Final post!

Comfortable flight on a Delta B777-200, actually slept for 4 hours or so, total flying time from Jo-burg to Atlanta about 17 hours. Watched two movies I have been wanting to see: Precious and Blindside. Mostly now just watching the flight map and marveling at our path. We are now just off the Atlantic continental slope approaching Georgia from the southeast. Altitude 36,999 ft. with a ground speed of 454 MPH and a head wind of 100 MPH (which is why this westbound flight is taking longer than the eastbound flight). Time to destination is 1 hour and 38 minutes and it is now 5:16 A.M. Have already set my watch back. Time now in Cape Town is 12:16 P.M. and the volunteers are probably almost ready to head back to CCS. Mrs. A’s morning story-telling during the assembly (acted out by her pupils) in the school’s inner courtyard is long over and I will write and tell her that I was thinking of her during that time. We have traveled 7535 miles so far and the best part is that North America is on the screen, with the Appalachian Mountains printed in bright bold red letters trending in a northeasterly direction. I wonder how many thru-hikers are already making their way north from Springer…Breakfast is coming…

Now we are over the continental shelf, even closer to the USA. Should be making landfall soon, between Savannah and Charleston. I am excited to be coming home and know I will need to do a fair amount of catching up on events I missed, both local and national. I dearly hope that some decent sort of health care bill will be passed soon. Glad to be coming home to a land where the president has only one wife instead of three or four or five and two children instead of twenty. Sure hope Obama stays as squeaky clean as he is – we need that kind of leadership. And I am happy to come home to a land where crime is way more under control. Many of us don’t realize how lucky we are to live in the USA!

Truth is I never felt as if I was that far away (one third of the way around the world) because South Africa, and especially its cities, is indeed not a third world country. There are shopping centers, big store chains (Woolworth’s -no relation to our old five and dimes- Ackerman’s, Betterman’s), huge grocery chains (Pick’N Pay is everywhere), world class restaurants, fast-food chains – some of them unique to that part of the world, as well as the American imports. Probably won’t have reverse culture shock this time around. Tanzania and its pot-holed red dirt roads and roadside dukas felt so much farther from my world – even though, geographically, it was probably closer.

I had a wonderful time since I’ve been gone since mid-January with several groups of wonderful people, first the OAT group with whom Renee and I traveled and then the CCS groups, both mine and the one which came recently. And I enjoyed meeting and working with the CCS staff – office, security, drivers and kitchen and house staff. Each of them enriched my experience. The professionals at Blossom Street Primary School were most gracious, as were all the South Africans I met – those who befriended me when I needed a ride or directions – and those who helped me explore, like Clem and Dot on Table Mountain and also Ian and Mark, the OAT tour directors, and many others.

Woody will be enroute from Manchester, NH to Baltimore, MD this morning to pick up our car and then come for me at the Richmond airport by noon or 1 P.M. Hazel has been the subject of his attention this winter. Let’s see if maybe the two of us can stay home together at Wintergreen for awhile!

Yes! The map now shows we are flying over the USA!