Etosha!

Saturday morning at 8am a Crazy Kudu combie (van) picked me up at the house. We picked up a German woman at a guest house, and a German couple and Australian girl at Backpackers United. When we got to the Wild Dog & Crazy Kudu headquarters we were offered coffee and tea waited a few minutes for our guide to come. When he arrived, he explained a bit about the trip itinerary and then we packed up our things in the safari vehicle and got on the road. Our guide's name is Bennie, and his assistant is Alfius. On my trip was the German couple, maybe in their mid 50s, an older German woman, and an 18 year old from Australia.

The girl from Australia is named Angela, and she has been in Africa now for 7 months, working at a camp in South Africa, and traveling East and Southern Africa. She was born in Hong Kong, and her parents moved the family to Australia when Angela was a year old. Peter, the German husband, asked Angela if she lives Japan. She said no. Then he asked if she lives China. She said no, I am Australian. He seemed surprised.

It was a cloudy morning. You know when the sky is grey, and all the greens of the grass and trees really stand out? That's what it was like. The drive up was really beautiful. The road was bordered on both sides by mountains. And everything is so green here! The rainy season is just getting under way, and all the plants are flourishing.

It rained in an out on the drive to Etosha. The roof of the bus was a bit leaky, and it started raining on us! It wasn't much of an issue, but it was quite funny. Some spots on the road were a bit flooded, and the roadside grass became roadside marsh. I really was surprised at how green everything was! It was beautiful. Every now and then we passed a windmill. We passed over Swakop River, which was flowing roughly and completely brown with sediment.

Once we passed the mountainous area, everything became totally flat. You can see for kilometers and kilometers. And there are these things called micro-climates, where it rains in one spot but is completely dry where you are. It was really cool to watch the rain falling from the clouds far away.

There are HUGE termite hills all over the place. Apparently these are large termites, perhaps the size of my thumb. Many people collect them and eat them. They lite a fire, and the termites are attracted to the light, meanwhile singeing their wings and falling to the ground, where they are gathered and then either fried or boiled.

After two hours on the road or so, I realized that everything looked so much nicer when I COULD SEE THINGS with my glasses on. It was great!

There are chirping frogs, much like peepers, that were very loud. It reminded me of summer at home. There were a lot of road sign warnings for crossing kudu and warthog.

Herero People
Our first stop was in a town called Okahanja, meaning "very angry" and "sick and tired" in Herero. The town is mostly Herero people. Years ago the Germans attacked the Herero people because they wanted to take the land. The Herero people were obviously upset and angry, thus the name Okahanja.

Most people in Okahanja are cattle farmers. There are randomly placed farms all over the place on the drive north. In the middle of nowhere, too. Herero women frequently wear large dresses and head wraps, which represent the horn of the cattle, an animal which they live off of.

Etosha
Etosha used to be 80,000 square kilometers, and has been reduced to 22,900 square kilometers, reason being that surrounding people wanted more land, and so it was distributed.

We got to the park around half past three. We set up our tents at the Okaukuejo campsite, and then went on a game drive. Alfius stayed with the camp, and got dinner started. Bennie took us driving for a while. We saw lots of springbok, gemsbok (oryx), ostriches, steenbok, wildebeest, and a bunch of birds. It was hard to catch photos of the animals, because the ones that stayed still enough were far away, and the ones near to the side of the road ran away at the sound of the vehicle. We were back at camp by 6:30. Dinner was pork chops, sausage, mealymeal, garlic bread, and salad. Everything was made on the campfire. After dinner we walked 100 meters or so to the "lit" watering hole, but the lights were off and we couldn't see anything. We headed back to camp and had tea and coffee. Side note- the bathrooms were lovely.

Jackals began to appear and explore around our campsite. Bennie told us that the cries we hear from the jackals translate into "if you leave your shoes outside the tent, I will carry them away and chew them up". It reminded me of Ronan! It was really dark by now, and the jackals started to hunt moths! The moths at Etosha, and in Namibia in general, are huge! The jackals jumped and played with the moths, and chewed and spat them out after catching them. The jackals really just acted like cute little puppies.

It started to drizzle around half past nine and I was tired anyway, so I went to sleep. The tents are made of heavy canvas, and absolutely no light gets through. I couldn't even see my hand in front of my face.

I woke up to rain pat pat patting on the tent at 5:30. By 6am the rain had stopped, and we all got up for breakfast. I had pb&j for breakfast, and strawberry yogurt. We were joined at breakfast by sociable weavers. They are small birds that spend their lives chatting with each other and at humans, and weaving HUGE bird mansions in the trees out of straw. Funny thing is, they enter the "rooms" of the nest from the bottom, and stay upside down when inside.

After breakfast we broke camp and got in the safari vehicle to go game driving. We saw a lot of springbok, gemsbok (oryx), ostriches, steenbok, and wildebeest again. We also saw impala, which are nicknamed "McDonald" for a brown "M" that appears on their tushies. We saw a few kori bustard birds, which are the heaviest flying birds. Bennie also told us that the springbok are brown on top and white on their belies as a way to cool them off. They can run at 88kmph. The babies jump, or "spring", for joy, while the males jump to attract females. We saw chameleon in the middle of the road, that Bennie almost ran over!

Then we started seeing giraffes, which I was SO excited about! Bennie, who is chock full of cool facts (I suppose he has to be, it's his job- but anyway), told us that giraffes have dark tongues as protection from the sun. Apparently, giraffes eat the leaves of the thorned acacia tree, and because they have to be careful around the thorns, they spend 18-20 hours a day eating. They also have 7 vertebrae in their necks, just like humans.

Bennie showed us the two most common trees in Africa; the camel tree acacia, and the umbrella thorn acacia. He also pointed out a mopane tree. Moths lay their eggs on the leaves, and then many Africans pick the larva, or worms, off the tree and boil or fry them and eat them. Elephants and goats like to eat the leaves, the wood makes good firewood, and the leaves, when used for tea, act as a cough suppressant.

Anyway, around noon we had driven up to another campsite, called Halali, for lunch. While Bennie and Alfius made lunch, the five of us walked to the watering hole. Of course there was nothing there. But the view was lovely, and benches were set up on this rocky structure, underneath a bamboo roof. The sun was shining and there was a nice breeze. I saw a lizard, and took a picture of it.

Lunch was hot dogs and veggies. After lunch, Angela and Christine (the older German woman) went for a swim, and I finished Into the Wild. I sat at the edge with my feet in the water. It was a really beautiful pool, and the sky was blue and there were big puffy cumulus clouds and everything was perfect.

Then we got back into the safari vehicle at 2pm, and went for another game drive. We saw lots of zebras! And then we saw a group of seventeen giraffes parading through the grass! It was incredible. We saw more of the same animals and after a while saw barely anything. We drove into our new campsite, Namutoni, and set up camp. There was a group of Estonians set up at the spot next to ours, singing crazy songs. They were nice, though. They offered us wine, and were really welcoming. We had pasta with meat sauce for dinner, and then fruit salad with vanilla custard.

Then we walked to the watering hole, but saw nothing. We could hear lions, though. That was really cool. Angela and I met this guy Chris from Windhoek. He is the IT (information technology) guy at the campsite. I told him that we didn’t have much luck with animals, and that I really wanted to see elephants, rhinos, lions, cheetahs…and he said, “that’s like saying you want to meet Father Christmas, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy”. I couldn’t stop laughing. Thing is, he’s right. It’s the rainy season right now, and many animals, especially the rhino and elephants, are up north.

I suppose I have never heard a lion actually roar before, because it sounded much different than I thought, almost like a gruff whine. The roars were getting louder. Chris brought Angela and to the main part of the resort, a big white castle that used to be a prison. I asked him if it was still used as a prison (I was kidding) and he was like, “Oh, no, we closed it last week”. SO FUNNY. Like, really, I have never met someone funnier and wittier than me, until yesterday! Anyway, we were at the top of the castle on a deck, looking for the lions from a higher point. We didn’t see any, but we definitely heard them. We were listening for them, and down below the deck is the kitchen, and someone dropped some pans, and Chris goes, “oh, did you hear that? Pots and pans”, and I said, “is that a dangerous animal?!?!” So funny. So so funny.

Anyway, Chris ended up inviting Angela and I to watch a movie on his laptop, but the two of us were so tired that we just went back to camp. We hung around the campfire with Alfius and the Germans, and talked about the lions and animals and some other stuff that I don’t remember. Ha. Oh, and for a half hour or so the clouds cleared and we could see Orion and the Southern Cross.

Right after I went to sleep, it began to pour. I was already in my tent and drifting off to sleep, and it was really peaceful and calming to just lie in the dark listening to the rain and thunder.

We woke up this morning and had breakfast and broke camp. We went on one last game hunt, and finally saw some kudu!

After that, we got on the road towards home. We made a few stops, the last being at Okahanja to shop at the craft stands. I picked up a few things, and ended up spending $500 Namibian. I was home by 6pm. Suzanne used some of my olive oil to make dinner, and in return made me a lamb chop and pasta for dinner.

Marybeth is back from Botswana. Good thing, because apparently the center didn’t run too well today while she was away. Good grief. Things are taking a turn for the worst…again.

Bianca and I leave for Sossusvlei tomorrow morning. I will be back Thursday night. Happy Valentine’s Day, in advance!

Funnies of the night:

Me: should I shower before Sossusvlei? I haven’t showered for 9 days now…

Ajay: Yeah, that’s fine. Just shower after 12 or 15 days.

Me: why, what happens after 12 or 15 days?

Ajay: it’s just a good number.

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Bianca showed us how she calls her dog, by blowing through her cupped hands, and extending her outer hand, making a increasingly high sort of noise. Ajay and I whistled on candy wrappers, like you would do with a blade of grass.

ROOSTER CALLS AROUND THE WORLD

In Nicaragua, the sound is made by saying, “key-kur-ee-key-key”

In Germany, the sound is made by saying, “, “key-kur-ee-key”

In India, the sound is made by saying, “ko-ka-ra-ko”

And that concludes our conversation for tonight.