marhug
marion and hugh norton Joined: June 23rd 2009
Logged in: November 16th 2009
Logged in: November 16th 2009
Travel Blog Posts
From the waterfront
Sorry this last blog on our African trip is rather belated but we’ve now been back in the UK over two weeks - and been to Crete for 10 days on a cheap package deal! In that last week in Cape Town we had various vehicle related things to sort out but had time for a last little sortie down towards the southernmost point of the continent (Cape Agulhas, not Cape of Good Hope) and back through the winelands - and more time wandering the great waterfront area of Cape town. Driving the rugged coastal route from Cape Town eastwards once we had got past the spread of development on the flat land, and passing through a number of holiday/weekend settlements, reinforced for us the rather nice lifestyle many Cape Townians must have as they have ... read more
toffee mountains
(First up some advice to anyone else searching out stuff about camping in Namibia. Don’t stay in the Namibian Wildlife Resort camps except in Etosha - they cost 2-3 x as much as private camps that are immediately outside the reserve areas and in most cases they have much better facilities. We had pre-booked months ago at Sesreim and Hobas thinking one needed to and not realising that the private camps nearby are just fine - better. Apparently a couple of years ago NWR revamped their camps and readjusted their charges upwards enormously as they bear no resemblance to the Lonely Planet figures!! So.....a word ...) The journey from Swakopmund on the coast to the red dune area further south was through rocks/ mountains that had received the whole treatment, melted, twisted and turned, tilted ... read more
local artwork
(This about 3 weeks old now - sorry!) We hit the Skeleton Coast in the far NW of Namibia (well, at Torra Bay) in a screaming side wind that was whipping sand across the road and sand-blasting the vehicle fairly effectively! What a journey from the searingly hot, interior, flat scrubby semi-arid so-called farmlands to the desolate and exposed coast with cold sandy southerly. We did hunkerdown for a night first at an inland camp before entering the Skeleton Coast Park on the edge of a dry riverbed at Twyfelfontain where there are apparently masses of ancient rock paintings (we decided not to see these) - hunkerdown being the operative word as there was also a hefty wind bearing down upon our braai fire, such that we retreated into the truck and crunched on sand ... read more
mokoro travel
Mokoro trip in the Okavango Delta (Botswana) and the Etosha NP (Namibia) Twice now we’ve signed our lives away: for the microlite flight over the Victoria Falls and now for the 3 day mokoro trip on the Okavango delta. The indemnity form that we signed for the latter said that it was an “inherently dangerous activity”. It crossed my mind that our travel insurance would surely exclude both of these kinds of activity - and here’s us thinking that we are being very conservative and not so intrepid at all. This blog is evidence that we survived to tell the tales. The Guma Lagoon Camp (NW side of delta), from which we set forth in the mokoros (canoes), had an idyllic setting with very friendly and helpful people running it - great kitchen, dining room, bar ... read more
river front cruise
From Kasane in the far north of Botswana we explored the Chobe National Park a bit - not a lot: a day drive and a river cruise. The riverfront cruise was brilliant and we would recommend this as essential for everyone - someone had recommended booking through Water Lily Lodge as they had small boats and this was a good choice. It was beautiful out on the water and animals seemed to appear on demand: hippo, crocs, elephants, buffalo, various antelope, water monitors, baboons, giraffes - and just masses of birds. There was one very exciting (not quite the right word - rather scary and horrific when you think of the consequences...) when a hippo chased our boat - it was nearly gaining on us at one point.......phew. Our boatman did tend to take us in ... read more
rest up
Well we’ve now managed quite a few rest-up days - waiting days too for the arrival of our first grandchild, Kathy’s baby - seemingly nearly 2 weeks late. Alistair James (so far) has now arrived - on 16 Aug but rather unwillingly it appears. Thankfully all is well. We didn’t hear for more than a day as our 3 day rest-up at Jungle Junction on Bovu Island in the middle of the Zambezi River (as recommended by K and A from their trip in 2006) put us out of contact other than through the owner getting his emails intermittently on the island or travelling to Livingstone about 60k away. So we were thankful we heard at all - and now we’ve seen photos which is even better. Barbara also arrived successfully after a 48 hour ... read more
shifting
(and again can't get the photos on) Whew! But we’re getting used to this - long days on the road. Driving is easy as each straight stretch might be 20-30 ks long. These four days were the Falls Park to Vryberg (SA still), to Gaborone (Botswana), to Francistown (B) then to Kasane (still B). On the 5th day we took 3 hours to get through the Zambian border and that’s a whole story in itself. Features of these four days and their campsites included camping in a farmyard (of a ‘lodge’) with a half-grown ostrich causing us to retreat rapidly into the truck and wonder what to do next. Their 8-9 year-old daughter noticed our cowering and came dashing out and threw a tennis ball at the bird which made it disappear - much to our ... read more
reinflating tyres
The 800k detour! (having trouble loading photos as internet connection is too slow - will try again later) Again a local gave us good advice but this time it was ‘go west now to see the spring wildflowers - the rain has come early.’ We debated this over 2 rest days, again in a nice cabin at Upington doing the washing, and decided to head into the setting sun. The 400km journey west to Springbox had a South American feel (not that we’ve been to S Am!!) with huge sweeping semi-arid plains between various oddly shaped piles of rock - well mountains actually of all sorts of shapes (I could just imagine a gaucho galloping across). (Strangely) my navigating skills were tested that afternoon as we had difficulty finding the Namaqualand National Park - a whole ... read more
marching towards us
Rain and lions in the Kalahari It rained in the desert! We had to crack open our raincoats for the first time in SA as we set up second camp - then there was a spectacular thunderstorm (which they said was unusual) that evening and rain over night. Couldn’t believe it - rain in the desert! It actually wasn’t much but was wet enough to need a coat for a bit. And now it is spot the lion - that’s what it is all about - we have now joined the ‘great 4x4 lion-hunters’ brigade. One peers at the sightings board at each camp, chats to neighbouring campers in and out of the ablutions and kitchen blocks and pulls up beside any other vehicle and say “have you seen any?” You also get lined up at ... read more
Jo'burgh motorways
Road trip - Jo’burg into the Kalahari (Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park) via Upington No difficulty getting to the Jo’burg airport to drop Jennifer off, but noticed two interesting road signs by on and off ramps on the motorways: “Crime alert - do not stop” and “High-jacking hot spot” and also noticed police cars sitting on the berms - some reassurance we thought. We did however experience some difficulty getting out of Jo’burg as we somehow managed to get onto the N1 heading north instead of south so we did a complete circuit on the ringroad midst heavy Saturday midday traffic before we got the right road south. Meanwhile we were both busting to go to the loo, as we hadn’t found the place for high vehicles to park at the airport but just dropped J off making ... read more
