Time for a break

 Before long we will begin a journey that will take us to Argentina, Bolivia, and Canada (Saskatchewan, Manitoba & Ontario). This will be a personal leave mid-term in our assignment to Southern Africa. It will be good to visit family and friends and take a respite from the enjoyable but demanding work that occupies us on a daily basis.

This will be our first foray to Argentina and Bolivia. The stop-over in Buenos Aeres is only a 24 hour connection but it will give us a day to explore the city and test the few words of Spanish we know.

We plan to spend a couple of weeks in Bolivia with Melanie who is working with CUSO in the high altitude city of La Paz. It is the world's highest "de facto" capital city, or administrative capital. Depending on where you live in this mountainous city you could be anywhere between 9,840 - 13,450 feet above sea level. Hopefully we will able to huff and puff enough to find adequate oxygen to avoid altitude sickness.  Metro La Paz has a combined population of over 2.3 million. If circumstances allow we also hope to visit Peru while in the region.

From La Paz we will head to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan where  Allison and Jason live. Here we plan to spend a good deal of time loving & being with our grandson Riley and giving his mom and dad a bit of a break.  Family and friends will keep us more than occupied while on the prairies. We are hoping the summer warmth there will thaw out the cold we have experienced recently here in South Africa (nightime lows of -2C and daytime highs of 11C). It has been a chilly winter so far - particularly with no inside heating system other than small localized heaters (we know this will get little sympathy from our prairie friends after 5 months of -15C to -20C temps).

Heading east we will stop in Winnipeg, Manitoba for a brief visit before ending up in southern Ontario to see more family and friends. All in all this will be a much appreciated break and will refresh us personally as well as the many friendships we have in Canada. So before long we will climb aboard an airship and sail off into the wild blue yonder...