Blogs from Africa - page 11

We woke early and sat on our balcony with a cup of tea watching the birds in the trees just in front of us. Then we spotted some small brown creatures that looked like a cross between a rabbit and a guinea pig, racing back and forth. These turned out to be rock rabbits, which are not, in fact, rabbits at all. Dalton picked us up at 9am and we set off in the hotel’s 4WD for Rorke’s Drift, 23km away on dirt roads. We drove past the local primary school where the children were dressed in Zulu costumes as part of South African heritage week. As soon as they saw us they all abandoned their dancing and rushed to the wire fence to wave to and give us a little dance! Dalton was very amused ... read more

I can still picture that National Geographic magazine on my grandparent’s dusty coffee table, right next to the Swarovski bowl, full of stale sweets. It was February 1982 and I was 13 years old. Despite the controversy about the Giza pyramids touching each other in the cover photo. It didn’t matter. It ignited a spark within me to travel to this exotic place to marvel at this feat of mankind. But you know how the story goes. Life happens. No matter how I tried. No matter what I planned. I never got there. Then finally one day, I had a text from my best friend, who is also my cousin. I’ll call her Shell. She had just retired, and after years of child-rearing and career climbing, wanted to travel. With me. Her top pick: Egypt. We ... read more

In July of 2023, we’d tried to acquire the required admittance visa for both Kenya and Tanzania, the two tour locations that this trip covers. The Tanzanian visa was straightforward, despite a variety of government photo requirements requiring additional editing, but those came through. The Kenyan visa (also required) was unavailable because the online system had been shut down due to a hack at some point in July 2023, presumably stealing guests personal financial information such as passport and credit card numbers. After contacting our tour company to discover what our next step should be, we were sent an official Kenyan government document stating that until October 24th 2023, the country would allow visitors to acquire the required visa upon landing at any Kenyan airport - for us, Jomo Kenyatta in Nairobi. With this information in ... read more

What a great day! The sun was shining and Sara felt better after a day of lying in bed ill. We started the day at Monkeyland, which sounds tacky but is in fact a huge reserve housing monkeys rescued from zoos and private owners worldwide. A ranger took us on a guided walk, with the moneys often running up to us. The most numerous were the ring tailed lemurs, so cute with their long ringed tails and big yellow eyes. Several were nursing tiny, very new babies. There was a female gibbon, separated from two newer gibbons that were in a cage for new arrivals, so they can get to know the other residents of the reserve before mixing. They were calling to each other making an astonishing racket. The guide told us the howler monkeys ... read more

We awoke to frost on the ground, though the day warmed rapidly as the sun rose in a cloudless sky. We took a walk down the dirt road outside the farm, spotting birds and flowering plants – well, observing rather than identifying them as we have no idea what anything is called! The farm lies on a plain surrounded by the Swartberg mountains, which looked beautiful in the early morning sun We were passed by two English, leathered-up motorcycle tourists who had stayed overnight in the farm, on their way to who knows where. The farm itself grows alfalfa and lucerne which is turned into animal feed. We had booked to visit one of the ostrich farms nearby but the map we had been given was clearly wrong. It wasn't far but we were a bit ... read more