Travels With Maria

Dublin

We are on a driving trip to Ireland, where we will be spending three weeks traveling around the perimeter of the island. This will necessarily be an overview, nothing in-depth as we have a lot of ground to cover. As we get older, with so many places to go, we figure this is likely the only time we'll be here, so let's see as much as we reasonably can in the allotted time. We landed in Dublin early Sunday morning, got a bus into the city center. We had a bad breakfast in the hotel, after which we were able to check in to our room early. Then off to…
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Chobe

Safari jargon: A.L.T. - Animal-Like Thing. Refers to a false alarm sighting African massage - bouncing in the safari vehicle African Salute - animal turns its back to show you its butt Loo with a view - Where we pee Bushy bushy - Where we pee Water the flowers - Woman pees Check the tire pressure - Man pees Early start today. On our way out of camp just after sunrise, we saw lion footprints from last night, one reason we are not allowed out at night and need escorts to return to our tents after dinner. We drove around the park for three hours or so this morning. We…
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Four Corners

There is only one point where four nations come together in one place. We crossed this X today. We drove across the beautiful new, one-year-old Kazungula bridge across the Zambezi River between Zambia and Botswana. From the bridge we could see Zimbabwe on our left and Namibia on our right. The point where all four meet is in the middle of the river, slightly to the east of the bridge. 

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Up the River

African rivers are lifelines for the plants and animals that rely on water in this arid climate. The rivers are full of fish, the trees lining the rivers host fish-eating birds, the mammals come warily down to the bank for a drink. Hippos lounge around in the water. Crocodiles sun themselves on the bank. It was a quiet, smooth, cool, dust and insect free way to watch the wildlife.

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To Zambia

We exited Zimbabwe, then walked across the Zambezi bridge, an engineering marvel for its time (1905). This is was pretty spectacular, 420 feet below us was the Zambezi, one of the great rivers of Africa, flowing through its vertical gorge. From the center of the bridge, we could almost see Victoria Falls around a sharp bend in the river.

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Zimbabwe Village and an Elephant

They showed us around their village. The livestock pen where they keep young sheep and goats. The adults can be let loose to browse on their own, but the baboons will eat the young guys, so they have to stay behind and eat acacia pods. Then to the kitchen, outdoors, surrounded by a 3 foot high, 15 foot diameter round wall which serves as a wind break. They cook over mopani wood fires as this wood is not too smoky when it burns. Next, the indoor kitchen, used when it rains. It was hot outside, but the kitchen was cool even with 14 of us. 

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Hwange National Park

We climbed into the safari vehicles for our first game drive. It was nice and cool with just enough breeze as we went down the dirt track at 10 mph. Within 2 minutes, our guide, Victor, stopped and pointed out leopard tracks in the road dust. These guys are amazing to spot this stuff while driving.

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On to Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe is an economic disaster. The Chinese loaned them money to develop the exploitation of their coal. When they couldn’t repay, no problem, we’ll just take over the coal industry. We passed numerous trucks hauling coal, much of which gets shipped to China to increase their carbon load. We passed a brand new power plant that was belching a huge column of brown smoke into the air. After we turned off the main road to the park access road, there was the open strip mine. Black coal dust everywhere. A multi-acre dump littered with the carcasses of hundreds of defunct vehicles and heavy equipment, abandoned there because it didn’t cost the Chinese anything to dump it there. Worst of all, this was former National Park land that corrupt government officials had leased to the Chinese coal interests.

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Sossusvlei

Sossusvlei is one of Namibia’s must-see spots. Some of the world’s highest sand dunes in the world’s oldest desert provide the spectacular setting for a visit. Deadvlei is a flat pan, about a kilometer across, that used to have water until it was cut off from the river by a sand dune, about 500 years ago. The trunks of trees, dead for 500 years, make for an eerie scene, surrounded by high dunes.

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Namibian Tribes

While Namibia as a whole is surprisingly modern, there are tribes in the remote northwest of the country that maintain their ancient traditions and way of life. We were fortunate to visit two of these tribes with our guide Abel Man who was able to explain a lot about their lifestyle. We also visited the Damaraland Living Museum, where modern, educated Damara people preserve their tribal culture.

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Desert Elephants

Up early this morning to chase desert adapted elephants. We teamed up with another vehicle, a German family of four with their guide. Their safari vehicle is open, fresh air and good visibility. Ours is a four door Ford pickup truck with air conditioning. Trailing our little two vehicle caravan was a young hot shot South African who passed us several times, each time raising big clouds of dust. Open vehicle versus A/C. https://youtu.be/1YZ7vYU3XLw?cc_load_policy=1 After about half an hour, we left the road and drove along a riverbed. The ephemeral river is dry most of the year. The elephants hang around near the river as there are places they can…
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Damaraland

We flew yesterday from Cape Town to Windhoek, capital of Namibia. We have arranged a tour with Lark Journeys, who sent a driver to pick us up from the airport and drive us to the hotel for our first night's stay.  We met Claire from Lark at the hotel where she gave us the detailed run down of our Namibia excursion. She left, and we took a walk in the neighborhood to get a bottle of whisky. The liquor store was right across the street from the Chinese embassy. Windhoek is a very modern city, new buildings, clean, wide, smooth streets. Our hotel looks brand new. It has many buildings…
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Mandela on Robben Island

Today, we made the morose pilgrimage to Robben Island. Ever since Europeans first started coming here, they have used this island, 6 miles or so from Cape Town, as a place of exile or a prison for their enemies, of which there have been many. The original inhabitants, each other, lepers, and most recently political prisoners have been held here by the Dutch, then English, then Afrikaners. For the duration of the 30 minute ferry ride out to the island, we were bludgeoned with a video recording the endless chain of horrible events on Robben Island during the sorry history of colonization and general European assholeness. Upon arrival, we were…
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To the Bottom of Africa

We have been to the northernmost tip of Africa in Tunisia, the westernmost in Senegal, and now the southernmost (well, almost; a point 200km east is slightly farther south, but the European history of this place grants the Cape of Good Hope much greater significance). South Africa has extreme income inequality. After Khayelitsha yesterday, we got a bit queasy going through Camp's Bay this morning. Filthy rich, flashy cars, chichi coffee shops crowded with ugly white people drinking soy lattes along the beachfront promenade, blithely ignorant or worse, intentionally ignorant of the world most people live in. Pathetic. Only white people here. Oh, plus some service people... https://youtube.com/shorts/mjSpyvtDfHM How to…
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Khayelitsha!

At 1:30, we were picked up by Juma and his driver Ismael who took us to Khayelitsha, the second largest township in South Africa after Soweto. Established in 1984 during apartheid as a place for black people to live, it has grown to 3 million people. We expected slum conditions, abject poverty, probably the same thing you'd expect visiting a South African township. We were pleasantly surprised by what we saw. https://youtu.be/-HhTlSRJpMo?cc_load_policy=1 Juma is a serial entrepreneur. In addition to his tour company, he has two bicycle shops, a sandwich shop and several other small businesses in Khayelitsha. He starts the business, gets it going, hires local people to run…
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