I am truly a happy woman!!! In fact, I felt like I died and went to heaven.

What could create this sense of euphoria? Why dancing of course! But even better – simply the best dance party that I have been to since coming to Southern Africa!

This weekend there were a plethora of choices for dancing. The hardest part was actually making a choice. Well I can say is that not only did we choose right – in fact, there were 3 women simply in heaven because of our decision to attend the Dance Party Braai at the National Botanical Gardens.

What can I say it was simply a magical combination! Nothing makes a perfect night out more than wonderful girlfriends, fantastic music and the perfect venue to dance.

The trip to the Botanical Gardens started with my third trip of the day with Buche, a debate about where the Botanical Gardens actually were ( I won!) and my manning the two way radio (See my earlier post). Janni is now getting very use to me keeping him posted on our location and trust me, it is Buche putting the radio control in my hand – although today Janni must have thought that I had taken up permanent residence in Buche’s front seat.

Following our (Buche & mine) debate on the location of the Botanical gardens in the Village, I was instructed to report in detail to Janni over the two way radio exactly where we were. The poor man got a very abrupt end to our conversation when Buche pulled up to the entrance of the gardens. The reason for the abrupt end – I could hear the music and see the crowd gathered to enjoy the event! It truly was a party!

Buche had barely made it to a stop before I had dropped the radio and was out the door already dancing….what can I say! I truly love to dance. With a laughing Buche trying to get my attention for at least two seconds so he could confirm whether I needed him to come pick me up or not. It actually took him about two minutes to get me to focus on his repeated question and only then because the song changed. Which was okay as he had no attention of abandoning me until my girlfriends had also arrived and quite frankly he gets a real kick out of the fact that I am pretty much content to dance anywhere as long as there is good music.

With the arrival of my girlfriends it was time to truly swing into action. And that is exactly what we did. The venue of course was outside at the gardens which meant that I could kick off my sandals and dance on the grass. The night sky was lit up with a spectacular display of lightning in the distance and the music was rocking! In fact we ended up as part of a huge dance circle where everyone got a chance to move into the centre and show their own special moves. It truly was a piece of dance heaven!

After just over three hours of non-stop shaking what our mommas’ gave us the lightening displayed turned into gusting wind and rain which was truly refreshing after three hours of dancing in the extremely warm air. When the big inflatable screen nearby began to topple over from the gusting wind and rain threatened to come pouring down we made the decision to head for the car so that we weren’t totally soaked when the down pour hit. Obviously without realizing it, some of my bootie shaking must have been interpreted as a rain dance. Buche will be happy with me at least for accomplishing downpours.

Arriving at the car didn’t end the dance party however! With the rain holding to a gentle down pour, a backdrop of lightning and awesome music belting out of the car’s stereo, my girlfriends and I continued to shake what our mommas’ gave us for another twenty minutes in the parking lot. So although the evening ended far earlier than anticipated  each and everyone of us agreed that it was simply the best evening of dancing we have had to date.

But don’t worry I have already planned my next dance outing for Friday, April 4th at Botswanacraft. The South African band Freshly Ground (links to two of their videos http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLuSyqMlm_U  and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nUAarErp5Y  )   is performing live in an outdoor performance at Botswanacraft so once again I will be bootie shaking until 2:00 am.

How does life get any better than this? Lately, it always seems to somehow manage it…and that I will absolutely embrace!