Swaziland Candles

On one of our many family adventures we set out to explore the very small country within a country, Swaziland.  It is located in the southeastern part of the country of South Africa. It has many traditional events that happen, the Reed Dance in March being one of the most well-known.  However, we chose to visit when things would be calmer and were not disappointed at all. The adventure begins when you get to the border guards.  You get out of the car, get in a line, wait, wait, then have to finally show passports.  Then, get in the car, go through another gate lock down, get out of the car, wait in line, wait, wait…then do the same thing again now that you get into Swaziland.  Just make sure you don’t have a child that has to use the bathroom, because, this is difficult and remember, it is also a bit remote…facilities are “rustic”. However, the beauty and serenity of the fertile lands and farms against the backdrop of magnicifent mountains was quite breathtaking.  We had beautiful weather, sunny, warm and warmer.  We wanted to stay forever.

One of our main goals was to visit the famous Swaziland Candle Factory.  The candles are all hand made, and and you can sit for hours and watch the quick and deft fingers of craftsmen shape the hot wax to exactly anything really.  We saw hippos being formed, elephants and wildebeest and many other typical African game animals.  I wish we had better pictures but here are a few of the amazing things they created.

If you can ever get there, do it!