My first week at Outward Bound SA

Sit back, make a cup of hot chocolate and grab an orange cause this is quite the lengthy blog post!

I cannot believe that I've already been at my project for a week! It's been super busy here at Willow Point - Outward Bound's main base, based in Sedgefield in the Western Cape. I'm so glad I've been keeping a diary to remember what we've been doing each day, as I honestly feel like I've been here for months.

Last Sunday me and Scott flew from Johannesburg to George, which is roughly the length of the the UK. We were met at the airport by Emily, who's the area manager for OB and has worked here for three years. She showed us around the centre and introduced us to the other instructors. Everyone here is so welcoming and friendly that any nerves that I had or didn't even realise I had were soon completely gone. I also found out that the staff here love nothing more than a game of Uno to relax after a busy day, "It's not personal, it's just a game" is often heard while we play.

Whenever we're here at Wilow Point, I'll be sharing a room with Talitha who fly's out on the 22nd (although I'm currently sharing with three spiders, who if you'd like to know have been given names) and I've attached some photos of it. As the pictures show, the furniture I have is basic but does it's job, the lamp doesn't have the correct plug for the socket and there's only one of those. But putting my photos on the wall and unpacking all my things has definitely made it feel more like home. We're lucky that the previous volunteers left furniture for us as apparently it's been a tradition to make the next volunteers after you either find or build their furniture, as long as other staff members don't take it first! Toilets and showers are shared not only by all staff members but also scorpions and snakes if the sings on the doors are to be believed. The showers and most taps here use salt water as we're right next to a estuary but I'm happy to say that the showers are much warmer than the sea is!

From Tuesday to Friday there has been a school group of over 130 teenage girls so we've been helping in any way we can. As we haven't started training we couldn't help instructors that much but I've been shown and allowed to set up the Jacobs Ladder and Trapeze (leap of faith) ropes. As part of the course, every morning the participants have to do PT (physical training), run and dip. Getting up at 5.15am each morning for this has definitely been a struggle especially as it's dark outside and my sleeping bag is so warm but it does give an opportunity to see the sun rise over the estuary and sleeping till 7am now seems like a luxury.

The food here has been amazing thanks to Nicky who cooks for the staff Monday to Friday. My appetite has definitely grown since coming here and being so busy everyone eats so much! I'm also in love with the oranges here - they are giant and so tasty. Spending a few minutes trying to peel them are definitely worth it and there's been a few days that I've had three in a row. Friday night we had a Braai which is the South African term for BBQ. It was really good and I got to try pap for the first time. Pap is a food along the lines of rice and mash potatoes but it is delicious and everyone here absolutely loves it. At the weekends we cook for ourselves and yesterday me and Scott raided the fridges and freezers to find something to cook. We'd like to think our beef mince, vegetables and potatoes were a Masterchef worthy dish. 

The weather and local geography isn't what I was expecting when moving to South Africa. Looking out my window I could believe that I was somewhere in Scotland with the mountains and pine trees that are all around. The weather has been good so far, quite warm during the day not getting above 25°C but then it gets dark very quickly around 6.30pm with the temperature dropping as well, winter has just finished here after all.

Today we're all off so me and Scott are going into Sedgefield to do some exploring. Then afterwards I think we're going to tackle our washing that needs done. No washing machine here so it's handwashing all the way from now on.

On my training course I signed up to be a 'Project Trust Correspondent' which means I'm sent monthly tasks about things to write about. Our first task is titled 'Breakfast is breakfast' so I'm going to be uploading the article I write for it on here very soon.

Enjoy the photos,

Rachel