Tom & Pam Usher’s Highlights of the Dubai and Africa Trip from 10 July to 20 September

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Tom & Pam Usher’s Highlights of the Dubai and Africa Trip from 10 July to 20 September

After a 28 hour plane trip home on 18 September, flying via Dubai with a 4 hour stop-over, it’s time to reflect on all our highlights and adventures.

Dubai

- The rate at which the UAE built the city to its present state

- Visiting the highest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa

- Dinner and entertainment as well as Sand dune bashing in the desert.

- Dhow sunset boat cruise

Kenya

- Lake Nakura: first siting of White Rhino with baby

- Maasi Mara visit to see the Maasi people and see them do their jumping dance

- Seeing the Big 5 in their natural habitat in the 1^st 2 ½ hours: lions, African buffalo, hippos, white rhino with baby, and leopard. We also saw many other African Animals including 2 cheetahs, different antelope species, crocodile and birds

- Staying in the resort where runners from Kenya and other African countries do their altitude training

Uganda

- The Gorillas – I sat 2 metres away from a big silverback, watching him eat

- A relaxing 2 days at Lake Bunyoni with spectacular views of the many islands in the Lake

- Seeing the source of the Nile River at Jinja, travelling on the back of a local motorbike

Tanzania

- Visited Tanzanite outlet – only has 8 years supply left of the only tanzanite mine in the world

- Game drives through the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater and seeing the animals, including wildebeest

- Watching a cheetah run down and catch a gazelle – incredible speed and power!

- The sunsets and sunrises over the Serengeti

- Saw the most beautiful bird, the lilac breasted roller, the emblem for Botswana

- 4 nights on Zanzibar Island, 2 in Stone Town and 2 on the northern beach

- Snorkelling from a dhow boat looking at coral and having a beautiful fish lunch on the beach

- The traffic jam in Dar es Salam where we got out and walked rather than wait in the traffic

Malawi

- Staying at 2 resorts on shores of Lake Malawi

- Horse riding, including bareback into Lake Malawi

- 'Cheap and formal’ Fancy dress dinner party at Kande Beach on Lake Malawi

- Tom was Chief with 4 wives (Pam, Georg, Yashuia and Myrta) at Kisolanza Farm Iringa, Lake Malawi.

Zambia

- Sunsets and sunrises over the Zambezi River on a river cruise (they called it the Booze Cruise!!)

- Livingstone Falls on Zambia and Zimbabwe sides + flying over them in a microlight plane

- Staying at the chalet looking over the Zambezi River

Botswana

- Being on the ferry (border crossing) where Zambia, Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe borders meet

- Chobe River sunset boat cruise seeing 100s of elephants, buffalo, hippos, several crocodiles, and 1000s of birds

- Chobe National Park game drive where we saw the Kalahari elephants, the biggest in Africa. Many had their tusks removed by poachers – a big problem in Africa

- Visiting Okavango Delta, travelling 1^st by speed boat then transferring to mokoros, dugout boats which were propelled by polers. We floated along narrow paths between reeds for 1 ½ hours. It was beautifully peaceful, with no boat motors. Pam tried her hand at using the mokoros and poles – great fun!

- Sunset over the Okavango Delta, sitting in our mokoro

- Listening to the Polers singing during a balmy evening around the campfire

- We did a 45 minute flight in a 8 seater plane over the Delta. It was amazing seeing 100s of African animals.

- Seeing the huge expanse of the Makgadikgadi Pans which is bigger than Switzerland. Once a large river-fed lake, the Makgadikgadi Pans now lie saline and empty.

- Seeing the Baobab Valley around Gweta

- Seeing the Kalahari San Bushmen and learning how they are keeping their culture alive at Ghanzi, and hearing their ‘clicking’ language (their tongue clicks as they talk)

Namibia

- Windhoek: Dinner at Joe’s Beer House Restaurant which was amazing. I ate a kebab which had a variety of meats on it – ostrich, crocodile, zebra, kudu and chicken. The kudu was the best – tender and tasty. Tom had a gemsbok (oryx) steak which was also delicious. In Cape Town, Tom had the same meal as I did in Windhoek, with the addition of warthogs

- German influence in Namibia – architecture, street names, food

- Waterberg Plateau Park in northern Namibia – sunset over the escarpment

- Damaraland: the 2500 prehistoric rock engravings of Twyfelfontein, plus the Ugab Terraces and the Vingerklip mountain on the way from Khorixas to Outjo. We also saw the unusual rock formation which looked like organ pipes.

- Saw Damara people who paint themselves red

- Etosha National Park: sitting at the 2 manmade waterholes at sunset (eastern and western ends of Park), watching the big and small animals come to drink.

- Tom did a night game drive and saw 12 black Rhinos!!! Fantastic!

- The large salt pans in the middle of Etosha - This is where we got a flat tyre.

- Swakopmund: Pam did hot air ballooning over Namib Desert and Tom did Dune bashing on a quad bike. We also visited the spectacular Crystal House where there was the largest crystal in the world along with many colourful ‘thunder eggs’. The Museum had a fantastic display of taxidermy display of all African animals and birds.

- Solitaire: we visited the tourist renowned German bakery where Tom had an apple pie and I had a big, big, big muffin which had slabs of chocolate through it.

- We went to the famous Sossusvlei area, where high orange sand dunes surround vivid white salt pans, creating a fascinating landscape. We climbed these as well as Dune 45 which is about 250 metres high. We stayed at the top for sunset – breathtaking!

- Visited Fish River Canyon, the 2^nd deepest canyon in the world (Colca Canyon in Peru is the deepest), including at sunset.

South Africa

- Orange River – Pam canoed up the river, plus we saw the sunset....again!!!

- Cape Town: Seeing my sister Sheryl for the 1^st time at Mama Africa Restaurant, and then travelling with her across southern South Africa. Going up Table Mountain by cable-car. Beautiful restaurants at the A&V Waterfront. Western civilisation. Beautiful city beaches. Magnificent coastal drive down to Cape of Good Hope. Wild flowers along the Western Coast which were all out.

- Stellenbosch wine region – visited 4 very different wineries

- Garden Route from Mossel Bay to Port Elizabeth

- Visited most southern point of Africa – Cape Aghulas

- Driving along Route 62 – many times more picturesque than the Garden Route

- Visiting Addo National Elephant Park

- Staying our last night (Day 70 of our Africa trip) at Fairy Glen Private Game Reserve, near Worcester and seeing 4 of the Big 5 (no leopard).

Over all, we enjoyed the tenting experience as one soon gets into a system. We travelled with some lovely people. We want to thank them all for being such great travel companions. Thank you also to my fellow card-sharps who played cards with me around Africa on the truck/bus - George, Andrew, Ash and Sarah who were all from England. It was good fun.

If anyone tells you that you shouldn’t travel as a couple by yourselves in a 4x4 throughout the African countries we have visited, I would strongly disagree. We always felt safe.

So in summary, the animals, the scenery, the special natural features, the beautiful local people, particularly in the underdeveloped countries we visited, the game meat we ate, the special activities we did and our special travel mates, all have made the last 70 days an amazingly special journey.

We arrived in Brisbane on time at 6.45am on 20 September 2012. We caught a taxi, all laden down with 2 bags and 2 carvings and 3 other bags.

When we arrived home, our front door was open and there was our daughter Kerrie and grandaughter Gemma waiting for us. We walked into our house and on our floor to ceiling window looking out the back yard were the words “WELCOME HOME!!” Kerrie and Gemma had made the sign. We then looked on the bench and they had made biscuits which spelt our ‘welcome home’. This was duplicated by another ‘welcome home’ biscuits which were in the fridge. Kerrie had bought the essentials (milk, bread and a treat for Tom – yoghurt). We are SO lucky to have such an amazing daughter. XXXXXX.

We were very happy to be home but will miss Africa and the adventures the continent gave us. As one of our fellow travellers Amanda from New York said "we can wash the dust out of us but not Africa".

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