Spitzkoppe

Posted on March 6, 2013 by hilarylust

The morning after cheetah park, Kelsi and I woke up early to watch the sun rise. We walked the short path to this rickety wooden viewing tower and climbed to the top. The sunrise was gorgeous, and we entertained ourselves by playing the lion king soundtrack as the sun rose. We are nerds.
Then it was off to breakfast and into the truck. Our drive to spitzkoppe was only a few hours, so we had time to stop at some craft stalls along the way. We pulled over at the side of the highway to see the wares of the local tribes. They sold bracelets and dolls and all sorts if little hand made trinkets for tourists to buy. There were three women from two different tribes and three small children running around at their feet. The two tribes were the Hereros and the Himbas and although they both spoke the same language, their customs were extremely different. The Hereros wear long dresses, and have hats with horns on their heads. We had seen them on the border of Botswana and Namibia all grouped together with horned hats and crafts to sell. The Himbas attire is completely opposite. They wear pretty much nothing at all, and the women never shower… Ever. Instead, they cake their bodies in mud to stop the smell and keep their naked skin cool from the sun. They are definitely a sight!
The children were adorable and were having a great time just running around causing trouble. Kelsi and I gave them some lollipops and they were so eager to have them that they started sucking them with the wrappers on.
After all the shopping was done we climbed back into the truck and made it to Spitzkoppe.
Spitzkoppe is the beginning of the Namibian desert: for us anyways. It is deathly hot, very dry, and has some of the most amazing rock formations. Our campsite was right next to this huge, mountain-like boulder. Just down the road, there were more crazy rocks, each one more alluring to climb on than the next. This was Kelsi’s rock heaven. She couldn’t wait to start climbing around!
We started with a rock formation called the bridge. The bridge was massive brown-red rocks that stretched out like a walkway across the horizon. Gina, Anisha, Kelsi and I spent a good half hour or so climbing around the rocks, before Kelsi got attacked by wasps and we decided it was best to go home.
When we arrived at camp, it was already time to head out on our walking tour to see the cave paintings. Our guide was a funny little short man from the damara tribe. He explained some things about the area, like how the rocks had been carved by wind and water erosion over a million years ago, or how Spitzkoppe means “pointed head” in the local dialect. Then he tried to teach us some if the damara language. I say tried, because we all failed epically in the lesson. There are four basic click noises in the damara tribe; each one with completely different meanings. To me, they all sounded identical. One was a click from the front if the mouth, another the back, one from the side. I could make out the differences between them when he said them all in a row, but then was lost again when he spoke a sentence. Pretty much the language lesson was a complete failure. So on we went…
We continued on to some cave paintings called “The Small Bushman’s Paradise”. These were paintings written by the nomads, to pass on information to other nomads. For example: a picture of a rhino facing east, meant that water was in that direction. Our guide explained about some more drawings, as then about the history. “These paintings date back to between 200 and 4000 years ago” he explained. I actually had to stop him and ask again “did you say 200 and 4 Thousand?!”
“Yes”
Seemed like a pretty huge gap. A lot can happen in 3800 years; but there you go!
When the walk was over, and we’d had dinner, we decided to hike the 20 minutes to the top of the large boulder for sunset. It was a pretty steep climb at parts, and we left pretty late, but we managed to make it for one if the most sensational sunsets on the trip thus far! Plus, we successfully watched a full sunrise as sunset on the same day!
By the time we made it back to the bottom, it was pitch black. We sat around the fire for a little while telling stories, then it was time for sleep. Tonight, however, we were upgrading from our tents, to a cave!
In the giant boulder we were camped at was a little cave that had an opening to see the stars at night. It was a perfect place to sleep for the night! No matter that we saw a rat scurrying about earlier in the day, and our guide ensured us that the scorpions don’t go into caves, and the leopards will avoid us as well. Great.
But Manda had set up some candles to light our way, and about 7 of us decided to sleep in the cave and watch the stars! Such a perfect ending to a fun filled day.

The Cheetahs of Otitotongwe

Posted on March 4, 2013 by hilarylust

Our next stop was a campsite called Otitotongwe, or more commonly referred to as Cheetah Park. It was hot and dry and desert-like at the campsite, which was perfect for drying all our wet belongings.
At 4:00 it was time to see the cheetahs. Cheetah park actually has 4 cheetahs that are tame enough to play with. You can touch them, play tug of war, cuddle them, whatever you’d like! We were overly enthusiastic (as we are about most everything here) about petting the cheetahs. Gina especially had been waiting for this day since Vic Falls, and it was finally upon us.
It was unbelievable to pull up to the reserve and see cheetah’s just wandering around with people. At first we were all a little uneasy about how or where to pet them. We had rules like “don’t wear sunglasses” and “don’t touch their feet or tails” but otherwise we were free to romp around on the grass with them!
There were three cheetahs that were a couple years old, and one cheetah that was only 8 months. You could tell he was the baby of the group. He had softer fur, tufts of fuzzy hair around his head, and had the energy if a kitten on catnip. He zoomed around the yard, tugging on people’s loose clothing, stealing hats, and playing tug of war with anyone who would join. At one point he ran over to me and started chewing down on my ankle. His mouth fit around the entire thing as he tried to detach my foot from the rest of my leg. Attacked by a cheetah in Africa? Check!
When playtime was over, we drove off to the next part of the reserve. This area is where rehabilitated cheetahs are slowly introduced back into the wild. They have a few hectares of land to live on and hunt as they please, but once a day a truck drives through the area to feed them. The cheetahs clearly know that the truck means food. As soon as we drove down the road, the first cheetah came running towards us. The driver got out, while we all stood in the truck’s trailer and took photos. The guy took a stick to ward off the cheetah, then used it to spear a giant hunk of meat. Instead of letting the cheetah chew the meat off the stick, he flung it in the air for the cheetah to catch. As soon as he did, the cheetah sprinted off to eat the meat alone.
We carried on, and before long there were three more cheetahs running towards us. We fed all three of them in similar fashion then moved on to the next ones. We fed 9 cheetahs all together and then finally drove back to camp. What an exciting afternoon!

El Dorado

Posted on March 2, 2013 by hilarylust

We arrived at El Dorado by mid afternoon and the sun was shining! Unfortunately, our tent was still full of water, so we had to borrow our driver, Vincent’s, tent for the night. After setting up our tents and eating lunch, a group of us followed one of the workers at the campsite to see the daily cheetah feeding!
El Dorado is a campsite / farmhouse. The Dutch family that owns the place allows campers to set up on their property for the evening, while they continue to tend to the animals they own. They have a number of ostriches roaming around, as well as some oryxes, puppies a leopard, and three cheetahs.
When the cheetahs saw us coming they ran towards the fence, eager to be fed. Then they started mewing! They sounded just like little kittens that were hungry. It was the strangest thing. These cats were huge! I would have expected them to roar, or growl or anything except for sound like a small house cat that could fit in the palm of your hand.
I turned to Kelsi, “that’s it, new favourite African animal! Sorry giraffes, you’re out, cheetahs are in!” Then it was feeding time. The guy opened up a large bucket full of raw meat chunks and pulled out a stick. As he skewered a large hunk of meat, the cheetahs went wild with mewing. They jumped up against the fence and pressed their faces as close to the meat as possible. Then the guy pushed the meat into one cheetah’s mouth, it tore it off, and ran off to the side to eat it. Then he fed the second cheetah, and the third, and by then the first one was back to get some more! On the second round, he let us feed them. We each got a turn to give one of the cheetahs some food, take some photos and carry on. It was so much fun.
When our cheetah high was over, it was time for the bar. We heard that El Dorado had a very unique bar, and we were eager to check it out. Turns out, the rumors were true. The bar was really just the living room of the family’s home. They had a little bar set up for travelers to order drinks, then you just sat on their couches, chatted with their children, and socialized. As well, the room was full of animal heads mounted on the walls. Each one had been caught by the owners, stuffed, and set up around the room. There were all sorts of antelope, a lion, cheetahs, leopards. Pretty much everything we had just seen in Etosha. It was very impressive having all these animals staring down at you as you sat and had a beer.
While we were sitting around, we met the little girl that lived at the house. She was very sweet, and almost a little shy, but wanted to chat with us anyways. She proudly brought over a little 6 week old puppy for us to hold. This was the only remaining pup from their litter of 5. The others had either died or already been sold to other families. This puppy was absolutely adorable! “That’s it guys, cheetahs are out, this puppy is my new favourite African animal.” We probably spent more time cuddling this little dog than we did staring at the cheetahs earlier.
Unfortunately, while we were sitting there, the wind picked up and it began to rain. Not again! Kelsi ran back to the campsite to close the tent flaps. When she returned, she was soaked to the bone.
“The tent flew away and I found it in a tree nearby! It’s full of water…”
Great. Two tents down, no more to go.
It took a while for the rains to slow, then we all walked back to the campsite for dinner. We were lucky that we could eat outside. The weather was nice and gave us a half hour window to eat in the fading light without getting wet. Then it started back up.
We were exhausted, and the miserable weather was matching our moods. I was not very interested in sleeping in a puddle two nights in a row.
Nonetheless, we had no other options. So once again, we took our towels, soaked up what water we could, slept as much in the middle of the tent as we could and tried to get a couple hours of sleep.
After another restless sleep, we woke up in a moat. Water was all around the edges of our tent, but otherwise we were doing okay. All of our stuff was safely in the truck, so we just had to dry our sleeping bags out!
Then we found out that the truck had flooded and all our bags were wet as well… There’s just no winning.
So we packed up our wet things and piled back into the truck to try to nap on the next drive!

Etosha

Posted on March 2, 2013 by hilarylust

It was a 10 hour drive from the Delta to our campsite near Etosha National Park. Even though we knew this, we thought having drinks at the bar the night before was a good idea. When someone suggested shots, we also thought it was a good plan. Then when pulling an all-nighter was laid on the table, Kelsi, Gina and I were definitely in. We sat at the bar, went swimming, played our new favourite Afrikaans song “Maybe Baby” about 100 times, and partied with Sean and Nick, two of the guys that ran the campsite, until our breakfast call at 5:30 the next morning.
The 10 hour bus trip was excruciating. We kept pointing blame at each other: “did you suggest shots last night?” “Why would we decide to stay up ALL night?!” We did a lot of napping during the first half of the trip. We also did a lot of itching.
Kelsi and I had been bitten by bugs so many times while we were in the delta that our legs looked like they’d been through a war zone. We probably had 30ish bites on each foot alone: Mosquito bites, ant bites, and caterpillar rash covered our bodies. We slathered on this silver ointment that Gina had, but to no avail. We tried tea tree oil, an aloe itch relief gel, and anything that people could offer to help. In the end, only scratching our bites until they bled gave any sort of satisfying relief.
We were almost too distracted with the scratching to see any animals on our Etosha game drive. Being our 9th or so game drive on the trip, we were not overly impressed by seeing an impala on the side of the road. But the animal sightings picked up when we came across our first watering hole.
The watering holes are where the action takes place. The first one we pulled up to had a tonne of animals. There were a huge herd of impalas, an oryx or two, a bunch of zebras, about 15 giraffes, and a pride of 8 lions hanging out in the trees a few meters away. They were all so close to each other it was possible to fit them all in a single camera shot! As soon as we arrived, the lioness got up to have a drink of water. You could see the rest of the animals tense up. The impalas shuffled the other direction, the giraffes stood still and followed the lion closely with their eyes. The zebras ran in a frenzy to the other side of the watering hole, then every eye in the area was intently watching the lioness move towards the water. She lapped up water for a few minutes, with the whole animal kingdom watching, then stalked her way back to the shade.
Just a few moments later an elephant came walking towards the back of the bushes where the lions were relaxing. This was where we got to see who the real king of the jungle was… Turns out both elephants and lions are scared of each other. The elephant jumped back in surprise when it came around the bushes, face to face with 8 lions. The lions were equally shocked to see a full sized elephant sneak up behind them and ran to the next tree grove. The animal kingdom still stared, alert and ready to flee! The only animal un phased was the male lion. He sat his ground and simply lifted his head when the elephant went past. What an exciting afternoon at the watering hole! Eventually, the elephant washed himself in the water and we drove onwards to camp.
Just before dinner that night, it began to rain. Kelsi and I, worried about our tent, frantically tried to pull it under the cover of a tree and save our bags. It was just a little rain, under the safety of a tree, what could go wrong?!
Then, the wind picked up, and it rained harder. It poured actually. We all huddled in the truck to eat our dinners. When the rain failed to slow down, none of us were keen on leaving the safety of the truck. So we sat, and waited. We waited until the rain slowed and Manda told us we had to get off the truck to save the battery…
So remember in Vic Falls, when we picked out the most dilapidated looking tent we could find? Well this finally caught up to us big time in Etosha. When we made it to our tent, the walls were saturated with water. The floor had small puddles around the sides and drips were falling from the ceiling. We took our towels and mopped up what we could in the tent. The rest we wiped down with wet wipes and crossed our fingers that the rains wouldn’t come back in the night. Then we went to sleep.
It didn’t take long before the rains started up and the water came dripping into the tent again. The bottom half of my body had a steady drip and my feet were sitting in a puddle. Kelsi had it worse… “I’m gettin’ it in the face, Hairy!” She announced.
At first it was funny. We laughed at our sad situation as we felt the drip drop of the rain fall into our laps. Then we nearly hit our breaking point. We’d had very little sleep in the past 48 hours and were getting cranky. The rain soaked our sleeping mats and our wake up time was creeping closer. We contemplated pulling our sleeping mats into the communal bathroom and sleeping on the floor, but it was too much effort.
At 5 am we were brooding. This was the worst tenting experience we could think of. When Manda woke us 45 minutes later we didn’t want breakfast and we didn’t want to socialize. We had a cup of tea and took it for a walk to see the sunrise. Screw this day!
Luckily, we calmed down a little and had a good long nap on the bus. We had another game drive to get through, then off to our next campsite: El Dorado!

The Okavango Delta

Posted on March 1, 2013 by hilarylust

Our next adventure was a 2 night, 3 day trek in the Okavango Delta. It was a half day drive to the campsite at the mouth of the delta. When we arrived, we were given a brief overview of the next few days. Then we set up our camp, had lunch, and off to the bar to have a few drinks. We chatted and danced, well into the evening, with the tour leaders and the guys who worked at the campsite. Our five AM wake up call was less than pleasant. Nonetheless, we packed up again and piled into a truck that drove us the hour or so to the entrance point. The Okavango Delta is between 50 and 80 000 square kilometers depending on the season. It is a labyrinth of waterways, shifting islands, and reed covered marshes. It is home to thousands of animals, and a huge array of plants and animals.
When we arrived at the entrance point, we were greeted by a bunch of local villagers that would be our polers and our guides for the three days.
We paired off into twos, and were given our own poler for the weekend. Our poler was a young guy named “Life”. Life quickly became Kelsi and my new favourite person; he was laid back, loved to dance and sing, and had as much fun laughing at Kelsi and I as we did at each other. Plus, our new favourite game was coming up with generic phrases about life that could literally be used in each situation. When Life would push our boat past all the other boats, we would say “That’s just Life in the fast lane”. When we’d cruise through different waterways from the rest of the group, we would nod our heads and agree that “sometimes Life takes you on an unexpected path”. Then we’d curl over in laughter at how funny we thought we were. This continued relentlessly for three days. We’re such losers.
The first thing we did was pile into the macorro boats. Macorros are small, hollowed out, wooden boats. Each boat held two people, and a poler. Kelsi and I climbed in the front as Life gave us a push forward and climbed in. The boats moved through the delta by being pushed along with long poles (thus the name “polers” for the guides).
It was about an hour and a half to our camp by boat. Life pushed us along easily through the tall reeds and lily pad filled ponds. The passages were tiny. They were hardly wide enough for our little boat to make it through.
The entire trip, the reeds kept smacking Kelsi and I in the face. It was difficult to see what was going on around us. But that was okay, we just kept noting how “sometimes Life throws many obstacles your way”. The puns made the ride all worth it.
Finally we had arrived at camp. It wasn’t much, just a small island with enough space to set up our tents and a communal area for eating and bonfires. The whole camp was set up under a giant sausage tree. This was the first time we’d seen a sausage tree close up. It was finally possible to see how massive the sausage fruit really were. I went into my tent one afternoon, and when I came out, one had landed right outside the door. It was huge, and easily weighed a couple pounds. I was lucky that it had missed hitting me in the head. That thing would have knocked me out for sure!
Our fear afternoon was lazy. We couldn’t leave the camp without a guide, so we lounged around and napped for the first hour or so. By midday it was too hot to be in the tents anymore, so we grabbed Life and Manda and a few of us headed to the swimming pool.
The swimming pool was just an area of the swampy water that was slightly deeper and had less reeds around it. The water came up to our waists, and we had a few meters to swim around in. Kelsi, Gina and I had way too much fun koalaing each other (leaping and clinging on to another person with all fours) and attempting to take underwater photos in brown water. We completely disregarded the “no splashing” rule that was in effect to avoid crocodiles. Oh well, we survived!
By late afternoon it was time for our first walk. We split off into smaller groups of five. Our group was Kelsi, Falafel, Gina, Anisha and I. We set out with two guides : Life and Brian (And yes, I made the Monty Python connection, even if they were completely oblivious to it).
I have two words to say about our walking safaris: Sticky grass. Sticky grass looks very similar to the long grass with fuzzy spurs on the end that we were constantly walking through. Only occasionally, the long grass would be a patch of sticky grass that would death cling to your clothes, never to come off! Okay, perhaps a bit dramatic, but it wasn’t pleasant. Note to everyone trekking in the Okavango Delta, don’t wear yoga pants! By the time I was half way through our walk, my favourite black Lululemon pants were completely green with sticky grass. You had to pull each needle off individually (which took me about a week of working at it on the bus). I heard a bunch of remedies: wash it, burn it, stick tape to it. In the end, it was a painfully slow process of doing it by hand.
Other than sticky grass, the Delta walks were actually quite fun and informative. We didn’t see a tonne of animals. I had expected this, from what we were told by other groups, but that was no problem; the scenery was beautiful and the guides were super knowledgeable. We came across lots of zebras and birds; we saw frogs and grasshoppers and all sorts of crazy looking insects. We did come across a number of fuzzy caterpillars, especially in our campsite. They were cute to look at, but they attached themselves to people and gave them really itchy rashes that lasted for days. Mostly, our walks consisted of looking at the ground avoiding anteater holes and staying safe from prickly acacia trees.
At one point, I caught my foot on an acacia branch, tripped forward and scraped the top of my foot on one of the spikes. Kelsi began laughing at my weak attempt to free myself from the branch. Then she fell in an anteater hole. Karma’s a bitch.
The walk finished around sunset, and then it was time for dinner. We all hung around the campfire for the evening, but had an early night. Our next walk was scheduled for 6:30 the next morning.
Our morning walk was 4 hours long and was before breakfast. We were all unimpressed at having to go on a four hour hike without a full stomach, but after a small rusk bar and a cup of tea, we were refreshed enough to start the trek. Our second walk was similar to the first. Brian explained about all the flora and fauna and we became experts in identifying animal droppings. We also got to try some red star berries that looked like grapes but tasted like apples. It was really neat to have Brian as our guide. He is one of the few guides that was originally a bushman. His perspectives on the trees and the animals was so interesting.
The baobab tree, the one with the massive trunk that is so often seen here in Africa, was particularly special to Brian. He believes that the ancestors from his tribe live within the tree. You can hear their voices in the night, that is why you should not camp directly beneath one. The spirits in the tree will steal the voices of enemies that decide to camp under the safety of a baobab.
Good to know!
Brian also taught us some of his bushman language; finally we had found an African language with clicks! This was very exciting to me. We learned Natambooka (Good Morning) and Hongu Mana (Thank You). Back at camp, we played a traditional bushman game called xhonu. Don’t ask me how to pronounce it. The “x” is some crazy click sound that I couldn’t make if my life depended on it. The game was similar to the Malawian Bao game, but had more complex rules. The guys said that if two people are really good, the game can go on all day.
Our second afternoon was lazy as well. We arrived home from our walk late morning and had another nap. Afterwards, about 6 of us ganged up on Sox at a game of xhonu and got our asses kicked. When games and lunch were over, we had Hector teach us how to pole.
We were disasters. It is much more difficult to steer the boat than it looks. Kelsi and I spent more time stuck in the reeds laughing than we did moving. But we didn’t flip the boat and end up in the water, so I count that as a win!
In the evening, everyone got back in the macorros to watch the sunset. Life pushed us along to a lake about 45 minutes from camp where we hung around waiting for the sun to go down and watching for hippos. We never found any hippos, but we did make lily pad necklaces and I got to try my hand at poling again. I hadn’t improved much in two hours, but the open water made it easier to move around. The three of us almost missed watching the sunset because we were laughing so hard at my inability to push the boat straight. Finally Life had had enough and he took over.
I decided to ride in the boat backwards on the way home. My thought process was that the reeds wouldn’t hit me in the face that way. Instead, I sat there in constant anticipation of being smacked in the back of the head. My anxiety was so hilarious to Kelsi that she was left in wheezing laughter for the entire 45 minutes home. That combined with our still constant Life puns and we were exhausted by the time we arrived back at camp.
“Kelsi?” I asked at one point “what would you do if you turned around and Life just handed you a bunch of lemons?” We really are special.
Back at camp we had dinner and then dancing around the fire. All the locals got together to sing and dance traditional African songs by the campfire. It was really fun to watch, and they even got all us up off our seats to join in.
The next morning we were up early to head home. Life poled us back to the truck and we said goodbye to him from there. Quite an incredible three day trip!

Back to Botswana

Posted on March 1, 2013 by hilarylust

The next morning we were up early and back on the road with our new group. There was 17 of us in the new group; this time a completely different mix of nations. Mostly Germans, some Italians, and of course a few Aussies.
It was a short drive that day. We dealt with border formalities and went back to the last campsite we visited in Botswana. The plan was to do another game drive and an over night in Chobe National Park. The exact same activities we’d done four days earlier. Kelsi and I opted to stay behind at the campsite and skip this excursion. We were tired, and both emotionally and physically exhausted. Plus Kate and Ash from our last group, who were continuing South to Johannesburg on a different tour, were doing the same thing. We figured it would be fun to hang out for one last afternoon.
Falafel stayed behind as well. She was also continuing all the way to Cape Town with us. So we had a pretty good group to hang out with at the pool for the day.
About an hour after our group had left we were so happy about our decision. The skies opened up and the rain came bucketing down. Apparently the game drive was windy, freezing, and left everyone soaking wet by the time they reached their bush camp.
Kelsi and I spent the night hanging out with Manda and our old driver Elouise and listened to them tell all their disaster stories about past tours. We sat under cover from the rain well into the evening, just laughing about all the crazy things tourists do in Africa.
The next morning our group was back and we were off to do another Chobe River cruise. It was pretty much the same as the last time. Cherry was our driver, we saw some hippos and elephants, and we sat around enjoying a cold beer with our new friends.
This time though, we didn’t have the boat to ourselves. About two other German tour groups joined us, leaving Kelsi, Gina and I to sit on the floor by the cooler.
Gina’s bags had finally been recovered and sent to the campsite, which was such a relief. She was still a little blue, but that would fix itself all in good time!
The second half of the boat cruise we saw very few animals. It began to rain again and the wind made it freezing cold.
When we arrived back at camp an hour later, we found Bush Baby flooded. All our stuff was soaked, sleeping mats, blankets, bags, everything. Good thing we decided to choose the most mangled looking tent! Unlike our last tour, this truck didn’t have ANY rain covers for the tents. We pulled our tent under shelter, hung our stuff up in the damp night, mopped out the floor of the tent, then climbed back in with the spare sleeping mats Manda provided. I hope it’s not going to be raining much on this half of the tour!

Goodbye and Hello

Posted on March 1, 2013 by hilarylust

I hate goodbyes. Especially goodbyes that are going to last forever. What do you say to people when you know you’ll probably never see them again? Sandy and I joked about some of the generic goodbyes people come up with. “Have a good one,” “stay in touch,” “keep on truckin'” or my least favourite “have a good life”. My personal favourite is when you plan to meet up to say goodbye, and then plans have to change and you never see the person again. It just saves so much awkwardness.
Saying goodbye to the woo girls was sad. But I was hungover and still half asleep when Cara came climbing through our open window to say goodbye. I was nervous about the gorge swing and trying to get ready for rafting. So it didn’t feel like a goodbye.
It hit me that everyone was leaving as I watched the cab drive away with Robbo, Emily, Nick and Sandy all in the back. What now?
Now we had new people to meet. A new group to bond with. And new adventures to experience. I was so excited to keep on with the trip. We have SO many incredible things to do still, and 3 months to go! It was just sad we couldn’t do it all with our new friends by our side.
That afternoon we wandered around lost. We sat in a dingy Internet cafe with a squeaky fan, trying to catch up on the world we left behind at home. Then we sat at the pool bar with a cold beer. It felt weird just being with Kelsi. The two of us had rarely been alone together for the past month. We both kept looking around for the others to join us.
So we decided to go meet our new tour guide and sign some paperwork. Manda, our new guide was really amazing. He was accommodating, easy going, personable and really sweet. But we just kept looking back over at our old truck, with our first guide Chris, our cook Duncan and our incredible driver Elouise.
We had missed our new group meeting the night before and didn’t know anyone in our group. Manda sorted us out and let us pick out a new tent. We picked “Bush Baby #4” the most dilapidated looking tent we could find. “This one’s ours!” We announced proudly. We set it up, then walked through the campsite in search of our laundry. We walked by a table in the middle of our camping area and saw a girl sitting there alone. She looked blue. Literally. She was wet and her blue Thai pants had bled, staining her legs a bright blue colour.
“Hey, are you on our tour to Cape Town?” She was. So we did introductions in an effort find a new friend on the trip.
Gina was from Brisbane and had just spent the last few months in Mwanza volunteering with orphans. On her flight down to Vic Falls, the airline had lost all of her bags. All she had were the wet clothes that had turned her blue.
“That sucks! What are you going to DO?!” We asked.
“I’m going to sit here and have a cigarette” we laughed.
“You want some chips?”
“Yup”
We had nothing to complain about. Poor Gina had just left all of her orphan friends, lost her luggage, and sat alone in the middle of the campsite covered in blue. It was kinda funny. Especially when we then had to walk right by her, carrying all our freshly washed clothes tauntingly past her.
Gina seemed like a cool chick. Looks like we’d have at least one good friend to cause some trouble with on the second half of the trip.
Things were looking up! Let’s begin a new journey…

The Gorge Swing

Posted on March 1, 2013 by hilarylust

Every time I thought about the Gorge Swing I felt faint. I kept thinking, “why in the world would I ever sign up for something like this?” The Gorge Swing is labelled as “bungee’s big brother”. It is a 70m free fall followed by a 110m swing across the gorge. It is considered 110% on the adrenaline scale. Good lord.
In the booking office, the video of the gorge swing conveniently only shows millisecond clips of the jump. The rest is just smiling faces and thumbs up from people who have just completed the jump; it looked so easy. Damn you advertising!
Either way, I had to do it. Everyone was doing it! Yes, I’m that easily peer pressured. Plus, by the time I arrived on site, they already had my money; might as well throw myself from a cliff.
It was only a couple hours after the rafting that we loaded back up in the truck and set out for the second part of our day. We arrived back at our briefing base for safety instructions. I didn’t hear a thing. I just kept staring down at the gorge in appalled horror. Was I really going to jump into that?
Finally it was time to strap ourselves into the safety equipment and walk the couple minutes to the swing. I desperately wanted to go first. Just get it over with and be done with it. But there was only enough equipment for a few people, and Kelsi wasn’t strapped in yet. We’d have to wait until other people went, then use their straps. Kelsi and I were going tandem. It was my compromise for signing up. If I’m dying, we’re doing it together.
Kelsi was pumped. I detected no fear in her voice as she calmly talked me through our jumping technique. Then we walked up to the jumping point, and I think it hit her. We were about to JUMP OFF THAT!
Surprisingly, I calmed down a little when we arrived. It looked like just one big swing. Like we would just let go, and gracefully swing to the other side of the gorge and back. No big deal.
The first couple stepped up to the platform. They shuffled to the edge, smiling and a little nervous, then the operator started the countdown.
“5…4…3…2…1”
They stepped off.
There was a bloodcurdling scream that was cut short. They fell straight down and disappeared into the bottom of the gorge. SCREW THAT!
My stomach dropped, my knees went weak. I’m sure I went ghostly white in fear. There was no graceful arc, there was no calm dismount from the platform. There was just fear. Raw fear.
Kelsi noticed it too. So did the rest of the people waiting to go. We were all either silent, or nervously laughing. Nick was standing alone by the railing with no expression on his face. This was his fear, and he was about to face it, no matter what. Sandy was stoked: just walking around like nothing had happened, taking photos for people as needed. I was just trying to stand on two feet without falling over.
Up next were Robbo and Emily. When they stepped over the edge, I was the one that screamed in horror from the safety of land. It just didn’t get better. How is it possible to drop so fast?!
Just like the first couple, Robbo and Emily came up smiling. I knew I was going to love the swing. I knew as soon as the jump was over I was going to say how amazing it was. I only had to get past the small problem of stepping off that ledge first.
Kelsi got strapped in.
We were up next.
I was in a dizzy state of mind. I kept taking deep breaths to calm myself. Kelsi was equally as nervous as we stepped over the safety rope and started walking down the platform.
“Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god” I kept repeating as we shuffled our way along the plank. “I can’t look down. DON’T look down”
“Omg, I’m definitely not looking down” said Kelsi.
We had one arm wrapped around each other’s backs, holding on to the safety clip. I’m sure my free hand was shaking. I kept my head up and just looked at the clouds.
“Are you ready?” The guy at the end of the platform asked. My stomach sank. Oh god.
Then Kelsi looked down. “Shrek! I’m lookin’ down!!” We both nervously laughed.
“FIVE” the guy started.
I wasn’t ready. I take it back.
“FOUR”
All I could think of was. I better get out from the platform far enough that I don’t smash my head on the platform as I go by. How would I know when to step off if I wasn’t looking down?!
“THREE”
I’m going to throw up. Or faint. Or both.
The next thing I knew my stomach was in my throat and I was falling. I don’t even remember numbers two and one.
I felt winded, and I couldn’t breathe. There was screaming in my ears, I think it was both Kelsi and I screaming, but I was too disoriented to tell. We were falling on an angle, with Kelsi half on top of me. Apparently I just went for it right as the guy reached one and dragged Kels down with me.
I felt like I was falling forever. Just trying to catch my breath. Then all of a sudden the rope caught and we started swinging out into the gorge.
“Oooooooh myyyyyyy God!!!!!” I screamed. The fear was gone. We both started screaming and hooting in excitement!
I turned to Kelsi. “Oh my god I love you so much right now!” We hugged and screamed and shouted into the echoing gorge, slowly spinning as we flew. 110 meters we glided all the way across the gorge. Then back, over the river below.
My feet were tingly and numb. It was like a strange pins and needles and it lasted about five minutes after I was safely back on land. My hands were shaking with adrenaline. This was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. I LOVED it!
We swung back and forth across the gorge until finally the safety rope was close enough to hold on to and we were dragged to the top. We pressed our feet out against the rock cliff and climbed our way up the last part. When we reached the top I was still shaking with excitement and had a huge grin on my face.
“Nick, you’re going to LOVE it!” We both said. He was still very unconvinced.
Nick and Sandy were up next. Even after I’d just finished the jump, I was equally as on edge as I watched the two of them walk down the platform. It was just as crazy watching them leap and disappear into the gorge. It never gets old.
In the end, they both loved it as well. We all went to the bar for a celebratory beer before heading home. It was the final day before Nick and Sandy left us to go home. But we’d had a pretty epic day so far! The gorge swing was definitely a success, and another thing to tick off the bucket lust.

The Zambezi Rapids

Posted on February 28, 2013 by hilarylust

Our early wake up time was rough. 7am and we were already on the road with stomach churning hangovers. Today we were white water rafting down the infamous Zambezi River.
During this time of year, the water levels are high in the river. This means the rapids are a little less intense; I was probably the only one happy to hear this. The Zambezi river has world class rapids. They are intense at high water and absolutely insane during the low water season. Having only been white water rafting in very low grade rapids, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect with grades 4 and 5… I was a little nervous.
We started at base with a safety lecture: wear a helmet, this is how to row, and swim, and be saved. You are going to fall out. You are most likely going to flip your raft. You are going to have a great time…
It was a half hour or so drive to the starting point. Then we had to climb for twenty minutes to the bottom of the gorge. There were enough of us on the tour to fill 4 rafts with 7 people. Our boat held Kelsi and I, Robbo and Emily, Sandy and Nick, and Kate. The perfect crew.
Our guide was a young, fit, Zimbabwean guy with a great sense of humour.
“Okay, we need two strong guys at the front!” He grabbed Nick and shoved him towards the front. Then he looked Sandy up and down “no, you had too much to drink last night” he laughed and turned to Robbo “you want to be in the front?”
Robbo took two steps towards the front of the raft, slipped on a rock, and went splashing into the river. Good start. Nick grabbed him by the life jacket (as was described in our safety lecture), dunked him in the water then yanked him up towards the raft. Robbo managed an odd, armless, salmon-like wriggle onto the boat that left us in fits of laughter before the trip had even begun. They were right, we were going to have a great time.
When we’d all soaked ourselves in water, and climbed into our respective places in the raft, our guide ran through the basic instructions. “When I say forward, you row; when I say left, do this; and right, do that. When I yell ‘GET DOWN’, everyone get inside the raft and face the outside at a 90 degree angle. When I shout “JUMP OUT” everyone leap out of the boat. Understand? Okay!”
So we went through the process one at a time. “Forward!” and we rowed. “Left!” And we turned. “Get down” and we ducked inside. “Forward again!” So we jumped back up and started paddling. “Get down” we fell back down into the bottom of the raft… All of us except for Nick. Nick was so excited about the “jump out” part, that he just ejected himself from the boat and hurled himself into the river. Way to listen buddy.
When the guide saw him he just shrugged, “okay, jump out!” He took his paddle, swung it around and nailed me in the chest, knocking me backwards into the river as everyone else threw themselves from the raft. We ended up, once again, in stitches laughing.
When our failed practice was over, we headed for the first rapid. White water shot up in front of us in waves and whirlpools as we floated towards it. “Forward! Forward!” We could hear our guide yelling at us “Faster!!! Okay stop!” We pulled our paddles back and crashed our way up and down through the first rapid. Our raft tipped, and fell back against the wave, until we came safely out the other side. Success! All my fears and worries about rafting melted away. This was too much fun already!
After a couple more similar rapids we pulled over on the side of the river to do some cliff jumping. Everyone got off the rafts, climbed up the rocks and leapt into the river as the guides filmed and took photos from below. We had a great time watching everyone fling themselves from the rocks, life jackets still on, and into the water below. When it was Emily’s turn to jump, she thought the guide had said to curl into a ball when she jumped. So she took a step forward, jumped, wrapped herself into a cannonball, started shifting forward and landed with a splash…face first. Although I’m sure the landing hurt like hell, we couldn’t help bursting into another laughing fit when we found out she was ok. When all of us had a turn, it was back in the boats and time to move along.
We floated along for a minute, then braved the next rapid with ease. We paddled and turned and crouched our way through the next couple rapids without any injuries or losses. At one point, Sandy asked if he could command the boat. He had been trained in white water guiding before, and figured he could give it a shot. “Not here” said the guide. “The next couple rapids are big ones. Wait til we get further down the river.”
We had been trying to convince our guide to purposely flip our boat in the middle of a rapid since the beginning of the trip. It wasn’t going to be that great of a story if we all stayed afloat the whole time. Unfortunately, he said that he wasn’t allowed to do that; so instead, we threatened to sabotage the raft ourselves, all jumping to one side as we crashed over a wave. I’m sure he thought we were crazy.
The next rapids we were going through were three different ones in quick succession. 15, 16a and 16b (also called The Terminator). Our guide explained briefly how we were going to go through it and what to do if we fell out. “Please.” He said “do NOT fall out on these rapids. If you fall out at 15, then you have an excruciatingly long trip before we can pick you up. 16b is a grade 5 rapid. You really don’t want to have to swim your way through that. But if for some reason that happens, float down the middle. There are too many shallow rocks and whirlpools at the edge of the river.” Ok, we agreed. No flipping on this one.
So we watched the first raft go through before us. The team paddled and rose against a rapid, then crashed down out of sight, then back up again on the other side. The edge of their raft came up alongside another wave and the whole boat began tipping to the left. Paddles began to fly, people leaned in various directions, trying to counteract the movement, and then the entire raft flipped, as if in slow motion, on top of them all. Oh my god. This was going to be good.
We followed behind them and braced ourselves for the same fate. We rose and crashed and spun our way through the first part of the rapid. We paddled through the second half as quickly and as hard as we could. “FASTER! FASTER! FASTER!” Our guide wailed at the top of his lungs. We paddled as hard as we could, until we passed the point where the first boat had flipped. We continued to crash through the rapids, water splashing over us, into our mouths and eyes. “Okay guys, you are going to have to get down for this next part I think. Wait for my queue!” We bumped our way along the water for a moment, and I held my breath in anticipation. “GET DOWN! EVERYBODY, GET DOWN!”
We jumped off the edge of the raft, grabbed our paddles with both hands and faced the outside as quickly as we could. I could hardly see a thing. Arms and legs were flailing in my peripheral vision, water crashed over us, I wasn’t 100% sure which direction was up, then I looked out towards the shore, and saw a man floating down the edge of the river. I looked back; our guide was missing. “He’s gone! Our guide fell off!” someone yelled (it could have been me, who knows). By the time we had all realized what happened, Sandy jumped up at the front of the boat and threw himself towards the guide’s place at the back. Nick stood up at the front of the raft as we plowed through another rapid. He held his paddle above his head
with both arms “HECTOOOOOOR!!!” He roared in battle cry. Sandy managed to take a seat at the back of the boat “Everybody up! FORWARD!” We all jumped up and started to row. Our guide was now long gone from the boat. We had commandeered the raft and were taking charge. “FORWARD! FASTER! TO THE LEFT!” We heard Sandy shouting commands as we hurled along into the final, grade 5 “Terminator” rapid. We were at full force adrenaline by this point. All of us were yelling and shouting in incomprehensible excitement. It was chaotic. “GO!” “GO!” “TOGETHER!” This was our raft now, and we were going to take it all the way to the end of the Terminator. Despite our best efforts, we kept floating off to the right side of the river. In front of us were a bunch of jagged rocks, sticking up out of the river, behind us we could hear the muffled yelling of a man in a kayak trying to catch up with our raft. With Sandy’s guiding skills we just barely missed the rocks. As we passed them, the kayak caught up to us, and we pulled the man, kayak and all, into the raft with us. He took command for the last few seconds of the rapids, and when we all came out into the calm river on the other side, we were back into breathless laughter again.
Turns out we were the ONLY boat that didn’t flip during the set of rapids; and we did it without a guide!
Another raft had picked up our guide somewhere downriver and he was laughing just as hard when he was safely returned to the boat. When we all got back in, we paddle high-fived at a successful rapid completion!
Our adrenaline was still pumping as we continued down the river. The next rapids were fun, but nothing compared to what we’d just been through. So we rounded a couple more bends with ease, then pulled over on the side of the river to let all the rafts catch up.
“Okay guys, the next one is a big one” our guide warned. “It’s just one big wave we’ve got to go through. At low water this wave is over 18 feet high. Are you guys ready?” We had no choice really, so we started to paddle.
You could see the wave growing as we came towards it. It was huge, looming above us as if to say “go ahead, try it”.
“FORWARD!! PADDLE! GO, GO, GO!” Our guide screeched as we came closer.
The wave now towered over us. White water spraying in all directions over us. We dipped down right before we hit it, then came vaulting up against it with surprising speed. We paddled as hard as we could, pushing the boat more and more vertical as we climbed the wave. The guide was still screaming from behind us, but his voice was drowned from the sounds of the rapid.
Our boat climbed into a fully vertical position then seemed to freeze. In my mind, it was all slow motion. The boat shifted to the left and I could see everyone in the right side of the boat falling towards me. I saw water, then land, then water, then the raft, then everything was dark and silent.
I was spinning under water and had at some point lost my paddle. I wasn’t sure which way was up, so I just stayed still and hoped I would come back up to the surface. When I came up I was spewing water from my nose and mouth. Everything was dark, and I kept slamming my head into something hard. It took me a moment to realize that I was under the raft. A wave pushed the boat up for a moment and light came pouring in for just a second before crashing back down into darkness.
I pushed myself back down into the water and tried to come out from beneath the boat. I came back to the surface choking on water. I could see the raft, upside down in the river. Our guide was standing on top if it dancing. He was laughing and pointing at us as he jumped around! “Who fell off now!?” He taunted in giddy excitement.
I was still coughing up water when Sandy yelled at me to grab his hand. He pulled me towards the raft so I could hold on. Then I turned around to see Nick holding out his paddle, trying to get back to safety as well. I grabbed his paddle and dragged him back to the boat. The three of us and the guide managed to flip the raft upright again and we all climbed in. I had no idea where Kelsi was. Actually, I didn’t know where anyone else was.
We were still crashing through the rapids when we saw four life jackets bobbing down river a little ways. A man in a kayak was with them, yelling some sort of commands. When we caught up to them, they were all tangled together. Kelsi’s paddle was locked in Kate’s life jacket. They were holding hands, and they were killing themselves laughing. I leaned over and grabbed Kelsi by the life jacket.
“Baby! Baby!” she shouted “I’ve got your paddle, baby!”
So I dragged her and the two paddles, very un gracefully, into the boat and we crashed onto each other giggling. “My paddle!!!” I was so excited it wasn’t lost.
We were all safely returned to the raft, and now no longer had a leg to stand on when it came to teasing our guide about falling out. We were happy though; our raft had flipped just like we’d wanted!
The final few rapids were easy. We cruised through them, rowing here and turning there. We clung onto some of the other boats and sprayed water at each other teasingly. Then finally it was time to pull over and climb out. What a trip!
Not much was left to do… Except for climb out if the gorge! Climbing out of the gorge is like climbing up a 40 story building. It didn’t help that it was now midday and the heat was deathly hot. I didn’t realize how out of shape I was until three quarters of the way up the hill. I was faint and out of breath and drenched in sweat by the time I reached the top. Luckily, icy cold water and beer was waiting for us along with a huge lunch! We recovered, and hydrated, and filled ourselves to the brim, then hopped back in the truck to head to camp. Our hangovers were completely nonexistent. What a morning. Up next: the gorge swing!

Victoria Falls

Posted on February 26, 2013 by hilarylust

We made it to the town of Vic Falls by late morning and pulled right into the adventure booking office. For many people in our group, including our woo girls, this was the last day of the trip. So we all sat together and got a quick overview of each activity available. There was an endless number of wallet emptying things to do: elephant riding, lion walks, helicopter trips, bungee jumping, zip lining, flying foxes, the gorge swing, and white water rafting, among many other things.
We signed up for the combo package of white water rafting and the gorge swing, both of which were giving me heart palpitations even as I handed over my credit card to pay. Luckily, we booked for the following day, which gave me a full 24 hours to mull over my impending doom.
For that afternoon’s activities, Kelsi, the boys and I decided to take it easy and head over to the falls to take some photos. It was only a quick five minute drive to the entrance to the park, and from there we got to explore the lookout areas on our own.
Our first glimpse of the falls was spectacular! It was a cloudless afternoon, with a rainbow in the background and tonnes of white water crashing into the gorge below. We were now standing in the Zimbabwean side of the falls, looking towards the Zambian part we had swam in just two days earlier. The pools we swam in looked even more dangerous from this side, and we could even see a small group of people on Livingstone Island about to start their tour.
There were 12 lookout points from the Zimbabwean side of the park. Each one had an even better view and a different section of the falls to look at. At one lookout point you could stand right on the edge of the cliff looking out towards the falls. You hardly even realize that the rocks just abruptly end and fall straight down to the bottom of the gorge. There were no ropes, and no park staff members to watch people; anyone was free to just walk right up to the edge and look over. Makes me wonder how many people have just fallen over the edge, never to be seen again.
The last part of the falls started to get pretty misty. We all had to cover our cameras so the water wouldn’t get in, and we were all drenched by the time we hit the final lookout. Two of our three cameras stopped working, and even though we would have loved to hang out on the rocks, looking over the falls forever, it was time to salvage the last of our electronics and head to the bar for milkshakes.
The outing was definitely worth the $30 US dollars that it cost. Unlike my experience at Iguazu Falls, Victoria Falls was almost completely void of tourists. Apart from four other Germans we ran into, the four of us were the only people at the falls that afternoon. It was amazing!
When we’d had our fill of the falls, we made our way back to the campsite to shower and relax.
For dinner that night, we had reservations for 13 at a fancy restaurant down the road called “The Palms”. Originally a romantic dinner for two for Robbo and Emily, the other 11 of us decided to crash and have a big meal all together.
We all dressed up (for the first time this trip) and sat down to a wonderful meal. The restaurant served traditional African dishes with unique types of meat. We tried ostrich, crocodile and warthog as our strange new animals, and then a few classic dishes that were out if this world. Kelsi and I started with a mouthwatering prawn, coconut and ginger soup and a chicken ratatouille type dish. For our main we tried the warthog and the most incredible beef medallions I’ve ever eaten. Between 13 of us we tried pretty much everything on the menu; everyone got to taste a little bit of each and by the end if the meal I could hardly move I’d eaten so much.
When dinner was over, a few of us moved along to the casino across the street. The place was empty, even in a Friday night, but we had a great time playing slots, black jack, and dancing at the little nightclub. Afterwards, we went back to the campsite for drinks at our chalet and a middle of the night swim in the pool. A pretty great way to spend our last night with Mel, Cara and Sarah. Miss you ladies already!