Hi All!  I've just got back from an amazing holiday in South Africa with an engagement ring!  Rich proposed on the final night of our safari & I'm so happy I think I might burst!!!  We thinking of Summer 2010 for a wedding & I cannot wait!!! Just thought I'd share my good news with you all!!

CONGRATULATIONS!!  :)  :)

congratulations!!! thats wonderful!

god i'm jealous! a safari and an shiny ring and (i'm sure) lovely man :)

let us know about the wedding plans :)

Huge congratualtions.............................
That is fantastic news, thanks for sharing it, we may now want tobe kept up to date with preps ets!

Karen

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!!!
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PS nice change to your sig too hun lol :) !!!
Good luck in 2010 you must be so excited!!!!

congratultions!!!!! :-D

how was your holiday? hope you had a great time! its 2 months today that i go over! cant wait!

Thank you all, I'm so happy I could burst, feel like pinching myself to see if it's real!!  We've been together a long time (11 years) & I had my hopes on a wedding & now all my dreams have come true!!! Plenty of time to plan etc which is good for booking things but I want to do it now!!!

Kiger - holiday was fantastic, the weather was very kind to us, the South African people so kind & went out of their way to make us feel so special! You'll have a fabulous time, I'm pretty sure we passed the Thunzi Bush Lodge (that is where you're staying isn't it?) & it looked very nice!  I could go on & on about it but I won't bore you, I am very jealous you're going soon!

aww thats great,im really happy for you! :-)

yeah thunzi is where we are staying,found a few other great places to! we are going to a place where you get to see all the abandoned and rescued lion cubs you get to go in with them give them a cuddle and play with them!!! im looking forward to that the most! never mind meeting my boyfriends family! ha ha!
was the weather good while you were out there? did you manage to get up table mountain?
you will have to have your honeymoon there now! ha ha! :-D

Oh! I didn't know about the lion cub thing, that sounds great!  We went to a Cheetah Outreach Centre & an Elephant Sanctuary where I got to feed the babies bottled milk!!  Weather in Cape Town was rubbish, rained all of the 3 days we were there, didn't actually get to see Table Mountain until the clouds lifted just before we left plus the cablecar was closed so didn't get to the top but we got some pretty good views & pics from Signal Hill. After there though the weather wase fab everywhere, mid 20's. Where else are you planning on staying?  The whales should still be around then - a whale watching cruise is a must IMO.  Can I help you out with any suggestions etc?  Where are you planning on staying?

Congratulations Gembo :-) :-)

WOW Congrats!!!!!

I wish you all the luck in the world! :)

many congats to you both and i hope you had a great hoilday.
keep us informed with your wedding plans!

CONGRATUALTIONS!! :-)

Burst away, as long as you are full of champagne **tongue hanging out!** :-D

So pleased for you,
:-)

:) CONGRATUALTIONS :)

CONGRATULATIONS

thats good that the weather stayed nice for you apart from cape town though!
wow did you! lucky you! where was the cheetah outreach place and the elephant sanctuary? thats sounds great! :-)
have decided not to go to cape town,as much as i want to the holidays is already costing a fortune! we are flying to port elizabeth and will be staying at the summerstrand hotel while we are visiting stevens family that live around there for 5days then we are going on safari for 3 days then flying up to durban and staying with family there for the rest of the holiday (about 10 days) think we will be going to quite a few different places while we are up there they are organising alot of it its much cheaper for them to sort it over there.
how was your flight? we have just booked ours,were going to go with klm but found a great flight,quite a few changes though :-( we are flying london to johannasburg with virgin atlantic then jb to port elizabeth with BA then port elizabeth to durban with south african airways and the same home agian! got then for good prices! im just organising the coach trip to london now...soooo expensive!
ooo yes will definalty go whale watching! we are going on a sea safari aswell that should be good fun! i really want to go in a shark cage but steven wont do it with me!!! im not doing it on my own! ha ha! we booked a helicoptor tour of durban last week so looking forward to that aswell! im so excited! :-D

*~*~*~ Congratulations!!!*~*~*~* :-p

> where was the cheetah outreach place and the elephant sanctuary?

Spier Vineyard in Stellenbosch & Knysna Elephant Sanctuary - both very very good!

I saw the Summerstrand Hotel, it's at the end of the beach walk, looks like it has nice views on the beach!  There's not a massive amount to do in PE, but the Boardwalk Entertainment Complix is good for a night out, some good restaurants & a casino!  The Addo Elephant Park is only an hour from PE though & we heard great things about it!  I'd like to go back & start in Durban, not too keen on Joberg though, have heard it's quite bad for tourust muggings!!

Flight's were fine, KLM were really good & on the way back we checked our luggage in at PE & didn't see it again until we landed in Manc (we went PE, Joberg, Amsterdam & Manc)...but of a killer on the flights home but I was so excited about telling people about the engagement it wasn't too bad plus we had a night flight so got a few hours sleep!

I hope you have a fab time & look forward to hearing your stories when you get back!  If you're on Facebook look me up & you can see the photos (I'll accept you as a freind my full name is Gemma Hampton!)  I'd recommend South Africa is anyone - the people are so nice & it's sooo cheap to eat out!!  I'm jealous now...although I'm thinking we could go back for our honeymoon & maybe see the Victoria Falls!!!!

yeah alot of people have told me PE is crap! nothing really there! ha ha,dont think we would of been going there if stevens family wernt there! have found quite a few good things going on there just takes ages to find them.we are going to shamwari and doing the whole addo tour! ive been watching loads of vidios on youtube that people have made at addo,looks amazing!
yeah i have heard and read quite a few bad things about JB,i saw soon really nice places there that i wanted to visit when i told steven about it he said we cant go there it is a really rough place!! :-O

ha ha planing the next trip allready! yeah you will have to go on your honeymoon! being the place that he proposed to you! wow yes victoria falls would be nice! id love to go and see the big hole in kimberly.im already planning when we go next year too! ha ha and i havnt even been there yet!! my boyfriend is really excited to go back "home" hes so proud to be south african he always says what an amazing country it is.

yeah ive got facebook il add you now :-)

what is your picture of on facebook??? lots of Gemma Hamptons ha ha :-D

> what is your picture of on facebook???

you'll laugh at this but it's me n Rich stroking an elephant! I'm in the nottingham network!

ha ha i saw that one aswell and thought it might of been you but didnt want to add just anybody! ha ha :-D