Travel to Southern Africa might include going on safari, exploring the beautiful coast, spending time in nature preserves, or enjoying big city life in Cape Town or Johannesburg. Southern Africa is the southernmost region of the African continent including the countries of Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
Our Destination Master, Helen Josephine, provided us these clues for a named area in Southern Africa:
- It is a rocky headland on the Atlantic coast of the Cape Peninsula in South Africa.
- It marks the point where a ship begins to travel more eastward than southward.
- It was originally called the Cape of Storms, by the Portuguese explorer Bartolomeu Dias. His discovery in 1488 established the sea route between Europe and Asia.
- The area is now a wild, rugged, scenic, and generally unspoiled national park home to at least 250 species of birds including one of the two mainland colonies of African penguins.
- The area also comprises a treasure trove of 1100 species of indigenous plants, many are endemic (occur naturally nowhere else on earth). Including the Proteaceae family, of which up to 24 species occur such as the King Protea.
- It is the legendary home of the Flying Dutchman, a ship crewed by tormented and damned ghostly sailors doomed to sail forever through the stormy sea without ever succeeding in rounding the cape.
If you guessed, the Cape of Good Hope, you are correct!
We had two speakers at our meeting. Avis Russell presented her Visionary Community Level 1 speech, “Gratitude–The Key to a Happier Life.” In this speech, Avis concentrated on using vocal variety and body language to enhance the message of her speech. She shared stories from her childhood about her Mother’s self-sacrifice and gratitude that have influenced her. She has passed on the examples of gratitude and appreciation she learned from her Mother to her own children. She ended her speech with a call to action and challenged us to show appreciation and gratitude daily, not just on special occasions. Our second speaker was Kit Myers. Kit presented her Presentation Mastery Level 2 speech, “Rhodesia or Zimbabwe.” She included childhood memories about first learning about the diamonds found in Southern Africa and the colorful map of the country from her grade school classroom. Even though the names of the countries changed several times over the years, as a child she wanted to visit Africa, and finally she got the opportunity as an adult.
The Travel Talkers Master, Tym Myers, asked us questions about traveling to Africa. He wanted to know how many different flights it would take to travel to South Africa from San Francisco, which language we would speak (Afrikaans, Zulu, or English), and if it was true that the color of the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean was different where the two oceans meet at Cape Agulhas the southernmost tip of South Africa.
At our next meeting, we will continue our travels around the world. Join us as we share our adventures about traveling to the Middle East on Thursday, March 14th from 6:30 pm to 7:30 pm. We want to hear about your travel and adventure plans. Most Middle Eastern countries (13 out of 18) are part of the Arab world. The most populous countries in the region are Egypt, Turkey, and Iran, while Saudia Arabia is the largest Middle Eastern country by area. The country of Dubai had 14.36 million international tourists in 2022 ranking it the 4th most visited location globally.
Guests are always welcome to attend our meetings. If you would like to join the club, contact Helen Josephine for an application form.
Register for the meeting: https://tinyurl.com/TravelTalkersZoomLink
RSVP on MeetUp to let us know you are coming to the meeting.
Looking forward to hearing your travel stories! Join us to be inspired to take your next trip.
Helen Josephine,
Travel Talkers Toastmasters
Travel Talkers Toastmasters 
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