We're a retired US Navy couple (Jonathan 24 years and Leigh Ann 22 years) and married for 27 years. We've been abroad for over a decade and in March 2018 sold our beautiful home in Hout Bay, South Africa, our cars, motorcycles, tools, and nearly everything else we owned to go where the winds take us. As much as we love the Cape Town area, we find we're happiest when we're traveling and seeing what's going on someplace else. Our real joy is just being in other places, going about our lives and soaking up the atmosphere while we're there. We are immensely grateful to have the opportunity to live this lifestyle.
We're avid yoga practitioners with Jonathan having a teaching certification, we love the hustle and bustle of city life as well as being on a farm or out in nature. Regardless of where we are, you'll find us out walking for at least an hour or so everyday whether in the city, the countryside or along the beach in almost any weather. Leigh Ann is a bit of a cook and likes a little gardening, is a regular swimmer when a pool is available and has taken up knitting in the past couple of years and is totally addicted! We both spend a lot of time reading, Jonathan does some beautiful origami, we love good food and believe some of the best is what's local. We also like a little good wine or beer or a good cocktail but not in excess as that makes yoga rather unpleasant the next day!
While we were in the Navy, we did five international moves with our two cats, Velveeta and Tortuga. Wow, did we love those two! Sadly, after 18 years they were no longer with us to make the last move to South Africa, but at some point nearly every day we reflect on the joy they added to our lives.
In general, we both have strong maintenance backgrounds from our time in the Navy. Jonathan knows everything from welding and brazing to small engine repair to electronics to construction to bomb disposal (yes, he was part of the Navy's elite bomb squad). Leigh Ann can also hold her own on most projects (but absolutely not disarming a bomb). We are very capable of maintaining homes and gardens in locales where we don't speak the local language and dealing with vets outside our home country. What we don't know, we can be counted on to figure out on our own.
With the exception of Covid-19 lockdown in South Africa, we've been house sitting almost full time for about three years through House Carers and and we absolutely love what we are doing. Our experience is varied from short term sits of a few days to a very challenging long term sit in Hawaii of 10 months and to taking care of a working ranch in ranch in Washington last winter. Regardless of where we've been or what the tasks were, we've found the entire house sitting situation really positive for us and for the homeowners. We've made good friends along the way, had interesting experiences and visited places that we didn't even know were on the map. Everything that we've done from taking care of dogs, cats, chickens, goats, sheep, horses, cattle and a yak to dealing with trespassers to local police and snowplowing to tractor driving has resulted in 5* reviews.
** This is very important to us: as house sitting is based on trust, if you feel the need to have video or audio surveillence in your house, we are not the house sitters for you.**
We're most interested in longer term sitting assignments of one to three or four months but are pretty flexible. So, if you're looking for a couple who will give exceptional care to your pets and can manage anything that's thrown at them in any situation, get in touch with us. All the best, Leigh Ann & Jonathan