2008-02-25 – 2008-03-03 Exploring South Africa – Jo’Burg to Durban

2008-02-25

Summary

- Arrived in Johannesburg

- Massive thunderstorms

Our flight arrived a little ahead of schedule. We were transferred via bus to the terminal. We had to show our Yellow Fever Certificates for entry into South Africa as we’d come from east Africa. When we arrived we followed our instructions to get our arrival transfers… info desk of terminal 2. Ok found it, but there was nobody waiting near the desk for us. We asked the guy behind the desk that said he thought there’d be a shuttle bus coming at 8pm, but best to ring them (it was 6pm). I went down to the phones, but realised I had no Rand yet, only USD. They wouldn’t accept USD, so I had to go back to the ATMs to get some Rand out, then back to the phones. We called up the contact number we’d been given in our documentation for the transfers. No answer…. that’s handy. So we went back to the desk who said we could get a taxi if we didn’t want to wait 2 hours, however the taxi would be 350 Rand (about US$50). No thanks, I’m not paying 50 bucks when I’ve already paid for the transfers. It turns out there was another girl waiting for the same transfer as us, Katie. The guy by the desk was very helpful in leading us up to where Katie was sitting. We decided we’d grab a bite to eat for dinner. Just after 7pm, while waiting for our meals, the transfer driver rocks up… but now it was his turn to wait for us. I had pesto penne for dinner… first time I’ve had pesto and probably the last. We finished up and Juda, the driver, took us to our inn, which was about a half hour drive.

We got to the inn just after 8pm, so had missed the pre-departure meeting at 8pm. Most of the other people on tour were already in their rooms, so we didn’t meet any of them that night, only our tour leader Kevin. I find the South African accent very similar to New Zealanders. Anyway, that night there was a huge thunderstorm. We were awoken in the middle of the night by the loudest lightning strike I’ve ever heard. The thunder was deafening; scared the crap out of us when it woke us up, it was just so loud. It turned out that this strike had taken out the power.

2008-02-26

Summary

- No power

- Skye caught out by ATM scammers; statement to police

- Pilgrim’s Rest… ‘cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese’

- Bourke’s Luck Potholes and Blyde River Canyon

- Bushveld Camp; leopard at waterhole

Tuesday morning, we were up for breakfast at 5:30am; no power… AGAIN! Luckily, just after the breakfast the power came back online, otherwise we would not have been able to leave as the gates were electric. There are 8 of us on this tour: 2 males and 6 females; we are the only Aussies.

We headed off for our long day’s driving. Our first stop was just at a shopping centre to stock up on supplies around 9am. I went to the shopping centre while Skye went to the toilet. When Skye was done in the toilet, she went to the ATM to get money out. She came into the shop and had just reached me when an African guy came running up behind her saying something about her transaction not being finished. I didn’t actually hear what he said but figured maybe Skye had left her receipt behind at the ATM or perhaps even her card. My hands were full of food and drinks to buy, so I couldn’t really go and see what was happening. As I was paying for everything I was thinking that she was taking a while and was going to go check on her straight after paying for the goods. As I was walking out she was coming in and said to me “Scott, I don’t know what just happened”. She looked worried, so I asked what had happened and as soon as she started to say she’d followed the guy out there and put her card in the machine and couldn’t get it back out, I knew exactly what had happened as I’ve read so many stories about it happening. We ran back to the bus to call up and cancel her card immediately. Of course neither of our mobiles worked… typical international roaming style! We used Kevin’s mobile to call and Skye was on the phone for quite a while. Apparently on the other end, the bank was saying their system was down so they were unable to cancel her card. Now as far as I’m concerned that is absolutely appalling. The reason we got these traveller’s passport cash cards is because they go on about how safe they are and that there’s a 24 hour access number to cancel it immediately if it is lost or stolen. The lady on the other end is going ‘can you call back later’…. errrr NOOO! ‘well I could try again if you like’…. Well DUH, of course I’d like you to try again. We were unsure whether these guys (there had been a few of them involved) had managed to get the PIN for the card or not. All the time waiting for this thing to get cancelled, knowing full well that these guys would be heading for other ATMs to get money out asap. On the plus side they couldn’t use it to purchase anything as it wasn’t a credit or debit card. In the end, the card still had not been cancelled after 15 to 20 minutes on the phone with them…. absolute crap! After the call, Kevin rang the police to come down.

When the police arrived, Skye had to give a statement of what had happened and then we had to wait for the detectives to arrive so that they could open a case. Someone had gotten the rego number of the vehicle involved, so chances were good that they could have caught these guys. They asked Skye if she would testify, but I don’t see how that’s ever gonna happen. The police had a list of registration numbers and descriptions of people doing this at this exact ATM, but were unable to prosecute as they only target travellers who are unable to testify against them in court (as they continue their travels elsewhere, or they go back to their home country). Anyway, a valuable lesson learnt by everyone on the tour. I assume they had inserted some form of device into the card slot which would stop the card from being ejected. Even after entering her PIN, Skye could still not get her card out. She had covered the keypad while entering her PIN, so chances are they would not have seen it, but I don’t know what sort of technology these guys are using… whether their device can record the numbers entered, either electronically or via a camera, or whether the number is stored on the magnetic strip of the card and can be decoded by some illegal scanner they had… who knows.

We left after about an hour and half there, at a stop intended to take 20 minutes, so this put us very much behind schedule. Skye tried calling the bank again, and the card was finally cancelled; the amount in her account sounded correct but any transactions made that day would not have shown up on her account yet.

We stopped for lunch in Dullstroom for burgers and pizza… take away since we were running behind schedule. Next stop was at Pilgrim’s Rest, a quiet little historic town, traversing Robbers Pass along the way; a place where robbers would wait to ambush carts of gold passing through during the gold rush. I paid some African ladies there to take their photo (a common expectation here) and they were hilarious. They’d just stand there going ‘cheeeeeeeeeeeeese’. The ‘cheeeeeese’ would go as long as it took to hear a shutter click. We continued on our way until we reached Bourke’s Luck Potholes. This is where two rivers have met and have corroded away at the rocks to form big potholes. The canyon here was spectacular; so much colouration transitioning through the smooth rock surfaces, with a few waterfalls here and there. Next stop was at the Blyde River Canyon lookout. I didn’t manage to find the official lookout; well I thought I had… I thought I was the last person out there as I couldn’t see anyone else, so rushed back to the truck cos I thought they were waiting for me, but found I was the first one back there. I’m still not quite sure where I went wrong… the path must have forked and I’d followed the wrong fork… nevermind, it was still spectacular landscape of the canyon from where I was looking from.

We arrived at our Bushveld Camp around 6:30pm, just after the sun had set. They had a pool there, so Skye and I went for a quick dip as it was bloody hot and humid! While we were waiting to eat, a leopard wandered over to the waterhole nearby for a drink. It was pitch black at this stage, but there was a single light setup at this waterhole (about 100 metres away) so that we could see anything that visited there during the night. This was our first leopard sighting; though no photos turned out acceptable, we did get some video footage. Shortly after a hyena came along for a drink. The night sky was filled with stars, many more than can be seen from the cities. Praying mantises are everywhere here, it’s common to have one hanging off your pants or sitting on your head. I got attacked by mozzies tonight; the bastards were going up my pants and biting my legs. The ‘tents’ we slept in were far from the tents we’d stayed in previously. These were permanent tents, so no setting up was required. There was basically a large open straw hut with a tent setup in it. A door at the back of the ‘tent’ lead to the bathroom, which did have hot water. This was luxury living compared to east Africa… and no 100m dash to the toilet hoping no animals are waiting for you.

African Colour

Bourke’s Luck Potholes

Bushveld ‘tents’

2008-02-27

Summary

- Game walk; wildebeest, giraffe, ant lion, dung beetle, orb spiders , baboon spiders

- Isaac talks about some shit

- Shit spitting competition; Australia places 2^nd after South Africa (1^st of the visiting countries)

- Badgers burgle bacon

- Game drive & night drive

- Massive thunderstorms

- No power

Wednesday morning we had a 6am start for a game walk. We walked for about 3 hours, stopping regularly to learn more about the ways of the bush. The tracker/guide Isaac told us about the different trees and which leaves you should use to wipe your ass and which ones you shouldn’t. He was also very informative about shit, he really liked saying ’shit’ a lot. We looked at elephant shit and giraffe shit. You can tell from a giraffe’s shit whether it is male or female. Isaac really knows his shit We followed this up with a shit spitting contest. Shit spitting is a competitive event that is taken very seriously over here. There is a big competition held here and the winner gets on the front page of the paper, what an honour to be the best shit spitter. Anyway, you start by getting a piece on antelope shit, we used impala shit, licking your lips and then rolling the shit in your mouth to moisten it up before spitting from the marked line. Whoever spits it furthest wins. Canada vs Latvia vs South Africa vs Australia vs Germany vs Italy. I stepped up to the plate to represent Australia, Skye was too chicken, and we had one representative from Latvia, one from Italy and one from Canada, and two from South Africa (the guides); Germany refused to participate. The South Africans (the guides; Kevin and Isaac) of course won, having had practice at shit spitting previously; but I took the honour as the longest shit spitter from the remaining countries, doing Australia proud. We saw a wildebeest and a giraffe while on our walk, as well as a few dung beetles, orb spiders, baboon spiders and some ant lion; one of the ‘Small 5′. In Africa, the ‘Big 5′ are the game who were the most expensive to hunt and the most prized kills/shootings: lion, leopard, elephant, rhinoceros, and buffalo. The Small 5 are then named after the big five; an ant LION. We have now also officially seen all of the Big 5 after the leopard sighting last night.

When we got back to camp, it was time for some brunch. Unfortunately the badgers had gotten away with our bacon through the night, but we made do with what we still had. That afternoon was free to do what we wanted. We went for a swim as it was a hot day, and spotted some game at the water hole nearby to our camp. Throughout the day we spotted impala, baboons and kudus (we had not seen kudus in east Africa; they are a type of antelope).

Wednesday afternoon we went for a game drive, of course the clear skies had changed into storm clouds…typical. Not a lot of game around… all we really saw was impalas. We did see a leopard tortoise though, another of the Small 5. Yes that’s right; there are tortoises in the middle of nowhere. We stopped off somewhere to watch the sunset while our tracker was tracking a rhino, turns out the rhino had gone off into thick bush though, so no chance of seeing it with our vehicle. The game drive then turned into a night drive through the use of a spot light. Still not much game, but plenty of lightning to fill the sky; although it was cool to see a porcupine running along with his spikes up. Saw a few zebra and a couple of jackals but that’s about it. The lightning over here is insane; there were literally strikes every couple of seconds, sometimes multiple strikes in different places in the sky. Some of the lightning arcs from cloud to cloud, not like the standard cloud to earth lightning we see back home.

We went back to camp for dinner to find that the power was out, surprise surprise… this was now the 5^th day in a row that the power had gone out (for Skye and I). We ate dinner by torch light and Skye and I washed dishes by torchlight; even though as a shit spitter I wasn’t supposed to be doing dishes that day, but 2 of the other non-shit spitters had done lunch dishes and the other had not done her part by doing dinner dishes with Skye. That night, I could hear the lions roaring through the night, way off in the distance. There was an annoying bird perched right by our tent that was screeching a lot through the night.

Baboon Spider

Bushveld Waterhole

2008-02-28

Summary

- Morning monkey menaces

- No power; 6^th day in a row!

- Hazyview inn is a blast; roaming warthog, wild pig, ostrich & zebra (from Racing Stripes)

- ‘Short’ walk along Sadie River; getting close to nature and getting covered in it!

- Bullshit, rhinoceros beetle, dansel flies, orb spiders and huge mozzies

Thursday morning, it was the white vervet monkeys that had raided all our fruit this morning; no fruit for breakfast. We ate breakfast, and then hit the road to Hazyview. We stopped off at a shopping centre whilst Kevin bought supplies. Within 5 minutes the power was out…. 6^th day in a row for us now! This is getting ridiculous, it follows us everywhere! Without power, most of the shops closed. We had an hour to kill and our plan had been to pick up a few things from the supermarket then go to the internet café. The supermarket was closed as it had no power, and we didn’t bother looking for the internet café as no doubt it would be offline. We managed to find a supermarket in the shopping centre, and that was one still open. We picked up some stuff, and then headed to a café for a drink. The café could only serve canned and bottled drinks as there was no power. They couldn’t even make a milkshake for Skye without power. Finally an hour had gone by and we got back on the truck to go to the inn.

We arrived at our Hazyview Inn early afternoon. This place was a blast! It’s a log cabin sitting on stilts in the subtropical forests on the banks of the Sabie River. If there’s not a warthog riffling through your bags, a zebra trotting through the car park, frogs in the toilet or an ostrich drinking from the swimming pool, then there’s a wild African pig in the kitchen. On arrival, Meatloaf (the warthog) was there to toss around people’s bags curious to find out what was inside. We all just stood there in utter amazement, watching this warthog. Skye and I went for a stroll to check the place out. A zebra, Gilbert, trotted through the car park. Apparently Gilbert, the zebra, starred in the movie ‘Racing Stripes’. We continued on, passing the ostrich in the grass, then looking at the abundance of butterflies, dragonflies and grasshoppers. Whilst heading back for lunch, we came across the ostrich on the pathway. As I went to walk past her she started heading towards me, I kept walking and she kept following, so I jumped behind the tree until she lost interest in me. Skye made sure to go the long way around to avoid the peckish ostrich. After lunch, the tour group went for a ’short walk’ to the Sabie River… hardly the short walk we’d anticipated. The track was very overgrown, I started out at the start of the line, so had to be the one to crash through the spider webs and collect most of the prickles and pollen crap along the way. The track was very muddy with the recent rain. When we got to the bridge, we waited for everyone then Kevin lead the way… thank God! The next stint of the trail was totally overgrown and there were some huge spiders sitting in their webs right in the middle of the path, which I probably would have charged on straight through without seeing them. The ’short walk’ took almost an hour, and in the heat and humidity, we were buggered. A few people went for a swim in the river while the rest of us sat around trying to stay cool and recover. We were covered in black jacks (little black seeds that cling to anything that touches them), pollen and prickles. We headed back to camp and everyone hit the swimming pool. This was when the ostrich decided it wanted a drink from the swimming pool.

While we were eating dinner, Napoleon the wild African pig was opening all the cupboards and drawers in the kitchen trying to find some food. After dinner, we all hung out at the bar, having a few drinks and playing cards. Australia cleaned up winning 7 hands of ‘bullshit’ (similar to ‘cheat’, but a tad different in the rules in that rather than counting up in card face values, you only have to match the type of card that is down… i.e. a spade, or a diamond, etc), with South Africa winning 1, while Latvia, Italy and Canada were unable to win a hand. Once again Germany didn’t participate. The lady from Latvia, Ingrida is a crack up, she’s a real fun loving character. A rhinoceros beetle flew into Skye’s head, and then landed on my shirt… another of the Small 5. We’ve also seen a ton of dansel (sp?) flies here, which interestingly start out as ant lions. I also saw the biggest mosquito I have ever seen, it was like twice the size of a standard mozzie! Earlier on when I’d gone out of our room and looked up, I’d decided we’d get our mosquito net out tonight. The roof was lined with spiders, heaps of them. Most of them orb spiders, some of them as big as the palm of my hand. Probably just as well as we found spider poo on the other bed and had a beetle dive bombing around our room throughout the night.

Meatloaf

Sabie River

Big Fly (name it?)

Hazyview Inn

Pig in the Kitchen

2008-02-29

Summary

- Kruger National Park game drive

On Friday morning, Dorothee (from Italy) told us of the snake she had seen in the shower when she’d gone to the bathroom through the night. We ate breakfast at 7am and headed off to Kruger National Park for a day of game driving. We didn’t see anything we hadn’t seen before; zebras, buffalos, a warthog, elephants, wildebeest, impalas, impalas, impalas, and more impalas. We did see a baby elephant thought, which was pretty cool. Sorry, I stand corrected; we did see a crocodile which we hadn’t seen previously. We hoped that the croc was going to have an attempt at the impalas drinking from the banks, but the impalas must have spotted it and moved away. Thus far Kruger has been a little disappointing for us. It has not measured up to the Serengeti, and as for the Ngorongoro Crater… well nothing has even gotten close to that yet… though we hear that Etosha in Namibia may give the crater a run for its money. We had stopped off somewhere in Kruger for lunch where we bought a couple of souvenirs. The vervet monkeys there tossed aside bin lids and tipped over bins, scavenging through the rubbish for food. Some irresponsible tourists there were throwing food to them… tut tut! This was our day of lashing out. We had seafood, lettuce and ice cream, all the things we’d avoided previously. Tuna and salad sandwiches was what we were given for lunch, so it was eat that or go without. At the end of the day, we went for a swim at the Kruger camp, where we stayed in little huts for the night.

Looking for Lunch

Playing Chicken

Angry Ellie

Baby Ellie

Hitching a RIde

Kruger Ellie

2008-03-01

Summary

- Very early morning

- Kruger National Park game drive

- Through Swaziland

- Zululand inn

- Bullshit and presidents & assholes

Saturday was a very early start, we were up at 4:30am; these early mornings are killing me! Today is to be a day of long driving. As the sun came up at 5:50am we were out game driving… another cloudy day, as yesterday had been. Those bright sunny days disappear as soon as game drives start. We spotted some rhinos off in the distance, who quickly ran off into the bushes. We later came across a few lionesses laying in the grass… still no males. We stopped off for a snack and then drove onwards. We saw a bunch of cars pulled over and knew something was there. This was it… finally… a male lion! I snapped away as the lion lazed in the shade of the tree. We headed on to Crocodile River, which is usually littered with crocs. After all the rain though, the river was flowing too fast for crocs, so we only spotted one. Onward to Swaziland, watching the many sugar cane fields of Swaziland flash by.

Skye called the bank up and found that no money had been taken, but several unsuccessful attempts had been made, getting the PIN incorrect. Luckily the thieves had obviously not seen her entire PIN when she entered it into the ATM.

We passed back out of Swaziland into South Africa again and arrived in Zululand just before 4pm. We stopped off at the shops, which was just crazy. There were people everywhere, and a whole lot of weird people. One guy was lingering around our bus the whole time; I’m not sure what he was up to. Anyway, we got out of there asap as it was a bit chaotic there. We checked in at our inn, and then quickly headed for the pool. The Zululand inn is quite rustic, very tiny huts to sleep in, with nothing but a pair of beds and a light, but thankfully there is a pool! There is also hot shower, not that we would use the hot water though, it is so hot and sticky here! We stayed in the pool until dinner at around 7pm. We played cards that night, playing ‘bullshit’ again, but I think they got sick of the aussies winning every hand (we are obviously great bullshit artists) so we tried our hand at ‘presidents and assholes’. Kayla had taught me this game previously at Victor Harbour, so it only took one round to refresh my memory. Unfortunately Canada seems to be taking out most rounds to become president and I tend to linger around the asshole ranking, usually falling into the vice-asshole ranking. That night was very hot and humid, so it was a trade-off between sleeping in my sleeping bag liner where the creepy crawlies throughout the hut couldn’t get me, or sleeping with no covers and allowing the inhabitants of the hut to crawl all over me throughout the night. It was just too hot, so I chose the latter.

Kruger Lioness’s

Baboon with baby

Kruger Lion #1

Kruger Lion #2

2008-03-02

Summary

- Nature walk at False Bay

- Game drive at Hluhluwe National Park; white rhinos, nyala, impalas, giraffe, buffalo, zebras, elephants, warthogs

- Scorpion, snouted cobra, bush babies, praying mantis, mouse, nocturnal butterflies, geckos, frogs and other creepy crawlies

- ‘Scartt!’

The following morning, we were told about Canada’s run-in with the scorpion that made its way into her room. Any trip to the toilet usually saw at least 5 geckos and if it was night, there’d be at least 1 or 2 frogs as well. We started the morning with a nature walk at False Bay… my god was it hot! The temperature here has been hovering mid-high 30s; combined with the humidity and it’s shocking. A two and a half hour walk through the forest and along the coast left me looking like I’d just showered. We came across a red dyker (sp?) on our walk and found a heap of fossils along the coast, as well as animal footprints through the sand. As soon as we got back to the inn, everyone was in the pool asap. A few hours of cooling in the pool and we had lunch. I was running low on cleans, so I did my laundry by hand again. Right after doing my laundry, I found out that tomorrow we could pay to have it done at the Dolphin Coast… dammit, now they tell me… nevermind.

That afternoon at around 2pm, we went for a game drive at Hluhluwe National Park. After clear blue skies all day, the clouds rolled in for another overcast game drive… the clouds would have been much better in the morning to cool our walk and give us clear bright weather for game drives! As soon as a game drive is about to start, the clouds just roll in from nowhere! At Hluhluwe the animals did not seem afraid of the vehicles, unlike all previous game drives. The shrubbery was not as thick as Kruger and the mountainous terrain, rather than flat plains, meant you could see wildlife off in the distance; a herd of elephants or giraffe or a few rhinos. We had a few close encounters with white rhinos (all previous sightings were black rhino) and buffalo, who walked right alongside or in front of our vehicle. We saw plenty of giraffe here too, impalas, zebras, elephants, warthogs and also the Nyala; an antelope which can only be seen here. Today’s rhino count ended at 25, not bad for a few hours game drive. A stop off for a toilet break had a zebra and its calf walk within a metre of us standing there. Meanwhile, Latvia (if you haven’t noticed, we tend to refer to one another by country names now) was down looking for crocs in the river, when she turned around to see a snake in the tree at her height right beside her; a snouted cobra apparently. She did capture some of it on video, but most of the video was of her running away.

Ranking of game drives would put Hluhluwe in second place, behind Ngorongoro Crater. Kruger falls into last place, and Serengeti in third. These rankings are purely based on my experiences there; everyone gets lucky or unlucky at different times so of course people going to these parks on different vehicles/days may not rank them the same. I know Canada saw a lot more lions in the Serengeti, including lion cubs. She also saw a leopard with its kill and lions with their kill, so no doubt the Serengeti was way up there for her. No more game drives for a while now, with the next one being in Namibia I think; a few weeks away.

Meanwhile, I forgot to mention that our laptop, barely a month old, has obviously faced an impact at some point, and now a good portion of the screen has packed up, i.e. it is black. Still usable for the rest of the trip to a good extent, but obviously pretty buggered.

That night, I cooked the braai (bbq) for dinner, big mistake to volunteer. It was already very hot and muggy, and standing over the campfire did not help the situation at all. Anyway, after chowing down on dinner, we played ‘presidents and assholes’ again to the sound of bush babies in the background. Bush babies are little monkeys, but they actually sound like a human baby crying; hence their name. Plenty more praying mantis, nocturnal butterflies (not moths), and a visit from a mouse throughout the card game. Every time Latvia says my name, she says it as ‘Scartt!’, cracks us up every time. After a few beers it was time to hit the sack for another muggy hot night.

False Bay Walk

Impala at Hluhluwe

Rhinoat Hluhluwe

Nyala at Hluhlwe

2008-03-03

Summary

- Zululand high school

- Sangomma’s marriage prediction

- Dolphin Coast

- Traditional fish braai and Springbok

After packing our bags and having breakfast, we were on our way to a Zululand school. This was a high school of grades 8 to 12. We visited a classroom where the students sang and danced for us. There were some incredible singers amongst them. Most of them were a very fun loving bunch, just like the younger kids we’d seen in previous school visits. Several of the buildings in the school have been built purely based on donations from tourists with this tour company. Leaving the classroom, most of the students wanted to shake your hand or give you a hug. We then made our way to the Sangomma’s (spelling?!) hut to have our fortunes read. Tradition has it that spirits are called and bones are scattered on the floor and ‘read’ to determine the fortunes of those in the hut and answers to any questions asked by the visitors in the hut. Apparently I don’t want to get married until I’m an old man, but Skye will talk me into marrying her by the end of the year. We will have 2 kids; a daughter, then a son… You can imagine the reaction of the rest of the tour group, I’m not gonna hear the end of this one!

Back on the road on our way to the Dolphin Coast. Worth remembering that this is now the 4^th day in a row that we have had no power cuts, not to be taken for granted! The Dolphin Coast inn was right on the beach, although it was too rocky to swim at that particular section of beach… the swimmable area was about a km or 2 along the shore. It was a lovely day, so we walked down for an ice cream and a swim at the beach. Seeing Latvia get continually dumped by the waves was hilarious, she couldn’t get back up again in time before another wave would knock her back down again. We went back to the inn for a traditional fish braai by candlelight on the patio, the added bonus was we did not have to help cook it and we did not have to help with cleaning up… ahh this is the life.

After dinner, we had a traditional round of Springboks; a shot of peppermint liquer with something else on top similar to baileys… I forget what it’s called. However, we weren’t allowed to drink it like a normal shot; instead we all had to put our hands to our head with a finger up acting as the springbok’s antlers , and repeat a bunch of lines about jumping to the waterhole and then spotting a lion, then a leopard, all whilst acting it out at the same time. Basically the idea was to make us look like twats, and I think that part was successful. The ritual then ended by taking the shot in your mouth and tipping your head back. It was quite tasty, just like an after dinner mint.

I quickly updated the blog before walking down to the tavern for a few beers, it turned out to be about 20 mins walk to get there. Upon returning, we had to pack 2 days worth of stuff into a small bag as tomorrow we would be going to the Drakensberg Mountains on a smaller 4×4 truck, so the big bags had to stay behind. A few nights earlier we had been told of the 7 hour hike we’d be doing up the mountains in Drakensberg and were all dreading it to a degree. We retired to bed for a nice mild night, leaving all the windows and sliding door open to let the sea breeze in; much better than the hot humid nights we’ve been having previously.

Zululand High School

Sangomma Reading ‘Bones’

Dolphin Coast

2008-03-04

Summary

- Durban; uShaka Marine World

After breakfast on Tuesday morning, we headed to Durban. We had several options we could do there; we went to uShaka Marine World for 2.5 hours… really you could spend a whole day there if you had the time. I thought it was like a mix of Sydney Aquarium and Sea World. We caught a bit of the dolphin show and seal show, then spent the rest of the time milling around the aquariums. Both of us love underwater creatures, so we thought it was great there. Some of the sting rays there were gigantic, as were some of the fish. The highlights for me were the lionfish, the jellyfish and purple rock fish. The others in our group didn’t spend as much time there, but like I said I love that sorta stuff so I could’ve spent the entire day there. From Durban we headed towards the Drakensberg Mountains.

Dolphin at uShaka

Jellyfish at uShaka