Ciao for Now

We’ve been in Thailand for over a week now (which is amazing, by the way…if Anna and I were any more relaxed we’d be in comas), but we wanted to say a few last words about South Africa.  To be honest, even after we booked our flights to South Africa we had some apprehension about traveling there.  Whenever we would discuss our round-the-world trip itinerary with anybody, the South Africa segment would almost always elicit a “oooh…be really, really careful” response.  One American woman we met in Croatia (who had never been to South Africa) went as far as to tell us, “If you get lost driving around South Africa, chances are you will get murdered.”  Gee, thanks for that.  Well, while we certainly kept our wits about us and used common sense (didn’t walk around alone at night, didn’t pick up hitchhikers, researched driving directions, etc.), we can’t recall a time where we felt threatened or unsafe.  To the contrary, we found South Africa to have such a joyous culture (which is amazing considering how little the majority have), and we found all the locals we met to be friendly and welcoming.  I mean, we didn’t even get murdered once!

South Africa does have a high crime rate…there’s no denying that.  But if you’re putting off visiting the country because of some preconceived notions about safety, don’t.  Our advice is to go.  Take some necessary precautions and exercise some common sense, but go.  Go for one-of-a-kind Cape Town and its Neighborgoods market.  Go for the stunning scenery of the Cape Peninsula.  Go for Bohemian Kalk Bay.  Go for the food and wine in Franschhoek.  Go for the Karoo’s magical landscape.  Go for the gorgeous coastline of the Garden Route.  Go for the culture and the smiling Xhosa people of the Wild Coast.  Go for one of the most beautiful mountain ranges in the world in the Drakensberg.  Go for the mind-blowing wildlife in Kruger National Park.  Go for the craftwork, art and music.  Oh my…the music.  Everywhere you go there are kids drumming, clapping, harmonizing and dancing.  Try starting your day off with this and see if you’re not grinning from ear to ear (Soweto Gospel Choir – Seteng Sediba):

Go for some perspective.  Go to South Africa.

One of the main reasons we wanted to visit South Africa was to see its renowned wildlife, so for the grand finale of our month long drive across the country we set aside six nights in Kruger National Park. It was mind-blowing. You can watch Discovery Channel everyday for the rest of your life, but nothing compares to seeing wild animals in their natural habitat with your own two eyes. For me, it was nothing short of a religious experience.

Because Kruger is the oldest, biggest and most visited game reserve in all of Africa, I was somewhat worried it would feel a little like a theme park. It didn’t at all. We could hop in our car, turn down a dirt road and not see another car for hours. Our first day, we pulled right up next to an elephant on the side of the road, turned off our engine and watched it feed in silence for a good 30 minutes. Amazing! Overnight visitors at Kruger typically stay at one of 12 rest camps located throughout the park, and we chose the Crocodile Bridge, Lower Sabie and Olifants camps for our visit. Each evening, everybody returns to the camps (you have to be back in the gates by sunset) and gathers around the communal kitchens to have some drinks, cook up dinner and discuss what they saw that day. Our neighbor one night was a professional chef, and he shared with us some of his wildebeest stew (yum!) as well as stories from all his past trips to Kruger. It’s hard to explain, but there’s just this cool little vibe of community between everybody there…an unspoken understanding that you’re fortunate to be somewhere very special. It’s a little like being at the lot before a Phish show.

One of the highlights of our visit to Kruger was going on a 4:30am guided bush walk with Irving, the most macho park ranger of all times. This dude made Bear Gryllis look like Richard Simmons. He was a walking encyclopedia of wilderness knowledge with x-ray vision and the hearing of a jungle cat. We’d be walking along, and he’d stop in his tracks and say something like, “Rhino…800 meters to the southeast…female…25 months old…Sagittarius.” At one point, Anna couldn’t help but laugh when Irving spit out 20 minutes worth of facts about some male aardvark tracks we stumbled upon. Plus, he had such burly stories about tracking and being charged at by, as he put it, “big and hairies.” Beyond Irving’s awesomeness, being able to get out of our car and walk into the bush was an experience Anna and I will never forget. Oh, and on the way to our walk we drove by two male lions feasting on a fresh kill. It was such an amazing sighting that even our guides were taking pictures. We also took a guided sunset drive one night, which treated us to some cool nighttime wildlife sightings as well as the craziest lightning show we’ve ever seen.

During our visit to Kruger, we saw elephant, giraffe, zebra, impala, lion, rhino, hippo, crocodile, wildebeest, baboon, warthog, buffalo, mongoose, jackal and more cool birds than I can name. The only animals we really wanted to see that we missed were the elusive cheetah and leopard. We’ll get ‘em next time. We took hundreds of pictures (you can see them all on our Flickr page), but here are some of our favorites:

We had our first of many elephant sightings as soon as we entered Kruger

Two male lions feasting on a buffalo kill

Spots and stripes

Buffalo proving the butt-cut never goes out of style

Two lionesses

Wildebeest	Impala

“Whatchu lookin’ at?!”

Rhino at sunrise

Up close and personal with an elephant

Zebra are the coolest

Vervet monkey

Sunrise on the drive to our bush walk

On the drive to our bush walk	On our bush walk…can you tell it’s about 5:00am?

The lion was so impressive even our guides were taking pics

Irving protecting us from a leopard tortoise

Warthog and babies

African elephant

Saddle-billed stork

Anna goes crazy for elephants…	…while Johny is cool as a cucumber

Post feeding nap time

Kudu

Giraffe striking a pose

Our “safari tent” at Crocodile Bridge	Our hut at Lower Sabie

The huts at Olifants	The viewpoint at Olifants

The view from Lower Sabie

Watching a family of elephants from the viewpoint at Olifants

Scoping it out at Lower Sabie	Wildebeest stew gave me some stomach problems

Rush hour at Kruger

Sunset over some hippos

And a couple videos, for good measure:

From Coffee Bay we headed out of the rugged Eastern Cape into KwaZulu-Natal. An eight-hour drive that took us through rolling hills dotted with round colorful huts, immense stretches of farmland and hectic, bustling towns where people and livestock outnumbered cars in the road, brought us finally to the Drakensberg (“Dragon Mountains”), a mountain range that forms the dramatic boundary between South Africa and the Kingdom of Lesotho. We entered the pristine Champagne Valley in uKhahlamba-Drakensberg Park and were immediately thrilled with our new “home-away-from-home” at the Inkosana Lodge.

Former mountaineer and owner of the lodge, Ed, showed us around the beautiful property, which had everything you could think of and more…amazing scenery, an indigenous garden where you could pick herbs and veggies to cook with, big shared kitchens stocked with every appliance under the sun, a colorful and cozy “hang out” room with piles of National Geographic magazines (I think Johnny and I read about eight cover-to-cover between the two of us before we left), four big, friendly dogs, delicious home-cooked meals, a fridge stocked with Savannah Dry and an “organic pool” (however, we decided after hearing from some German travelers that the pool had leeches that we’d rather enjoy looking at it than swimming in it!).

The lodge	The indigenous garden

One of the super awesome kitchens	Million-dollar slogan: “It’s dry. But you can drink it!“

The “tree circle” on the lawn…our favorite late afternoon spot

Clouds reflecting in the “organic” pool

The Drakensberg is known as being one of the best spots for hikers and climbers in South Africa, and we took advantage of some of the half-day hikes in the Monk’s Cowl area of the range. Our first day we took the four hour “Hlatikhulu Forest Loop” and were blown away by the magnificent landscape of green hills and jagged rocky peaks. We passed through lush forests and waterfalls and even ran into a group of wild horses along the way. The magical moment of us alone with wild horses on the side of a mountain was a little bit tainted by the fact that one of the horses passed a serious amount of gas – really loudly I might add – in my face, but it was still a highlight of the day and Johnny got a good laugh out of me hightailing it away from the horse up the trail. Already very happy with our awesome hike and wild horse encounter, we couldn’t believe our eyes later that day driving back to the lodge when we spotted zebras on the side of the road! Where else does that happen?!

Our hike started out shrouded in mist	Sterkspruit falls

Wild horses

We are getting really good at balancing our camera on rocks for self-portraits!

Nandi falls	Flora along the trail

Zebra!

Our zebra sighting whetted our appetite for our final destination, Kruger National Park

On the second day, we took more of an uphill route called “Blind Man’s Corner” where our heavy breathing and sweatiness was rewarded with incredible views of the valley and mountain peaks. In the evenings, we’d sit out in the big Adirondack chairs on the lawn at Inkosana and soak in the tranquility and beauty all around us. It was such a peaceful place, and Johnny decried it as one of his favorite mountain ranges of all time.

Johnny taking in the view at the “Sphinx”

Johnny scaling the rocks	Another great balancing act

We almost lost Johnny…

The Cape Peninsula, the Winelands, the Garden Route, Hogsback…we’ve really enjoyed every place in South Africa we’ve been thus far. All the people we’ve met have been super friendly and welcoming, and the scenery is an unimaginable combination of beauty I can only describe as coastal California meets Napa Valley meets Joshua Tree meets rural Hawaii. It’s been amazing, but it hasn’t exactly felt like Africa…at least not the Africa I had been picturing in my head. Well, that all changed upon our arrival to Coffee Bay, located on the very appropriately titled Wild Coast.

We noticed a different, more authentic feeling South Africa as soon as we crossed over from the Western Cape to the Eastern Cape, but the 80 kilometer drive down to Coffee Bay, known as “South Africa’s most dangerous road,” took it to a whole new level. It almost felt like I was playing a video game as I continually swerved to avoid cows, goats, donkeys, stray dogs, schoolchildren (the cutest kids of all times) and potholes the size of our Nissan Tiida. Passing Xhosa women carrying sticks on their heads dressed in traditional garb, including red clay on their faces to keep out the sun, Anna and I definitely had a “Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore” moment.

We survived the livestock, pothole, cute kid obstacle course and arrived at our hostel, Coffee Shack, where we could finally exhale and admire our surroundings. It’s hard to imagine a more picturesque setting. Behind us were rolling green hills dotted with Xhosa villages while in front of us the sun was setting behind towering cliffs crashing into the Indian Ocean. Unfortunately, that would be the last time we would see the sun during our time in Coffee Bay as the next few days were full of wind and rain. It did, however, manage to stay dry enough for us to join a walking tour of one of the nearby Xhosa villages. Seeing how the Xhosa people live and learning about their customs and rituals from our guide Jerry, a Xhosa himself, was incredible. We saw how their traditional mud huts are made, hiked to the Sacred Pools, got our faces painted by Jerry (OK, that part was a little cheesy), ate a home cooked lunch in a Xhosa hut and even got to try some local Xhosa homebrew out of an old milk carton. Later that night, we enjoyed a traditional braai (barbeque) at our hostel, which included fresh oysters and mussels plucked right from the sea and drumming entertainment by some local Xhosa boys into the wee hours…a most excellent day.

View from our hut	Our hut at Coffee Shack

Hiking in the hills	The Wild Coast

The Indian Ocean	View back towards Coffee Shack

Traditional Xhosa huts…the green “paint” is made from crushed rock and berry juice

Xhosa kids	Little man hard at work

Rolling hills full of Xhosa huts

Xhosa man fixing his roof	Xhosa woman

Red clay face paint	Anna getting tribal

Anna made some friends	Jerry and Johnny

The Sacred Pools, where Xhosa believe their ancestors go after they die

Wood fired meal	Veggies, mealie pap and meat sauce

Having lunch in a Xhosa hut	Xhosa brew

Fresh oysters and mussels at our hostel	Traditional braai at our hostel

Drumming at our hostel	Drumming and dancing into the night

Part of the reason we wanted to take this big trip was to experience new cultures and see firsthand how different people across the world live, and our stay in Coffee Bay definitely provided us with a heavy dose. For that, it was worth the white-knuckle drive, the crummy weather and being out of our comfort zone for a couple days. We also found it interesting that at a placed called the Wild Coast, which is considered one of the more primitive areas in South Africa, there seemed to be more integration between whites and blacks than anywhere else we’ve been in the country so far. Some of the accommodations at our other stops in South Africa have felt almost liked gated fortresses (our room in Franschhoek had a panic button!), and even though apartheid ended almost 20 years ago, things still seem very, very separate. I don’t know…maybe all the gates and alarms are necessary and warranted in those areas, but being able to walk and mingle worry free with the local Xhosa people, who would always greet us with a wave and a smile, was quite refreshing.

Needing a spot to spend a couple nights to break up the long drive from the Garden Route to Coffee Bay, we headed inland to the tiny village of Hogsback, perched 1,300 meters up in the Amathole Mountains. The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit author JRR Tolkien lived his early years in nearby Bloemfontein, and legend has it his books were inspired by childhood visits to Hogsback’s indigenous rainforests, rolling green grasslands and steep mountain peaks.

We settled in at our hostel, Away with the Fairies, which had amazing mountain views, a bar and restaurant with yummy food, hiking trails starting in its garden, and the world’s scariest tree house. It had everything we needed right there on the grounds, and it was great not having to get back in the car for a couple days. We spent our time hiking to nearby waterfalls, relaxing in the garden, braving the climb to the tree house and enjoying the company of fellow travelers from Australia, Holland and England. Unfortunately we didn’t encounter any hobbits, but we did see a family of goats as well as about 30 Samengo monkeys swinging from tree to tree.

Hogsback’s peaks literally looks like a hog’s back

Our cottage at the hostel	View from our cottage

Entrance to the hostel	You could take a bath at the edge of the cliff

Madonna and Child Falls

“Big Tree”	View from our hike

Goats!	Samengo monkeys!

Rickety latter to the tree house

Anna in the tree house	Johnny in the tree house

Self portrait in the tree house

View of the valley from the tree house