Western Province: Garden Route

The Garden Route is famed for specactular scenery - the Southern Ocean hits the coast, which in parts is rugged, and in parts beautiful sandy beaches. The combination of rocks, wind and ocean rips, makes for good waves and some of the best surfing spots in the world. Hugging the coast line are the mountains, which make a stunning back drop.

So far the weather in WP has been good, with clear blue skys and temperatures in the early to mid 20s. Pretty much perfect for visiting beaches along the Garden Route.

Of course, by the time we reached Mossel Bay, the sun had gone, and the fog rolled in!! We checked into the Santos Express - this is an old steam train, set up on the beach, next to a working train line, with the old cabins converted into bedrooms. This was something a bit different and it was nice being so close to the beach, or so we thought...

We could put up with the slightly dense and unhelpful staff, and the smallish rooms, but at 3am, the place came alive. We assume this was closing time for the pubs, as all the kids came down to the beach car park right next to the train. Then as they do, they were there for a few hours, playing loud music (the same two songs over & over again - r&b pop of all things!), chatting, drinking, and generally making a bit of a racket.

We had wondered why there were some slightly derogitary comments in the comments book, why we had to pay in full in advance for our stay (very unusual in SA) and why there were signs saying no refunds!! It all became clear after that 1st night, and the novelty of sleeping on a steam train lost its charm, so we checked out a day early (and got a refund - thank goodness)

This worked out for the best, and we headed over to Kynsna. We were originally planning to take the Outeniqua Choo-Tjoe (a working steam train) to Kynsna, but due to some severe storms a month or so earlier, the winds and rain caused massive flooding, landslides and rockfall down the mountains and have effectively destroyed this attraction (about R40m in damage) and it is unlikely this will ever be repaired.

So, we drove to Knysna, (and found that quite a bit of damage had hit the road as well), and were lucky to get to the accomodation office just before it shut, and they recommended this lovely self-catering log cabin over looking the lagoon and Knysna heads, complete with balcony and spa. We checked out the hostels, but after the previous night, decided to upgrade to some luxury and stayed at the lodge.

Knysna itself is a pretty little town that has been voted "SA's Nicest Town" two years running, so only fitting that we should see our first mugging as we drove along the high street!!

The attraction of Knsyna is the lagoon, forest walks and the headlands. Unfortunately, those bad storms meant that most of the walks were closed, so we headed down to Plettenburg for the afternoon. Plett, has some really nice beaches and good surf, so we had a little look, but the drizzle meant we ended up in a beach bar - this is where we saw our first whales ;D

The next day, we took a boat trip over the lagoon to the west side of the Knysna Heads, we caught a tractor train up the mountain where we were dropped off and walked back down through the forest to see the views from the heads which were amazing, then stopped off by some coves.

Luckily we lost the slightly insane group singing "Follow da leader" in very Jamacian accents, and Evelyn took care of her knees and joined the oldies group by taking one of the free walking sticks. There were some great views and nice fynbos, and after the long walk there was a great buffet (if you like seafood) so Marc really enjoyed himself... and the desserts where lovely. So after we filled our tummys we caught the boat back to the docks to continue our journey.

Western Province: Oudtshoorn

Next we drove to Oudtshoorn, with the little Karoo on one side and the big Karoo on the other. The Karoo is basically fynbos (shrubs and bushland) and mountains as far as the eye can see. So as you can imagine, there is not much here apart from beautiful scenery, and of course, the busy “Ronnie’s Sex Shop” !!



Oudtshoorn has a bit more life to it, and is famous for its ostrich farms, which are in abundance. There is also Cheetaland, which we visited, expecting a large sanctuary full of recouperating cheetas - a bit like Evelyn's lion experience. What we got was nothing like a land, but a zoo. We were a bit disappointed, as all the animals were squashed in and didnt look too happy, and whilst we wanted to go and pat some cheetha cubs we were a bit disheartened. The croc show was equally as small, and the crocs weren't in a playful mood or interested in the dead rabbits on offer (there was no disguising what was for dinner!!) The pigmy hippos, lemars, and meercats were cute and had a bit more space to play in.

We checked into Backpackers Paradise, and were pleasantly surprised – good, clean, ensuite room with balcony, friendly staff, cheap internet, TV room showing the footy (Germans got the remote early so couldn’t watch the Pool vs Galatasry;( ), BBQ/fire area by the bar. What more could you ask for at a backpackers;) This was the perfect place to relax after a 54km cycle...

Ahhh, the story of the 54km cycle ride - After leaving the backpackers at 9am by mini van and being dropped off an hour later at “Die Top” (The Top) of the Swartsberg mountains (This mountain range reaches a height of 1585m above sea level), and so our journey began.



Looking over all the mountains that we were about to conquer we finally realised that we may have slightly over judged our fitness (well at least Evelyn thought so…) Although most of it was downhill it made it quite treacherous with the steepness, windiness and adding to that the wind factor, so staying on the bike was a challenge!! So no matter how hard you tried to pick up speed before the inclines the wind just took it away from you, not to mention the optical illusions of some of the up-hills that looked like down hills. But it was great fun trying to outdo the other couples ;)



After 1.5hrs (25km) we got to the Cango Caves (and what an up hill it was to get to them!) Marc sneakily cycled up and around the corner - to impress Evelyn as she got off her bike at the start of the hill with a few of the other girls - and once out of eye shot also walked ;)

So it was that at around 12.30 we did the adventure tour at the famous Cango Caves. This tour takes you 600m under the mountains and through the caves showing off the stalactites and stalagmites and all the other rock formations that have built up over millions of years. Once we passed through the easy bits and climbed down a few stairs we got to the tight bits.

It started with the accent up Jacobs Ladder, before coming to lovers lane, named so because the only way to get through is to hug the rock. This was followed by a tunnel where you have to bend over double to get through. By far the hardest part was climbing the Devils Chimney – no stairs on this one - you had to lift your right foot (or knee) to about waist height to get the first footing, so you could push yourself up to get a hand hold, and begin the 7mtr almost vertical climb. The complication is that there is barely enough room to get you first footing - the diameter of this tunnel was less than ½ metre, and it was dark so you couldn’t see the top. The girls & guys at the front of the group were scared about going up and getting stuck, so Evelyn volunteered to up first. She made it look easy ;)


Lovers Lane (left) Devils Chimney (right)

A few people then followed, and this big, burley man was having a few problems, so Evelyn had to virtually drag him up. His girlfriend, then tried to go up, but wasn’t listening to the instructions about the foothold. So she tried to just scramble up the rocks – this is impossible to do without sucker pads as the rocks are smooth, slippery, and virtually straight up. Marc was watching from the bottom, and was in hysterics at watching this womans feet move so fast, but getting absolutely nowhere ;) – imagine the speed at which a meercat moves its front paws when digging a hole, and thats close to this womans feet!!

There was then the post box (takes letters, but not parcels). You have to shimmy on your stomach, head first, to the gap, then reverse through the gap on the side, feet first, on your back. Marc is almost classed as a parcel ;)



This tour took us about 1 1/2 hours (it felt like three) and we still had another 25kms to cycle, and the downhill bits were over!!! Our next motivational check point was a cute little tea house, which offered much needed refreshment (tea & scones) and a pool! There were a couple people from the hostel there, so it was nice to sit down, chill, chat and forget about the remaining 10km home…

This last leg was ok, but a bit tedious and demoralising - it was a couple of long straight (flat:D ) roads - one was about 4km - a really long distance on a bike!

When we got back, a Braai (BBQ) was on the go, and Marc signed up to get some Ostrich steak. Marc likens this to beef - it was red, soft, succulent, and pretty tasty - and is probably better than beef as less fatty than rump. Evelyn thought it tasted of sea salt and compared it to fish! After dinner, the fire was kept going, so a few of us sat outside, and relaxed with a well earned beer and chatted trying to get over the throbbing of our sore muscles.


The next day we visited one of the ostrich farms. You learn a bit about how the farm works, and how stupid the ostriches really are!! There are various exicting facts about ostriches which are best saved for a chat with a beer. The farms are also fun, and you can feed, touch, and ride the ostriches, stand on their eggs, and get a neck massage from them (we've got some funny videos)!!




Our final stop in Oudtshoorn was a waterfall, which we opted out of on our cycle ride ;)

Western Province: Montagu

Cape Town is our next stop. The flight in was one of the worst we’ve had in terms of turbulence, and all we could do was grit and teeth and hope we didnt hurl!! Our first sighting of Table Mountain when we came to land was great!

We were coming back to Cape Town later, so for now we were heading out to the Karoo... The Karoo is the beginning of nothingness and the landscape changes from the coast to hinterland, with desert/savana and mountains. The drive to Montagu was spectacular with the roads leading through wine valleys and mountains.

Montagu itself is a quaint cape-dutch colonial town. We stayed in a lovely B&B with beautiful, high ceiling rooms, oozing character with loads of original features and decor. It fits with the town perfectly and makes you feel like you are back in the 60’s.

The main draw card to Montagu are the hot springs. We were expecting to see water coming up through the ground and filter into a spa type pool. What we got were basically standard heated swimming pools, with water coming in via hot jets. You wouldn’t necessarily know these were naturally made, apart from the lack of chlorine. If you stay at the hot springs resort, you can apparently see the springs coming out of the ground (but that’s for the posh people ;)

Finding somewhere to eat dinner was a slight problem, as once the sun went down the place became a ghost town. We eventually found somewhere open, and as they had no pasta left they had to make it from scratch!!

The highlight of the stay here was breakfast the next morning. This was the most amazing breakfast we have ever had. A lovely exotic fruit platter awaited us when we arrived, with a wide variety of marmalades & jams, cereals, and cold meats also available. Then there was our cooked breakfast, which was also fabulous. Evelyn especially liked the homemade anti-drip tea cosy on the tea pot, which was so simple but practical (& looked pretty)

After brekkie, we went for a stroll along lovers lane, but due to flood damage we couldn’t walk all the way to the springs – that’s our excuse anyway ;) Still it was a lovely walk along the river where the locals were splashing around.

Kwa-Zulu Natal: Hluhluwe-Imfolozi NP

This was an exicting day for us (marc couldnt sleep), and was an early start. This was our first self drive safari - at Hluhluwe Imfolozi National Park. Our choice of vehicle: a bright "internet explorer" blue 1.3 ltr golf (4x4 recommended for the offroad tracks!!)

We were told that the park opens at 5am... lucky for us we left a tad late as when we got there at 5.55am we arrived to a locked gate and a sign saying that it opens at 6am...so we only had to wait 5 minutes instead of 1 hour in the middle of nowhere!! So, Evelyn signed us both in as SA citizens (So Marc got in 1/2 price) & we were the first to enter the park (v unusual for us).

We wanted to be early to give us the best chance of seeing the elusive cats - Lions, cheetha, leopard - which we keep missing & are generally only seen at dawn/dusk after/before hunting.
Unfortunately, we saw none of these :( We checked the sightings board when we left, and there were no lions, a leopard was spotted in the north of the park (where we didnt go), and a cheetha was spotted in the south (where we did go) but once again, close but the timings were just out.



It was still a really exciting day though - looking in the savanna for animals is great fun, with us having a competition to see who could guess the correct number of buck spotted in a 5 minute spell (Evelyns hundreds were close ;) Marc was great at spotting things miles away (e.g. Warthog) whilst Evelyn's near-sightedness came in handy (spotting the massive rhino in front of the warthog ;)



We saw 2 of the big 5 - buffalo and white rhino; We saw vultures first thing, hoping they were circling a kill, but not this time. We saw an eagle close up, kudu, waterbuck, redbuck, duiker, wildebeast, zebra, and loads more which are noted in our little daily diary. As we drove around, there were several hides overlooking watering holes - it was good to get out on foot and sit in the hides to try and spot the game. However, the watering holes were dry and the best we saw were old elephant footprints ;)



One of the highlights was when we came across loads of cars viewing about 15 girraffes about 10mtrs away which was lovely to see - the only giraffes we have seen (at most around 3 of them) have been quite far away and well camaflogued.

The main highlight and ultimate experience was when we turned a corner coming up a hill and came across a massive giraffe in the middle of the road! At first we were unsure if he was going to stay or run, as he just stood and watched us (the likeness to Peter Crouch was uncanny). After a few minutes we drove on slowly only to realise that there were even more giraffes just 2mtrs from the road busy having their brekkie. It was just wonderful to see and we watched them for around 10 mins.



Our funny momment started the night before, when Marc silently checked the fuel gauge and thought it would be OK !! But its not wise to go on safari with only 1/2 a tank of fuel !! We arrived at the park, and confirmed there was a gas station in the park. We reached the little hut that was the petrol station at 7am, but it didnt open until 8am. So rather than wait an hour, and with "loads" of fuel, we carried on. However, 100ks later, we got a shock with a nice loud beeping sound from the fuel gauge. So, we had to turn around after doing 5km on a 12km one-way circut - lucky enough for us we just managed to reach the petrol station with a minute to spare before it closed for another 1 1/2hrs (which was around 12pm)!!



So after spending about 8hrs in the national park, we headed back to Umhlanga Rocks for our final night in KZN. Unfortunately for us, there was gale force winds of over 80km p.hr, which made driving a bit tricky. It also meant that we got a call at 5am the next morning, to tell us that our visit with the Natal Sharks Board to see them check the shark nets had to be cancelled as it was too dangerous :( - we wouldnt want to be blown into shark infested waters ;)

On our final night we went out for the best meal so far (at Razzmatazz). Despite the name, this place wasnt chessy, but quite classy as its within the grounds of a 5 star hotel. The restuarant overlooked the beach, had a good atmosphere, great staff, and lovely food. Marc had croc kebabs for starters, and prawn curry. Evelyn had tricolore salad and the best steak medallions that shes ever had, and thats saying something !!

Kwa-Zulu Natal: St Lucia

After leaving the Stevensons we drove to Umhlanga - a popular sea-side town 20km North of Durban. We originally planned to stay here after St Lucia but we didn't know it was bank holiday weekend so we had to rejig our schedule to avoid sleeping on the beach!!

We had a lovely fish & chip lunch over looking the ocean and visited the Umhlanga Lagoon National Park where you can go for a 2km walk through the bushes and there's a broadwalk across the lagoon. We came across the rare grey duiker - which is the smallest buck of 1/2 meter in height, it was really cute and we just stopped and watched it for about 10 minutes and it wasn't bothered by us at all. We also came across baboons which was a little scary as they can be quite vicious and the longer we stood and watched them, more appeared out of nowhere. There are warnings to go with a guide for protection (or maybe that was due to the locals and not the animals :)

We went to the Gateway Shopping Centre which is quite well known for their outdoor artificial surf, where you request the speed of the water and you can do tricks on this make shift wave, pretty cool to watch.

Next day was a long drive - we now know to take the toll roads as the "alternative" route takes ages. We stopped off at Eshowe in Zulu-land and did a tour around the museum that is based in a British Fort our guide was really informative and showed us around, we saw old weapons, hand made baskets and huts. There was also an interesting fly trap which was used during the plague. We discovered that even today there is a Zulu king but he has no political power and an interesting fact was that in the late 1800's there was a white Zulu king who had 48 wives and 117 children! Was he lucky??

Finally arriving in St Lucia just before dark - this is a really small town consisting mainly of one road with all the shops and tourist offices on it. We drank in the evening at the ski-boat club to watch the sunset, this place is on the banks of the estuary where we watched the kingfishers, crocs and hippos just off the banks. Really amazing to just sit there and be at one with nature.



A bit of background on St Lucia - It is one of 7 World Heritage Sites in SA (of which we visited 5). This place is special because of it contains 5 different ecological environments - coral reef, sand dunes, wetlands, wooded forest, and savanna. This means wildlife is in abundance and is very diverse.



Next morning we were off for a day at Cape Vidal which is located in the National Park and as we drove though we saw buffalo, buck and zebra. We just chilled on the beach and did some snorkelling, what a beautiful day. We also stopped by Mission Rocks where the waves crashed against the rocks and we watched Kites soaring, looking for their dinner.



On the way back to town we took the detour on the offroad track and saw some wildlife only to find that once we got back onto the main road there was more out here close to the tar road!! ;)

We took a night safari with our host on his Shaka Barker tours that he runs in this massive 4x4 that takes up 2/3 of the road! This is quite a difficult tour as the only way to spot animals is by the glare from their eyes from the spot light, there was a 50% chance of seeing leopard on this tour, but unfortnately we found tracks that we couldn't follow :(

The first spot of the day was pretty amazing as he stopped the truck on the side of the road, within minutes of passing through the gates and came back carrying a small cameleon - how he saw this small creature from the truck whilst driving was unbelievable (apparently they glow and reflect light)



Next was a wildebeast that hangs out on his own - the story goes that he is confident that if he stays round his area he'll find a mate so he didn't migrate with the rest of his herd - he's been in this area for 4 years and still hasn't realised that there are no females ;) We didn't see much else that we hadn't seen already, although he did spot some green pigeons and an owl with freshly caught prey.

Half way through our tour we stopped off and had some hot chocolate to get us warmed up, this was a bit scary and only half the group actually got out of the truck!



Next morning we went to the Seaview beach and we couldn't have asked for better weather as it was lovely and sunny. We had real good fun as we managed to get free boggie boards and did some boggie board surfing for most of the day. We really had to hang onto the boards as some of the waves were really strong and if they caught you wrong you tumbled for quite a bit. See below for Marc in action...



We finished off our lovely couple of day in St Lucia by having some more drinks at the ski-boat club to a lovely sunset.

http://www.shakabarker.co.za/

Kwa-Zulu Natal: Drakensburg

So on to Kwa-Zulu Natal - this is on the East cost of SA, with Durban as the best known city & is 1hr fly from J'brg.

We've got 7 days here but we could have spent much longer. KNZ is home to the surf beaches (& sharks) around Durban, snorkelling & diving around St Lucia/Sodwana/Kosi, Imfolozi Hulhulwe (pronounced shlu-shlu-wee) safari park, the Drankensburg mountains and as its name suggests this is Zulu-land and home to many wars between the Boers (white Dutch South Africans) and Zulus, and of course the Brits and everyone (seen the film??)

Our first stop was a little town called Nottingham Road which is based in the Midlands Meander region of the DRAKENSBURG. Evelyn's family live here and it was really nice of them to let us stay - Thanks Uncle Sam. It was great to see all the Stevenson Clan (& dogs & cats), though a shame to have missed Aunt Lyn and Iain ;(

The drive to Nottingham was completely different to the rest of SA we've seen so far - its green!!! When we got to the Stevenson's, we were loving the views. This is a beautiful place, surrounded by hills and mountains, peace & quiet. Across the fields and meadows you can see Giants Castle on the horizon. We walked the dogs (Monty & Rommel) and the cat (Libra) followed :-)



On our first morning, the next door neighbour (say 2kms away) wanted to do some controlled burning on his fields (helps prevent uncontrolled summer fires and plant regeneration), so we earned our keep by helping start the water hose with Uncle Sam - We had to hunt down the hose, and Marc gave Sam a bit of electric shock & bath (not at the same time;) when trying to get the thing started...



We also went to with Haley & baby Ben to watch Rachel horse riding. Sam jnr was full of energy and teaching us how to play rugby - he's good, far better than us ;)



The weather wasnt ideal during our stay - we could still see the snow on the mountains, and Sani Pass (the road into Lesotho) was blocked. The day we went to explore, it was a bit overcast, so the visabilty wasnt as good as it could have been, but there were still great views on our drive.

The Midlands Meander is full of arts and crafts shops, of which 75% of their stocks have to be home made. When we got to the mountains, there were some more lovely little cafes to stop and have lunch before our walk.



We originally planned on taking the 1 1/2 hr trail at Monks Cowl (nr Champagne Castle), but ended up detouring onto the 3hr one!! There's loads of beautiful scenery and waterfalls, we saw some buck, and then got a bit scared as the mist started to come down over the peaks!! We kept walking hoping each hill would be the last ;) When we finally made it back to the car, we were one of the last remaining... Our drive home was a bit scarey - the roads were very very misty and we could barely see 1mtr in front of us. Thankfully the roads were quiet (we were the only fools driving) and we made it home safely :-)

We were here for 3 nights, and could of stayed for another 3....

Warmbaths

Tour over, so off to find a bed. Leigh & Werner very kindly offered to put us up for a few days, and we are eternally grateful for the comfy bed and warm nights ;)

On the day after the tour, we hired a car & met Aaron & Belinda to show them a few of the sights of J'brg. We took a shopping trip to Rose Bank flea market to get ourselves some bargins & by chance we bumped into Sally & Scott before they left for the airport. All of us came back overloaded with South African goodies - we picked up some lovely candle stick holders & bowls for a bargain price (or so we think after some killer bartering). These of course have a tribal story attached, but you'll have to come visit us to hear it ;)

In the pm we went to the Apartheid Museum. A difficult subject to broach, and we both think it was a little bias against whites, but you'd probably expect that ;) I guess worth a visit, but best seen in conjunction with the Voortrekker Museum in Pretoria to get a better understanding of both sides...

So after a couple of days of relax - the next stop is Warmbaths (bela bela). This is a water park with slides, wave pool, rubber rings, spa, etc and has heated water with places for sun bathing & a campsite. We went here with David & Chris, and Kelly & Rajmund. We stayed here a couple of nights; having a BBQ and fire in the evenings, then going for a swim, & then back to the tent to chill with beers and hubbly-bubbly ;) Thanks to Kelly for cooking up some nice food & brekkie.

We had a great time here, and it was good not being in a Kia combi van ;)

The Tour - Part 6: Rhino Sanctuary

It was a 7 hour (500 km) journey to the Rhino Sanctuary, through rough roads – think we messed up the wheel alignment on this drive a tad ;) as Jimmy drives like he’s in a 4x4 but we’re actually in a Kia minibus doing 140 kph on a road full of potholes is not our idea of fun :D



Once at the sanctuary we went for a drive to see the Rhinos. Miles was driving, not a good idea, as we got stuck in the beach sand after about 5 minutes and had to push our way out. Saw some rhino, buck, zebra, giraffe, springbuck, impala and kudu. The highlight was when we went back to the watering hole and got out of the bus to take some final snaps. Saw a rhino in the distance slowly making his way towards us, hoping that we will get some close ups we stayed out the car. Closer it comes, just a little closer…. oh dear, it’s getting quite close now, maybe we should get back in the car? Hurry…phew, back in the safety of our car. But the rhino is still curious and comes even closer and walks among the 4x4 vans and here we are in our little Kia! This little 2 ton rhino actually stuck his horn in one of the cars whose window was open. Then he decided he wanted to rub up against a car and finally found his rubbing post.



How lucky were we to see this rhino so close and live to tell the tale!!

This was a great end to our 10 day tour with Acacia. Miles and Jimmy were great and we couldn’t of had a better group to do this with. One thing we won’t miss is the camping and we are so looking forward to a proper bed with pillows and shower.

The Tour - Part 5: Okavango

After Chobe another long drive to capital city Maun. When we arrived, we were pretty much the only ones there, so could pick and choose the best spot. However, little did we know that the 50 singing Christians would pitch camp right next to us, keeping us up late and waking us up early ;( We had our first traditional South African meal - potjie

Next day, Marc got his timings slightly wrong, and Evelyn wasn’t too thrilled to have missed out on an hour’s treasured sleep!! But at least we weren’t the last ones to pack up for once ;)

We had what can only be described as a military troop carrier take us to the Okavango Delta to meet our guides for the next two days. Sam is our poler, who luckily enough owns a fiberglass mokoro (canoe) whereas some of the others got the wooden ones (made from sausage tree) which leak a bit ;) After about 2 ½ hrs mokoroing through the reeds and a couple of sightings of wildlife – elephant, zebra and birds (where Marc almost tipped us over by standing up too quickly) It was quite a trick to figure out the best way to sit in order for the reeds not to whip you in the face but lucky enough for Marc, Evelyn sat in the front ;)



Just before we reached our island there was a herd of zebra crossing the water which sounded like a mixture of drums and galloping. We finally reach our island (called Nuquaneere, which means “your mother will cry” because it is so far away from home) and set up camp before going for a swim in the hippo watering hole. Marc bought a football for us to play with which the guides went crazy for.

After a chilled afternoon we went on a bush safari walk. Sisko (our bush guide) gave us a bit of an intro to the bushes and what to do if you encounter:
Elephant – run in a zigzag sprint
Rhino, Buffalo – climb a strong tree (not many of these around)
Lion - stand still and look directly at it and pray ;)
Snake - slowly retreat, no sudden movements

So, now that he got us well and scared, Belinda in particular, we went for our 2 hour bush safari walk. We saw zebra, blue wildebeest, impala, warthog and lots of poo. We got to know our animal crap very well as Sisko kept picking it up and telling us about the different kinds and how old it was eg. male giraffe has round and pointy poo. Interestingly, burning elephant dung is a good mozzi repellent !! We also came across the famed Boabab tree which is known as the upside down tree and is huge.



During the night we woke to hear something in the water by our campsite only to find out the next morning that it was an elephant!

Next day we went for a 4 hr walk and saw elephant, giraffe, ostriches, buck and a baobab tree and more poo. We came across an elephant skeleton which was interesting. Went for a swim in the afternoon to clean as it’s pretty much just bush round here. We then went in search for hippos in the mokoros and came across some in a watering hole - they saw us so it was time to get out of there. We could hear them in the water along the side of us which was pretty scary as they can be vicious. Finally loose them and a large colorful spider fell into the boat by Evelyn, who almost tipped the boat. After recovering from the shock we stopped off to see the sunset from the mokoros over the delta, which was just beautiful.



We made sure there was a big fire that night to scare the animals away. We had a fun night full of games with the polers and Marc tried to lead in “God save our Queen” which was pretty dismal as none of us knew the words - Marc thinks he has the body and looks of Justin Trousersnake but is definitely not blessed with the voice ;)

That night we heard hyena, and some zebra crossed the water by our camp, the frogs weren’t as loud due to the fire but still a bit scary camping in the middle of Africa about 40k from the nearest village.

The next morning we did another walk and came across a buffalo skeleton and back at camp we heard a thudding noise only to realize that an elephant was bashing a palm tree to get the fruit down. Quite funny to watch as all you see is this big tree shaking in the distance.

Time came to pack up to get back to civilization and a shower!!

Once we reached the meeting point NZ guides Gary and Clive picked us up and asked if we were dying for an ice cold beer…. Woohoo the guys faces lit up and out come the cold bevies. Quite a difference to the delta boiled water.

Later in the afternoon we were crazy enough to do a ½ hour flight over the delta to see where we had been. The plane was a tiny 6 seater (incl. pilot) and made Evelyn feel very ill. We saw some wildlife and the meeting point for the polers. Overall we were glad to be back on the ground…

The Tour - Part 4 (Chobe)

After the excitement of Vic Falls, we were now off to see what most people visit Africa for – The Aminals

A relatively short drive to Chobe National park, which is back into Botswana (Miles had to offer a small donation to officials to get us across a wee bit quicker). This place had a bit more luxury – the honeymooners opted for a luxury upgrade to a proper bed, shower & TV. This in effect gave us an upgrade with extra blankets and pillows ;)

Our first safari experience was a cruise along the Chobe River. This can be hit and miss, because you can only go as far as the river bank, so cant always get as close to the animals. This was definitely a HIT – one of the best safaris we’ve had.



Our first spot was a herd of elephants feeding next to the bank. It was amazing to get so close to so many of these majestic animals, which weigh up to 3 tons. We must have been within 5mtrs, and got a detailed look at how they pull up the grass, shake off the dirt, and then eat (500kg a day). And once again, a bull was showing off to the ladies ;)



Then our guide expertly saw a fish eagle and a monitor lizard. We could barely see these things once we knew where they were, so these guys are v good to spot them from a distance and instantly know what they are!! Next was a croc basking in the sun, then we got really close to some Kudu and Waterbuck who had come for a drink.

We saw loads of hippos, including a cute baby following its mummy. And then loads more elephants watering and mud bathing. Its just incredible to watch these animals up so close, in their own environment, and watch how they behave naturally. Its difficult to explain how wonderful it is to see and watch all these animals.



Other animals we got to see were red antelope, giraffe running, monkeys, baboons, buffalo, loads more crocs & hippos, plenty of birds – storks, cranes, and other colorful tweeters we couldn’t identify, and some jelly fish

On our way back, we saw another beautiful sunset, over the river, with elephants wondering across the savanna :)



Next day was an early rise for a 6am 4x4 truck safari. In terms of animal spotting, not quite as good as the river safari. We still saw elephant, giraffe, buck, kudu, buffalo, hippo, and some baboons – some carrying their babies and some trying to make them ;) Ultimately, we came on this trip to see lions – there were tracks and it was quite exciting following them, but our driver missed them by a few minutes – all the other safari trucks managed to see Simba casually stroll in between them ;( Still, whilst disappointed to miss the lion, it was good to get really close to the buck and baboons, and spot so many things ourselves