Monday, July 7th, The Cavern, Drakensberg, South Africa

Greetings!

Today was one of those infrequent days when no group activity is planned.  Except for meals, we’re on our own at the Resort.  Speaking of meals, the fare includes some local game, and lamb, beef, and fish.  Fruit and vegetables are plentiful, and I’m looking forward to the pineapples I see ripening in the fields around us.

Pat and I decided to two-hour hike on a Nature Trail leading out of the Resort, up through a dense forest, to a waterfall just past a protea garden. 

The views there of the basalt mountain escarpment covering a layer of sandstone were spectacular. Some of the log stairs were a bit difficult to climb, both up and down, but we took it slowly, and were surprised to finish in less than the time described in the guide.  The unique ferns and trees which have survived in this protected high valley were very special.

It was pretty cold this morning due to a storm which crept up from Cape Town, but it warmed up later and we spent most of the middle of the day on comfy couches in the Library reading and working on our computers in the sunshine. Quinton and I worked together to better prepare him to market his tours (www.africaschild.co.za), and to use a Google Blog and Google+ to organize an effort to develop internet content on South Africa’s important natural resources.

I have come to believe that tour guides are the richest resource a country has.  We tourists depend on them, not only for helping us experience the country, but to see it from a perspective few others have.  Anything I can do to help Quinton inform us is time well spent.  And I admire especially his passion for assisting South Africans to visit the places we tourists see.  I’m interested in helping him develop some ways to allow more self-guided tours with richly-delivered content through smart phones at targeted GPS locations similar to what I’m doing for California’s coast and parks.

To see the rest of the photos we took today, click on Monday, July 7^th, The Caverns, Drakensberg, South Africa.  And check out where we’re going next on our Google Engine Map.  

Sunday, July 6th, The Cavern, Drakensberg, South Africa

Greetings!

We drove 560 kilometers (336 miles for us yanks) today across some great-looking farmlands and residential areas.  Tan grasses, green bushes, yellow-barked acacia and brown wattle trees provide a feast for the eyes.  

To make the scene more dramatic, today’s weather brought the edge of a serious storm coming up from the Cape, which was dropping its moisture and snow on the other side of the mountains we are headed toward for tonight’s two-day stay (Drakensberg).

I have only one problem with the landscape, however.  Seems the government decided long ago that their land reform distribution program design was to homestead all the blacks to a patchwork of farmlands. 

We’d drive past white-owned, beautiful sugarcane farms covering all the eye could see, and then the next hill over would begin a valley of distressed homes with no infrastructure.  The next hilltop would begin another vast expanse of green farmland, followed by another valley and hillside urban sprawl.   It’s been said that this intentionally made it much more difficult for the new housing residents to organize, and to create coherent communities.

The Cavern is an amazing resort, high up in a secluded valley in the Drakensberg Mountains.  To make our entrance even more awesome, those storm clouds I mentioned provided a light show that had us all scrambling to get shots of it.   I swear we all expected either the alien craft from Close Encounters to descend, or the one from Independence Day.

Finally, a beam of light pointed the way to a single tree marking the entrance road to the resort.

To see the photos we took on the way here today, click on Sunday, The Caverns, Drakensberg, South Africa.  To read the itinerary for the stay here, or to figure out where we are going next, check out the Google Engine Map.

Saturday, July 5th, Umkhumbi Lodge, Zululand, South Africa

Greetings!

We're still here.  The Zulu king's game reserve is huge, and the elephants, giraffe, nyalla (small deer), Kudus (large deer), and buffalo were not hard to find.  Unfortunately, everything else took the high winds and impending cold snap as an excuse to hide.

We started off the day with a flat tire, which was made more difficult by the fact that the lug nuts were on so tightly that it took a call to the local tire shop to break the grip.  We had breakfast on the bus, as the game pursuit started a little later.

Once on the Reserve, we scouted the hills, trees, bushes, and grasslands for any signs of the Big Five. These specific animals (Lion, Leopard, Elephant, Buffalo, and Rhino) are the most dangerous to hunt.  The first two have been elusive but we saw the others, and plenty more today.  We spent part of the afternoon in a Zulu Village, and were treated to a Zulu song and dance performance that displayed their remarkable harmony and physical agility.

To see all of the photos we took today, click on Saturday, July 5th, Umkhumbi Lodge, Zululand, South Africa.  To see where we're going tomorrow, click on our Google Map and find the placemark for July 6th.

Friday, July 4th, Umkhumbi Lodge, Zululand, South Africa

Greetings!

I know some of you think that Zululand is just some B movie backlot, where black actors in the 1950's starred as tall warriors fighting the British.  It can't really still exist.  I mean, it's South Africa, didn't all that get eliminated when Mandela was released?

If you're like me, and didn't follow very closely, you'll have missed yesterday's whole country (Swaziland), and probably also not understood that South Africa has quite a few complexities.  One of which is that the Zulu people still occupy a significant area in the north eastern part of the country.

We're staying tonight and tomorrow night in three of ten small one-room structures hidden away in a forest in Zululand.  Umkhumbi Lodge is very cozy, and provides us with the perfect location to use as a base for to explore the Hluhluwe/Imfolozi Game Reserve.  It was the Zulu King's private game hunting area, and so became the sanctuary for animals when the general slaughter of anything farmers hated in the apartheid era.

To see all of the photos we took today, click on Friday, July 4th, Umkhumbi Lodge, Zululand, South Africa.  To check out our route tomorrow, click on our Google Engine Map of the itinerary, and find the placemark for July 5th.

Thursday, July 3rd, Mlilwane Wildlife Sanctuary, Swaziland

Greetings!

We almost didn’t get into Swaziland.  Quinton had a full passport, with no blank page on which the immigration official could place her stamp.  His new passport is at home in Cape Town.  And he thought he could talk his way around the rule, and get her to place it on a page with some room on it.  Turns out he did, but it took some pretty good theatrics and much sweet talk.  But she definitely could have re-routed our trip had she insisted on the rule that you need one blank page.

Today was mostly a transit day, so there are few photos.  We’re staying at the Mlilwane Wildlife Sanctuary, in a very large reed and branch basket about fifteen feet high and thirty feet wide.  It even has a bathroom connected to it, and a fan overhead.  There are about ten of them arranged in a circle, and we made our way through kudus, impalas, wart hogs, and hippos who also find this area home.  The name says it, and we’re just visitors.  Tomorrow morning, we’ll see who else is in our neighborhood.

To see the few other photos we took today, click on Thursday, July 3rd, Mlilwane Wildlife Santuary, Swaziland.

Wednesday, July 2nd, Hippo Hollow, South Africa

Greetings!

The two of us are listening to Tommy Emanuel through a small speaker attached to Pat’s IPod touch.  Pat’s writing in her journal, and I’m trying to come up with something as good to write here.

So just how do you spot African wildlife while crossing miles of thick head-high brush and trees at a healthy pace?  

First, you hire a top-notch driver/guide.  Quinten has the worst view, as he’s three feet lower than us in the cab, and has to keep half his focus on the road and the other safari vehicles around us.  

But he’s been at this along time, and amazes us when he finds Hippos 200 meters away in a clearing.  Or eagles in a tree across a lake. He says there are techniques.  Watching for straight lines (not usually in nature), looking for odd shapes and contrasting colors, trying to achieve a deep depth of field so things both far and close are seen. 

Knowing where things usually are helps alot.  Birds are in trees (except guinea fowl and others that walk around), and are sillouetted against the sky.  Felines hide in the tall grass, and you only see their heads and ears.  And in the heat of the day, they’re in the shade under bushes and trees.  Everything loves the river, and the green food growing along its banks. 

So with six sets of eyes, not too many other tourists around, and cameras and binoculars at the ready, we achieved another great day in the Park.  Toward the end of the day, we started getting a little blasé about elephants, giraffes, and monkeys.  Just give me a lion, leopard, or cheetah, please!

To see the rest of the photos we took today, click on Wednesday, July 2nd, Hippo Hollow, South Africa.  And to learn more about our adventure tomorrow in Swaziland, check out the Google Engine Map of our trip.

Tuesday, July 1st, Hippo Hollow, South Africa

Greetings!

Pat’s already asleep and it’s only 9:30pm.  We’re both tired from an exciting day in Kruger National Park.  On the way to the park, we peered over the edge of the escarpment at the Blyde Canyon Forever Resort.  For over 100 years, the company of resorts which included Blyde Canyon was owned by the government of South Africa.  Known to be used as a getaway for government officials, it was sold in 2003 to an American chain of Arizona investors who operate marine and park-based resorts around Lake Mead.  Promoting itself now as dedicated to charities serving the young and those with HIV-AIDS, it seems appropriate for us to visit and take in the view.

A few hours later, we arrived at Kruger National Park, and started our search for Africa's famous wildlife.  Binoculars and cameras in hand, we spent the next several hours scouring every tree and bush from Kruger's extensive road system.

We'll be back tomorrow for another round of hunting (with eyes), and the illusive lions, leopards, and rhinos are high on my list of animals to find.

In the meantime, to see the photos we took today, click on Tuesday, July 1st, Hippo Hollow, South Africa.

And check out the Google Engine Map we made to show the route and itinerary for the rest of the tip.  Tomorrow's activities are found on the placemarks for July1-2 in Kruger National Park.