That moment when your toes are dangling over the edge, your heart is pounding, you have a pit in your stomach, and all sounds are muffled, except the voice of the man behind you that was the only thing anchoring you the ground just seconds before. 5, 4, 3, 2, No turning back now, 1, GO!
Upon arriving in Cape Town, we can honestly say we didn’t know much about what to expect. After hastily skimming the South Africa Wikipedia page and listening to our friends blabber on about their previous semesters abroad, we remained pretty clueless.  We hopped on the plane at LAX (actually JFK) for a short 24-hour journey to what we now know is one of the most exhilarating cities in the world–the absolute perfect home for the adrenaline junkie.
In the weeks since, we’ve learned that a streetlight is a “robot”, unlimited wifi doesn’t exist, and eating ostrich is as common as a chicken nugget. We could tell you that there are 11 national languages, that “lekker” means cool (although we do not recommend getting it tattooed on your ass…we speak from a severe case of second-hand embarrassment), and can give you a brief history of Nelson Mandela and South African Apartheid. While we’ve learned a lot about this incredible city and its past, we are constantly trying to live in the moment and make the most of our far too short 5 months abroad.  So, we try to take advantage of Cape Town’s incredible restaurants, awesome nightlife, trendy music scene, and the extensive opportunities to get our adrenaline pumping.
We eased into the thrill-seeking South African lifestyle with a 4am wake-up and 2-hour bus ride to Gansbaai to go cage diving with Great White sharks. As Shark Week may have mentioned, South Africa is the Great White capital of the world, and probable home to the Megalodon.  After hours of numb fingers and toes, we were summoned to put on our flattering wetsuits, flippers, and goggles, as it was finally our turn to hop in the cage. Calling it a cage is probably giving it too much credit: it was more of a flimsy set of wires attached to the side of a rickety boat, which didn’t provide us with much comfort as a 10-foot Great White gnawed at a tuna inches away from our horrified faces. Despite our undeniable terror and probable hypothermia, it was a great day and we will forever cherish the memories (a.k.a. the like-worthy additions to our Facebook album).
After exploring the depths of the sea, we decided it was time to get our hearts racing again and opted this time for an aerial form of excitement–a “combat mission” on a huey helicopter. You may be thinking, “How scary could a helicopter ride be?” To that we respond: this one had no doors. It would be completely reasonable for us to stick half our arm out the window midway through the flight–and no, we were not harnessed in, just your run of the mill airplane seat belt (fasten and pull!). As we began our flight, the pilot ensured us that he too had a family counting on his safe return. The first half of our flight consisted of a scenic tour of some of Cape Town’s most notable features–Table Mountain, Lion’s Head, and the beautiful beaches at Camps Bay. Then came the fun stuff. The previously relaxing ride turned into a full fledged military combat simulation, complete with dips, dives, squeezes between impossibly small gaps between trees, and a few other near-death experiences (or so it seemed).
Apparently cheating death twice wasn’t enough for us, so we packed our bags (and tents and headlamps) for one of the seven natural wonders of the world, Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. While spring break usually entails bikinis and booze cruises, we opted instead for a more uniquely African way to spend our time off.  Once at Victoria Falls, which, to give you a little perspective, is a little more than twice the height of Niagara Falls, we decided to live on the edge (literally).  We traveled to a small island in Zambia, called Livingstone, for breakfast and a little morning dip.  After doggy-paddling a short but current-ridden distance, we found ourselves overlooking the edge of a 108 meter waterfall.  As our guide backflipped into the water just before the edge, we glanced at each other with a look that could only be mean one thing–“holy shit.”  We each closed our eyes, counted to three, and followed our dread-locked guide’s instructions to jump in.  After sitting on a rock at the ledge for a few minutes we each took our turn hanging over the edge.  Our guide grabbed our slippery feet as we inched forward as the upper half of our bodies dangled precariously over the edge. Long way down; that’s all we can say.
While we have done our best so far to take a walk on the wild side, there are still things we have yet to try but can’t wait to get to. For one, we are counting down the days until we can hurdle ourselves out of a plane 9,000 feet in the air and hopefully get a few hilarious shots of our faces wildly flapping in the wind.  We also hope to take a trip up the Garden Route, where we can tackle the world’s highest bungee jump off the Bloukrans Bridge.
Signing off with our new favorite abbrev: T.I.A (This is Africa),
Libby and Danielle