Tuesday 25 March 2014

WOYWW - From South Africa with Love!

Well, I have been away from my trusty craft desk for a couple of weeks enjoying a fabulous holiday in the stunningly beautiful Western Cape Province of South Africa !!

We had a wonderful time and saw some of the beautiful sights - and had a lovely Sunday craft session with Bella in her amazing craft room !

Here are some of the amazing views we enjoyed !

Here is the view of Table Mountain and the city of Cape Town from Robben Island.
On our visit to Robben Island we were privileged to have a 121 tour with a former prisoner at the gaol who gave us a moving insight into his life there & took us to see Nelson Mandela's cell and the lime quarry where the prisoners laboured each day.

Ironically for such a famous prison island, it has some beautiful parts including the coastline & the views across to the mainland are stunning as you can see.

Equally when we ventured up to the top of Table Mountain on the cable car the views over the city were amazing too ! 
It was like being perched on top of the world - at the bottom of the world ! 
Next stop Antarctica !


Being a garden lover, I couldn't miss the opportunity to visit the world famous Botanical Gardens at Kirstenbosch - they call it "the most beautiful garden in Africa" and having visited I would say you would be hard pushed to disagree ! 

And a major highlight of our trip was visiting the Penguin colony which lives on Boulder's Beach on the Cape Peninsula - we were amazed to see them so close up and to find out they live in burrows in the sand ! 
They were so very cute !! 

Another great part of the holiday was meeting up with Bella once more - we all had lunch on the V&A Waterfront where we were staying - which has a great fun vibe whatever time of day to visit ! 

 Then Bella invited us back to her house for the men-folk to watch football on the telly whilst we had some brilliant fun in Bella's amazing craft room !
Here's Bella working on the Finnabair canvass we made together ...
  Sadly our time was all too short - and now we are tying to work out if we can set up some Skype along crafty sessions !!
Bella gave me some wonderful gifts - here they are on my workdesk back in Wales ready & waiting for me to work on the next project !


And finally here are some South African stencils I hope to use when I get round to scrapbooking our trip - I just have to work out which of the 1,056 photos we took will make it to the scrap layouts !!

Have a great crafty week !!  Ali xx

21 comments:

  1. Wow, it looks amazing! I'm sure such a fabulous trip will give you enough craft ideas for years to come!

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  2. Hello, Alison (& Richard). A great write-up. It was good to be included in your coffee date with Bella at Kalk Bay- I could tell the two of you would chat and craft up a storm!

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    1. Hi Jennifer, Lovely to meet you too - sounds like you had a great time with Tim ! Do you have a blog yourself ?
      Take care Ali x

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  3. Great looking desk and goodies from Bella! I love all the pictures and wish I could go to Australia or South Africa someday! Thanks for sharing and I hope you have a crafty week! Vickie #49

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  4. Welcome home! Sl glad to see you had such an amazing time...the pics are beautiful. Especially the one of the penguins on the beach :-) How lovely to meet up with Bella again and do come serious crafting!!
    Hugs, LLJ 27 xx

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  5. What an amazing trip you had with so many interesting visits and crafting too! Those penguins are so cute.
    Great photos to remember your wonderful experience.
    Jo x

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  6. The penguins where so cute.. Glad you had a lovely time crafting and catching up with friends.. My kind of souvenirs you brought back with you..
    Happy WOYWW
    Sandy #25

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  7. What great photos. It looks like you had a lovely trip. And how fun to have met up with a crafting buddy!

    Happy Woyww,

    Sandy #10

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  8. Happy WOYWW... Love Bella's desk full of craftyness. See you next week.
    hugs,
    Kimmer #91... last , but not least AGAIN.. LOL

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  9. How wonderful to get to meet and play with Bella in such a BEAUTIFUL country! Your pictures make me want to get my bags packed and head out NOW! LOL
    Happy WOYWW
    Krisha #12

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  10. Happy Belated WOYWW. What a wonderful holiday. I would love to go to South Africa. Such beautiful colours and light. You will be scrapbooking for ever! Ali x. #42.

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  11. Such a gorgeous place to visit and how wonderful that you got to meet Bella. Sounds like the perfect holiday. I love those stencils, the flowers look beautiful.
    Have a great week,
    Von #23

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  12. That looks like the perfect trip Ali, stunning scenery, good chats with crafty friends, can't beat it.
    Welcome home and don't forget to share more photos.
    Ann B

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  13. We had no internet yesterday as Luke had used it up watching Youtube vids! I missed participating, but it is great to see your post about your trip. Only 1056 photos in 2 ten days? That is impressive! Can't wait to see your posts with the pics you took. Jen does not have a blog sadly, but she does visit and comment on ours.

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  14. Looks like you had a super time, adore your seahorse stencil. Thanks for the visit yesterday BJ#70

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  15. Hello Ali, thanks for stopping by my nest, and thanks for sharing you fantastic holiday, fantastic views, your personal workshop looked like some big fun, those stencils are just fabulous, can't wait to see what you create with them, the photo's are wonderful especially the penguins, have a wonderful weekend,,,,

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  16. Welcome home Ali, what a fab fab trip you must have had..the pics are just amazing. And of course, dead jealous of your time with that lovely Bella...and then..you brought home some lovely goodies too! Am happy for you, and therefore only a little green eyed!

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  17. Fabulous goodies on your desk and a fabulous vacation too! Thank you for visiting my WOYWW blog post! ~ Sandy #82

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  18. Looks like you had a great time. Enjoy the new stash ;)
    xoxo Siooux

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  19. Awesome things and a fantastic holiday by the sounds of things. I want in on those Skype craft sessions when you get it sorted! Sounds like great fun.
    Happy very belated WOYWW!
    Tertia #67

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  20. Hi Ali, a late week visit from me as promised and thank you for your visit and lovely comments. Wow, amazing photos of SA, glad you had a fab time. Lucky to visit with Bella too. Cheers and hope you enjoyed your weekend RobynO
    #77

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