Well that was a different Christmas.

We haven't really updated you about our activities since we arrived at The Canyon Roadhouse on the 23rd. And then, we took a blog holiday yesterday! We figured that none of you were going to be on the internet anyhow (yeah, right!) being that it was Christmas Day and all...so we took a break too.

So we'll kind of squeeze two days worth of activities in this one post!

First of all, dinner on Monday at the Canyon Roadhouse.

Is this not a great looking oryx steak dinner? And it tasted as good as it looked. I was stuffed!

We have been alternating lunches and dinners. In other words, we try and have a late lunch one day, and then a snack later, and then the next day we try and have as early a dinner as possible, without having a lunch. Breakfast has been included in our stays at the Gondwana Lodges, and so we always have a great breakfast. Eggs any way you want them, bacon, fresh fruit, yogurt. So then having a full lunch and a full dinner is just too much food!

So with all of that food, we still have to find a way to get some exercise, and it's not that easy when it gets so hot here. We try and do a morning walk.

There was a trail up into the hills. It's a strange landscape without much vegetation.

Some of the rocks are very strange.

We weren't gone long, but it was still a decent walk. We went back to the Canon Roadhouse to take some pictures of some of the artifacts lying around. The place is decorated like a "route 66" style garage with old car parts and stuff lying around. It's a kind of a fun motif, and we'll tell you more about it in another post.

Old truck with a tree growing out of it!

We played a few rounds of cribbage while sat around the pool in the afternoon. Ruth won one, and I won two which is surprising because usually Ruth is luckier with cribbage!

Christmas Day started with us going for a drive after breakfast! There was a self drive 4x4 safari and so we figured we go do the whole 27 km route. We were doing not bad with our little SUV style "all wheel drive" vehicle, but it was such slow going. We had done 5 kms in the first hour! So we simpy turned around and went back. Didn't see any animals, but the scenery was different...

Us, out on a 4x4 safari. Didn't make it that far!

And then, we did the 20 km or so drive from Canyon Roadhouse to Canyon Lodge. We had read a lot about the design of the chalets at the Canyon Lodge, so we were excited that we were going to be staying there, even if only for one night.

Great scenery close to the Canyon Lodge.

We got there fairly early and so our room wasn't quite ready yet. No worries, they made us a coffee and tea and we sat outside for a while. Then, we took a little hike up to their sundowner viewpoint. The rocks are really neat and it's the perfect habitat for the rock dassie.

What's a rock dassie, you ask?

We actually spotted a family of rock dassies. They were pretty far away so this is the best you get. They're something like guinea pigs.

Us, enjoying the view.

Now, as I said, they have some interesting chalet designs at Canyon Lodge. We'll show you more pics another day, but I simply have to give you a little preview. The chalets are all built into the surrounding boulders. Literally!

Our chalet, built into the rocks. You can see Ruth sitting on the front porch!

Now like I said, this place in built into the rocks. More pics later (and maybe even a video!) but here's our facilities...

Don't bump your head on the rocks! Very cool.

It was another baking hot day. So we figured some more relax time by the pool was warranted. The pool is really neat too!

We missed our family, but this was not a bad way to spend Christmas Day!

We met a couple of guys by the pool. Noticed they had North American accents and asked where they were from. Both have lived in New York City, although one is now living in Cape Town. Got along fine, and even had dinner with them later in the evening. Hope to see them both again, since we are headed for Cape Town next week, and then New York City again in March.

Well, that's another Christmas gone. We wonder where we'll be next year at this time. Would be great to spend another Christmas with all of our family, especially now that grandkids are getting old enough to enjoy the experience. Maybe we can talk everybody into meeting up somewhere warm. Would sure be better than us heading back to Canada for a couple of weeks! I guess we'll see.