A long weekend in Sun City

This past weekend we traveled one and a half hours to a resort called Sun City.  This was not a small resort but massive with 4 individual hotels, apartments and time shares.  Buses connected you to all the activities and amenities Sun City had to offer.

One of the 4 hotel's pool

We took off for our vacation Friday through Monday opting to stay in the apartments as a separate bedroom is a must since sharing with Adalyn equals little sleep for me.  Plus the bonus of a full kitchen and living room made it nice and roomy.  Though with all the activities, we spent little time in the apartment.

Each morning we went to the Valley of the Waves which is a water park complete with a wave pool, a little kid's area, and some adult water slides.

I got this pic right before it opened that day.

They had one slide called the Temple of Courage which was one long slide traveling 70 meters down and very few people were even attempting it.  But Mark and I thought that since we are there, why not try it all.

 Quite a beautiful view but scary drop to say the least.  Adalyn loved watching us go down the slides.  We spent the morning enjoying the waves, the long lazy river where we spotted monkeys in the trees and Adalyn loved the kid's area slides.

One afternoon we strolled through the Bird and Tree paths taking us over a large swing bridge and into some caves before embarking on our Elephant Wallow adventure.  More about the interaction and feeding the elephants in the next blog.

 It was a hot 33 degrees Celsius that day, 91 in Fahrenheit and since we are a mile up the heat can get to you.  Luckily we found a nice ice cream shop that we visited each afternoon.  For only $1.50 per cone it was a steal.  After grabbing Adalyn some dinner to go, we headed back to our apartment, got her ready for bed and welcomed the child watch attendant who babysat and put her to bed so Mark and I could enjoy an evening dinner alone.

After another morning at the Valley of the Waves, along with some good naps by all 3 of us, we spent the next afternoon at the Maze of the Lost City.  This is one of the largest permanent mazes in the Southern Hemisphere and you reach it via a 100m long suspension bridge.

 At the end of the maze which thankfully the walls are high enough to offer some shade as you walk through is a microbrewery with spectacular views of the resort.  We let Adalyn lead us through the maze telling us which direction to go and to our surprise it only took us 15 minutes to reach the end.  She must have a keen sense of direction, we must remember this when we are lost next time.

Next we headed inside to the Arcade Center where Adalyn enjoyed hopping from ride on car/bus/train/animal to the next.

 Another night out for Mark and I to have dinner was great and we were able to get the same sitter for Adalyn which she lovingly called "my friend" the next morning wondering why "my friend" did not sleep over too.

Sun City offers so many activities we did not get to experience even half of them.  Mini golf, a whole camp area for kids, Animal World, bumper boats, game drives, a theater, a crocodile farm, an adult adventure camp, the world's fastest zip slide, balloon safaris, golf, parasailing, jet skies, and a tip to a cultural village.  Guess we will just have to go back again so we don't miss out.  We enjoyed our vacation very much and it was nice to have time for just the three of us to relax without having to travel far.