Excited to experience another American road trip, we pile in the car with way too much luggage for 4 days and set off – destination, Panama City Florida, stopping for the necessary supplies; Doritos’s, Twix and Sour Worms (so not sour and very disappointing). On our way and with time to kill we make a stop in Clanton to view Alabama’s Giant Peach. Of course I make sure we park the car and take full advantage of this once in a lifetime photo opp.

Back on the road and we make our second stop in Montgomery, the state's capital. We struck it lucky as it was the 20th anniversary of the Civil Rights Memorial Center so we got free entry. learning something about the civil war and putting our names on the wall of tolerance - pledging to take a stand against hate, injustice and intolerance - we went off to visit the capital buildings and took loads more photo's. I must admit that this part of the trip was actually very interesting and I figure that as I find myself now living in the state of Alabama, I had better learn a little about the history of the place.

Setting off on part three of this trip we make our way to Troy, where we do a flyby tour of the campus and go and get our arteries clogged at the renowned students’ eatery, Crows Chicken. On our fourth and final leg of the road trip we find ourselves being guided, by our trusty Garmin, down a very long and scary dirt road in axe murderer country – all adds to the excitement of course.

Eventually we make it to Panama City and I am elated to find myself in a very new and very suave penthouse condo on the 25th floor. Oh what a breath of fresh sea air.

Day one was spent lounging on the beach, playing beach bats and Frisbee, truly basking in the glory of being back on the beach. Although the sun could have been hotter and the breeze could have been less, I cannot complain as I realize how much the sea means to me and how much I miss the Cape Town coast. To complete the day in true Panama City style we head off to Sharky's and sip on daiquiris - bliss. After finding ourselves in the middle of a parrot head convention we drank like we were teenagers, danced like no one was watching and had a great time. We were eventually forced to leave due to the unfortunate event of closing time. Oh but the party was not to end here.... Coyote Ugly was next on the list.

Now to put things in perspective, this was one of my all time favorite movies, and dancing on the bar at Coyote Ugly was one of my life time goals. To cut a very long and possibly embarrassing story short . . . goal accomplished.

After 4 days of sun, sand, sea and so much fun, I reluctantly packed my bags, said goodbye to my penthouse dream and headed off. I will be back. It is the beach and where I belong.