Endless Summer Tiny World

So the safari has been extremely awesome so far! i have met some great friends and we have clicked so well only after 6 days! and the worst part  is that i have to say bye to all but 2 of them! it was a sad farewell this morning! The last couple days have been pretty great! A couple days ago we took a tour on the Chobe River at sunset and it was absolutely amazing!! We saw a group of about 9 elephants, babies, moms and dads, that all came down to the river for a drink and a mudbath, the baby was even rolling around in the mud. This was then followed up by a family of Rhinos – baby, mom and dad-  all strolling out of the water.  And then followed by an amazing sunset!

We then spent a day crossing a river to Zambia – this ferry takes forever and seems like its going to break down. It also doesnt help that the workers take bribes to get trucks on first. Luckily we got there early and was only about a 2 hour wait or so.  We are now in Victoria Falls and yesterday spent the day watching people and some of my friends bungi jumping (no I wasn’t crazy enough to jump) and then took a really short helicopter over the falls. The water is super high so the falls are at their prime and it is so cool!!  Tomorrow will be a trip to the falls to walk in front and on top of them and then Saturday we head north to continue our trip towards Nairobi.

So I have been on an overland tour for about 3 days now with amazing people, ther are 11 of us including our guides! For now our guides are biggie, Paul our driver, and angus the regional manager training Paul,the rest of the characters are: matt, the pretty eye candy from Australia, Joe the cooky hilarious guy from Australia, Howard the guy who us too much older than us and terrible with one liners, Diana the youngest sweetest innocent girl from Australia, Bridget and kat the sisters from new Zealand, Catherine the kinda crazy new zealander and me! It’s really great! Yesterday we went through a safari of Kruger national park and it was amazing! We saw elephants, giraffes, rhinos, warthogs, lions, impala and loads of others!!! It was really awesome!! The last two days we were driving to and through Botswana and today we are staying at. Place called elephant sands… Ther is a huge watering hole right outside the bar and within 5 minutes of being here there was a huge elephant at the watering hole drinking and throwing water on itself! It was amazing… We’ve also seen a family of elephants tonight and the nights not nearly over! It’s amazing! And I’m loving being in safari!!! Keep in touch!!

While in Maputo my last day I mostly laid low, as I have been feeling very broke!!! I got up very early the next day and got on a 9 hour bus ride to Johannesburg…. Ugggh! But the bus ride ended up much better than I ever expected. Before we even left Maputo our bus broke down, the gears weren’t working correctly…. But the bus they were going to switch us to wouldn’t even start, so we just kept going and had to go very very slow up and down hills in south Africa. Most the way to the border I was sleeping but after the border I had 2 new best friends, Keanu and Anil. They are two brothers sitting behind me. Keanu is 11 and Anil will be 10 this week. I then also met their mother, Mira, their grandfather, their younger brother, Malachi, and some cousins. Throughout the course of the next 7 hours I got invited to go stay at their house for a couple nights. This sort of was a family affair. When we got to their stop in joburg I met Mira’s husband Raoul, and her brother Matthew. Then when we got to the house I met Raoul’s brother Paul and her nephew Lito. It was really great to stay with them, see what the homes were like and what the families were like!

Their house is surrounded by a wall and has a gate across the driveway just like all houses in joburg. Unlike the US it seems to be just the right size for their family with a kitchen, living room/dining room, one bathroom, and a bedroom for each person, though the two younger boys share a room so they have an extra bedroom. Out back not attached to their house in another room with two twin beds and a bathroom, this is where I slept. They also had another room attached to the house but with the entry out back and a large room behind the garage where their maid slept. Yes they have a maid who cooks and cleans and helps with the boys because labor is so cheap here. They were so surprised when I was describing some of the houses in the US and I said not many people had maids or had that large of a house and no cook!

The first night they asked if I wanted to go with the boys to a movie, which I of course said yes. The boys were so wound up they were running and jumping all over on stage in the empty room. Then on the way home they were all in the back singing and dancing to songs like dirty bit by black eyed peas and pretty girl rock by keri hilson… haha. But as soon as we dropped Lito off, Keanu and Anil were out. After dropping them off Paul offered to take me out in Joburg and show me a little of the city, but it turns out that even a city like Joburg is pretty dead on a Sunday night. So we found a little bar with salsa dancing and the people there were really good…. some even looked like they could be professional salsa dancers. We enjoyed watching them for awhile and then when things died down we were heading out when the music changed and more people came in. So we decided to stay and in true Joburg fashion this is when my cell phone got stolen. Of course I was not being very smart and left it on the table and walked away for a minute not paying attention…. basically like having a giant blinking sign asking someone to take it! Even though my cell got stolen it was a really good night.

The next day Mira and I took a short walk around her neighborhood, also going by and stopping at the boys schools, we helped her father loading his truck for his business a bit and then when the boys got home I played some video games (Anil’s favorite) and soccer (Keanu’s favorite). That night Mira’s dad invited us all to go to dinner at a Portugese rugby restaurant where I got to meet more family! I met Mira’s sister and several cousins, neices and nephews and saw her brother again. They had lots of stories and questions for me just like I had lots for them! It was really really cool to be able to go and spend time with their family and see how all the dynamics work. It was very nice to be able to stay with them for couple nights and hopefully sometime I will be able to return the favor or at least be able to help plan a trip to Disneyworld the boys so des

I have spent the last two days trying to figure out how to get USD for the safari, finding out that I am definitely not prepared very well and deciding after talking to people who have just done the tour that I need a warmer sleeping bag. So I am now the proud owner of a much thicker sleeping bag I just bought from a guy here and hope I can sell to someone in Nairobi. Tonight is a meeting for the safari and I have already met several people who will be on the first part of the tour with me. What I know so far is that the bunch leaving here tomorrow will got up to Victoria Falls together, where we will meet up with the group coming from Cape Town and then we all split up, some will continue to Cape Town, some will go on to Nairobi and some will be done from there. More details to come soon I hope, though I don’t know how much access to internet I will have while on tour.

A  third world country  and a third world country I  got! Mozambique is definitely third world. There are huge colorful markets everywhere with people setting up stalls to sell everything from fruit to couches and mattresses. They will sell absolutely everything at these places and there is almost no need for physical stores. There are women and children everywhere with babies strapped on their backs with colorful clothes and carrying huge tubs on their heads. These tubs contain anything from the largest avocados I’ve ever seen to bread to drinks to water. If the bus stops or slows down men, women and children come running up to try to sell you cashews, or drinks or fruit, even jewelry and nail polish and flip flops. The public transport system is on Chapas, which are actually mini buses meant to hold about 16 people.You stand on the side of the road and flag one down and get in…. they tend to fit as many people as possible in with no regard to babies, elderly or women. I was in a chapa with at least 30 people in it. At that point they left the sliding door open everyone just stood on the bus and held onto the ceiling with most their body hanging out of the bus, all that was missing was a couple chickens and a goat or two!

Tofo is beautiful with turquoise waters and a huge beach, but since it is a tourist area it is not priced as a tourist area! But it is always free to lay on the beach so I have been doing a lot of that. Also enjoying the liquid sunshine, as my dad would call it when it rains but is sunny out, as well as the sea breezes and even a storm or two. I hung out with my irish friends Ciaran and Michelle and we enjoyed making some great food with the local produce and just hanging out sharing stories. I went on an ocean safari in search of whale sharks or even a manta ray and unfortunately we didn’t see anything…. in fact we didn’t even get out of the boat to snorkel at all!!! That was a disappointment, but just means I’ll just have to keep traveling in order to find a whale shark (like I was ever really gonna stop… right!) It was a great week with great friends and very nice and relaxing before I have stuff I have to get done before safari.

While in Port Elizabeth (PE) I didn’t end up going to the Elephant Park and instead hung out with my british friends Nicole and Becca. They are really awesome and I get along great with them. PE is not a very exciting town, but it is a place you have to stay because the BazBus has a layover there.

The girls and I ended up walking into town and checking out their very old library and a curios shop, otherwise we just had a little lunch on the boardwalk and ended up at the hostel having a great time chatting with everyone for the night while some people made a Braai (BBQ).  The next day I split from the girls as they were going to stay in Durban for three days and I wanted to stay on the beach in the country instead of the city. I went out to Coffee Bay. The place was amazing. It is in Xhosa Country, and this part of South Africa has only been part of the country for 40 years or something like that. When they speak they make a weird almost clicking of the tongue noise, there are cows, horses, donkeys, sheep and even pigs all over, crossing the roads whenever they want and the people live in round huts with no electricity or running water in most of them.

The first day there I went on a hike with others from my hostel, including my two friends Cecelie and Elizabeth from Norway, and we went to hole in the wall. Which is a large archway out in a wall in the ocean. I couldn’t get over how our guide Joseph did the hike with us in barefeet, but most of the people out there don’t wear shoes most of the time. I actually cliff jumped into the arch, which was really cool, but not the most comfortable cliff jump I have ever done as the swells were large and I felt like I was gonna jump onto a rock. My jump was more of a bellyflop as the rocks were a little wet as well. We walked back to the hostel from hole in the wall, it was about 6 miles and took about 2 – 3 hours. It was beautiful though with a route that went right along the coast! Most of the time I felt like we were hiking on animal paths.

That night we got invited to the headman of the local communities’ house for dinner and dancing. The women started off by dancing and singing for us and then they served a two course meal that consisted of pap, a maize type food, and sauce and sweet beans with some other type of corn food. It was actually very good. We also got to ask questions about the local culture and customs and have them answered by the headman or the women. They even had us all up and dancing by the end of it!! It was super amazing to experience and definitely felt like you were in the real africa!

The next day Cecelie, Elizabeth, some Danish girls we met and I all spent the afternoon on the beach and then took the cheapest surfing lessons I’ve ever heard of! I think the 2 hour surf lesson costs about $4 USD for the board, wet suit and lessons. The best part was that the waves are always rolling in on this beach so there is so much less work… so much less paddling! It was definitely much easier than the lessons I took in Hawaii!! And I actually stood up!!! so it was very exciting!!

After coffee bay I met back up with the british girls in Durban for a night and then we headed on a bus trip to Swaziland. Another country!!  While in Swaziland we did a cultural tour where we got to a museum showing us traditional weddings and dance and then had a guide walk us around a community. This community was very similar to a township and they are always very sad to experience. But there was a very inspiring guy we talked to that was teaching young children to draw and play instruments!! We then got to have the local braai…. it was amazing!! some of the best meat I have had in South Africa!

The next day the girls and I headed to Nelspruit where we spent a night hanging out watching movies at the hostel before I had to say bye to them. I was so sad to see them go!! I really really enjoyed them, but they had a safari in Kruger to go to while I headed off to Mozambique.

I was planning to take a bus to Mozambique but since I hadn’t prearranged a visa the taxi driver told me I needed to take a minibus. These are more like 14 passenger vans that they fit 16 people into with fold down seats. I got on one and was at the very back corner squished like a sardine. We all smelled so bad as it is so hot here! I feel like I am melting everywhere!!! The minibus driver was super super nice and walked me personally through customs and getting a visa and all!

I am in Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, and it is a big city mainly. The sidewalks are all torn up in places and it makes me wonder if that is a result of the civil war that was happening in the country years ago. It is so hot so I am very happy to say that I am headed up to Tofo, a beach resort area of Mozambique. I think you can go snorkeling with whale sharks there so that is my next adventure!! I have about 10 days here and have to back in Johannesburg by April 13 as I leave for a 29 day safari the next day!!!

The Safari is a camping safari. We camp the whole way and it goes through Kruger in South Africa, Chobe in Botswana, by Lake Malawi, and through the Serengeti plus Victoria Falls and Zanzibar. So I am very excited for the trip! I also found out my friend Chelsy from the ship is going to meet up with my in Kenya and travel with me for about a month or so!! So a lot of exciting stuff will be happening in the next couple months so make sure you stay posted and keep in touch!!!

I just tried adding pictures but it is telling me my pictures are too large to add to this site!!! Sorry! I will try to take my camera down a level so that I will be able to add pictures from here on out! I will try adding them to facebook as well!!

So St. Patty’s day for me was spent on long street – the party street in cape town- with about 10 other people from my hostel. We had a ton of fun, danced and then just hung out on the balcony of some bar/hostel and watched everyone out on the street! It was absolutely crazy out, with people everywhere and long long lines to get into some bars/clubs. I gave myself a 2 am curfew as I had to be up at 7 am the next day and some older guy, juan, that I had chatted with all week, he is from spain but lives in SA, walked me back to the hostel.

The next morning I got on the BazBus (backpackers bus) and started the journey I thought was gonna be very short but ended up all day to Storms River. The bus in great because you make tons of friends and even find people going to your same hostel. I met a guy named Jan (pronounced yawn cause he’s dutch) going to my hostel. So when we got in we headed to the only restaurant in town…a 50s diner where they had tons of Elvis photos and Marilyn Monroe! The next day I got up and headed to the TsiTsiKamma National Park. I hiked 4 k with a German man, Uwe, to a waterfall that was falling over a cliff and into the ocean, but there was a pool you could swim in as well! We had a swim and a nice hike and it was nice to be out in some nature. The hike was actually more like rock jumping and scrambling over rocks! It was really great! We then shared some lunch and then went on a much shorter hike over a couple suspension bridges. The park was really amazing! I had only booked one night in the hostel and they were booked full for the next night to I went to Jeffrey’s Bay with Jan.

Jeffrey’s Bay is a huge surf town and has a huge beach and all kinds of discount Billabong and Quiksilver shops. The hostel is perched at the top of a hill at one end of the beach, it is pretty cool and it seems many people end up staying for a very long time! I have been here for three nights, mostly just hanging on the beach all day! But today I need to go on a search for more sunscreen!! The first night because I was friends with a Dutch guy we attracted more dutch (they are everywhere here!! ) and I now have a new love of the dutch. I spent two days hanging out with 3 to 5 dutch and even though I am the only one who speaks english they all still speak english, even if I am not in the conversation, but just so I can understand! The first day I hung out with Jan, Emeile (we call him email) and Robert. These guys were hilarious! They spent probably a half hour in the billabong shop trying on hats… so funny! They also let me convince them to get in a huge boulder throwing contest on the beach. I was very sad to see them leave. Tonight I am off to Port Elizabeth for two nights, where I hope to go to an elephant  park. I also already know two british girls at my hostel so I have friends already!!

Robben Island is the island that has a prison, and is famous because it is the prison Nelson Mandela was kept at. I headed out there today and was sadly a little disappointed. The coolest part was having an old prison inmate as your tour guide, seeing Table Mountain with it’s Table Cloth (when a huge cloud sits right on top of the mountain and also flows down the front of the mountain) from the ocean and seeing penguins. I was disappointed because they seemed very disorganized with an entire busload of us confused as to where to go and with no guide, and then you got on the bus to drive around the island and it was super hot with no airconditioning and they would stop the bus all the time to talk to you so there was no breeze!!!

I’m just happy I got to see the famous South African Penguins though!! Happy St. Patty’s Day everyone! it is my farewell night for Cape Town as I have an early bus out in the morning to Storm’s River, which is about an hour from the city on the coast! Time for new friends and new adventures, but not before one last send off night on the town!

Last night ended up well, a bunch of us were hanging out on the hostel terrace and decided to head down to the waterfront for dinner. It was fun, there were 9 of us who went so it was a good time!

This morning I woke up early and went a township tour. The townships are communities that are basically squatter communities, where a lot of the people who lost their homes during apartheid moved to and now continue to live, sometimes in one room houses they built themselves! It was very down to earth educating tour. It sort of made me realize that I really was in Africa. Though it would not be the best way to live. I went there with so many questions and think that now I may have even more! It was very eye opening and I would recommend something like this to anyone who comes to Cape Town.

The tour started out at the District 6 museum. This is the museum about the area (district 6) which was the largest community of coloured people who were forced out of their homes during apartheid. They were forced out to create room for new developments and this became a white only area. These people were mostly moved to the Cape Flats where they squatted on government land. Some areas have government housing, or hostels and others are all houses built out of material the people found themselves. Some look like a normal neighborhood with cars and everything you could need, and other parts of it are all makeshift houses, or businesses in old shipping containers. There are now tons of townships all around Cape Town, as well as other cities as well,  and the largest one they think has over 1 million people living there.

After being to the hostels they lived in, it is amazing how small of a space the government planned to put these people in. But also how small of a space some people are still living in! There were people out everywhere, everyone was very nice. And we got to go to a “brewery” and a witch doctor. There were terrible smells at the witch doctor, and this beer is pretty unbelievable, they fill up a bucket about the size of a paint bucket and you get to have it. It takes 4 days to brew and is made in huge plastic barrels.  The hostels were tiny and two families shared an itty bitty room with two twin beds. You paid rent for a bed and put a number you bought into an elecric box and that is how you get electricity.  There were 6 families sharing one bathroom and one bigger dining room area.

There were nice places and houses that looked pretty normal and some that were built by the government and after paying rent on them for awhile you were considered the owner. After that there were the makeshift houses and shipping containers. The shipping containers were mostly businesses because they were so hot during the day. The self built houses were basically whatever and however big you built them. They had no water, and they share toilets at the edge of the section of town. There was one spot that had water, they get water for free, and you went there to do your showering and cleaning of clothes and get buckets of water to take to your house.

It really was amazing. There are so many questions to ask when you are there and sometimes it is so hard to understand how this happened. But all in all, it is pretty eye opening to smell, hear and experience! I have attached lots of pictures of the hostel bed you rent, the brewery and its brewmasters and drinker, and the community.

So Yesterday I headed on the bus to go to Table Mountain first – the 1,087 meter high mountain that is the backdrop to Cape Town, and what do you know I didn’t bring my camera. So I just took the tour bus all around Cape Town without my camera until I got to my stop where I could get it. I then went back to Table Mountain and actually went up it on the tramway. It was a really really cool at the top. It is unbelievably flat at the top, for a mountain, and there were lots of little walking trails all around that led you right out to the edge of the mountain. After that I took the tour around to Camps Bay, the famous beach where I got some great pictures and lots of sun! I am now super sunburnt with a sweet farmers tan! haha! Last night me a few friends went out to dinner at a nice Turkish restaurant and then just spent the rest of the night hanging out at the hostel terrace.

Today I woke up and took the bus to the botanical gardens. They were cool but definitely not what I expected. Not sure what the plan for tonight is, but just wanted to get some pictures up! I’m off to do research on my next steps from here, I will let you know when I know!

Yesterday after doing some essential stuff, I wandered down to the Q & A Waterfront. It is adorable, very touristy and super busy since it was the weekend, but a very nice waterfront. It reminds me a lot of San Francisco except Cape Town is not as hilly and has the Huge Table Mountain as it’s backdrop. The rest of the afternoon I just had some downtime as I am still jetlagged! Last night I got to watch some of the six nations rugby games and then just sat and chatted with fellow travellers. I am staying here another 3 nights as I am waiting for some mail and I will move on to travel the southern coast on Friday.

Today I plan to get a hop on hop off bus tour so that I can learn a little more about cape town and see more of the sights and I am going to head to the top of Table Mountain… I hear it is the best views in the city! I’ll try to post some pics later today or tomorrow!