was the Step no. 1 The Body scrub (although it was quite intense) my skin felt soooo smooth afterwards.

When granny wet her costume in the warm shower after the Body scrub she took it all off!!  and went in towel alone, so to prove my solidarity I did the same — of course “A” our male therapist (or torturer as granny would have it) for the day was quite fine with that.  Now how is that for daring and courageous.

In towels alone, the Step no. 2 The Mosaic water splashing thingie was quite fun, as we had to splash each other wet from head to toe,

in preparation for the Steam room, which was Step no. 3 I thought I could not breathe, but then once I got used to the steam it was just sweat, sweat, sweat….with a little respite and some lemon water then back in and sweat, sweat, sweat.   From Step no. 4 (first of) the Cold shower (to detox of course and close the pores), things got a bit hairy (in more than one sense of the word) OMF!!  what a “bracing” shower –with a few OMF@CKS!  and choice expletives, although we were given permission to swear, I am not sure A expected what came out of our mouthers……the b@stard made us stay under for 2 minutes instead of 1….

Then onto Step no. 5 The Dry Heat Sauna — also breathtaking (in the literal sense of the word!), then another Step no. 6 Cold effing Shower then back into the Step no. 7 Dry Heat Sauna with white hot cement sprinkled with some Lemon Grass aromatherapy oil to calm our nerves….I had to lie down to try and breathe (you know that hot air rises, cold air sinks theory — it works!)….then yet another Step no. 7  Cold double effing Shower….. I lost track after this,  sure that one’s mental capacity diminishes after taking so many cold showers…I do remember the White Pebble timed “cold” & “hot” reflexology which had to be repeated 3 x .

The Rain aka Deluge beds on which I feared I would expire by drowning while lying on my back on the white marble slab covered only by a flimsy/ form showing sheet;   at the first shower/ deluge I got water up my nose, in my ears and every conceivable hole in my head….then I shifted up on the bed with a facecloth over my face — this was akin to a water massage – lying on my stomach is also not my most fave position, but I enjoyed the water massaging my back….

After which it was the Cream room to moisturise and put our gowns and slippers on — then to the Candle room to lie quietly and get over the trauma!!  _  What is the purpose of having individual Mirrors mounted on the ceiling above each Candle bed I wonder….. do people look up at themselves feeling detoxed?!! Or convince themselves that they are now calm and healthy??  We skipped the health tea and skedaddled back to our room for a re-tox.

Gosh!  I have been at it now for ages…..got to go, will continue with the next part soon….enjoy your day!