S.A. Safari

Wassup everyone! Sorry about the slow updates. The ship charges $ for internet so I find myself rushing around foreign countries looking for internet cafes. Right now I'm in Malaysia logging on from a hotel room on a resort island called Langkowi. There is like a tropical storm going on and I got some downtime. Anyway, here is some stories from the last few days in Africa. I've been wanting to call home but with the 15 hour time difference its tough. Peace everyone, hope all is well...

South Africa: Day 4

Day 4 was a day for rest, homework, and irish coffees at the cafes in and around the wharf. Chaz and Colin got back from J-Bay that day and told us about their epic trip. After driving halfway across the country on the wrong side of the road (South Africa drives opposite to the U.S.) they ended up meeting the Billabong CEO's daughter at a bar and stayed at her dads pad on the cliffs above J-Bay. They hit J-Bay with a good swell, and scored some good waves and pics. On their way back they stopped off at the worlds largest bungee jump at Bloukrans Bridge. I was jealous, the Bloukrans was one of my top priorities but I didn't get a chance to get out there, as it was raining my only free day. Next time for sure.



That night we celebrated my buddy Bill's b-day on Long street. I tried South Africa's rendition of mexican food but wasn't impressed. I also chilled with some Rasta's I met on the street who shared fruit with me and told me about South Africa. Later I bought a homeless guy some groceries. He went right for cereal, milk, and cookies. I figure it was because of the high carbs. Melle and I pulled an all-nighter so we could avoid missing our 4 a.m. flight to Durban for our safari.

Our trip took us to the Hluhluwe-Umfolozi Game Reserve in Kwazulu-Natal, where the Zulu natives once lived and thrived. Unfortunately their population has diminished and has moved to the cities. All of the big-5 can be seen in the Umfolozi. The big-5 is: Lion, Elephant, Buffalo, Rhino, and Leopard. In the end we saw all but the leopard.


Our safari guides were very interesting folk. Our main guide was Stefan, a quirky South African who went to school for engineering but ended up realizing that he didn't like what he was doing and dropped everything to become a tour guide. He now owns his own business, has won tour guide of the year, and takes out many famous people from the U.S. and abroad (including some United States senators, whom he refused to name). The other guides had some interesting views on politics and race and ethnicity. I had some long conversations with them where they told me about how in Zimbabwe President Mugabe has been evacuating white farmers and how the country is now starving because the natives haven't learned advanced farming techniques. The whole time I was wearing a shirt from my shark dive the previous day that said "Save the White Shark", and he kept making a joke out of it and telling me "Save the White Man". At first it threw me off, but after he told me his reasoning behind it I could sympathize with the South Africans a little bit. The race relations in that part of the world is back and forth. First with apartheid creating inequalities for the blacks and now with the African National Congress in power struggles with the Afrikaaners (Dutch South Africans, living there since the 1600s).

On the bus ride out to camp we saw elephants, giraffes, white rhinos, baboons, warthogs, springbok, and empala. Interesting fact about the White Rhino: It is called the White Rhino not because of its color (it is actually grayish) but because of the Afrikaans word for wide, "Wyd". The White Rhino has a jaw that is wider than its counterpart the Black Rhino, but when the English came to South Africa they misinterpreted the Afrikaans word and called the Rhino white and the label stuck. Systematically in order for their to be a white Rhino their must be a black Rhino so that is how they got their names.


We arrived at camp to meet the crew, who were mostly Zulus. We enjoyed an excellent dinner of lasagna served to us by the big Zulu woman simply called "Mama" and hung around the campfire before crashing in our state-of-the-art tents. Although the campsite was luxurious compared to some excursions I've had, by no means was it completely safe. The group that stayed there just a few days before told us that Hyenas had roamed around the campsite at night and that they had heard them yelping close to their tents. The open campsite was situated on a slight plateau looking out over a river that was dry at this time of the year.


We woke up early for a morning game drive. Upon seeing a family of elephants, we stopped to take pictures but had to get out of there fast once their ears started flaring and they got close to our van. Statistically elephants are the most dangerous animals in the bush, if they flair their ears it means their angry. On this game drive we also observed baboons. After seeing baboons up close and personal, I have no doubts why Darwin assumed humans evolved from these creatures. They have such human-like qualities. Animals in the bush, and in Africa in general, just seem smarter. For example, I saw a cow outside of Durban look both ways before crossing the road.


Later that day we went on a game walk, but saw only African birds and a couple of elder buffalo that had been left behind by their herd because they were too slow. Our guides told us that the lions would get them soon. Circle of life. The Lion King actually paints a pretty good picture of the bush, I couldn't help relating everything I saw to the movie.

The evening game drive was awesome. We got word from a family driving through that their were lions in the vacinity. We raced to where they said they were. We saw them from a distance with binoculars. I can see why they call these beasts the kings of the jungle. We were the only group that saw a lion, and everyone was eager to see one some time before we left the next day.

That night we were jammin some tunes by the campfire for the group, when all of the sudden we hear three roars back-to-back right behind our camp. Our guides quickly ushered us to the deck where we broke out the spotlight and searched the riverbed for lions. We were able to spot the glare from their eyes but after about an hour of waiting they took off.

The next day we took off for the boat for our 12 day journey across the Indian Ocean to Chennai.


-Chris