Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Home safe and sound

I spent the last days in Cape Town looking at various colonies of animals.

There was;

  • The seal colony

    Packed with genuine un-clubbed seals







  • The penguin colony

    Wearing their nice little tuxedos as all good penguins should







  • and of course the township of black people.

The township tour was very interesting. I felt perfectly safe walking through the so called "no go" areas. They were very keen for the tour not to appear like a game drive, where people would drive through and take snapshots of the locals from their windows. So unfortunately all I got were shots of these buildings.

Apartheid may be over but these people still live in the same shitty cramped houses. Though a few of them are richer now. I drove past a shanty town and peered in the doors to see DVD players and plasma screen TVs.

This was Cape Town. Apparently in Jo'burg there was a shoot out in an area where the tour goes. I wouldn't have done the same tour in Jo'burg.

We also saw a whale on the first tour. I could tell it was a whale because someone said, "hey look over there it's a whale". At first I thought it was a rock, but a small spray of water confirmed it was a whale. It's great to capture them on film in the wild. Check out this photo, wow hey, I should work for National Geographic.

I then endured a flight to Perth for 9.5 hours then endured Perth itself for 8 hours. It's a funny old town Perth, during the day I struggled to keep awake. By night time I feared for my life. I just thank my lucky stars I didn't look at Ben Cousins, or some other local hooligan, the wrong way.

Overall the tour was a lot of fun. I saw lots of interesting places, people and animals. I guess my only regret is that I never found out if Mark Philipoussis found true love with a kitten or a cougar.

Monday, October 8, 2007

Cape Town is cold

The main thing we did in Botswana was check out the Okavango Delta. It's a pretty standard trip for people on the overland trucks. You meet up with some local people who take you out into the wilderness on their mokoros (a very shallow canoe). It wasn't until I was safely back on the truck that someone informed me a tourist had been taken from their mokoro by a crocodile.

We got to the site and set up camp. It's not like other campsites since it's in the wilderness. We didn't have showers, toilets or anything. But the locals were kind enough to dig us a hole.

The first afternoon we were taken on a 1.5 hour game walk. Our guide was Mots, (or Mops or Mox). He looked the part of the traditional tracker in his shoes and designer jeans from timberland. But he was very knowledgeable
about animal shit. Which was just as well because that's all we saw. We saw Elephant, Hippo, Zebra, and Giraffe shit. We were very amused that he used the term "shit" rather than the less colourful term "droppings".

He also taught us a bit about the various plants and what they are used for. At one point he told us the poison something was used to cure the something. We asked are you sure? Turns out you use the roots, the leaves are poisonous. A bit later on he told us another plant that was nice to taste. So I stuck a leaf in my mouth. It was then he told us you use the roots, not the leaves. I should have known.

We were following
his stories fairly well up until when he told us about the plants used to cure babies. When the shadow of the eagle is cast on the baby you need to give them the plant to stop it from getting sick. It was then we thought, how much of the other stuff he's told us is also bullshit.

The next day we got up early to do a 4 hour game walk. It was different to the previous walk because this time we saw some Hyena shit as well. At one point we saw what was either a red back deer, or a rock. My bet was on rock until it jumped up and ran away.

Mots was very apologetic that there wasn't much game around. But if they aren't around there's not much he can do about it. At one point he suggested maybe the lions had scared them off to another section of the park. So I asked, "So what you are saying is there's a pack of hungry lions roaming around and we're the only edible thing for miles." He just laughed.... and nodded.

That night the locals put on a song and dance show. They were a bit embarrassed and were slow to get going. But it soon became apparent that they were great natural singers. Their dancing however reminded me of the Werrimull School dance of 1989. Lots of small shuffles to the left and then shuffles to the righ
t in equal number.

It was then of course our turn to give a song. The group dynamics had changed considerably since Rachel's 21st and so the song of choice was some Beatles number that I didn't even know the words too, and some Barry Manilow (well maybe not Barry but you get the picture). So I volunteered "Pump up the Jam" which I did a solo acapella version of.

We then jumped back on the truck and headed to South Africa. At the border it took a huge amount of self control not to hold up my passport and say "Duplamatic Ummunitee". But I did manage to not say it and got through without any incident.

Once inside South Africa we stayed at a campsite that still felt like it had aparteid. The white guys bar had a bunch of angry looking Afrikaner farmers. Just across the road was a run down shack with no roof that had people singing dancing and heaps of music. I wanted to go hang out with the blacks but I didn't have any Rand yet and I was very tired.

That night it rained and thundered and lighteninged and my stuff inside my tent got wet. But it was the last night of camping THAT I WILL EVER HAVE TO DO IN MY LIFE. So it was ok.

I'm now in Cape Town. I was told it's a lot like Melbourne and that's true. So far it's been very cold, wet and raining and also quite sunny, and that's just this morning. Only 5 days to go and I'm back in sunny Cairns.

Monday, October 1, 2007

Mugabe Sux!!

I'm now out of Zimbabwe so it's safe for me to say that "Mugabe Sux!!"

My last update was from Dar Es Salam in Tanzania. Well a lot has happened since then. Claire and Ken have become so close that they have become known as Clen. But I am no longer sharing a tent with Bjoern, I managed to get my own. So it's not all bad.

We drove for many miles for several days in the truck and turned up at Kande Beach on Lake Malawi in Malawi. We went on a village tour to see how the poor Malawegians were getting on. The highlight of the tour was the local school where we were the main distraction. Then the head teacher hit us up for some donations. It seemed stupid to pay all these middle men at World Vision or wherever when you can pay straight to the source. So I gave $50 USD to pay for the education of an orphan. Though it may go towards helping the head teacher buy a new car.

Some of the group decided to head out on a boat with the locals to do a spot of fishing at a nearby Island. I wasn't up for that but decided to go for a swim. I said to Tom, from the young English couple, that I was thinking of swimming to the Island. He said OK, and off we went. It was when we were about half way there that we realised it was quite a long way. But like Ethan Hawke in Gattaca, "I never saved any for the swim back", and we pushed on. Luckily the fishing boat was still at the Island and we got a ride back. The locals estimate it was a 600m swim but it seemed a lot longer than that to me.

In Malawi I bought a whole bunch of wooden stuff, including these quite big Malawi chairs. I had a local from the village called Fred Flintstone who was helping me to part with my money. People love these chairs until they find out how much they are to post. But more on that later.

Following Kande Beach we were 4 days on the road. Usually getting up around 5 or 6am and getting into camp at about 5pm. Most of the time I spent playing cards, or the game "500" to be precise. After 10 hours straight Clen, Tom and I had gone slightly mad. So much so that I went open misere on more than one occassion (ask a 500 player if you don't know what that means).

Finally we lobbed into Zambia and the town of Livingstone. Named after the goofy English explorer that got himself lost. A good bonding experience and almost compulsory for these truck trips is the booze cruise. First we go to a little village that has lots of goofy clothes and buy each other fancy dress outfits. You don't know who's got you and how mean they are going to be. Well they were particularly mean to me. I had to wear a leopard skin g-string and a red lace negligee. For my sake and everyone else's I chose to wear my boxers underneath. The booze cruise had all you can drink beer and spirits and true to form I drank so much I passed out. Not such a great idea when the owner of the campsite is named Grubby and he decides to take photos of your testicles. But it was a good night for the crew as both the Zimbabwean group leader and the alcoholic truck driver (pictured to the left) both picked up a member of the group.

After a day of recovery we went White Water rafting down the Zambezi river. I was fine on the grade 5 rapids, but on a grade 2 rapid I lost my balance and fell out, much to everyone's amusement. I even had time to say, "uh oh here I go!"

While in Livingstone I thought I'd check out how much it would cost me to get my wooden stuff back home. Well the DHL wanted $600 USD, Fed-Ex wanted about $350 and the post office wanted $170. I'll hang out until Zimbabwe I thought.

We then crossed the border into Vic Falls on the Zimbabwean side. They are really struggling and even in this very touristy part of Zim the supermarket had virtually nothing. All I could find was a tin of grapefruit slices and a pack of cards with Asian girls in Bikinis. So I both one of each.

The Zimbabwean economy is so screwed that $1 USD is worth $30,000 Zim dollars. But that's if you use the bank. On the black market it's $300,000 Zim dollars. So of course I chose the black. Which was great at the post office. It's about the only place that must use the proper rate and I posted my stuff for $20USD. I was so excited I tipped the posties. Now let's hope it makes it home.

Most of the group was breaking up and going their separate ways in Vic Falls. So we had a farewell dinner and a few drinks. I think I got back about 2am, but I had to get up at 6am to watch Geelong win the AFL Grand Final. I was then booked in for a bungy jump straight after. I learnt a valuable lesson don't drink and bungy. I didn't throw up during the bungy, just before and after.

A walk around Vic Falls helped. The fresh cool water sprays you as you wander around. I was happy to pay the $20USD into Mugabe pocket.

I'm now in Botswana. Where Ange is the only cool kid left of the Truck. We still have the whinger and his wife, weird Adelaide girl and the quiet one I forgot initially. We've picked up 5 extras. 4 of them are couples over 50 and there's another standard Kiwi chick. One of the couples are American.

We went on a game drive yesterday and it's now official. I'm bored with Elephants. I just want to see a leopard but I don't think it will happen. In fact I'm pretty bored with riding on the truck for 10 hours a day too. But oh well only 5 days to go on the tour and about 5 days in Cape Town then I can go home and rest.