Safari ... Brazil v Ivory Coast...

A few days late, but nonetheless, Ron/Ben/Bill/Allie and I went on a mini safari last week to a northern section of Johannesburg. It is a private game reserve and is populated by rhinos, lions, hemboks, ostriches, all sorts of African animals. And baby lion cubs:

The rest of the group is enjoying that safari today, so I'm sure they'll have additional stories and photos.

On Sunday night, 10 of the group headed to the Brazil - Ivory Coast match at Soccer City, one of the marquee matchups of the Group of Death. 8 of us had tickets, but Mitch and I did not, and decided we would try and buy tickets from someone outside the stadium. We arrived there at 5pm (8:30pm kickoff), and there were definitely far more buyers than sellers. Many sellers were attempting to sell average tickets for double their price, not realizing that in a 90,000 seat stadium, there will be tickets available. Our patience paid off and around 7pm Mitch got the attention of two Englishmen that had spare Category 1 tickets. We paid just slightly under the face value of R1120 ($150ish) each and ended up with tickets 6 rows off the pitch. They were epic seats in a fantastic stadium - which will host the World Cup Final on July 11. Definitely worth the time and effort to score tickets. The game was not as close as we had hoped, but Brazil put on a show, reminding everyone that their talent is almost unparalleled.