Hello from Africa!  We finally managed to pull ourselves away from St. Lucia after a week on the beach-swimming and snorkeling.  We made our way to a Zulu town called Eshowe.  We had a short stay there but while we were there we visited their museum and went for several hikes. The first hike led us to their tree top boardwalk which was 10 m in the air.  The following day, we hiked to a series of waterfalls that were well hidden from the town.  At the last fall which was about 10 m tall, we were able to climb under and freeze while we were pelted by the water.  The highlight of Eshowe was that the hostel was attached to a microbrewery that made a dark beer! South Africans do not like darks, so we were pleasantly surprised.  Coincidentally, the hostel was celebrated its 10th anniversary and beer was free the whole time we were there.  Needless to say, it was hard getting up in the mornings there.   Next we were off to Durban.  The pull of Durban was what kept us going in Lesotho.  It's always 25+ degrees so we knew that we would like the place. Although it's a city of 3M people, it's relatively safe, especially compared to Jo'burg and Cape Town.  Durban has a large Indian population and we ventured several times to their quarter for cheap and delicious Indian food.  After we visited the markets to buy fresh curry spices and seafood.  Strangely enough, SA is surrounded by ocean but it's nearly impossible to buy fresh seafood except in Durban.  We bought two thick tuna steaks and a huge bagful of prawns for 40 R total (6$) and grilled them up on the braai (aka bbq). Yum!  Durban is a cool city and it was just fun to be caught up in the rush of city life again.  It has wonderful art deco buildings everywhere but unfortunately we left our cameras at the hostel to avoid losing them to tsotsis (thieves).  Our last day in Durban, we headed to the horse race track.  The day we arrived, we went down to enquire into if they had any races that day, which they didn't but instead they had their 2nd biggest race of the year on Saturday.  They gave us free tix into the track and gave us lessons on how to bet.  The guy even gave us his insiders picks on who to bet on! We even won 3 races, but since we were making wimp bets (6R-1$) we didn't win much.  But it was a lot of fun as we got dressed up as best as we could, Michaela with her floppy hat and I even had a nice Montecristo cigar to add to my style.   We set off to the Transkei, the old Homeland for the Xhosa people.  During the apartheid era, the government established a province to ghettoize the blacks into a rural and underdeveloped area.  This part of SA reminded us a lot of Lesotho as there wasn't really any towns, but scatterings of huts and farms on top of tall hills (the area looked a lot like Lesotho except the mountain tops were lopped off).  People here are extremely poor.  We stayed along the coast in a place called Coffee Bay.  We were attracted to this place by its name and our hopes of drinking good coffee and not instant Chicory/coffee mix. Fortunately, the hostel had good brew but none of it is actually grown locally.  This was a laid back place. In fact, the only white people there are hippies running the hostels.  The area is also known as the Wild Coast as there is a ban on any developement along the coast to keep it wild.  It was refreshing especially after Durban to be in a relaxed atmosphere.  While in CB, we hiked to the Hole-In-the-Wall, 3 hours there and 3 back. It was a challenging hike, up and down hills, along the beach, through farmland. The whole time we were accompanied by a dog named Puppy, who was our night watchdog.  The Hole-In-the-Wall itself was extraordinary. We arrived during hightide and the force of the water through the hole was amazing. We ended up having to walk the whole way back to the hostel as well. A 2-hour massage the next day was never more deserved! Especially when it only cost 300R ($50). will write more later. jcs