But our misadventure wasn't quite over. The lodge where we were staying is quite a ways from the airport, and I'd volunteered to book our extra night and arrange an airport transfer. I did request the transfer when I booked our room, but forgot to confirm said transfer directly with the lodge. Accordingly, no one was waiting for us when we arrived. Monju was a champ, explaining our situation to various people, arranging a phone call to the lodge, and eventually securing us a ride. Meanwhile, I was unsuccessfully attempting to see if I could track down my camera, acknowledging that it was almost definitely futile but unwilling to give it up without at least checking.
In sum, I really established myself as an excellent and organized travel companion.
After a decent night's sleep, I'd recovered some of my composure and we actually had a pretty great day today in Arusha. The driver the lodge arranged for us, Sylvester, used to be a porter and then a guide on Kilimanjaro with Exodus UK and the African Walking Co (the company we're using), so he was full of helpful information about the mountain. He also told us a bit about his life: he grew up in a Masai village, one of 26 children his father had with 4 wives. When his father refused to pay for him to go to school, he ran away to Arusha and slept on store verandas after the businesses had closed. Eventually he began working as a porter, and Exodus eventually paid for him to go to school to learn English, after which he worked as a guide. After having lumbar problems, however, he had to stop climbing the mountain and began his career as a driver.
We first visited Shanga, an organization that hires disabled people to make jewelry and household products from recycled materials -- even most of the tools used in the workshops are recycled. Next, we ran a couple errands, including a stop at an electronics store, where I was able to replace my camera. So my absentminded mistake was regrettably both avoidable and expensive, but ultimately fixable.
We leave for Kilimanjaro tomorrow morning. Wish us luck.
After finishing our overland tour and spending a night luxuriating in a real bed and an amazing shower, I had only one full day to spend in Johannesburg (Jo'Burg, Jozi, etc.). As per my usual MO, I tried to cram in too much stuff, leaving me too little time to do said stuff properly. Eileen and I took the hop-on, hop-off bus, but only hopped off twice. The first hop was Constitution Hill, the site of the jail where both Gandhi and Nelson Mandela were imprisoned. I hadn't realized that Gandhi spent time in Johannesburg, but he did, arriving as a young lawyer in 1903 (he'd lived in other parts of South Africa beginning in 1893). Experiencing discrimination in South Africa -- for example, he was thrown off a train for refusing to move from his seat in the first class cabin (for which he had paid) when a woman complained about his presence -- apparently made a huge impression on him and prompted his commitment to social activism. In addition to a museum about the jail, Constitution Hill is now also the site of South Africa's constitutional court (nerd alert). Our second stop was at the apartheid museum, which is excellent and requires much more time than the couple hours I was able to spend there.
Eileen left from the apartheid museum to the airport, whereas I was picked up to do a two-hour bicycle tour of Soweto, which stands for SOuth-WEst-TOwnships. We stopped at Nelson Mandela's house and the Hector Peterson memorial. (Of the estimated 600 children killed during the 1976 Soweto student protests against the Bantu Education Act, Hector Peterson was one of the youngest.) In cycling around, I was struck by the level of variation within Soweto; some areas were quite nice whereas others were very rundown. Children often ran alongside the bicycle or came up to ask for a high-five (and occasionally jerk their hand away in a "no-five," proving that some things are universal). In one instance, I was so busy trying to avoid hitting any of them that I didn't pay attention as I turned over a curb, hit it at a bad angle, and wiped out. I got a couple small cuts on my hand and a little dirt on my pants, but once again the only real injury was to my pride -- the kids were super impressed.
After crossing the Botswana-South Africa border, our first visit was to Blouberg. Our campsite was in a beautiful location, set in the hills. We took a quick hike up one of the hills to a swimming hole, then drove in to visit the local community. We first sampled traditional beer at a shabeen (an informal bar, usually located in somebody's residence). I confess I wouldn't select it over the beers that I'm used to, but it wasn't *so* bad -- just a bit sour and with a milkier texture than normal. We also learned a slow, kind of shuffling dance from the shabeen's other customers. Next, we enjoyed a traditional meal. There were so many dishes it would perhaps better be labeled a feast; there had to have been at least 20.
The night drive was (somewhat surprisingly) a real highlight. The trucks weren't anywhere near full, so we were able to work the side spotlights looking for wildlife. Familiar animals look different at night; wildebeest, for example, look positively demonic with glowing eyes underneath their horns. Even a herd of impalas is a little creepy when so many sets of eyes glow back at you. But for my part it was really the nocturnal animals (and the lion) that made the drive so fun. We saw an abundance of spring hares, little furry bouncy animals like rabbits, except with a long tail. We loved watching them bounce around, but the driver wasn't impressed. Depicted on the right is a genet, a nocturnal animal that at times looks almost like a cat, but is actually closer to a rodent.
It was also really cool to see different kinds of animals hanging out together. On the left is one of my favorite pictures from the trip, showing two baboons sitting close together (maybe they're on a date), being chaperoned by a kudu behind a tree.
Our campsite outside Hwange, the Ivory Lodge, is situated right next to a watering hole where tons of elephants come to visit. As we pulled in, we saw them from a distance, and after we arrived, we could visit a small viewing hut to see them up close -- literally only a few feet away. We sat and observed them for not nearly enough time, but even during that relatively short period, several elephant groups arrived, bathed in the watering hole and showered themselves with dirt (to protect against the heat, which was pretty intense), then moved on when another group arrived. The continuous stream of elephants was really magical, but we had to leave to go on our game drive through the park itself.
On the game drive, I learned to recognize new forms of antelope: not springbok and oryx like I'd seen in Namibia, but impala, kudu, and steenbok, the smallest antelope. We also saw zebras, giraffes, warthogs, crododiles, more elephants, a hornbill, and -- most excitingly -- a pride of about 6 lions, albeit from a pretty long distance. There were apparently hippos in the watering hole we stopped at too, but I didn't realize that's what they were so I suppose it doesn't count. All told, our first game drive was pretty successful.
Our full day in the Matobo park began with "rhino tracking," though we were lucky and had far more rhino than tracking. Right near the entrance to the park we saw a group of white rhinos and, slightly further away from the group, we were able to come unbelievably close to a mother and her calf. Apparently, a mother takes her baby further away from the rest of the herd to avoid any accidents while the baby is still vulnerable. Their horns were cut off in an attempt to dissuade poaching, but unfortunately it doesn't work because there's still a little stump left inside the skin (their horns are basically like fingernails). Indeed, at the end of our visit, the guide heard that one of the park rhinos had been killed that day. :(
The Matobo hills are believed to be the longest continuously populated (by humans) area in the world, as evidenced by the bushmen paintings at Nswatugi, our next stop. The current theory is that the artists would make paint by using not only plant materials but also by mixing in the urine and bile of animals. Because of the acid in those substances, if you look closely at the paintings, you can see where the figure has actually been etched into the rock. Their spiritual beliefs were such that they made a new painting every time they stayed in the cave, so the wide stripe of solid paint at the bottom of the painting is actually several drawings layered one on top of the other over thousands of years.
Our final stop of the day was at Cecil John Rhodes' grave, at the "Top of the World" location with an incredible 360-degree view of the hills. Rhodes (of Rhodesia, DeBeers, and scholarship fame) died in Cape Town, the richest man in the world at that time, but requested that he be buried at this location. Because the hill is sacred to the local tribe, the Matabeles, he had to be granted permission to be buried there. Interestingly, permission was granted because of the role Rhodes played in bringing about peace between the British and the Matabeles, deals that he largely brokered by coming by himself out into these hills to meet in person with Matabele leaders. I'd known before coming that Rhodes was/is a complicated and controversial figure, but that particular facet of his life was new to me and really interesting.
It is difficult to imagine a sharper contrast with the Matobo hills than the Nata salt pan in Botswana, where we spent the following afternoon and early evening. It is flat, flat, flat, but also beautiful in its own way. Although animals were not abundant, we did see a jackal, several ostriches, pelicans, and flamingos, as well as a hole dug by an ant bear (a form of anteater). The major draw, though, was the sunset over the reflective water.
Eileen and I successfully met up with each other and our overland tour group at Victoria Falls, where -- aside from Eileen's spontaneously bloody nose this morning -- we've had a great time (or at least I have). After taking it easy on Friday (Eileen's first night in Africa), we went to the falls in the early morning on Saturday; there's nothing like jet lag to make you a morning person. They're spectacular, especially because we saw them in relative isolation (before the throngs of other tourists arrived) and because there were several rainbows (including one double rainbow!). Some of the lookouts were more misty than others, but I think we came at pretty much the optimal time for actually seeing all of the falls. Apparently, when the water is really high, the spray is so intense that it's hard to see the falls, but when the water is really low, some of the falls aren't running anymore. But we got to see all of them.
We enjoyed high tea in the afternoon at the picturesque Victoria Falls Hotel. Finally, in the evening, we joined the group for a buffet meal and entertainment. We had our faces painted (in keeping with our ladylike personalities, Eileen chose a hippo and I picked a water buffalo) and the whole audience participated in some vigorous drumming.
This part of Namibia is quite possibly both the most amazing and the most bizarre place I've ever visited. The Namib Desert is reputedly the oldest desert in the world and home to some of the tallest dunes in the world. These enormous sand dunes are bright red, especially in the early morning light before black oxidation spots begin to emerge. Between some of these dunes are clay pans, the largest of which is appropriately called "Deadvlei," where there used to be water and live acacia trees. The trees are still there, but they've been dead for around 900 years. [I may have gone overboard with the zeroes in a couple postcards I sent, apologies!] Because they're protected from the elements by the huge dunes on either side, the tree carcasses remain in place even though they aren't petrified.
We stayed at a lodge pretty far away from the park itself, and arrived to/from Sossusvlei in a six-seater Cessna -- which was pretty fun in and of itself. The scenery at the lodge is stunning, not dunes but wide open plains punctuated by the occasional rock mountain. The lodge specializes in horseback riding, so we went for a sunset ride our first day at camp. There are a surprising number of animals living in the desert despite the dearth of water: springbok, oryx, ostriches, and jackals, as well as a couple types of birds, ants, snakes, and the biggest crickets I've ever seen (one had to be at least 5 inches long; it was easily as big as the lizards eying it).
Our first stop in Namibia was the "resort" town of Swakopmund, where the Atlantic Ocean meets Namib desert sand dunes. Both days we spent there were incredible and action-packed, involving quad biking through the dunes, kayaking with cape fur seals, and sand boarding. (Sand boarding is like snowboarding, except it's slower, you have to wax your board before each run, and -- most significantly -- there aren't any lifts.) The driver who took us to/from the airport and our various activites seemed to have a real taste for the macabre, so we were also educated about various grisly deaths occurring in the area during the past few years. Throughout our various drives, we heard of at least a dozen, including (but not limited to): the son of the wealthy Greek resort builder who drove so fast his liver burst and he crashed his car and died, though there was never a bruise found on him; a man who jumped off the end of the old jetty only to rise to the surface with a broken neck, to the shock and horror of tourists dining at the restaurant there; a child who got stuck in one of the slides at the water park and drowned; and the child of a local milk lady who died in a freak accident somehow involving a signpost (I missed the details).
In other trips I've taken to the desert, I've been surprised at how much vegetation can actually be found in the desert. Not so here. This desert includes areas satisfying my Platonic ideal of a desert: sand dunes as far as the eye can see and no vegetation or animal life in sight. It surprised me -- although it probably shouldn't have -- that the desert was so windy and a little cold. Somehow I'd always thought of the desert as being not only desolate but also still (and, of course, hot). But these dunes are constantly moving and shifting, such that the footprints we left hiking to the top of the big dune to sandboard were largely smoothed out by the wind two hours later when we boarded back down to the car. (Photo credit: Vijayp.)
Our kayaking trip was also fantastic. Not only did we get to play with the seals, but we also saw a plethora of flamingos in the Walvis Bay lagoon and a small jackal by the side of the road. The lagoon was fogged in during the morning, leading to several excellent views of flamingos in the mist (a phrase which somehow lacks the gravitas generally associated with misty mornings). The kayaking itself didn't involve an extensive amount of exertion, which is probably a good thing given how much hiking up sand dunes we would do later the same day.
people from those areas already had skills the Company viewed as desirable, and therefore (unlike slaves from nearer locations) did not need to be trained. The Slave Lodge museum is housed in the building where most of them lived. 
The airport was super busy even between 2:30 and 3:00 am, though I expect that's likely true at most of the big international airports. The line was very long at the Mickey D's but less long (nonexistent) at the caviar stand. I expect the caviar stand relies less on volume.