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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Haka Time!

What is up, my friends? Welcome back to New Zealand. I know I’ve made you wait for it, but at long last we have finally reached what is famed by many, including me, to be the most stunning place in New Zealand….

Drum roll, please…

Queenstown!

We arrived late in the evening and knew we had picked the right backpackers when we saw this type of artwork adorning the walls.

Ah, yes, home sweet, twisted home.

So are you ready to see some scenery or what? Without further adieu, I present to you…Queenstown.

Not too shabby, huh? After spending an entire day walking around town with our jaws practically dragging on the ground from all the beauty…and Sauvignon Blanc the previous evening, we pulled ourselves together for a visit to the quaint and charming town of Arrowtown.

Arrowtown has a Fall foliage festival every year, but we were about 2 weeks too early to celebrate officially. I think it’s safe to say we weren’t disappointed with the views.

Of course no visit to Queenstown is complete without a ride up the Skyline Gondola.

It just wouldn’t be right if I didn’t share my panoramic pics from the top.

Here are some of Amar’s night shots…awesome!

The next day we headed off to do a day hike on the Routeburn Track. It is meant to be spectacular, especially if you do the whole thing, but Amar and I weren't really feeling hiking with all of our gear including food and water for 3 days so we decided to take ‘er easy and just bust out a day tramp. I know, I know….weak, lame, unacceptable, blah, blah, but I’m totally OK with it.

The drive to Routeburn is spectacular as you might imagine.

The hike itself was definitely gorgeous with lots of suspension bridges over beautiful streams with the mountains in the distance.

I know it seems kind of lame that the picture above is the only picture I have from Routeburn, but it was more about hiking and being outside than snapping pics. Also, I think the most spectacular scenery requires the full, hiking/camping commitment so I think you’ll have to visit google images for more on Routeburn.

After Routeburn it was time to power on to Fox Glacier. The drive there was absolutely breathtaking. I can see why people lose their minds over this part of NZ. It’s otherworldly.

I was kind of obsessed with these tall, yellow trees. They are stunning and located all over the south island.

This is Wanaka, which was described to me as the kiwi’s Queenstown. As you can see, it’s off the charts gorgeous as well. This is Lake Wanaka.

And this is the drive to Lake Hawea. It’s starting to feel like the Shire, don’t you think?

Lake Hawea, folks.

It was definitely one of the most scenic drives we’ve had while in NZ. During this journey I’ve experienced many firsts in the adrenaline category, including sky diving, walking with lions, ultra light gliding, gorilla trekking, swimming with dolphins, etc. These adventures have been limited to the sky and the sea. It seems only fair that I take this adventure to the ground with a little stroll along a glacier.

As you may have gleaned from reading earlier posts, I’m not really a girl who enjoys cold weather. I have to say that the absence of winter for the past 2 years has been absolutely magnificent and I would be quite content to never have to experience winter again except maybe for a long weekend or two here and there for old times sake. That being said, I’m not going to let something like a little cold weather keep me away from breathtaking scenery like this gorgeous glacier.

Before stepping foot on the glacier it was necessary to attach some crampons to the bottom of our boots. This was my first time wearing crampons and I have to admit that I felt like a bit of a badass while I was wearing them. I mean, it’s not everyday that one gets to attach spikes to the bottom of her shoes, you know?

We ascended this ice stairway to access the glacier.

It was surprisingly easy to walk on the ice. Within minutes I felt like an old pro.

Btdubs, we were instructed to tuck our socks into our pants. I recognize I've rocked some hideous looks on the road, but this one was mandatory. Whatevs...when on a glacier, right?

Some parts of the glacier were stunning and reminded me of a Georgia O’Keefe painting.

Here are some more scenes from our walk.

My favorite part of our walk was when we descended into this deep crevice in the ice. It was so steep and slippery that we actually had to grab a rope to guide ourselves down the terrain. Rock on!

Needless to say, we were pretty fired up after the glacier and all about the ice. We met this skydiving pro at one of the lookouts outside of Queenstown who told us about this iceberg graveyard within Mt. Cook National Park so you know we immediately added that to the itinerary. I mean, how could we possibly pass up an iceberg graveyard? Obviously we can’t.

Before we get to the graveyard, how about some more magnificent scenery from the road?

We had to hike a little bit to get to the graveyard.

Are you ready for it? Are you fired up? Can you stand the anticipation?

OK, here you go.

Do you see those inflatable boats? Folks can shoot around the icebergs by boat or kayak. Kind of awesome, huh?

Yeah, I’m totally chilling in an iceberg graveyard…

And I think it’s awesome!!!

The weather was not on our side so we didn’t get to see much of Mt. Cook, but the clouds cleared for a second so we could catch a quick glimpse of the peak. Behold, NZ’s highest mountain.

Cue the song On the Road Again by Willie Nelson.

Amar and I decided to power on to Littleton, a small town about 30 minutes outside of Christchurch because we thought lodging may be more abundant than in Christchurch, which was at full capacity housing displaced residents and aid workers. As we rolled into Littleton, we quickly discovered that, sadly, it was also devastated by the earthquakes.

The entire town was rubble, literally. We couldn’t find a single shop, restaurant, or property that was in tact. It was heartbreaking!

At this point it was about 8:30 PM, which I have learned is the equivalent of midnight in most other countries, meaning everything is closed. We called every property listed in our Lonely Planet guide in an attempt to find a place to lay our heads in Christchurch, but they were all booked solid. We powered on to Christchurch and continued to see no vacancy signs displayed on all the properties. Wow…it seemed like we were going to enjoy yet another evening in the car. At least this time we had our luggage and most importantly for me, my ear plugs! As we were making our way out of town we discovered a property that appeared to have a vacancy. We inquired within and while the price tag was significantly more than we were used to paying in the backpackers, it was better than a night in the car so we jumped on it.

The gentleman at the counter asked where we were coming from and when I mentioned Littleton he looked at me with this strange expression on his face and asked me what exactly I was planning on doing in Littleton. I told him how we had hoped to grab some dinner and spend the night, figuring it would be a better bet than Christchurch. His perplexed expression remained unchanged as he informed me that Littleton was in fact the epicenter of the earthquake. Wow…I felt like a bit of a loser, but at least it was clear I was a foreigner. I can’t say the same for my kiwi travel companion who was also clueless about Littleton, but I did all the talking so his kiwi identity was not revealed. You’re welcome, Amar!

The gentleman asked me if I’d like an upper or lower room and I opted for the latter so we wouldn’t have to lug our bags up the stairs. When we got to the room I was a little taken aback when I saw this…

“Um, if you were me would you choose upstairs or downstairs?” I inquired. “Maybe upstairs is better so we won’t get crushed if the upper floor collapses.” The gentleman reinforced that the beams were just for support purposes and that we would be fine. In what I can only assume was an attempt to comfort me, he informed me that they hadn’t had an aftershock in 3 whole days. Sorry, but that didn’t really do much to calm my nerves. Sensing my concern, he continued that this was a new property and it sustained no damage from the earthquake. Evidently these support beams were just an extra precaution. Both Amar and I were a bit sketched out, but after a long day of driving we were beat and starving and decided to just hope for the best. Fingers crossed we aren’t crushed to death in the middle of the night.

I’m pleased to say the room held for the evening and Amar and I survived. Yay!!! It was time to power on to Picton and catch the ferry back to the North Island. The drive through the Marlborough region is breathtaking.

Throughout the drive I shared my enthusiasm about sinking my teeth into that spectacular carrot cake from the Picton Village Bakkerij and was devastated to discover that the bakery was closed for all of Easter weekend. Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!

We powered over to the ferry to buy our tickets, but the ferry we wanted was sold out so we decided to spend the night in Picton and power on to Wellington in the morning. I guess we were feeling a bit morbid about the night before in Christchurch because we opted to stay at Tombstone Backpackers. Notice the door is a coffin.

It was actually one of the nicest backpackers we had stayed in thus far though so if you are in Picton I’d definitely recommend it.

We arrived in Wellington on Easter Sunday, but had already called ahead and learned that the famous museum, Te Papa, was open. It was a miracle! It seemed like everything was closed all of Easter weekend, but not Te Papa. Sweet! It’s a fabulous museum with exceptional information and artifacts about Maori culture as well as NZ history and culture. I have no idea what this freaky deak baby had to do with anything, but it creeped me out enough to make me want to take its picture.

How about an even closer look of this Flowers in the Attic baby?

Some of the other highlights included a room that simulated an earthquake as well as the Colossal Squid display.

As the name suggests, the colossal squid is massive. In fact, it’s the largest invertebrate in the world with eyes the size of soccer balls. Crazy! It was definitely impressive and very cool to see one this close.

The next morning, Anzac Day, which is a public holiday in NZ and which Amar and I decided we would commemorate with the famous Anzac cookie,

we fully intended to nerd out big time and do a Lord of the Rings tour. Our new friend, Alexis, from Abel Tasman raved about the tour, getting us all excited to relive the adventures of Frodo in person, but the weather was horrendous with pouring rain and gusty winds so we decided that we’d have to take a pass. As it turns out, Peter Jackson was in town filming The Hobbit so we wouldn’t have been able to see the Shire anyway, which was huge on my list. Next time I’m in NZ, it’s a definite.

So we blasted out of Wellington with hopes of hiking the Tongariro Alping Crossing, but when I called DOC (Department of Conservation) to inquire about the weather conditions the ranger informed me with an incredulous laugh that it was torrential rain and blustery wind, making it an absolutely horrible idea to even contemplate doing the walk. Wow! There was no ambiguity there. Tongariro was a no go. So instead of stopping there we powered on to the lovely town of Taupo. The weather was kind of crappy so we made a quick trip to Huka Falls and then just walked around the town, which was absolutely adorable.

In the morning we powered on to Rotorua to immerse ourselves in Maori culture. Ever since Rob returned from NZ I have been obsessed with the Haka and now it was finally time for me to see it in person. I could not wait!!! But before we get to the main event, let me introduce you to famous, but extremely elusive kiwi bird.

Sadly, this picture is of a stuffed kiwi, but this bird lived a long and fruitful life, bearing many baby kiwi birds for Kiwi Encounter, NZ’s largest kiwi recovery program. This program was exceptionally well run, allowing visitors the opportunity to walk through the incubator and hatchery areas. In the evenings visitors can walk through the outdoor kiwi enclosure, offering a rare opportunity to actually see this highly endangered, nocturnal species. Amar and I had already made plans to attend a hangi (meal prepared in a traditional way) that evening, but we fully intended to see a kiwi on this trip so we’d be back tomorrow evening to see if we could spot this quirky bird in person.

The owner of our backpackers who has lived in Rotorua for more than a decade gushed to us about Mitai Village, claiming it was the one thing that was an absolute must while in town. Obviously with such a glowing recommendation, we had to do it. I was beside myself to see the Haka, but this evening proved to be so much more than just the Haka. The night began with the unveiling of the hangi, which included chicken, lamb, stuffing, potatoes and kumara (sweet potatoes) cooked in a hangi pit.

Yummy!!! It looked and smelled delicious, but we had to wait to gorge ourselves on this tasty feast, allowing the cooks some time to carve the meat and get everything prepared. In the meantime we were taken down to the stream where we were greeted by the traditionally clad warriors in a hand carved waka (war canoe).

It was awesome. From there we were taken through the woods up to the area where the cultural performance would take place.

OMG, it’s Haka time, folks. I could barely contain my enthusiasm.

Are you ready?

Are you excited?

OK, game on!

It was everything I wanted it to be and more. When it was over I wanted them to do it all over again. From the crazy eyes and outstretched tongue to the fierce gestures and intimidating shouts, I loved everything about it. If you are unfamiliar with the Haka I urge you to google it ASAP. You will love it, guaranteed!

After the Haka they engaged in other activities like stick games, a weapons display, and poi ball dances, all of which were exceptional and gave us some time to work up an appetite. At long last it was time to taste the delicious hangi. I shoved my face with the delectable meats and veggies, going back for seconds, and I think actually a third serving of the lamb. I know I’m a pig, but I’m telling you it was that good and one serving was insufficient.

After the meal we took a walk through the forest to see some glow worms in their natural setting. Did you know that glow worms are actually a maggot which uses it’s luminescent tail to attract insects? When put that way they sound kind of gross, but when you see them illuminated at night they look absolutely beautiful.

What a fabulous evening! As you may recall from my first NZ post, Amar and I were unsuccessful in our quest to visit White Island due to inclement weather. We were hopeful that we’d have better luck the second time around, but when we returned to our backpackers after our evening with the Maori there was a note waiting for us indicating that White Island was closed due to the weather. That was ok though because we had 3 days in Rotorua so we had one more chance for it to work out. Fingers crossed.

The next morning we headed out to the Buried village and as we were getting ready to roll out we noticed this adorable little bird on our windshield.

Let's just say that the Buried Village left a little something to be desired so the only picture I have to share with you is of this waterall on the park grounds.

After the village we took a gondola ride to the top of Mt. Ngongotaha, offering gorgeous panoramic views, but the main attraction for us was the high speed luge ride to the bottom of the mountain. I have been on many luges over the years, but I have to say this one was among the best I’ve done. It was a long ride, offering lots of twists and turns where you could be cautious and slow down or be a psycho and go full speed ahead. Apparently one of Amar's friends chose the latter on one of their boys weekends in college and actually flew off the tracks. Whoa! He must have been flying to actually shoot off the tracks. Thankfully Amar and I made it down the mountain unscathed.

After the luge we walked around Rainbow Springs National Park, which is home to lots of wildlife including the highly intelligent and mischievous kea bird.

This bird is notorious for destroying people’s cars. One of the car companies in NZ actually donated a camper van to one of these birds at the park, which it absolutely decimated. They video taped it and got such a kick out of it that they now sponsor this exhibit at the park. These birds are generally very social, but one bird in the park named Jenny had to be separated from the other birds after she killed her mate. Um, Jenny, you need to take it down a level, sister.

The information outside Jenny’s enclosure mentioned that she liked attention, encouraging visitors to speak with Jenny even if she acted like she hated it. Apparently she would sometimes even cry when people left her area even if she ignored them the entire time they were there. Of course I felt compelled to talk to the avian sociopath, speaking to her in many accents including Forest Gump and she totally loved it. She flew down to where I was standing so she could get a better look at me.

We “hung out” like that for several minutes, but when it was time to say goodbye and I walked away, Jenny actually cried. Aww, Jenny, you are breaking my heart. I walked back to her enclosure to say goodbye one last time. Poor disturbed Jenny.

The night was upon us and you know what that means…

That’s right, folks, it was time to see if we could spot some kiwis in person. We returned to the Kiwi Encounter and within minutes of entering their enclosure we heard a rustling in the bushes and this adorable and very industrious kiwi quickly walked past us to find the perfect spot to shove his beak in the ground and forage for food. It was absolutely adorable and unlike any other bird I had ever seen before. There were a total of 4 birds in the enclosure and we succeeded in seeing 3 of them. I’d say that was a pretty successful trip.

Haka…check

Kiwi…check

What else is NZ famous for that I can share with you?

How about the silver fern

And some sheep?

Apparently there are more sheep in NZ than people so let’s get all up in their grillz.

I know I didn’t get the chance to visit the Shire, but this part of NZ totally reminded me of it. Wouldn’t you agree?

After staring at some sheep we decided to kick it subterranean and see some glow worms at the

We descended into the caves and boarded a boat where we silently glided along the water through this labyrinth of limestone caves, stalactites, and stalagmites. The glow worms emit luminous colors making the roof of the cave resemble a star filled sky, but from the depths of the earth. It was so peaceful to silently glide along the water and take in the light show from above. Here’s a picture of our local guide gliding back through the caves to pick up her next tour.

After the caves we headed up to Auckland, but only for the evening to do a load of laundry and gather a few additional supplies for our trip up to the Bay of Islands. As with much of NZ, the landscape we passed along the way did not disappoint.

We based ourselves in Paihia, which happens to be the birthplace of NZ, as it’s where the Treaty of Waitangi was first signed between the Maori chiefs and the British Crown. We arrived into town in the late afternoon and while we could appreciate that it must be a gorgeous place, the torrential rain prevented us from really doing much exploring.

The next morning the weather seemed decent so we decided to explore the quaint town of Russell, a mere 5 km from Paihia and reachable by ferry. The town was absolutely adorable filled with cute shops, gorgeous art galleries, delicious food, and some beautiful beaches.

In addition to a cute town with impressive natural scenery, Russell happens to be home to some of NZ’s oldest buildings including its oldest church.

While the town was adorable I think my favorite part of the trip was the discovery of this natural wind tunnel atop a hill. As we were walking along the beach, we discovered this path that led up a grassy hill offering some great panoramic views of the town. Making our way to the top, we noticed the wind was particularly ferocious in this one part and all the landscape there, especially the tall grasses, seemed to grow at an angle. The wind was so ferocious that we could actually stand at an angle and practically have our entire body weight supported by the gusts, but because the temperature was warm, it felt great blowing against your face and body.

I became a little obsessed with the breeze and had to hang out here for about 10 minutes, screaming into the wind and letting it threaten to blow me down the hill. It was so much fun!

Unfortunately the weather went steadily downhill from there, with the rains so bad that they actually caused flooding in much of the north, washing out bridges and closing many of the roads. Since most of the beauty of the Bay of Islands comes from actually spending time outdoors, we decided it best to cut our losses and expenses and head back down to Auckland.

Here are some pics from One Tree Hill, which happens to be about a 5 minute walk from Amar’s house, offering stunning views of Auckland. What I loved about this place in addition to the great views and rolling hills was the fact that sheep and cows are grazing on the electric green grass. It’s so cool to be right in the middle of Auckland and still have sheep and cattle nearby.

After One Tree Hill we headed to the impressive Sky Tower where we took in more panoramic views of this beautiful city. They had these cool kaleidoscopes with information about the various sights in the distance that made for some interesting pics.

Like the World Financial Center in Shanghai and the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, the Sky Tower has patches of clear glass, showing you just how far up you really are and how much it would suck if you fell from this height.

The beauty of NZ is that it’s pretty small, making day trips to towns with vastly different landscapes very doable in the matter of a few hours. One such day trip was to Piha, a rugged beach known for its wild surf.

Another trip was to breathtakingly gorgeous, Waiheke Island, a mere 35 minute ferry ride from the Central Business District of Auckland. When you are there you definitely feel like you are on some beautiful island miles and miles away from the mainland with emerald water, white sand beaches, and a micro-climate that is several degrees warmer than nearby Auckland. As if the scenery isn’t enough, you also throw boutique wineries into the mix along with 5 star restaurants serving up mouthwatering fare, making Waiheke a little piece of paradise. I couldn’t get enough of this place and would absolutely recommend a visit if you find yourself in the Auckland area.

Stunning isn’t it? That is really how I’d sum up NZ as a whole. It offers some of the most magnificent natural scenery I have ever seen as well as friendly people, spectacular wine (Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc is my new obsession), amazing wildlife (um, need I remind you of swimming with dolphins in the wild), fascinating glimpses into Maori culture, and delicious food. I really don’t know what else I can say except book yourself a ticket ASAP.

A huge thanks to Amar for being such a wonderful host! It’s been fabulous meeting up all over the globe to explore exotic lands together and I hope our adventures continue after our respective entries back into the real world. Oh no, not the real world!!!!! Truth be told, I’m actually looking forward to what the next chapter holds and I believe great things are on the horizon. I just have to stay positive and trust that it will all work out. With mom watching over me and guiding my path, I have every confidence that I will be ok…actually, not just ok, but fantastic!

For now, it’s back to Thailand for about 10 days to hang with Rob and the rest of my Mae Sot family and then it’s back to the US for Rob’s graduation, the christening of my new nephew, Bryson, and then back to DC to hang with my crew and think about what comes next. I feel like I’m on the cusp of something great so fingers crossed that it all shakes out that way.

More from the Land of Smiles shortly. 　

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Kickin' It With the Kiwis

Hello, friends, and welcome back to New Zealand. After spending the morning shooting around Jacqui and Richard’s farm, we hit the road and headed to the Maori Rock Art Centre in Timaru. Jacqui hooked us up with a 50% coupon too so that was even better.

The museum was very well done, beginning with a traditional Maori welcome,

followed by exposure to lots of Maori rock art found throughout NZ.

The space is pretty blinged out with videos and sound effects

But it also keeps it real for the kiddies in all of us with an art center allowing us to do relief drawings. I’m not sure what the technical word is for this, but basically you rub a crayon over a raised image and you get a replica of that image. Here’s my masterpiece.

As you can see, I stepped it up a level by going with not 1, but 2 crayon colors. Notice the layering of colors and the intentional roughness of the edges. Is it a stretch to call this piece magnificent? I think not…

Also, I wasn’t haphazard in my selection of which piece to rub. I thoughtfully selected this piece because of the hollow spaces. Anticipating that you’d want to know more about hollow spaces, I took this picture just for you.

After our tour through the museum we headed into nature to see the Maraewhenua Maori rock paintings first hand.

I have to be honest, the artwork in this cave left a little something to be desired, but the surrounding scenery definitely did not. It was gorgeous even with the overcast weather.

Our next stop was to Elephant Rocks, giant limestone boulders sculpted by wind, rain and rivers. Rob, AC and Satomi visited this little gem while they were traveling around NZ and highly recommended it.

It is definitely picturesque and a very unique landscape.

Time to hit the road again.

The above picture gives you a little glimpse into the driving part of our trip. Yours truly basically had to drive every waking moment of the journey. Thankfully I was kind of used to driving on the opposite side of the road from biking around Mae Sot, but it’s definitely a different ball game in a SUV and on windy mountain roads. Never one to shy away from a challenge, I rolled up my sleeves and did what needed to be done. I put in the long kilometers and made sure we arrived alive each and every evening. As for Amar, um, well, I guess his navigational abilities could basically be summed up with this picture.

Yeah, I think it’s safe to say that navigating isn’t one of Amar's fortes.

Thankfully it’s one of mine so I promptly guided us to our next destination, the Moeraki Boulders.

As you can see, it's a collection of massive boulders on this beautiful beach. It’s totally weird and therefore totally up our alleys.

Wendy, this move is for you. Wendy and I used to do gymnastics and subjected our families to regular talent shows.

I wish we could take the credit for this awesome shot above, but the credit goes to this girl we met on the beach who had seen it online and suggested it to us. Of course the trade off was that we take a pic of her as well. El gusto es mio. The pleasure is mine.

It’s a sweet shot and kudos to the creative person/people who thought of it.

After frolicking around the boulders we thought we’d pay a visit to the yellow-eyed penguin colony at Bushy Beach. Did you know that the aforementioned penguin is the rarest penguin in the world?

Yep, it is so I can imagine you are on pins and needles waiting to see if Amar and I were so lucky as to catch a glimpse of these rare and elusive birds and the answer is…

Hell yeah we did!

Those pics are taken from the official yellow-eyed penguin lookout tower. Not to diss it or the adorable penguin we spotted, but it wasn’t overwhelming so we thought we’d try the more rugged coastline path near the lighthouse and I’m so glad we did because we got to get up close and personal with these adorable, little guys.

Don’t worry, we weren’t inappropriate. There are signs everywhere warning you that these penguins are extremely shy and to give them their space, but having been on African safari, Amar and I were ready with our 300 lenses.

Behold, the rarest penguin in the world. (visually, I’d like you to be picturing a magician called Gob. If you don’t get that reference, run, don’t walk to your computer and download the entire series of Arrested Development.)

These little guys were so cute. The wind was kicking up a storm (it is NZ after all) but these little guys would just stand there and take it, alternating between open and closed eyes. They really are so adorable. I know it’s not allowed so of course I would never do it, but I REALLY wanted to cradle one of these guys in my arms. I mean, it’s insanely cute, right? Actually, the baby seals might have been cuter, but these guys are still pretty darn cute.

After leaving the world’s most endangered penguin Amar and I weren’t satisfied to visit just any tourist attraction. Oh no, we needed something special…something rare.

Our solution to this omnipresent desire for greatness?

Booyah! That’s right, it’s the Steepest Street in the World.

Don’t even pretend to so much as suggest to me that this street is not steep.

It’s all I can do to prevent myself from falling backwards.

As I mentioned, I used to be a gymnast and it appears this gave me a bit of an advantage in the coordinated category. Um…Amar…are you OK? .

Just kidding! Amar was totally able to hang on the STEEPEST STREET IN THE WORLD!!! (now I’d like you to make the laugh like the Count from Sesame Street)

Obviously the bar had been set pretty high. I mean, after visiting the world’s rarest and steepest, we needed something major.

What makes the Tunnel Beach Walkway fit our criteria is that a blanket of opaque fog enveloped the air around us, making visibility practically nonexistent. Not letting something like a lack of vision get in our way, we hiked down this steep and muddy cliff only to discover that the closer we got to the sea, the better the visibility.

It was actually quite stunning in the rain with the wind causing the Pacific Ocean to smash against the cliffs.

After tackling this we powered on to Sandfly Bay for a walk along some dunes.

Next it was time to power further down south to the rugged Catlins. The Catlins weren’t originally on our list of places to visit, but we met this German camera man at our backpackers in Abel Tasman who showed us some insane pics of the Catlins so here you go. I’d like to provide a disclaimer that my pics basically suck next to the ones he showed, us, but this is the best I could do with the rain and gusty wind.

I present to you…Nugget Point.

It’s kind of like Stonehenge in the sea, huh?

Next we powered on to the bustling metropolis of Owaka where we’d be spending the evening. To give you an idea of how cosmopolitan Owaka is, I present to you…

Yes, it’s exactly what you think it is.

I have no evidence to prove this statement, but I bet the owner of this property has somewhere in the neighborhood of 17 cats.

The same owner also owns the adjacent Dollyworld. (insert knife slashing music and a visual of Jack Nicholson in The Shining)

Not wanting to spend too much time at either of these destinations, we powered on to Surat Bay in hopes of seeing sea lions.

Yay!!! I’m loving the pounding rain and wind. I'm actually doing spirit fingers under my jacket.

It was worth it though because we didn’t have to battle the elements long before catching up with some sea lions.

We had read that sea lions are a bit more aggressive than your standard seal and they weren’t kidding.

I don’t think this guy was actually pissed. I think he was merely trying to scare us because he promptly turned around and I swear I heard him laugh and call us punk ass bitches as he sauntered back to the ladies.

Jerk!

Next we decided to view some water. Fist we visited the Purakaunui Falls,

followed by Matai Falls.

Amar and I both experimented with a little trick we’ve been wanting to try, which is to slow down water so that it looks all smooth and flowy. I wouldn’t say that I’ve mastered it yet, but here’s my best attempt thus far…

Oooh, aaaah. Yeah, not really, but kind of fun to experiment with in some random, beautiful park on a rainy day.

Next we visited Curio Bay, which is famous for its fossilized Jurassic-age trees. These are the pics that actually enticed Amar and I to visit the Catlins, but it turns out that the fossils are tidal dependent and we were several hours on the wrong side of the tide so we had to bail. I did snap this nice pic of a seagull though.

I know, I know after the world’s rarest and steepest this is a small consolation, but it’s all I’ve got, folks.

Actually, I also have a picture from our backpackers to share. It’s pretty gorgeous, huh?

Despite the less than fabulous weather, we decided to roll the dice and power on to Milford Sound. I didn’t feel like a visit to NZ was complete without a little Milford Sound action so keep your fingers crossed that the weather improves. This is NZ so the weather can definitely change on a dime.

Wait just a minute, it seems like the sun is starting to come out. Oh yeah!

Pretty great, huh? I’m so glad we powered on to Milford because we lucked out with a perfect day. Woo Hoo!!!

After that we backtracked, taking our time to stop at various places along the road between Milford and Te Anau.

The is the forest you walk through on the Chasm Walk.

These are the Mirror Lakes

and this is the Divide.

What makes the Divide special, you ask? It’s the lowest east-west pass in the Southern Alps.

And here are some pics from the car on our drive to what is often described as the most beautiful place in NZ, Queenstown.

Yes, these pictures were taken by me. I may have stretched the truth earlier when I indicated that I did the lion’s share of the driving. To be fair, I actually only drove twice on the entire journey throughout NZ with the aggregate time behind the wheel over the course of 5 weeks totaling something in the ballpark of maybe 4 hours.

It’s not that I didn’t want to help with the driving, it’s more a product of Amar insisting that he drive. I’m sure it had nothing to do with me flying into the unstable shoulder atop a sharp and curvy cliff on more than one occasion or me subsequently driving like a grandmother to avoid further mishaps. Nah. Oh and as for my navigation skills, I think I would have to give them a NI (needs improvement). That was an actual grade in elementary school, btdubs.

In any event, check out the stunning scenery as we made our way to Queenstown.

This picture makes me think of the following movie quote:

Max and Jinx...friends for-ever.

Do you know what movie that's from? Yes, quoting it makes me kind of a loser, but whatevs. It's Space Camp and since I know what you are thinking, yes, I've eaten astronaut ice cream and I promise it's been a long time since I wore a diaper and drove cross country with a knife and garbage bag in my trunk. Really...

Well, folks, on that note, I'm going to let you run.

I leave you with the following 5 words: crampons, chisels, and iceberg graveyard.

So, basically. if you are fanatical about ice, then you are going to LOVE the next post.

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Baby's Got Battitude...Part 2

Hey everyone! I'm pleased to introduce you to the newest member of the family, Bryson Bugden Lindsley. (insert cheers of joy, herkies, toe touches and a round off back handspring, back handspring back tuck)

Bryson entered this world on March 2, 2011 at 3:56 AM. He weighted 8lbs, 14.08 oz, which is more than three pounds larger than his big sis, Abigail. Whoa!

Like his big sis and his late Grammy, Bryson's definitely got Battitude! You make us proud, Bryce, and I cannot wait to meet you in person in 1 week. That's right, little guy, I'm going to be all up in your grill in 7 short days. Get excited, little man.

I'd also like to take this opportunity to share with you our memorial plans for our mother. As you probably know by now, my mom was a teacher and absolutely loved what she did. When starting a new unit or lesson, she would enthusiastically research the topic, becoming an expert on the particular subject matter to make it come to life for her students. She would frequently share these new fun facts with each of us, strangely weaving them into casual conversation. Here's an example for you.

Me - "I've got the most annoying mosquito bite. It's itching like crazy and driving me nuts. I can't stop scratching it."

Mom - "Did you know that bats are one of nature's most efficient and eco-friendly methods for keeping mosquito populations under control?"

(Insert an uncomfortable silence followed by hysterical laughter)

My brothers and I would frequently make fun of her for these random segues into the wonderful world of bats, sharks, bridges, etc., but of course, deep down, we really thought it was adorable and evidence of her passion for teaching.

In thinking about what we wanted to do to remember our mother, we agreed that it must be something with an educational component in our hometown so that her legacy as an educator would live on for years to come. On our way to dinner at mom's favorite steak house in Marietta, GA, we hatched this plan.

We would partner with the Chattahoochee Nature Center, a place we frequented in our childhoods, to create an educational exhibit about bats in Georgia. This would be a fun and interactive exhibit that invited children to look, touch, explore and discover fun and interesting facts about bats.

While in Atlanta to close down mom's house, we met with the Executive Director and head of Fund Development to discuss our thoughts and come up with a plan. They were immediately on board and assembled their team to come up with some ideas for implementation.

We have decided that we are going to create an interactive and educational exhibit that will look like a hollowed out tree trunk (Georgia bats live in trees not caves). Visitors will be allowed to walk into the tree structure to learn more about bat habitats and conservation. On both the inside and outside of the tree will be petroglyph drawings of bats complemented by educational information. Above the tree structure will be a branchlike sculpture with hanging bats.

We are going to work with mom's school to get the students involved and since bats were already part of the curriculum it will be very easy to weave this into the festivities. I know the children made bat houses in the past so they can donate these to the nature center to make it even more bat friendly. The dedication will be on October 1st, mom's birthday. How perfect!

The October timeline also allows for tie in with the nature center's annual Halloween Hikes so that we can make this a month long celebration with films, guest speakers, and special educational events. Of course you know a renowned bat expert will be on hand on Oct. 1 to illuminate us on the latest and greatest in in the world of bats.

So...that's the plan. It's feels so right! What a great way to celebrate mom on her bday...her life, her passion, her Battitude.

Today is the 2 year anniversary of my mother's passing. There is not a day that goes by that I don't think of my mom and wish that I could hug her, see her, laugh and yap our faces off together, but I am in a much better place with things than I was 2 years ago. While I still feel her absence acutely and miss her terribly, I also feel healthy, optimistic, and strong. I feel lucky to have had a mother who was so loving, devoted and involved in our lives and I feel grateful that I got to spend as much time with her as I did. Not everyone is so fortunate. I appreciate that I have much to be thankful for in my life and I end my time on the road feeling excited about what comes next and trusting that I am exactly where I am supposed to be at this moment in time.

If my mom was here with us today I know she would be beaming with pride. Thank you, mom, for always believing in us and being our greatest cheerleader. We love you and will do our best to always make you proud.

#Battitude

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Greetings Middle Earthlings

Kia ora, friends and greetings from the land of kiwis. I was super pumped to see Amar waiting for me at the airport as I cleared customs. It’s been a while since I’ve had an airport pickup so this was quite a treat.

Amar lives in Auckland so I was able to make an immediate beeline for the shower and pull myself together for a tasty cup of chai on One Tree Hill followed by a a delicious lunch of green lipped mussels and a couple of glasses of a delicious NZ sauvignon blanc in Mission Bay. Yummy!!!

Since you know sister hates the cold, Amar and I were eager to make our way down south as quickly as possible before the colder temperatures arrived. As a result, we hit the road first thing in the morning and made our way to Coromandel.

What a stunning view! Wow! I’ve heard NZ delivers on gob smacking natural scenery (Lonely Planet’s words) and I have to agree that is smack daddy. Supposedly the South Island takes it to a new dimension of spectacular so if it gets better than this I think I’m going to be a happy girl.

Next we hit hot water beach, which is famous for this small stretch of sand where warm water oozes up from beneath the surface. All one has to do to access the soothing water is to hire a shovel and dig some holes.

Sounds easy enough, right? Amar immediately got to work on digging us our sand jacuzzi.

After digging for a while, we finally came upon water, but instead of being warm and soothing, it was ice cold. It’s kind of a crap shoot as to which section of sand will contain the magical, hot water so if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.

And again…

Unfortunately holes 2 and 3 were also duds, but thankfully some nice lady took pity on us and invited us into her pool. Don’t mind if we do…

The pools are only available 2 hours on either side of low tide so after all that hard work, it’s just washed away. No worries, though. We had plenty of time to soak in the relaxing water before heading on to our next destination, Cathedral Cove.

It seems like a beautiful place to go swimming, but it’s really only a good idea if you happen to enjoy arctic temperatures. I put my toe in the water to assess and practically got frostbite. So, Cathedral Cove…pretty to look at, but a death sentence for swimming in my opinion. Yes, I realize there are people swimming in the water who appear to be very much alive, but they are clearly insane. Enter at your own risk, folks.

The next day it was off to Mt Maunganui, or the Mount, for people in the know like yours truly.

The views from the top are absolutely spectacular with beaches and sea on all sides.

After conquering the Mount we powered on the Whakatane. Note, wh is pronounced like F so Whakatane is actually pronounced (fa-ka-at-ne). Yes, it sounds like what you think it does.

Whakatane is a tiny town, but serves as the gateway to White Island, NZ’s most active volcano. The White Island tour was canceled for today due to inclement weather so we were content to walk around town and check out the sites, keeping our fingers crossed that tomorrow would be better.

After checking out the town we checked into our hotel, which sat above an Irish bar called the Craic. I’d like to give a shout out to my Irish peeps, what’s the craic (’sup), y’all? The room was fine, but what the heck is up with this? Are we in NZ’s equivalent of the Bate’s Motel?

With the rainy weather there was absolutely nothing going on so we decided to see a movie at the local theatre. When we got back to our hotel at 10:15 PM we were surprised to discover that the hotel and Irish pub were both locked and completely vacant. Hmm, this is strange. Surely our hotel wouldn’t have locked us out. We actually cracked up laughing about how absurd it would be if we were actually locked out while we called the after hours number.

Standing outside the front door of the hotel, we could hear our after hours call ring inside, but when we peered through the glass to see if anyone was actually inside to take the call we saw nothing but this...

Neat. (insert hysterical laughter)

Next we decided to call the security company to see if they could help.

A very energetic and extremely helpful lady took our call, but advised us that this company was headquartered in Australia so she’d do the best she could to help us remotely. The number she had for the owner also rang inside so we knew that route was a dead end. Next she looked up the owner’s name in the phone book, of which there were 3 of them, ringing each of them in hopes that 1 would be the correct number. At this point it was around 11 PM so the people who answered were slightly annoyed, even more so to discover it was the wrong number. Oops, sorry.

This lady took it even a step further by calling the police to see if there was something they could do, but the police laughed and said this same thing happened 2 weeks ago and that we’d better find another place to stay. Going above and beyond the call of duty yet again, this amazing lady called a few hotels for us, but they were all booked…or not answering their phones. Whuck! Really?

So, it looks like Amar and I were going to be sleeping in the car after all. These photos are courtesy of Amar's cell phone.

Ah, home sweet home! During all of this we were cracking up laughing at the absurdity of this situation. First of all, it was insane to me that literally everything in this town was closed at 10 PM and secondly we must have looked so sketch standing at the entrance of the hotel in the torrential rain laughing our faces off. Of course no one was around to see our sketchiness, but if they were they would have definitely wondered what was going on with us.

Oh well, it could be worst. Though all of our luggage was inside the hotel, we both had our sleeping bags in the car. OK, time to get some sleep. Nightie night.

The above picture is a bit misleading, suggesting perhaps that I did actually sleep, but within minutes of applying my “eye mask” I was abruptly shaken out of my relaxed state by the violent rattling of the windows. OMG are we in the midst of another earthquake and what is that deafening sound? After tearing away my eye mask I discovered that we weren’t in any danger and that the simulated earthquake was being produced by my overly zealous, sleeping travel companion. Special…

As you know, Amar and I have traveled together before, but this snoring, which depending on his body positioning resembles a chainsaw or a fog horn, was definitely something new. Wow, I guess I won’t be sleeping much on this trip.

The next morning a bright eyed and bushy tailed Amar opened his eyes to discover me, 3 inches from his face, staring at him with an expression of horror. I believe my mouth was open and there may have actually been drool hanging from my lower lip. I proceeded to re-enact the evening from my perspective to a beet red and severely embarrassed Amar.

Apparently he suffered a terrible ear infection while in Africa and since then the snoring seems to have become an issue. Of course I realize there’s nothing one can do when sleeping, but we agreed that it was OK for me to shake Amar and tell him to roll over when the chainsaw revs up.

We made our way over to the hotel to notify the owner of her error, which resulted in a full refund and the invitation to shower in the room where our luggage had been held hostage. No harm, no foul and that razor blade sign does make a bit more sense now.

Since the weather was still crap we couldn’t do White Island so we powered on to the adorable town of Napier. A few kilometers outside of Napier was Te Mata Peak, offering stunning views of Hawke’s Bay.

It was insanely windy up there, but I was ready for it.

This bush is called flack and it’s everywhere on the North Island. I became obsessed with it, but I’ll spare you and share only this one pic…well for now at least.

After taking in some of the scenery we hit one of the local wineries, Mission Estate, the oldest winery in NZ. I highly recommend their chardonnay. Yummy!

The next morning we set out for Cape Kidnappers. As per usual for NZ, it’s magnificent.

Cape Kidnappers is also famous for its feathered residents, the gannets.

The walk along the coast is tidal dependent so we definitely needed to get our buns in gear if we didn’t want to swim back to our hotel.

The next day we powered down to Wellington where we’d catch the ferry to Picton and the spectacular Marlborough Sound the next morning. I was kind of craving Mexican food and had read that there was a good place in Wellington, but I have to say that these positive reviews were definitely not written by anyone who has actually had real Mexican food. LAME!

The next morning we caught the ferry to Picton, but the weather was abysmal so we’ll have to wait for those stunning views on our trip back up north. While NZ may suck on Mexican food, one thing it does really well in addition to lamb, wine, and dairy is bakeries and the Picton Village Bakkerij has the best carrot cake I think I have even eaten. We bought a huge piece, which we gnawed on over the next few days. Yummy!

After gorging ourselves on cake and wine it was time to get a little exercise and since no visit to NZ is complete without a tramp (hike) through Abel Tasman National Park, we did just that.

The walk is gorgeous through fern lined trails that open up to vistas of golden beaches and turquoise water. We decided to take our lunch in this little cove. This pic is courtesy of Amar.

Within seconds of pulling out our sandwiches we had some friends.

It was all fun and games until Amar decided to give them some bread. Ok, Ok he may have gotten some prompting from me, but before the bread even left Amar’s hands this giant albatross swooped in to get a piece of the action.

Maybe that wasn’t the best idea. I have to say, it’s not the most relaxing experience to have several fearless birds staring at you while you eat, but we managed.

Once the meal was finished the birds lost interest in us

and moved on to bigger and better things like tree pose along the shore.

Another iconic image of NZ is Split Apple Rock.

Yep, it’s split alright. Kinda cool, huh? Here's a little insider tip from a local...if you come down to Split Apple Rock at night you can see glowworms inside one of the caves to the left of the rock. Amar and I did this and it's pretty cool. Definitely bring a head lamp though because it's crazy dark and you have to walk down a bunch of steps to get there.

Wanting to experience Abel Tasman from several vantage points, we took to the sea the next day and kayaked up the coast.

Unfortunately the weather wasn’t great, but we didn’t let that dampen our spirits

After Abel Tasman we headed back to Nelson for a quick frolic around town. Rob lived in Nelson for a few months while writing his dissertation so he was thrilled for me to see his former stomping grounds. Not too shabby…not too shabby at all.

We decided to have lunch in Mapua, which is famous for their green lipped mussels and I’m so glad we did too because they were insanely delicious.

The drive back to Nelson was spectacular.

We originally intended to spend the night in Nelson, but we were there on a Sunday and evidently everything in Nelson is closed on Sundays, including the police station

��so we decided to stroll along the beach,

take in a lovely sunset, and then power on to Blenheim.

Blenheim is famous for the world renowned NZ sauvignon blancs so Amar and I were both pretty pumped to sample some of NZ finest. Cheers!

Of course NZ wineries have sheep wandering around. I mean, sheep are everywhere in NZ so it just makes sense that they’d be grazing in the vineyards as well. I love it!

After a fabulous day in Blenheim we headed to Kaikoura for whale watching and swimming with dolphins, weather permitting of course. Both of these activities are huge on my list of things to do so cannot wait to get my buns to Kaikoura and see some serious marine life. Woo Hoo!

Kaikoura is absolutely breathtaking with mountains, rocky beaches, and stunning blue water.

We decided to do the whale watching first.

They rode us out into the ocean for about 30 minutes and the sights were just stunning.

These folks run a top notch organization, slowing the boat to a stop a few meters away from our first whale. OMG, it’s a whale! I was quickly trying to change my camera lens so that I could zoom in on this gorgeous creature when he finished his session on the surface and dove back down into the sea. Fortunately Amar was quicker on the draw than me so here’s a pic of our first whale sighting.

Woo Hoo! Fingers crossed that we see some more. Within minutes the boat came to a halt and it was time for our 2nd whale sighting. Bring in on, baby!

The captain and his crew are whale experts and notified us when it was time to get our cameras ready for the quintessential whale watching photo, the breached tail as the whale begins its dive below the surface. 3, 2, 1...it is on!

Pretty awesome, huh? So do you think we lucked out with any more whales? You bet we did.

Amazing!! 3 sightings in one day. Woo Hoo! I’d say that is pretty darn lucky. As if seeing 3 whales wasn’t awesome enough we also got to see some of their friends.

Here are some more scenes around stunning Kaikoura.

Kaikoura is famous for it’s delicious crayfish so you know Amar and I had to give it a try. It’s crazy expensive, even at a little roadside stand, but it was mighty tasty.

As we were enjoying our lunch we were treated to this parade of sheep. Does it get more NZ than this? Awesome!

After our tasty lunch we headed over to a seal colony near the Point Kean car park. Check out this lil’ guy who seemed a bit lost from his friends and family.

What a cutie. After gushing over him we headed down to the rocks where we met these guys.

He's not pissed, he's just yawning.

These guys were so chill that we could get pretty close to them.

On our way back from the seal colony we saw our little penguin friend who seemed even more wigged out than earlier.

Poor little guy. I hope he made it back to his family. We decided to check out more of Kaikoura’s natural beauty with a stroll along the Kaikoura Peninsula Walkway. It was awesome to be walking along the cliffs.

These next 3 pics are courtesy of Amar. It’s gorgeous here, isn’t it?

At the end of the trail we came to this beautiful Maori sculpture.

Time to walk back.

Ahh, what a perfect day. Tomorrow I would be swimming with dolphins so I could barely contain my enthusiasm. I think I yapped Amar’s ears off talking about this being a dream of mine since I was a little girl. (cue that ridiculous song dreams can come true)

I was up early and practically foaming at the mouth to go swim with the dolphins. Amar is not a fan of actually being in the water with marine life so he dropped me off. I think I actually ran into the office I was so excited. The only concern I had was the water temperature, but it wasn’t an issue at all. Each of us was fitted with heavy wetsuits, complete with a hood, so the only parts of our bodies that were exposed were our feet, hands and faces. That seems pretty doable.

Prior to getting on the boat we watched an instructional video about the do’s and don’ts when swimming with dolphins. What I liked about this operation as opposed to others I had seen in different countries was that the dolphins were totally in the wild. We would take our boat out into the sea and when we happened upon a pod of dolphins we would then get into the water to join them. Of course since these dolphins are wild they cannot guarantee that a. the dolphins won’t do something crazy and b. that the dolphins will even be slightly interested in us.

Dolphins are very playful animals, but we have to convince them that we are fun too and worth checking out. To increase the likelihood of the dolphins taking an interest in you, were were advised to make dolphin noises and flap our bodies around like a dolphin. Are you kidding me? Could this be anymore up my alley? Basically, I get to act like the biggest freak show on the planet and my reward is to have dolphins come play with me. OMG, this is just getting better with each passing moment.

Dolphins also like eye contact so if and when they do approach, we were instructed to do our best to maintain eye contact.

OK, enough background, let’s get this party started. Keep your fingers crossed that we see dolphins.

As we approached a pod,

the swimmers were instructed to sit at the back of the boat with our feet dangling in the water.

Once the bell rang, we knew the propellers from the boat were off and it was safe to enter the water. As you can see, I pulled out all the stops here, renting a waterproof camera so that I could share these images with you…and of course salivate all over them for years to come.

Upon hitting the water, I immediately switched into super freak mode, doing my best to be as insane/dolphin-like as possible with the hopes of attracting the attention of the dolphins. I cannot express to you the feeling I got when 2 dolphins came zooming up to me. It is, hands down, one of the most special and unforgettable experiences in my life. I did my best to make eye contact with the dolphins and swam around in a circle for as long as they willing to play with me. OMG, I’m really swimming with dolphins!!! (again, cue that cheesy song Dreams Can Come True)

I was seriously in ecstasy when a dolphin or dolphins took interest in me and did my best to be as ridiculously animated as possible to keep them by my side. They are very fast swimmers and would zoom past you, swimming in tight circles around your body to see if you could keep up with them. It was so cool!

Inevitably the dolphins would tire of you and swim away. I hated this and took this as an opportunity to ramp up the crazy in hopes of attracting them yet again. If you were lucky, some dolphins would come zooming by to see what’s up with your freaky self, but sometimes, they were just done. We would swim with the pod for as long as the dolphins remained interested. Once they tired of us, we were loaded back onto the boat in search of the next pod.

We were allowed to enter the water on 4 separate occasions to minimize our impact on their natural behavior. The lady on the boat warned me that the camera was a little slow and that I might want to go with video. The pics featured above are my best shots, but most of my pics came out like this…

Awesome, right? My videos are a little better, but I decided that I wasn’t going to waste my precious time with the dolphins messing with the camera so I just enjoyed my time swimming with them. Fortunately, though, the peeps at Dolphin Encounter took pity on me and decided to include some pics taken by other swimmers…you know, pics that actually included a dolphin. Rock on! These pics are awesome. Enjoy!!!

This is my fave...could they be cuter? These are dusky dolphins, btw.

After the swimming part of the trip was over, we were invited to take pictures of the dolphins from the boat. This is definitely the best dolphin sighting I have ever had. Not only were there hundreds of dolphins, but these dolphins liked to jump. No way!!! Someone please pinch me because this is amazing.

I love this pic! So cute.

After hanging with the dolphins we headed over to some rocks where some seals were chillin’.

Hey you guys!!!

What's up?

Heeeeey!!!!

Alas, it’s time to head back to shore, but I have nothing but rave reviews for my dolphin experience. It was everything I wanted it to be and more. Wow, what a spectacular day and it’s only 11 AM.

Needless to say, I was beside myself all day. I bounced out to the car where Amar was waiting for me and proceeded to gush, squeal, and lose my mind for the next 30 minutes telling him all about my adventures. While I was swimming with the dolphins, Amar got the 411 (information) on another seal colony on the outskirts of town. Sweet. I hope you like seals because I’ve got some rockin’ seal pics for you.

Insanely adorable!

Aww, melt your heart adorable!

Our next stop was a quick visit through Christchurch. As you know, Christchurch suffered from a terrible earthquake, followed by hundreds of aftershocks. It was pretty depressing to walk through town and see the devastation.

This clay like substance is called liquefaction and it oozes out of the earth during an earthquake.

We met this sweet Aussie girl named Alexis at our hostel in Abel Tasman who happened to be in Christchurch during the earthquake. She actually saw the tip of the cathedral come crashing to the ground. Unbelievable! She proceeded to tell us heart warming stories of people helping each other during this terrible disaster and shared her own story of wading through waist high liquefaction to get to some stranger’s house who was going to let her crash there until her father could arrive from Wellington. Insane.

Despite the devastation, one could tell that Christchurch was a beautiful city. The fall foliage was in full effect, but there was definitely a strange and sad feeling in the air.

For obvious reasons, we decided against staying in Christchurch. As luck would have it, a few weeks earlier I had been in Saigon to renew my Thai visa and gobble up as much Vietnamese food as possible and happened to meet the loveliest kiwi couple my last night in town, Jacqui and Richard, from Geraldine, NZ. We stuck up a great conversation and when I mentioned that I would be visiting their fine country they generously offered to let Amar and I stay with them. Wow, how sweet!

Amar and I had zero hotel reservations lined up for this trip, taking each day as it comes and finding a hotel a few hours before stopping in a town. It just so happened that Geraldine was pretty much the perfect place for us to stop on our way down south so I reached out to Jacqui and Richard to see if we could take them up on their generous offer. They were fabulous and welcomed us into their homes with open arms. We arrived just in time for dinner. Tonight’s menu: green curry chicken with a side of steamed broccoli. My favorite! Yummy! After dinner they let us do some laundry as we kicked back in the family room to watch a little basketball.

Jacqui and Richard live in a beautiful home on a farm that has been in their family for several generations. Richard is a farmer and offered to take us out on some quad bikes the next day to get a feel for life on Robinson Farm. Could this be cooler? Wow, what a wonderful and unexpected addition to our trip.

This is Mindy and as you can see, she is super fired out to take a spin around the farm.

Here are Mindy and I on the back of the bike and ready to roll...

It's time to herd some sheep.

Check out the concentration. I think this dog's name was Dude and Dude was defs not playing around when it came to herding sheep.

Mindy is content to relax while Dude goes to work.

Does it get any better for a dog than this?

Actually, I guess it does...

Amar and I are just as pumped as these dogs. What a fantastic day!

Time to go check on some cows.

Dude is fearless...

Apparently the cows like this boldness...boom chicka bow wow...or should I say moo chicka bow wow? Yeah, I actually said that...

We'll leave you guys to your business. It's time to feed some goats anyway!!!

I'm totally feeding goats. Awesome...

Baaaaa....

Ok, Mindy, we get the picture...time to go home.

All aboard...

Man, what an amazing day! I'd like to extend a huge thank you to Jacqui and Richard for welcoming us into their beautiful home and showing us around their fabulous farm! What a delightful and unexpected surprise. I would love to return the hospitality so if and when you are in the US, please let me know. Thank you again for such a special and memorable visit to Geraldine.

Well, folks, that's it for now. Amar and I are headed further down south so prepare yourselves for more spectacular scenery. See you soon!

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Going Ape!

Hey, hey, hey and welcome back to Lake Bunyonyi where we are mere minutes away from the gorillas. Are you excited? I know I am so let’s not waste another second with pleasantries. As a delicate flower of the South, I don't mean to be rude, but I know you are dying to see some gorilla action so let’s just jump right in.

Amazing, huh?! We only had to hike for about an hour before reaching the gorillas. They run an organized operation out of Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, sending trackers ahead of the groups to try to pinpoint the location of the gorillas. They have a rough idea of where they will be from their sighting the previous day, but sometimes the gorillas are in the mood to move so they may cover a lot of ground between the time the trackers left them the night before and when they find them again the next morning. We had heard that the crew that visited our gorilla family the previous day had to hike 2.5 hours to get to them so, when after only an hour, we were given the reminder about do’s and don’t’s and told to leave our bags and walking sticks and grab our cameras we were pretty fired up! Bring on the gorillas, baby!

As we approached the gorillas we were instructed to make this low, groaning noise in our throats to identify ourselves as friends. Before the gorillas are actually even visible, we were surrounded by these guttural sounds. It’s pretty amazing, really, because you know they are nearby, but nothing prepares you for your first glimpse, which for us, began with crackling branches and leaves that finally revealed our distant cousin. My apologies in advance to the devout followers of divine intelligence, but the resemblance to humans is unmistakable.

Oh no I didn’t…

Yeah, I did. I’m sorry, but gorillas share 97% of their biological makeup with human beings.

Yes, I'm serious.

Oh, come on, we’re not that bad.

Really, you don't have to leave...come back!

Guys?

OK, that's better.

So how about some gorilla trivia?

Don’t be nervous, you can do this!

First question - how much can a fully grown silver back weigh?

Yeah, he’s a big guy. So, what do you think?

300 pounds?

More…

Yeah, I’m serious. More…

400 pounds?

More…

Yes, way!

MORE!

Hey, where’s the love?

Now that's just rude...

Hahaha! This gorilla isn’t actually flicking us off. He broke his finger and it healed like this. Evidently this is a pretty common problem for gorillas. Poor guy!

OK, so a fully grown mountain gorilla can grow to be 440 pounds. The mountain gorilla is the largest of the 3 species. Wow!!! Someone likes his food. Me too. Eat up, gorilla!

Sadly, there are only 710 mountain gorillas left in the wild and of those 700+, 340 are in Uganda. I know I’ve said this many times before throughout my travels, but I have to say it again, what a privilege to be here doing what I am doing! This is a dream come true!

There was a juvenile in our group that was thrilled to have the extra attention of some distant relatives. He would bust into these cute little dances and then turn around to make sure we were watching him.

Don’t worry, little dude, we’re definitely watching. Dance away, my friend. What a ham! I love it!!!

As you can see, the gorillas had moved into one of the nearby clearings so we had some pretty spectacular, unobstructed views for a good part of our visit. I actually needed to get my buns out of the way for this guy, strutting with purpose, to the next tree.

We had heard that one of the gorillas in the family we were visiting was a bit of a trouble maker and liked punching tourists as a little game.

Hey, that sounds like a super fun game, gorilla, except that it’s estimated that a punch from a gorilla is 8 times stronger than a punch from a heavyweight boxer, so maybe you could play that game with someone else?

Yeah, gorilla, I’m talking to you. Apparently some dude from yesterday’s group had the honor and privilege of being the recipient of a gorilla punch, and based on his description, I can say with 100% certainty that my life will be complete without this experience. Thankfully we all emerged from our trek unscathed. Phew…

I know this is going to sound silly, but it really was magical to be there sharing the forest with the gorillas for this brief moment in time. What a special and unique experience! I cannot gush enough over these gorgeous animals.

In an effort to not disturb the gorillas' natural patterns and behaviors we are only allowed to be with them for an hour. That may have been the fastest hour of my life because before I knew it we were being instructed to take our final glimpses and prepare to say goodbye. Wow! This was definitely an experience of a lifetime!

We were all awestruck as we made our way back through the forest. On the way back we walked through dense forest, whacking away at the overgrowth with our walking sticks and adding to the feeling of being in the middle of nowhere. It wasn’t the easiest terrain so I’d like to give props to my walking group that was the first ascend the final, killer hill in 20 minutes. Yay for us! We’re awesome! I’d also like to give mad props to the 68 year old, Alvena from Canada, who rocked it out! That last hill was no joke, but you took it like a champ. Woo Hoo’s all around, friends. What a day!

Before saying goodbye to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest we had a little graduation ceremony with our trackers and guides. We were instructed to clap for each person to "make the celebration more colorful." It was pretty fun, actually, and a great way to end our morning with the gorillas.

After 3 days it was time to say goodbye to Lake Bunyonyi and head to our next destination, Lake Mburo. This campsite was awesome with warthogs wandering around outside out tents.

This is our 3rd and final truck...hands down the best one of the lot. Hooray!!!

It’s so cute how they bend their front legs while eating to get the best possible bite. I’m with you, warthog. It’s all about the best bite.

This is definitely the closest I have ever been to a warthog. They were pretty tolerant of humans as well, going about their business and letting you know if/when you’ve gotten a little too close for comfort, like my friend, Ross.

OK, it wasn’t just Ross. The truth is that Ross and I were slowly making our way towards the warthog to see just how close we could get when suddenly we found ourselves on the receiving end of a mock charge. Yikes!!!

We’re not total idiots. We took our cue and got the heck out of there. Warthogs weren’t the only visitors to our campsite.

It turns out there were tons of hippos in the water as well.

We were told to be careful when walking around in the evening because many of the hippos took to land at night. Apparently, the tents were fine since hippos don’t really mess with human structures, but being startled by a human with a headlamp is bad news and generally results in the hippos charging. Um, I’d really like to avoid being charged by a hippo at 3 AM and since the bathroom at this camp was particularly disgusting…

I fully intended to do my business right outside the tent. Luck was on our side too because it was a full moon that night so we could easily see out of the tent to spy on any hippos that were wandering around.

As an aside, I just have to say for the record that many of the toilets in Africa rival the toilets in Tibet, the current front runner for the most disgusting toilets during my travels. One toilet to be particularly wary of is the toilet at the Kenya/Uganda border on the Uganda side. I definitely recommend that you hold your breath for this one. Even so, you may feel vomit rising up your throat while you are using this bathroom so do your business quickly and get outta there ASAP.

Even though the toilets are revolting, the samosas are delicious, or at least I'm told they are by the peeps in my group who apparently didn't use the aforementioned toilets and therefore still had an appetite.

With a successful gorilla sighting in our pockets, Lotta and I decided to celebrate with a little vino.

Everyone was in a celebratory mood and wanting to spend as much time as possible together before we had to say goodbye so we spent many hours hanging around the campfire.

This is Alex, our guide, who made sure we were where we were supposed to be at the right time. Thanks for watching our backs, Alex.

The next morning we were up early to head to Jinja.

Yep, we passed the Equator again. We actually stopped here for lunch and a little time to browse the nearby shops. There are some really good shops here so if you're visiting I recommend building a little time into your stop for these shops. One side is better than the other...you'll be able to tell pretty quickly.

Do you know which river’s source is in Jinja? It’s a famous one so give it a try…

If you said the Nile, you are correct!!!

Sadly we aren’t allowed to take any pics of the source of the Nile. I'm not sure what the penalty is for this...maybe a fine, jail time, or possibly even death...who knows, but I definitely didn’t want to find myself in a Ugandan prison so no pics for you, but here are some pics of our campsite. It was a nice one with Internet and walking distance to a nice resort with a pool and massages.

Jinja is the adrenaline capital of Uganda, but since I had already been a major adrenaline junky in Namibia and Zambia I was content to lay low. Lotta and I got massages and then busted into town to do a little shopping and enjoy a yummy lunch at Gately on the Nile. It was just what the doctor ordered. We had a great time hanging out at this camp...well, some of us did...um...Lotta?

Here's Ian rocking the Celine Dion fist pump that started as a double fist bump from the heart. You know what move I'm talking 'bout...

Those pics were courtesy of Ross. Thanks, Ross!

We powered on to Eldoret, which was a super sweet campsite with a pool, complete with a slide. The water was a strange green color and about 5 degrees so I abstained from swimming, but it was still fun to just lounge by the pool.

Of course with this being our last night together we had to celebrate! Let the games begin…the following pictures are from both my camera and Ross' camera. Enjoy!

Meet our delicious chef, Nick, and our careful and cautious driver, Peterson! Thanks, guys, for a great trip!

Say hello to some fellow North Americans, Danielle and Robin! They're Canadian, but I won't hold that against them. Kidding!!! I heart Canadians. Really!

Here are some of my Aussie mates, Erin and Ian. Apparently Ian's jam after a couple of cocktails is to lick people's faces. It looks like Mr. Licky Face might be out to play tonight. Time will tell...

And now our crew is complete with our fearless leader, Alex. Thanks, guys!

Poor, Brita, has a black eye after being slammed in the face with her oar during her white water rafting excursion earlier in the day. Yikes!!! Notice the tongue in full effect in the background...

Uh oh...

Yay!!! We love our crew!!!

Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!!! 3 cheers for my Aussie peeps.

Holla! Notice Lotta's cute necklace...courtesy of our shopping day in Jinja.

As you can see, there's a lot of love here!

One, two, three...crazy animal face!!!

How's this for ambience?

I spy with my little eye a tongue in the distance...also some very clean nostrils.

And it's on, friends. The face licking has commenced. Is Erin the only victim? Time will tell...

I love the face licking aftermath...really, guys, what's the problem?

Obviously we have reached the point in the evening where we are all bananas...B-A-N-A-N-A-S.

You know it's a good night when peeps start to bust out the break dancing...

and splits. Um...?

Oh no, it appears Mr. Licky face has struck again! I'd like to reiterate that these pics are a mix between mine and Ross'. This is obviously from Ross' camera. Way to go, Ross!

Of course no night is complete without a pyramid!!! This is our best attempt at a late night pyramid.

Even with all the night's festivities we're all about the hygiene.

What can I say except what an amazing time!!!! I absolutely adored my last crew in Africa and I'm sad to say goodbye, especially to my super sweet roomie, Lotta. I have every confidence that our paths will cross again though so no worries there. Honestly, our crew was so great and friendships were so genuine that I think I'll be seeing many of these friends again. How cool is that? Super cool!!!

Well, friends, it's time for me to leave Africa. It's been an absolutely amazing 2+ months and I have adored my time here. I must admit that I'm looking foward to a proper bed and shower and I'm really looking forward to the next week or so in Bangkok to live it up a bit in the lap of luxury. I'll be meeting up with my bro, Rob, in BKK within a few days of my arrival and I cannot wait. Rob and Tiff unite...let the freakshow begin...

Asanti sana, Africa. You have definitely captured my heart and I look forward to returning soon.

I'll see you soon in Thailand. Big hugs and talk soon!

#gorillas #Lake Bunyonyi #Lake Mburo #Uganda #warthogs #Bwindi Impenetrable Forest #rude gestures from animals

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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A Warm Welcome from Uganda

Jambo from Kenya, where, sadly, it’s time to say goodbye to yet another group of travel companions. I have been with many of these friends since Cape Town so it’s definitely hard to imagine this last leg of the Africa trip without them. We said our goodbyes hurriedly in the parking lot of their Nairobi hotel so that was kind of strange, but I guess it’s better than a long and lingering goodbye.

Bye, Janet, thank you so much for making our trip so memorable and fun. Your uplifting thoughts of the day and sunny outlook made each day a pleasure…yes, even the seemingly never ending days in the truck. Enjoy your time off in Nairobi and please keep in touch. I have every confidence that our paths will cross again. Take care chief, chief, chief and I'll see you in the not too distant future...inshallah!

A few of us made plans to have a final farewell dinner at Carnivore, which is known for it’s tasty game. Gobble, gobble, oink, oink, moooooooooooo sister is ready to eat!!!

When we arrived we were greeted by the mouthwatering aroma of grilled meat.

I was salivating within seconds of my arrival, but taken aback when I looked at the menu and noticed the glaring lack of game!

Don’t get me wrong, the options sound delicious, and I fully intend to eat my face off, but where was all of this tasty game I had been hearing about? Where were the warthogs, zebra, kudu, and springbok? I mean, I like beef and pork as much as anyone, but bring on the game, rafikis!

As it turns out, Kenya outlawed game somewhere around 2004 so heads up that Carnivore doesn't include much game on the menu anymore. We did have some ostrich meat balls that rocked my world and the beef and pork were also tantalizing so all in all I'd call this a win. Of course we got this meat fest started on the right foot with a proper cocktail.

Whoa, the Dawa isn’t playing around. I think I grew hair on my chest after this drink. I have to say that despite the glaring lack of game, I still managed to shove my face like I was a contestant in an eating contest. Even though I didn’t really save room for dessert, I made made it work to make Tim Gunn proud. Who are we kidding? I practically licked my plate…

Sadly, it’s time for me to say goodbye to my sky diving buddies and dear friends, Rami and Line.

They are headed to India and then Thailand so there’s a chance our paths will cross again in the Land of Smiles. I certainly hope so. Bye, you two, and save travels through India. You are going to love it!

As for me, it’s back to camp and time to meet my final group of travel companions for Kenya and Uganda. I have lucked out with 2 fabulous groups so far and I have every confidence that this next group will be equally as great.

We headed back into Nairobi in the AM to meet our new crew and as luck would have it, only a few new people were actually meeting us in Nairobi so we had the new truck, the best of the entire journey, to ourselves for the first 2-3 days. I’m not going to lie, after traveling with 22 people packed to the gills, it was total luxury to only travel with about 9 companions. We each had our own seats and took great pleasure in draping ourselves over every available surface, especially the 3 of us who started in Cape Town.

I met my new tent mate, Lotta, from Sweden. She was incredibly sweet and full of energy so I knew I'd be all set there. Africa, part 3, here we go.

Our first game drive in Kenya was through Lake Nakuru National Park.

Is that a rhino? Oh yes, I believe it is! Score!!!

Do you remember Gargamel from the Smurfs? I totally get that visual when I look at this bird.

Gargamel's real name is the marabou stork, but he is also known as the undertaker bird since he is the last to arrive after a kill, picking away any remaining parts.

He’s not really a looker, is he?

How about some more birds?

I love the facial expression of the sitting bird. He definitely looks wigged out.

Awww, it’s another adorable baby zebra. It looks like a doll, doesn’t it? So cute! How could anyone think of this little guy as a weak link? What sick and deranged people….kill, kill, kill

You're terrible, Muriel...

Here are some more scenes from the park.

All in all, pretty wildlife light…until now!

OK, a rhino...2nd of the day and better than the 1st, and totally awesome since they are heavily endangered, but it's still kind of hidden under a tree. Do you happen to have anything a little better than that?

That's what I'm talking 'bout!

The rhino is extremely endangered and often difficult to see up close. As you can see, we got the major hookup here with 3 right in front of our faces. It was pretty spectacular.

Can you believe how close we are to these prehistoric animals? Wow!!! This is a major coup.

Amazing! As you can imagine, we were pretty fired up after these rhino sightings! We totally lucked out and happened to be at the right place at the right time. That’s what it’s all about, really, when it comes to safari. Yay for the rhinos!!! Thank you, Lake Nakuru. This was awesome!

After the game drive it was time to leave Kenya and cross into Uganda, the pearl of Africa, where we’d be meeting up with the rest of our crew. Word on the street is that we’d be at full capacity with 24 people so we took full advantage of our last few hours on the truck to stretch out and relax.

Check it out, we’re on the Equator!!!

Kind of awesome! I actually took a bathroom break not far from this very spot. How many times can a girl say that she went to the loo right on the Equator? For me, it’s not that many so you better believe I’m going to say it to the world right here and right now.

OK, back to the game drives. Up next…

That’s right, it’s Queen Elizabeth Park, our first game drive in Uganda. Fingers crossed we see some great stuff.

Really? That’s it? Um…I don’t know what to say except “sawa, sawa,” which means go, we’re finished here, next…” I felt kind of sorry for the new peeps on the truck who had never been on safari before because we really didn’t see much.

Coming off of the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater this was pretty weak.

The veterans on the truck really couldn’t do much to hide our lack of enthusiasm, barely craning out necks to look out the window, no cameras in hand. With drool hanging from our mouths, we’d announce sawa, sawa before the truck even came to a stop, as in I know you aren’t stopping the truck for an antelope….

But it appears that, yes, we are really stopping for a water buck. I know I must sound like a total snot face, but after 45 days in Africa, most recently in what some may call the Mecca of game drives, I just couldn‘t get fired up for another antelope type animal.

Despite my lack of enthusiasm for the “game” we encountered, I did my best to be patient for the new peeps who were ecstatic for every animal we saw, including the antelope type animals, remembering that I was that person, excitedly bouncing from window to window to get the best possible shot of whatever was in front of us, not that long ago.

We did cap the drive with this warthog sighting, which was pretty cool.

After a kind of bust for a game drive, we decided to try our luck on the water with a ride down the Kazinga Channel. Queen Elizabeth National Park, take 2.

Check out the face on the baby hippo. Insanely adorable!

These birds were making this crazy noise with their throats, which were undulating rapidly up and down as they croaked. It looked pretty cool with thier throats moving in unison.

I think we made the right choice with the boat ride. This is definitely the closest I have come to hippos.

Um, mom, you are getting ready to poop on my head. Please don't...

Caroline, that shot is for you!

Aww, have you ever seen cuter buns?

As you can see, there are tons of hippos in the water. That being the case, I don’t think I’d really want to go swimming in the water, but that’s just me.

Obviously the locals have way more experience than me because they were whooping it up and having a grand old time in the water even with the hippos nearby.

Like everywhere we’ve traveled in Africa, the locals were very friendly, waving to us with huge smiles and words of welcome.

Here are some scenes from the Uganda countryside.

Tea, glorious tea!!!

Could I interest you in a little meat?

At long last we have arrived at our next stop, the stunning Lake Bunyonyi.

Lake Bunyonyi would be our home for the next 3 days. It’s proximity to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest makes it a nice jump off spot for gorilla trekking. Woo Hoo!!! I have wanted to see the gorillas since I was a little girl so you can imagine how thrilled I was to finally be in Uganda, home to 340 of the mere 700 mountain gorillas left in the wild. Wow, what a privilege.

Uganda is very protective of the gorillas and places rigorous restrictions on the treks to see the gorillas, allowing only groups of 8 people to go at one time. As a result, our group was broken into 3 separate groups, traveling on 3 separate days. My group would not be trekking until the final day so I decided to spend my first day visiting a nearby pygmy village.

To get to the village we took to the water and rode in a boat for about an hour. The scenery along the way was stunning.

Once we reached land, we hiked for about another hour to get to the actual village.

We just so happened to be on the border between Uganda and Rwanda. Do you want to see Rwanda? OK, here you go.

Wow! I wish I had time to visit Rwanda, but, sadly, my days in Africa are numbered. Just one more hill to climb and we’ll be at the village.

Our first guests welcomed us at the base of the hill.

When we climbed the hill we were welcomed by the chief and one of the elders.

The pygmies welcomed us with some traditional songs and dance.

The kids were busting some serious moves. Adorable!

I just couldn't get enough of this little girl. She was a dancing machine!

Wow! What an afternoon. We all felt a little conflicted about our visit to the village because it did have a bit of a human circus feeling to it, but the laughter and smiles were genuine and I felt very privileged and lucky to have been able to meet these folks. The pygmies are not allowed to own land and do not attend schools with the other kids. They are definitely an underprivileged group and I hope that our small contribution made a difference.

Time to head back to the boats and our camp.

It appears that we’ll be taking some winged guests with us back to camp.

Our new travel companions didn’t seem very excited about their sea voyage and kicked up quite a stink from the back of the boat. They continued to express their displeasure for a few minutes, but then settled in for the hour journey.

When we returned to camp we were regaled with stories of the gorillas from our fellow travelers. Only 2 days to go until I get to see the gorillas myself. I cannot wait! Stay tuned, folks, because the gorillas are up next.

Until then, big hugs from Lake Bunyonyi and I’ll see you soon.

#rhinos #Kenya #Nairobi #Carnivore #pelicans #marabou stork #flamingoes #monkeys #warthogs #Lake Nakuru National Park #Queen Elizabeth National Park #Pygmy tribe #dancing children #Lake Bunyonyi #African children

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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5, 4, 3, 2, 1...

All aboard! This ferry is headed to Zanzibar so as soon as these peeps get their buns on board we're off.

I have heard nothing but great things about Zanzibar so I cannot wait to get there and see for myself. In addition to taking in the spectacular scenery, relaxing on the beach, and mingling with the local people I am counting the minutes until I get to luxuriate on a proper bed! That’s right folks, we’ll be staying in a hotel for the next 4 days in Zanzibar and I’m so excited I can barely stand it.

Our ride to Zanzibar definitely started off on the right note when we learned that Janet got us hooked up with an upgrade to the 1st class section of the ferry, which means air conditioning, baby! Oh yeah, bring it on. I cannot even begin to describe the elation that spread through the group upon the delivery of this truly wonderful news. We were all at our breaking points after the epic journey from Malawi so we were more than ready for some creature comforts and a lil’ luxury. Janet, you are the bomb!

Our first stop in Zanzibar was beautiful and historic Stone Town.

We immediately headed for our hotel to drop our bags and sloth on our beds until our little hearts were content. After some mega relaxation in the room, Line and I ventured into the town to do a little sight seeing, shopping and of course eating! We met up with our crew at Africa House, which has the most fantastic balcony overlooking the sea, just in time for sunset.

After enjoying a few frosty beverages and taking in yet another spectacular sunset we headed over to the night market to chow down on some delicious food!

The next morning we were up bright and early to head to Nungwi, which is undeniably one of the most spectacular beaches I have ever visited both for it’s stunning scenery as well as it’s intensely rich culture. I really cannot stop gushing about this place, but before you get to see it for yourselves, we must first visit a spice plantation. I’ve been on a handful of spice tours in my year + on the road, but this is the first tour where we were given grass accessories,

a serenade from the top of a palm tree,

as well as samples of all the tasty fruit. I’m not going to lie, the mango I had here was the best mango I have ever eaten and because I was so enthusiastic about this mango I even got seconds. That’s right, peeps, a little enthusiasm goes a long way. OK, I admit that I don’t really do little in the enthusiasm about food department, but I think we can all agree that gratitude is a good thing.

Here are some pics from the tour. Does anyone know what this is?

If you said ginger you are correct. And can anyone tell me one of the things ginger is known to enhance?

It’s something that will put a smile on your face.

For those of you with your mind in the gutter, congratulations, you nailed it. According to our guide, ginger is known to enhance “horizontal refreshment” so remember next time you are making dinner for your special someone, add some ginger. You’re welcome.

After the spice tour we powered on to the beach. Not far now…

When we arrived we learned there was some kind of a mess up with our rooms, but the error was in our favor and we ended up in these gorgeous rooms overlooking the sea complete with a balcony and air conditioning. I know I don’t have to tell you, but I will, I was in complete and utter ecstasy.

Quite a step up from tents, huh? Enough talking, let’s bask in the breath taking beauty of this place.

After doing the happy dance to my favorite booty rap jams,

I busted over to the restaurant

for some lunch and in the process, made a new friend.

With my full belly I headed back to my balcony to drool on myself and take in some more of the gorgeous scenery.

Don’t you love it?! Literally, everywhere I looked something beautiful or interesting was happening, especially in or on the sea.

These women looked so majestic as they dragged the fishing nets through the water.

I just loved seeing the Maasai warriors walk along the beach.

Before I knew it the sun was already setting.

What a spectacular day! I can’t wait to do it all over again tomorrow. Good night, Birgit.

Day 2 in Paradise:

After swimming, lounging and eating I decided to take a walk along the beach and visit some of the Maasai shops along the way. I’m so glad I did too because I met so many wonderfully kind people.

Allow me to introduce you to my first new friend, Barak.

When he found out I was from the United States he actually let out a scream, enthusiastically clapping his hands and doing the happy dance while telling me that, like our President, his name was Barak (spelled differently) and he loved the US and Barack Obama! Not only did he name his shop after the President

but he also wore an American flag necklace that he made himself along with a Barack Obama yes we can keychain around his neck!

It was without a doubt one of my favorite I’m proud to be an American moments I’ve had on this trip. Barak and I chatted it up for a while and even exchanged email addresses.

Believing that personal touches matter and miracles can happen, I forwarded Barak’s email address and pictures to a friend of mine who is no stranger to the White House on the off chance that these pics and the story of one of the President’s most ardent supporters from across the globe might make its way to the right people and somehow Barack might receive a reply from the White House thanking him for his support. It certainly cannot hurt to try, right? Fingers crossed, friends.

Here is another friend I made who went by the name of Luca Air Conditioned Shop. He was hysterical and so proud of his clearly air conditioned shop.

I could have continued yapping with these guys until nightfall, but I had to say my goodbyes so I could jump in the shower and make it on time for the beach wedding we were throwing for 2 of our fellow travelers who had recently gotten engaged.

Of course the bride cannot see her groom until she’s walking down the beach so the girls and boys separated to get ourselves into a celebratory mood.

You remember Line, my skydiving buddy!

These are my German buddies. The lady to my left is Caroline AKA my secret pal who hooked me up with awesome jewelry for the holidays.

And here's our chief, chief, chief...Janet! Yay Janet!!!

We even had a mother of the bride,

music,

and a priest?

The vows were exchanged just in time for sunset. These photos are courtesy of Gan.

Woo Hoo!!!

Yay for the happy couple and hooray for another spectacular sunset. I really just can’t get enough of these.

After the wedding we headed further down the beach for a BBQ (insert the jingle, I want my baby back, baby back, baby back ribs…barbeque sauce) and who should go walking by, but my friend, Wendy, who I met on my Egypt and Jordan trip. No way!!!

I knew Wendy was living in Zanzibar, but she was in Stone Town so my hope was to catch up with her tomorrow when we returned to Stone Town. As luck would have it, Wendy was up north with her friends and just happened to be walking along the beach where we were having dinner. What a small world!! I love it. We screamed our faces off for a few minutes, hugged incessantly, and then gained our composure briefly enough to catch up on the past few months before hugging and screaming some more. How wonderful!

As if I wasn’t feeling all warm and fuzzy after running into a friend, I took it up a notch with this adorable puppy.

Of course we all had to take turns holding the puppy and then it was time for a little bit of this

and a whole lot of dancing. My night got even better when Luca Air Conditioned shop showed up. You know we busted some serious moves on the dance floor. What a fun New Year’s Eve Eve.

The next morning we headed back down to Stone Town for some more sight seeing and chillaxing before our New Year’s celebration.

Can anyone tell me which famous and larger than life singer was from Stone Town? Here's a little clue for you.

If you said Freddie Mercury, you are correct and should raise your arms in triumph while singing We Are the Champions.

There is also a bar named after him where Line, Birgit and I enjoyed some lunch before continuing our sight seeing extravaganza.

Stone Town is a wonderful place, but it has a history that makes one shudder.

It is estimated that slaves were sold in Zanzibar between 1830-1873. How horrifying to think that this was ever considered an option or even remotely acceptable in any way, shape or form.

Many of the homes near the slave market had holding cells in the basement. Hideous!

Today, Stone Town is beautiful with narrow alleys, interesting architecture, colorful markets, and warm and friendly people.

I've never seen this many dried octopuses or octopode in one place. Yes, I had to look up the plural of octopus. There seems to be quite a bit of rage surrounding the incorrect use of octopi so if you've been throwing that word around cut it out because it apparently drives people nuts.

How about a closer look at these octopode.

Did you know that an octopus is the most intelligent invertebrate? Here's a story that supports that fun fact. My brother, Rob, did an internship in Bermuda and one of his many duties involved studying the octopus' ability to solve puzzles. Rob's octopus was a bit crotchety in her old age, and to the extent possible for an octopus, conveyed with every fiber of her being her extreme distaste for these stupid and humiliating puzzles. She would confine herself to the corner of her container refusing to even consider such a demeaning endeavor and then out of boredom or pity for my poor brother would nonchalantly make her way towards the puzzle and solve it in about 2 seconds flat.

In addition to being a bit cranky, she was also notoriously cunning, making several attempts to secure her freedom. Armed with this knowledge, Rob dutifully ensured that the lid was affixed securely each night, but apparently we humans are no match for a determined, angry, and crafty octopus. Rob arrived at work one morning and discovered that his octopus had escaped. They searched the grounds extensively, but never found a body. There was a drain that led to sea not far from her enclosure so the assumed outcome is that the octopus is now enjoying her freedom back in the sea. Crazy, huh? Who knew octopuses were so smart? I guess we do now.

Where were we? Oh yes, Stone Town.

It’s an easy place to be and time just seems to disappear. Before I knew it, the sun was beginning to set

and the countdown to 2011 was underway. We had a delicious dinner complete with fire dancers and snake charmers, but what made my night even better was another unexpected reunion with a friend.

Yep, it’s Amar! Woo Hoo! I knew Amar and I were going to be in Tanzania at the same time, but we had already done the math and realized that we’d miss each other in Zanzibar by one day so you can imagine my surprise when I heard someone call my name and turned around and saw Amar standing there. Wow! Of all the bars in Zanzibar we just happened to be at the same one. As it turns out Amar’s tour leader got the group to agree to a punishing day of travel so that they could celebrate the new year in Zanzibar instead of Dar es Salaam. Obviously the group was fully supportive of an extra day in Zanzibar, especially NYE. Two unexpected reunions in two days….what a small, small world. I love it!

Amar and I spent the next few hours catching up on our African adventures and rang in the new year with a toast on the beach. Goodbye 2010 and thank you for a truly unforgettable year. I am filled with an overwhelming gratitude for the many gifts I have received during this wonderful, eye opening, and awe inspiring journey. While I’ve still got a long way to go, I can tell that some healing has taken place because I can actually refer to myself as someone who feels grateful, lucky, and appreciative again. After my mom’s passing I had a very difficult time with these words because I definitely didn’t feel any of those things and while I obviously don’t feel any of them with respect to losing my mother, I can see the rays of sunshine again and truly believe that the future is going to be a bright one.

A huge thank you to my friends and family who have stayed in touch and been my champions along the way. My world is a better place because of you and I wish you all health, happiness, inspiration, and love in the new year.

Here’s to you!

Next stop is the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater so get fired up for some serious wildlife action, friends!

Big 5 or bust!!!

#Africa #Another Barak #Barack Obama #Freddie Mercury #Masaai #Nungwi #Stone Town #Tanzania #Zanzibar #beach #fishermen #horizontal refreshment #markets #patriotic #sea scenes #slavery #sunset #intelligent octopus

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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In the Warm Heart of Africa for the Holidays

Hello and greetings from Malawi! I hope you are ready for stunningly gorgeous scenery, festive holiday celebrations, and lots of laughter and good cheer because that is the focus of this blog entry.

Malawi is known as the warm heart of Africa and this is immediately apparent, as everyone we passed on the street was wearing a huge smile, especially the children. In fact, the children wouldn’t just smile, they would race to the edge of their property and wave their little hands as quickly as possible to make sure they were seen. Some of the smaller children would actually stand in a split stance and lean forward to stabilize themselves for the ferocious waving session, which frequently involved both hands above the head. At times, it almost felt like a wave-off to see who could wave the fastest and most enthusiastically: us or them. It is without a doubt one of my favorite memories of Africa and something that will always bring a smile to my face.

In addition to the warm and friendly people, Malawi also has spectacular natural scenery. Take a look for yourselves. Here are some pics taken from the truck on our way to Lake Malawi.

This is our truck, Denver.

Denver may look nice and cosmetically it was nicer than Pumba, but it was configured differently and definitely not as spacious or comfortable. As I mentioned in one of my earlier posts, this leg of the trip consisted of many long days and by long I mean several 10, 12 and 14 hour days back to back. With all this time in the truck one has ample time to dissect the layout and conjure brilliant ideas for the perfect truck.

Thankfully Janet is an incredibly upbeat, glass half full kind of person and did her very best to keep the energy in the truck positive. Each morning, to get us started on the right track, Janet would read us an inspiring and motivating thought of the day. She also made sure the truck was decorated with helpful language tidbits and fun facts about the countries we’d be visiting.

Since we’d be celebrating the holidays and the New Year together she also made the extra effort to pimp out our truck with holiday cheer.

One of the ways we’d pass the time was to engage in trivia with one side of the truck versus the other. I am pleased to say that I wowed the truck by knowing who wrote the Star Spangled Banner. Yeah puppies, whose a patriot?

We would also sing to pass the time. Janet taught us a Zulu Warrior song, which was so much fun and became lodged in my head for the rest of my time in Africa. I’ll go ahead and give you the lyrics, spelling the words like I’m Hooked on Phonics, ok. I realize you may not have the beat, but I will be happy to perform this little ditty for you, upon request.

The entire bus, I mean truck, starts singing this together

I zeek a zoomba zoomba zoomba

I zeek a zoomba zoomba zay

I zeek a zoomba zoomba zoomba

I zeek a zoomba zoomba zay

Hold ‘em down you Zulu warrior

Hold ‘em down you Zulu chief, chief, chief, chief

Once we got to chief, one half of the truck would go back to the beginning of the song while the other half chanted chief over and over again until the other side completed the lyrics and got to chief. We’d switch back and forth until this got old, but you’d be surprised how many times we went around before losing our steam. With 10 hours or more to kill we might as well sing our little hearts out.

Our first stop in Lake Malawi, the Lake of Stars, was Kande Beach and we arrived just as the sun was setting.

While strolling along the beach, I was quickly befriended by the super outgoing and laid back Good Lucky and Yoda. Everyone there comes up with some kind of fun and playful name like Donald Duck or Pepperoni Pizza and Good Lucky and Yoda were going to be my buddies for the next few days in Kande Beach. After chatting it up for a while they decided that the perfect nickname for me was Chimwemwe, which means joy. I like it! I’ve had plenty of nicknames in my time, but I think this is one of my favorites.

I met up with Good Lucky and Yoda the next morning and we took a tour through their lovely village. Our village tour guide was all smiles and decked out for the holidays.

This woman was busy preparing the cassava for their evening meal.

As I mentioned before, the children in Malawi melt your heart they are so adorable and sweet.

Each of us was holding one or more children’s hands as we walked through the village and I am pleased to share that there was no begging for money, food, or pens. In my travels I have visited many small villages and it’s extremely rare to find a village that is devoid of begging. How refreshing!

I know it may seem like this kid probably didn’t want his picture taken given the expression he’s giving me, but he actually asked me to take his photo. Haha! Gotta love it.

This is the little boy who accompanied me throughout the village. He was absolutely precious and such a gentle lil‘ guy. When the adults would go into a part of the village where the kids weren’t allowed, he would patiently wait outside for me and then greet me at the door with a huge smile and an outstretched hand. It was so sweet!

One thing that we all noticed as we walked through the village and spoke with the residents was how many of them were raised by their grandparents, including my buddy, Good Lucky. We’ve all heard how the AIDS epidemic is a huge problem in Africa, but I can honestly say that I was caught off guard when I read some literature supplied at the Tanzania border that claimed that of the global AIDS epidemic, 67% of it is in sub-Saharan Africa! Wow, 67%! In walking through this village though it definitely seemed accurate. It’s heartbreaking, but also encouraging to see the public awareness campaigns underway on billboards in the big cities, on the backs of tuk tuks, and in the curriculum taught to children.

Here’s the school in the village. Even though it was a holiday and the kids weren’t in school, they still accompanied us to the school and performed an impromptu song and dance for us. They were so enthusiastic to have visitors and could have gone on for hours.

As I mentioned before, there are many orphans in this village and limited resources. While the need is obviously great, the tone of the teacher was nurturing and kind as he explained to us the way Malawi’s school system worked, the curriculum, and the ages and number of students enrolled. There was never a hard push for donations. He simply directed us to the blackboard where contact information for the school was located and thanked us for visiting his school.

As many of you know, my mom was a teacher and had a way of making education and learning fun. She read books to us when we were little and instilled in each of us a love for reading that continues to this day. Every summer we participated in the reading program at our library and I have fond memories of the balancing act required to get our huge stack of books from the library to the car and from the car to the house. As you can imagine, with 30+ years of teaching under her belt, mom amassed quite a collection of children’s books and resources over the years. With the help of several of her teaching colleagues and friends we were able to get many of her resources into the hands of educators in her community who could put them to immediate use, but we held on to a stockpile of children’s books with the goal of donating them to an organization(s) that served underprivileged children. Of course I’ll need to discuss this with my brothers, but I’d love to send at least some of those books to these children in this village that captured my heart this holiday season.

The more I’ve traveled the more I realize just how privileged I was to have had access to such high caliber education my whole life. It is truly a gift and something that my mom gave to hundreds of children and something my brothers and I would like to continue in her honor. I have more to share about this subject, but we’ll get to that in later posts.

After visiting the school, we headed on to the hospital, the maternity ward specifically, to see some of the new moms and babies. The conditions here were definitely not the greatest and the new mom we met didn’t look that well. I’m no doctor, but if I had to guess I’d say the insane heat and humidity was likely a factor. As for donations, they were in desperate need to mosquito nets so if any of you have access to them or would like to help I’d recommend contacting the school to get more information.

After our fabulous day in the village we headed back to the campsite to relax and gear up for our drum party on the beach. Prior to heading to the beach, we sat around the campsite and took in an impromptu jam session by Janet, a gifted drummer, some guy from South Africa who was staying at the campsite and great on guitar, and Rami and Line who sang beautifully together. Of course we all joined in the singing by the end so our spirits were high as we headed off to the beach. I wish I had pictures to share with you, but I was too busy busting a move to the sound of the drums. Jerry, you would be proud! We had ourselves a full throttle dance party, my friends, and it was awesome! Of course we also busted into a little I zeek a zoomba action, demanding that everyone in attendance chant the chief line over and over again. They had no idea what we were singing, but in the spirit of the holidays, they went with it until we had our fill. It was such a blast!

The next morning it was time to say goodbye to Good Lucky, Yoda, and our other friends from Kande Beach. Our next stop was Chitimba on the other side of Lake Malawi. Bye Good Lucky and Yoda! You guys are the best and I wish you health and happiness in the new year.

The campsite at Chitimba was killer.

In honor of the holidays Birgit and I even gave our tent a little flair.

The scenery here was breathtaking and the perfect place to celebrate the holidays. Check it out.

Janet and the kitchen team worked tirelessly to make us the most spectacular Christmas Eve dinner ever! (Several of the pics in this post are courtesy of Gan, our resident photographer and fellow traveler, who documented everything on the trip. Great candid shots, Gan, and thanks for sharing.)

Notice the festive holiday head gear.

Janet pulled out all the stops for Christmas Eve dinner. Not only did we eat at a proper table, but this table was decorated with a tablecloth, candles, crackers, and fancy holiday napkins.

Before eating we went around the table and told everyone what we were thankful for and then did a group toast for the holidays. From the scrumptious food to the exceptional company, everything about this meal was spectacular. Janet, thank you so much for making us feel like a family and for ensuring that this was one of the most memorable Christmas Eves of all time.

After gorging ourselves on a delicious meal, complete with a crumble for dessert

and cleaning up the dishes,

we sat around and enjoyed some wine and conversation before the torrential downpour started. This was the hardest it had rained since I had been in Africa, but I made it safely to my tent. With my full belly and the soothing sound of rain hitting the tent I was asleep in minutes and awoke the next morning, Christmas Day, feeling totally refreshed.

The next morning we had a “lunchy brunchy” thing around 11 AM so we could sleep in, lounge at the beach, chat with our families, and ease into Christmas Day. Like the night before, Janet hooked it up big time with the meal.

That’s right, people, a proper braai (remember to roll the r, please). Janet is from South Africa so you know she rocked it!

We also had mango and banana pancakes, hard boiled eggs, nuts, and chocolate. Oh yeah, bring it on, baby!

I realize I mentioned the kitchen crew and cleaning crew, but without much explanation beyond that so how about we clear that up? This was a participatory camping trip so each day we would rotate chores to ensure that everyone had his/her fair share of the duties. Inside the truck was a schedule so we not only knew what we were supposed to be doing, but who was supposed to be helping us to reduce the likelihood of slackers!

Now that we’ve got that straight how about we move on to the gift exchange? Yippee, Yeehaw, Woo Hoo!

We decided to go the secret pal route with some people leaving clues in the truck in the days leading up to the holidays. I got a candy bar from my secret pal that had a German clue so I knew it had to be one of my 3 German colleagues, but since I already knew who Birgit’s secret pal was, it was down to 2. Hmm, I wonder who it could be?

Dani was in charge of giving out the gifts and did a great job.

Ross was my secret pal and he got hooked up with (drum roll please) the Saturator water gun!!! I didn't want to risk Ross shooting his eye out or shooting the eyes out of any of our fellow travelers so no official Red Ryder carbine-action two-hundred-shot range model air rifle for him. Sorry, Ross, but your eyes are just too fra-gee-lay to risk it.

If you didn't get that old school movie reference, I highly recommend you check out The Christams Story ASAP. It's a classic!

Next it was my turn. My secret pal even gave me a card. Fancy!!!

Caroline was my secret pal and she hooked it up big time with a bracelet (same one I saw her buy that I was admiring and wondering if I should purchase) and an elephant necklace. How did she know that I’m a bit obsessed with elephants? Thanks, Caroline! I love my gifts…you know sister loves jewelry!!!

Here’s Karis, our driver. Someone looks happy!

After the gift exchange I made my way to the shops directly outside the camp.

The guys here were awesome and thrilled to shoot the breeze. Here are some of my buddies who I hung out with on Christmas Day.

Later that afternoon, which was morning in the US, I connected with my brother, Drew. I was so thrilled to catch up and hear his voice. We hadn’t spoken since I arrived in Africa so we had a ton to discuss. While we were Skyping this owl, one of 2 that resides there, was checking me out from across the room, and by checking me out I mean staring at me with unblinking eyes for about 5 minutes.

Owls have massive eyes so a stare down from an owl is something you notice. I swear if this owl had hands it would have done that move where you make the #2 with your fingers and point them at your eyes and then the eyes of the person you are stalking. I was staring back it this owl with some interest and a little bit of trepidation if I am to be perfectly honest, when out of the blue it flew towards me and jumped up onto my leg to get an even closer look. I’m not going to lie, I was a bit wigged out at this point, but did my best to keep my cool. I kept checking out its massive claws, which were kind of digging into the flesh on my leg, but then I’d move my gaze back up to its face where it was waiting to lock eye contact with me. Um, owl, you are freaking me out. Eventually the owl lost interest and me and flew to the other side of the room, but would continue to lock eye contact with me from time to time during the conversation just to let me know that he was still there. Ok, Creep Master, Flowers in the Attic, Children of the Corn Psycho, I see you. Please stop staring at me.

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to connect with any other members of my family, but we were headed to Zanzibar for the new year so I knew I’d have reliable Internet there and another shot to connect with them. I yapped Drew’s ear off for over an hour and he gave me updates on the other members of the family so I felt the love.

The next morning we were up at the crack to get on the road since we had a border crossing and a ton of kilometers to cover.

Here are some sights along the way.

We are now in Tanzania. Jambo!

After several hours of driving we stopped for lunch. Here’s a peek of our supplies.

Before touching anything though we must wash our hands. Hygiene first!

Within minutes of setting up the chairs and pulling out the tables to start lunch preparation we were surrounded by tons of smiling faces.

Like the children we met in the village, these kids were adorable, squealing with joy when we’d take their pictures and then show them the images. Man, digital cameras are the best for instant gratification. I wish I had a Polaroid though because it would be even better to actually give the children the photos.

After cleaning up and having one final bathroom break in the bush we were back on the road. I’m proud to say that there was no littering on this trip. We were a bunch of tree huggers here...

so after we did our business, we’d deposit the trash in this handy little receptacle at the back of the bus.

OK, time to get back on the truck.

On the road again…I’m so sick of being on the freaking road again. Remember that shot of us leaving Lake Malawi where we were all relaxed and serene? Fast forward to now, which has us road weary from a 12 hour driving day, followed by a 14 hour driving day, a border crossing, and a rainy night in a tent.

Yeah, it’s not pretty, folks. This was without a doubt the most punishing and brutal stretch of the entire trip. From time to time someone would declare just how “over it” he or she was, but for the most part silence, knowing eye contact, exasperated facial expressions, and forceful exhales reigned supreme. It was hideous, folks, but at long last we finally reached Dar es Salaam. Like most big cities, the traffic in Dar es Salaam is, well…take a look for yourselves.

Despite the traffic, there was a lot of interesting activity happening on the streets so we were thoroughly entertained.

Before reaching our camp we had one last hurdle to overcome and that was getting our truck across the water on a ferry.

You saw the traffic so you can imagine how long it took to get on this ferry, but Karis pulled some serious moves, which enraged practically every car on the road. This rock star move was critical, as it shaved some time off what was going on our 15thhour in the truck. Whatever it take, Karis. Make it happen, my friend. Get us off this freaking truck!!!

At long last we reached our camp. Not too shabby, not too shabby at all.

If you like exotic, then you are going to lose your mind over the next post, my friends. Can you say Zanzibar? Oh yeah, it‘s time to get fired up for white, sandy beaches, turquoise water, fishing boats, Maasai warriors strolling along the beach, and spectacular sunsets. I am giddy just thinking about it. I promise I’ll update soon. Zanzibar is without a doubt one of the most spectacular places I have visited in all of my travels so I cannot wait to share it with you.

See you soon and thanks for reading. I appreciate all your emails to let me know you are still reading and enjoying the ride. Your emails always bring a smile to my face so keep ‘em coming. Talk soon!

#Malawi #Kande Beach #Lake Malawi #Chitimba #African children #Africa #Tanzania #Dar es Salaam #markets #street scenes in Africa #African markets #donating to schools for underprivileged kids #overlanding in Africa

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Living on the Edge

Hello and greetings from Livingstone, Zambia where, sadly, it’s time for me to say goodbye to Maretha and Raymond as well as several of the fantastic people I have traveled with throughout South Africa, Botswana, and now Zambia. It’s amazing how quickly time flies by, but it’s a small world and genuine friendships were made so I am hopeful that our paths will cross again.

In honor of our last night we went out for a fancy dinner, and by fancy I mean we were in an actual restaurant as opposed to sitting in our collapsible chairs and holding our plates around a campfire. I’m not knocking our candlelight dinners by any means, but it was definitely a treat to be in an actual restaurant.

This is my tent mate, Birigt, and she is a great roomie. Thankfully I don't have to say goodbye to Birgit yet. She's with me until after Zanzibar.

Unfortunately several people had gotten some kind of a 24 - 48 hour bug over the past few days so not everyone could enjoy the final meal. Birgit was among the victims, but she got sick a few days earlier while we were still in Botswana, Chobe National Park to be specific. On this particular day, day 18 of my 54 camping extravaganza throughout Africa, it was pouring down rain and Birgit and 4 of our fellow travelers were sick as dogs, alternating between vomiting and the equally as pleasurable experience from the other end. Yeah, kind of a nightmare. Can you imagine being in a tent when your body is that kind of condition or doing your business in the campsite bathrooms? Horrible! We decided to hook it up for poor Birgit and upgraded to a room with actual beds and a private bathroom. Many of the campsites offered the option of upgrades and I am proud to say that this was the only time during my 54 day journey that I upgraded to a room. I’ll just go ahead and say what you are thinking….Tiff, you RULE!

The next morning several of us headed into Zimbabwe for the day because the view of the Falls is supposed to be better from the Zimbabwe side and we were all a bit interested to see how things were faring after all the madness.

It was only $35 for most of us to hop the border for the day, but our Canadian friend had to pay $75! As an American I have gotten used to paying more for many of my foreign visas, China & Tanzania especially, but we were all kind of surprised that Canada was getting the middle finger from Zimbabwe. Canada…really?

As you probably know Zimbabwe has no currency now so ATMs dispensed USD, which was fabulous since most of the countries I was visiting in Africa required visa fees to be paid in USD. The entire time we were walking through the town we received plenty of offers to purchase their now defunct currency featuring denominations like the 100 trillion dollar bill. Tempting, but I was already a millionaire with the 50 million note supplied by my brother, Rob, after his visit to Zimbabwe.

So are you ready to see Vic Falls or what?

How about a little Vic Falls trivia. I know you like trivia. Which is taller and wider, Vic Falls or Niagara Falls?

If you said Vic Falls you are correct! Vic Falls is 1.7 km wide and 108 m high as compared to Niagara Falls, which is 1 km wide and 58 m high.

Check out Bambi chilling on the park grounds.

If you look closely in the shots below you’ll notice that there are people walking along the edge of the Falls.

Guess who will be doing that very same thing tomorrow? Yep, it’s me. Daredevil Tiff is back in full effect, but more on that later. Let’s keep gushing over the Falls on the Zimbabwe side.

And now a moment for Dr. Livingstone.

As you can see, the Falls were absolutely stunning. The border town appeared to be pretty nice from the short amount of time that I spent there with a handful of cute shops and one super mack daddy hotel, The Vic Falls Hotel.

Some folks decided to shop, but Fabian and I decided to spend a few hours in the lap of luxury and have a delicious lunch.

I went for the ostrich salad stir fry dish, and as a member of the Clean Plate Club, I made sure every single morsel of the meal was gone.

How about a little tour around the hotel grounds?

The picture above demonstrates how far behind I am in my blog. Sorry, peeps, but I didn't exactly have regular or reliable Internet in the African bush. I'm working to get caught up.

Yep, that spray is from Vic Falls. Not too shabby. It was a fabulous way to end the afternoon in Zimbabwe. We returned to Zambia just in time for sunset as well. These Zambia sunsets really are spectacular.

After sunset we meet up with our new tour leader, the super fabulous Janet, who you’ll meet shortly, as well as our new travel buddies. The new crew seemed very energetic and high energy so I was feeling great about Africa, part 2. Maretha, Raymond and Mark, my skydiving buddy, were heading back through South Africa and into Mozambique the next morning so we spent the rest of the evening reminiscing about the insanely awesome adventures we‘d had over the past few weeks. I was certainly sad to say goodbye to everyone, but those of us still in town woke up in time to see them off in the morning and of course get in a last round of hugs. Bye Maretha and Raymond. Thank you for a wonderful trip.

Raymond actually recorded the miles and by the time we reached Livingstone we had traveled a total of 5,370 km/3,336 miles from our starting point in Cape Town. That is some serious driving, folks. Apparently our 2ndtour from Livingstone to Nairobi is even more driving and somewhere in the neighborhood of 8,000+ km/4,970 miles. Wow!!! We were also told that unlike the first leg of the tour where everyday there is a reward, the second leg, while awesome and containing some of the best stuff we will likely see, is frequently several days of driving long hours with no reward, but when we finally get the reward it’s the bomb. The Serengeti, Ngorongoro Crater, Zanzibar and Maasai warriors were all part of this journey so I have every confidence that it’s gong to be fabulous.

After saying goodbye to Raymond, Maretha, Mark, and our land yacht, Pumba, we threw on our swimsuits and headed off to Devil’s Pool where we were going to literally swim on the edge of Vic Falls. There is only a small window of time where folks are allowed to visit Livingstone Island and swim in Devil’s Pool and it just happened to coincide with my visit to Vic Falls. As my mom would say, hot diggity dog!!! I couldn’t believe my luck. Let’s hope I survive!!!

We started out by riding the boat to Livingstone Island..

When were arrived at Livingstone Island we were given a brief overview of the island and of course had to have a moment for the Dr.

After paying our respects we shot over to the edge of the Falls for a quick photo shoot before plunging ourselves into the water and swimming for our lives.

We stripped down to our bathing suits and then swam along the edge of the Falls to get to the jump off point for Devil’s Pool. There was a rope lining the edge of the Falls, which we were instructed to grab and hold onto for dear life if we started to drift in that direction. Upon hearing this news we were all a bit nervous, and fearing for our lives, swam our little hearts out the second we hit the water. As it turns out, this Michael Phelps level of swimming wasn’t necessary. The current wasn’t that strong so one would have to be an incredibly weak swimmer to get swept over to the rope, but it was still a little freaky to be that close to the edge. Once we got to the jump off spot we walked along this little ledge and were given a 2 second explanation of where we needed to jump and the rock where we needed to park our behinds after the jump if we didn’t want to die. Um...

Our guide was the first to go.

He told us we could either jump in like he did or slink off the rock into the pool. As luck would have it I was tapped to go first so I had to set the example. Bombs away!

One of the guys took all of our cameras so we could have photo memories of the insanity. He hooked it up big time.

Here’s a view from the edge.

We were literally sitting on the edge of Vic Falls. Crazy!!!

How about another view from the edge?

Can you believe that we were actually allowed to do this?

Here go Rami and Line, my skydiving buddies! Yippie!!!

After chillin' on the edge of Vic Falls we swam back to Livingstone Island and were treated to a fabulous brunch. I don’t mind if I do…

What an incredible morning! I cannot believe that I was that close to the edge of Vic Falls. It was truly an unforgettable experience. After gorging ourselves on our gourmet breakfast we headed into the Zambia side of Vic Falls for the more pedestrian view of the Falls. (insert yawn and eye roll)

JUST KIDDING!!!

Any view of Vic Falls is the bomb, but practically dangling off the edge and living to tell about it is something special.

To get to the Falls we walked through the grounds of a very swank hotel. These carolers were singing some classics to get everyone into the holiday spirit.

Oh the weather outside is frightful…yeah, certain songs just don’t quite work in this climate.

Rudolph, African style! I love it.

This hotel even had game walking around. Look how close we got to this zebra. Amazing! Some people even touched it.

Behold Vic Falls, round 4, Zambia. I’m nothing if not comprehensive, right? You can count on me, folks.

This is the bridge where the bungee jumpers did their thing.

So...that's a pretty big drop. Scary!

My glider pilot who took me over the Falls was saying that he was supposed to jump with his buddy last year, but his buddy went first and massively jacked up his back so he decided to give it a pass. Yeah, no kidding. I think if my friend got injured I'd probably bail too.

That story kind of reminds me of a childhood incident we like to call the 13th step. It was one of those games created by bored children with too much time on their hands, which involved jumping from the highest step possible in our basement stairwell. I was the big winner jumping from the 13th step, but in the process I smashed my head into the low hanging ceiling and then crashed my tailbone on one of the lower steps. I gimped around the basement clutching my throbbing head and backside much to the amusement of my brothers and Wendy. Not surprisingly, none of them wanted to attempt the 13th step after my crash and burn. Wusses...

So now that you've seen Vic Falls from almost every angle, which one do you like the best? They are all pretty sweet, but I think Devil's Pool was my fave. I mean it really doesn't get more insane that sitting on the edge of the Falls.

After a full day we returned back to the campsite for a final sunset before heading on to our next destination.

Goodbye, Livingstone, I adored every second of my time here and am so glad I lived to tell about it!

Malawi, here we come.

Get fired up for the holdiays, folks, because next time I see you we'll be eating our faces off and opening presents at the stunningly gorgeous Lake Malawi. See you soon! 　

#Victoria Fallls #Devil's Pool #Zambia #Zimbabwe #Africa #edge of Vic Falls #sunsets

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Vic Falls & Lions' Grillz

Hello, friends, and welcome to the border between Botswana and Zambia. I am proud to announce that I was a model citizen my last night in Botswana and in tip top shape for our border crossing into Zambia. It’s a good thing too because this border is notorious for taking an extremely long time. The crossing into Zambia is done via ferry and sadly there is only one ferry, which is a bit on the small side as you can see below.

We actually boarded the ferry within a few minutes of arriving, but we couldn’t go anywhere without our truck and the queue for the trucks was insane.

Once we cleared immigration, which was an absolute breeze, we had the pleasure of sitting on the Zambia side for about 2.5 hours waiting for Raymond and the truck. Ugh! There were tons of locals eager to sell us their wood carvings, copper jewelry, and various other handicrafts so with 2.5 hours to kill we had ample opportunity to browse their collections. They were all quite friendly, engaging us in conversation and eager to hear about our thoughts and impressions of Africa as well as stories about our countries, families, and friends. Despite the long wait, it was surprisingly pleasant, with good conversation and a shady spot on a log under a tree.

As soon as Raymond arrived we blasted out of there and rocked on to Livingstone, where we’d be staying for the next 4 days. How luxurious to be in one location for longer than 24 hours. It doesn’t sound like much, but it makes a huge difference mentally at least knowing that you don’t have to tear down the tent the next morning. I actually treated myself to the luxury of having my backpack in the actual tent. Normally, I would just grab a few essentials from my pack instead of lugging that massive beast into the tent, but with 4 days it was time to get crazy and just bring ‘er on in. Remember, folks, it’s all about simple pleasures here.

After we pitched our tents and got a bit settled we were given more information about the various activities available to us while in Livingstone, home of Victoria Falls. Of course you know I was all about the Falls and couldn’t wait to see them up close and personal. Since I seem to be all about the aerial views these days I decided my first glimpse of the falls would be from above in an ultra light glider. As you may recall, I took a glider ride over Wadi Rum in Jordan and absolutely adored it. When Amar was here he did both the ultra light and the helicopter rides and thought the glider ride was better because of the open air experience so I took his advice and signed up. The only disadvantage of the glider was that we weren’t allowed to take our own cameras with us, but they strapped a camera on to the wing so I am still able to share some pics with you.

Are you ready?

Do you feel excited?

I hope you aren’t afraid of heights because here we go…

What can I say except thumbs up, my friends!

This was the beginning of the rainy season so the Falls were just getting going again, but as you can see there is still a ton of spray coming from the water. My pilot was saying that while it is certainly impressive to see the Falls in their full, thunderous glory, the visibility is not as great because the spray is out of control. I’m sure any time one sees Vic Falls it’s terribly impressive. They are just so massive! We flew into Zimbabwe as well for some additional views.

As we were flying back to the landing strip we crossed over some shallow water where some hippos were chillin' as well as some elephants taking a drink from the shore. It was incredible to see them from the glider. Sadly, I don’t have any pictures of this to share with you, but take my word for it when I tell you that it was awesome!

And now to prove that it was actually me up in that glider, here’s my Top Gun pic. Notice the strut as I confidently make my way back to the reception area. Maverick, Goose and Ice Man, you can been my wing men anytime!

What a great way to kick off my time in Zambia. Let’s end my first day here with something spectacular.

Any guesses about what I’m about to show you?

I’ll give you a clue. It’s something I photograph a lot and each time I feature it I gush about how much I LOVE it.

Yes, you guessed it…sunset. Get ready too because Livingstone has some of the most magnificent sunsets I have seen on my entire journey.

Pretty great, huh? I told you.

The next day I decided to keep the adrenaline pumping and take a walk with some lions. Yes, despite the stories I shared with you about my Delta guide and Maretha coming face to face with roaring lions, I decided that this was something I wanted to do. Lion Encounter www.lionencounter.com operates the African Lion Rehabilitation and Release into the Wild Program on behalf of ALERT, the African Lion & Environmental Trust www.lionalert.org. Both organizations are doing fantastic work and I cannot recommend them highly enough.

Free-ranging lion populations have decreased between 80 - 90% over the past 30 years. Given the rapid and startling decline as well as the greatly reduced potential for natural decolonization of many of their habitats, ALERT supports assisted lion reintroduction into some specific locations, which meet their criteria for sustainability.

In situations where there is no available source population of wild lions, ALERT initiates a 4 stage program to reintroduce lions originally bred from captive individuals. In the first stage the cubs born in their breeding centers are taken from their mothers at 3 months old, which is apparently consistent with captive breeding programs among carnivores. The experienced staff of Lion Encounter takes the place of the dominant members of the pride, training them only to the point that it is safe for them to be with them. Each day the lions are taken into the bush and given the opportunity to build their confidence in their natural environment, both during the day and night. By 18 months they are able to take down game such as smaller antelope and by 2 years old the lions are seasoned hunters and ready to move into stage 2.

In stage 2 all human contact is removed, however prior to their entry into stage 2 the lions are radio-collared and micro-chipped to monitor their progress. The lions are given the chance to develop a natural pride social system with plenty of game to hunt and once the pride is stable and self sustaining, it is moved into stage 3.

In stage 3, the pride is moved into a larger, managed ecosystem where there are no resident humans, there are sufficient prey species to hunt, and there are also competitive species such as hyena. The lions in stage 3 will give birth to cubs who will be raised by the pride in the managed ecosystem, which is very close to their natural environment.

The cubs born in Stage 3, with all the human avoidance behaviors of wild lions, will develop the skills that will enable their re-introduction into appropriate game reserves, conservancies, and National Parks across the African continent.

In stage 4, lions born in stage 3 are released into the wild in several natural social groups. It's pretty amazing, right?

Before meeting the lions we had to watch an instructional video about the project as well acceptable behavior during our lion encounter. We were each given sticks to carry, not to beat them with, but to distract them if they should suddenly fixate on one of us or come a bit too close for comfort. We were advised to move the stick back and forth on the ground to engage the lion in a game of some sort and always remain standing with locked eye contact to assert our dominance. Um, ok. Is it common for the lions to fixate on one of us? I certainly hope not. Fingers crossed.

Uh oh, this is some serious eye-contact.

Can you believe how close we got to them? I have to say that when we first reached the lions and I saw just how big they were and the massive size of their paws and teeth, I definitely had a pang of fear and immediately questioned myself about the brilliance of this activity, but I was in it now so I might as well embrace it.

Um…yeah. That, my friends, is no joke.

So on the heels of that shot let’s go ahead and get even closer to the lions.

Notice my stick. Yeah, it’s kind of a joke, but I was gripping that thing for dear life. The only time we were allowed to get close(r) to the lions was when they were resting. During these brief moments, we were advised to slowly approach the lions and have our photo shoot. There were about 6 guys with us at all times who were surrounding the lions from all angles and watching their every move, advising us what to do when. I cannot tell you how happy I was to have these guys with us.

Now it was time to actually touch a lion. No, I’m not kidding. The guides approached with us, instructing us to approach from behind, maintain eye-contact and never, ever go anywhere near their faces. We were to crouch down in a position that would allow us to quickly get back to our feet if the lion made a move that was consistent with disfigurement or death. When I crouched down to touch the lion, my heart was beating like a drum and my hands were shaking. As I crouched down to give it a little touch, it quickly turned it’s head and locked eye-contact with me. The guide advised me to stand up in a calm and even tone. As you can imagine, I was wigging out at this point, but the lion didn’t seem that interested, giving it’s back a little lick and then resuming it’s relaxation in the grass. The guide instructed me to crouch down again, which I did and nervously pet the lion for about 2.5 seconds.

I’m not sure if you can really see my expression in this picture, but let’s just say that I think I left a racing stripe in my pants. I mean, I’m touching a freaking lion!!!

It’s fur was quite coarse and a bit rough. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I distinctly remember thinking to myself, “hmm, it’s coarser than I imagined.“ Of course this was immediately followed by, “please don’t let this lion lunge at me, please let me get out of this experience alive!”

The lion looks kind of vicious in the shot above, but it was only yawning. Still, check out those teeth. I’d hate to feel those chompers ripping into my flesh. It also looks like someone could use a little visit to the dentist. That's some wicked plaque, lion!

Yeah, these kids don’t play gently. They were definitely biting and clawing at each other, but it was all in good fun. The Lion Encounter staff that accompanied us would also have to play a bit rough when a rambunctious lion would get a little too aggressive, slapping it in the face just like a lion would do to assert his dominance. They were comfortable with the animals, but it was all about maintaining their dominance and keeping their height above the animals. Scary!

At the end of the walk it was revealed to us that rangers with machine guns were hiding in the bushes in the event that something super sketch went down. I had no idea they were there, but it is reassuring to know that there were greater precautions taken than the thin stick. Thankfully, there was no need to pull out the big guns.

What an amazing experience! I will never forget it and cannot say enough positive things about my time with the lions. It was such a privilege to be so close to these magnificent animals. I was so touched by the great work being done by these organizations and I will continue to monitor their progress in the years to come. This was definitely something special and something I would highly recommend.

While we were waiting for them to put together a video of the experience for those who were interested in purchasing it, we were able to walk around the grounds (not where the lions were hanging) and see some other animals.

Aww, could that be cuter? I just can’t get enough of elephants, especially the babies. Well I hope you enjoyed my first 2 days in Zambia. Stay tuned for a day trip into Zimbabwe as well as my dive into Devil’s Pool. Intrigued? I hope so. See you soon.

#aerial view Victoria Falls #ALERT #Lion Encounter #Victoria Falls #Zambia #lions #lions' grillz #sunset #elephants #lion rehabilitation #Africa

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Welcome to the Delta Where the Polers Play

Hello friends! Are you ready to venture into the heart of the Okavango Delta? I hope so because that is where we are headed next on this journey through Africa. Actually, I’m not sure if you’re ready for the Delta yet so to get you warmed up, let’s take an aerial view of the world’s largest (16,000 sq. km) inland delta.

I think the wildlife below, which looks like tiny blobs in the water, might be buffalo.

Yeah, I agree that the shot above left a little something to desire, but it’s the only shot that even remotely resembles wildlife from my flight over the Delta so that is why I felt compelled to include it in this post.

Pretty, huh? How about a closer look? We started our journey with a 50 minute ride on a speedboat, passing some spectacular scenery along the way.

Meet our captain, Daniel.

We sped along to the shore where we met up with our hosts from the Delta who would be navigating our mokoros, dug out canoes, to the rugged, bush campsite that would serve as our home for the next 3 days.

And away we go…

As you can see, the mokoro is propelled forward by the use of a long pole so the person navigating the mokoro is called a…

Anyone…anyone?

Bueller…Bueller?

Yes, a poler!

The polers grew up here so they are extremely familiar with the labyrinthine waterways of the Delta.

The ride to camp took between an hour and a half to two hours and the views took your breath away.

Our poler was named Richard and he had an extremely keen eye, spotting a crocodile within minutes.

Richard was almost apologetic that it was such a small croc, which a) it didn’t seem that small to me…check out this tail.

And b) I’m perfectly fine seeing a small croc while I’m in this tiny dugout canoe, which was so low to the water that I was practically eye level with the fish. No worries, Richard, really.

Once Richard would spot something, we would take all necessary steps to get up close and personal with it, which usually meant we that we’d shoot our mokoro head first into the reeds. It looked a little something like this.

Fabian, my mokoro mate, and I would immediately take cover by putting our head between our legs in an attempt to protect ourselves from the reeds, which would lash against us as we plunged into the reeds to get a better look. The temporary discomfort was worth it though because we got to see cool things like these adorable, little frogs.

Don’t ask me how he was able to spot something this tiny and well camouflaged, but he was a hawk, identifying all kinds of tiny inhabitants of the Delta.

As you can see, he was loving every second of it, hamming it up for the camera and making sure we had a great time.

In addition to having a great eye, Richard was also very knowledgeable about the medicinal uses of many plants found in the Delta like this flower that, when squeezed, releases water that is perfect for cleaning one’s eyes. Later, Visine.

After a very enjoyable ride through the Delta we arrived at our camp.

The camp was extremely basic with no toilets or showers, but it was super luxurious to arrive and have our tents already assembled for us. Simple pleasures, right? Maretha and Raymond had already warned us that the Delta was unbearably hot and humid, advising us that our number one priority should be to find refuge from the beating sun and to avoid any kind of physical exertion unless absolutely necessary during most of the daylight hours. Awesome.

I heeded their advice and immediately threw myself on one of our mattresses in the shade, only moving when the sun encroached on my shady spot or to use the toilet. This is the “door” to our “bathroom.”

If the shovel and toilet paper were against the tree, the “door" to the “bathroom” was open. To “shut the door” we’d take the shovel up to our “toilet,” which was a hole in the ground located a few meters away. After doing business, we’d “flush the toilet” by putting a little dirt on top and then “open the bathroom door” by returning the shovel to it’s place against the tree. Then we’d sanitize our hands and immediately throw ourselves back into a shady spot. Around 4:00 PM it was time to board our mokoros again and venture out into the Delta for a short nature walk and sunset.

Check out the massive termite mound. These are all over Africa.

When we returned to camp Maretha had dinner waiting for us. Woo hoo! It’s amazing how gourmet the meal was considering this was our kitchen.

You go, Maretha. Thanks for another mouthwatering meal. After dinner we sat around the campfire, but the bugs were ferocious, biting us through our clothes. After receiving my 384th mosquito bite I couldn’t take it anymore and dove into my tent. Thankfully Birgit had some highly toxic spray, which we used to coat our tent and successfully keep the bloodsuckers at bay. Of course you can imagine the feeding frenzy that ensued when I had to get up in the middle of the night to use the toilet, but what can you do?

The next morning we got up at the crack enjoy the sunrise and take a nature walk before the blazing heat took over.

It is so peaceful riding in the mokoros in the early morning, watching dragonflies, illuminated by the sun’s first rays, dance on the surface of the crystal, clear water. The Delta really has a magical feel to it when you are gliding through the tall reeds and coming to spectacular clearings filled with lily pads and colorful flowers.

Richard got us safely to shore and joined us on our nature walk.

This is one of the first things that we saw along the way. Yikes!!!

Our head guide told us about the various wildlife we may see during our walk and advised us what to do in the event of a face off with some of these animals. Do not run in a straight line if you are chased by an elephant or a hippo. Instead run in a zig zag. If you are confronted with a lion who seems like it could embrace eating you for lunch do not run or turn your back. Instead you should stare it directly in the eyes to assert your dominance. Ok, got it. Let’s hope that these valuable tips won’t need to be put into action during this walk.

You can’t seem them, but you could definitely hear the hippos grunting just beneath the surface of the water. Every so often their nostrils would peek through the surface of the water to get some air, but that was about it.

For you hippo lovers out there, don’t despair because we’ll have plenty of hippo action coming up in future posts.

These warthogs were so cute, racing through the field like their lives depended on it and then abruptly stopping to stare at the strange people staring at them. They always do this and it never ceases to crack me up. What little freaks.

Now it was time to head back to camp. I was following closely behind our guide to get some more insight into some of his many experiences in the Delta, especially the super scary, life threatening ones.

To be honest, our walk through the Delta, while abundant with stunning natural scenery, yielded little wildlife sightings. I realize that most animals prefer to be out early in the morning and around dusk to avoid the scorching temperatures, but I also couldn’t help but notice that we were walking through their habitat without any weapons or instruments to protect ourselves. From a liability standpoint, I thought there must not be a huge risk of being attacked by a vicious predator if our guides didn’t even take the precaution to at least have a big stick or something to attempt to fend off the attacking animal, but Maretha had shared a story of coming face to face with a lion in her first few months as a tour leader right here in the Delta so I guess it was possible. In this instance the lioness was so close and so enraged by Maretha and her clients' presence that when she roared Maretha could feel the warm breath on her face. Um, are you kidding me? I really don’t know what I would do in that situation, but I feel pretty confident that there would be a massive racing stripe in my pants Having a lion practically spit in your face while roaring at the top of her lungs is no joke.

Of course I asked our guide if he had ever come face to face with a lion while taking groups through the Delta and he admitted that while rare, it had happened 3 times. One time the standoff lasted for a few seconds while the other 2 were more prolonged in excess of 5 minutes. Five minutes may not sound like a long time, but it must have felt eternal with an irate lioness staring you down with bloodlust in her eyes and expressing her extreme displeasure with you by repeated roars in your face. I asked him what he did in these situations and he reinforced in a calm and stable voice to stay in one place, under no circumstances run or turn away, to stare the vicious cat in the eyes, and repeat unless or until she kills you or decides to leave. After sharing my horror, I pressed him to learn more about his clients' reactions during and after the encounter. Not surprisingly many of the clients actually wet their pants. Yeah, no kidding! I think I’d probably lose control of my bladder, bowels, and belly. Imagine that scene from the Exorcist where the possessed child starts yacking up green stuff and that’s pretty much the image I have in my mind of my response to seeing a lion face to face. Speaking of the Exorcist, did you know the Exorcist stairs from the movie are in DC? On my last weekend in DC before heading to Bangkok to start my journey I did an Exorcist photo shoot with my friend, Paul. It was hysterical and attracted cheers, laughter, and high fives from passersby. While I recognize that this has absolutely nothing to do with my trip through Africa, I feel compelled to share some of these pics with you just because I think they are awesome.

Sorry for the random segue, but I’m ready to reign it in again and continue our adventure in the Delta. This is the walk where I was asking our guide about his standoffs with lions.

As I mentioned, it was wildlife light and while this lil’ guy isn’t exactly exotic, he’s pretty darn cute.

Time to get back in the mokoro and head back to camp. I was excited to see what Maretha had up her sleeve. When we left this AM she was planning something that involved oranges and chocolate. She had already baked a birthday cake for us on the campfire back in Namibia so I had a sneaking suspicion that another cake was on the way. Fingers crossed. I heart cake, especially chocolate cake.

When we got back to camp we were all dripping with sweat so we immediately found some shade and threw ourselves onto the ground where we remained until it was time to head back out into the water for another spectacular sunset. Actually, that’s not true, I did get up for about 10 minutes to peruse and purchase these gorgeous bracelets that the women had made from the Delta grasses. You know I love jewelry and these bracelets are unlike anything in my current collection. Yay!

The polers were all sassy this afternoon, adorning themselves and us with decorations from the Delta.

Here are Richard and Fabian from my mokoro.

Yep, I totally got hooked up with a lily pad hat. Lovely!

And of course the moment I’m sure you’ve all been waiting for…sunset!!!

When we returned to the camp after sunset Maretha had another delicious meal waiting for us as well as a chocolate cake that was cooked inside the orange peel. It was finger licking good and I mean that literally. I wasn’t letting a single ounce of that chocolate get away.

After doing the dishes, we were treated to some singing and dancing from the polers. Their voices were so good. It was almost like we were listening to a CD. They were also busting out some serious dance moves for us. Of course we entertained them with a little ditty Maretha taught us called the Amarula song, which was pretty easy because it only had one lyric that we sang over and over again. I know that sounds kind of lame, but we pepped it up a bit with some dancing and then a kind of jacked up rendition of the Toyota Crazy Car/Cressida song. We were singing and laughing for most of the evening and it was such a wonderful way to end our time in the Delta.

The next morning we were up early to tear down the tents and head back to camp.

I cannot say enough positive things about my time in the Delta. It is one of the most beautiful places I have visited both in scenery and the wonderful people I met. Here’s a pic of our fabulous polers. A huge thank you to them all for their warm hospitality.

Once we reached the shore where we were to transfer from the mokoro to the speedboat there was a bit of a delay so we ended up sitting around for about an hour watching some storm clouds roll in and eventually open up in a torrential downpour. The good news is that our captain didn’t play around so what took us 50 minutes the first time, took only 23 minutes in the rain.

When we arrived back at camp we had to cart all of our gear (tents, food, water, and other random supplies) from the jetty to the campsite in the pouring rain, but we were already wet so it didn’t really matter. We were greeted by a smiling Raymond who hooked it up big time with the Mexican fiesta he prepared for our lunch. In case I haven’t mentioned it before, I’m a Mexican food fanatic so I was all about this special treat. He even warmed up our tortillas over the fire. Three cheers for Raymond and Maretha! You guys are the best!

After stuffing our faces, we packed up the rest of the things in the truck and headed to the border between Botswana and Zambia. Stay tuned for some final stories from Botswana as well as our entry into Zambia. The adrenaline junky Tiff came out in full force again in Zambia so get fired up for some more death defying African adventures.

Thanks for reading and I’ll be in touch soon!　

#Africa #Botswana #Exorcist #Okavango Delta #bush camp #flowers #lily pads #mokoro #poler #sunset #Exorcist steps #Exorcist stairwell DC

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Getting the Adrenaline Pumping in Namibia

Hey everyone and sorry for the extremely long delay in updating my blog, but the internet in Africa has been a bit sketchy and not really conducive to uploading pictures. That being said, the past two months have been absolutely fabulous and I can’t wait to share it all with you. I have to warn you that I have become a bit of an adrenaline junky so get fired up for some hard core, adrenaline pumping action in the upcoming posts, folks! Whether it’s jumping out of planes, walking with lions, or swimming on the edge of Victoria Falls I’m all in and crazy excited about it! Are you fired up to hear some more?

Can I get a hell yeah?

HELL YEAH!

On that note, let’s get this party started! After I said goodbye to Ayhan I spent the rest of the afternoon catching up on some emails, prepaying my bills, and Skyping with my family before I headed out into the African bush for my 54 day camping adventure. As I mentioned before, I didn’t grow up doing a ton of camping so to jump in for almost 2 months is kind of a big deal for me, but I have every confidence I can hang.

I met up with my group later that evening and was relieved to discover that most of my fellow travelers were more my kind of camping peeps…weekend campers who drive to their camp sites and booze it up for a few days. Phew! At least I’m not the only fish out of water here. Fingers crossed we all can hang or it’s going to be a painfully brutal 2 months.

We met our guides, Maretha (pronounced Marietta like my hometown…Holla!) and Raymond who seemed very laid back and cool. They had few rules, but were adamant that we don’t call our overland transportation vehicle a bus!. “It’s not a bus, it’s a truck” was pretty much the first thing Maretha said to us, enforcing a 2 Rand penalty for each transgression. The money was to be applied to farewell cocktails at the end of the trip so it‘s not like it was a horrible punishment. We all were guilty of calling the truck a bus on more than one occasion so you can imagine that the penalty box filled up quickly. Here’s a pic of our truck, Pumba. What do you think? Bus or truck? You better say truck or be prepared to cough up some cash.

We were basically a rolling house. This is our kitchen.

Here’s our luggage and our luxurious accommodation.

And here are our mattresses.

And our ever important water. Sandy, you will be pleased to know that I’m drinking water. Definitely not as much as I should be, but tiny bladder + 10 hour bus, I mean truck ride = holding it, being miserable and getting a UTI. So I decided the better option was to remain on the brink of dehydration.

OK I realize that may have fit into the TMI (too much information) category, but as you have probably noticed by now, that’s how I roll when it comes to bodily fluids. It’s TMI Central here and you know you love it.

So day one we drove a few kilometers away from the South Africa and Namibia border, staying for an evening on the beautiful Orange River. We were all thrilled to get off the truck and immediately throw ourselves into the river. Shan, I know I’m disobeying your strict orders to NOT swim in any body of water in Africa, but Maretha and Raymond assured us it was OK since it was flowing water. Also, it was crazy hot so I think it’s all good. Of course you’ll be the first one to know if this ends up being a bad decision, but I mean, how can I say no to this?

After a refreshing and hopefully parasite free swim in the river we settled in for an absolutely delicious plate of potjiekos, which is a stew-like dish of lamb and tons of veggies. Yummy! I certainly didn’t expect something this gourmet. Bring it, baby! Keep the scrumptious food coming.

The next morning some folks canoed down the river, while the rest of us luxuriated in the water and around the camp. Birgit, my German tent mate, and I took a stroll outside the campsite to get a better view. What can I say except gorgeous?

After lunch it was back on the truck and time to say goodbye to South Africa and hello to Namibia.

Hello Namibia! I’m thrilled to be here. Our first stop in Namibia…Fish River Canyon, the oldest canyon in the world. Oooh ahhhh!!!!!!!!!! On our way to the canyon Raymond would occasionally pull over to share an interesting tidbit with us. Our first fun fact of the day involved the Rhino Bush, which is filled with strychnine and as a result extremely dangerous to everything except the rhino who has the appropriate enzymes to digest it. So, if you should ever come across one of these bushes, please resist the urge to rub your skin against it, ok?

Our next educational lesson involved the nest of the social weaver bird who works tirelessly to build these elaborate nests to only have it inhabited by several other types of birds.

Don’t worry, the other birds don’t kick the social weavers out of their homes, they simply become the guests that never leave. Poor lil’ weavers. They are tireless though, building nests on just about anything. Here’s one on a phone line.

Finally, after hours of driving, we reached the canyon. Yeah!!

Just in time for sunset as well. Raymond and Maretha were so sweet and surprised us with some wine and cheese action to make things even better. Aww, thanks you two!

We were certainly off to a great start. Next stop: Sossusvlei with the red sand dunes. I’ve seen so many pictures of these dunes so I couldn’t wait to see them in person. We arrived at Sossusvlei just in time for dinner and another spectacular sunset. Look at Maretha hard at work preparing our dinner. If I'm not mistaken, tonight's entree was green curry chicken, South African style. Yummy!!!

Here’s my tent.

We were up at the crack so we could view sunrise from atop Dune 45. Not too shabby!

It’s much taller than it may look (150 meters to be exact) and being the first ones to ascend the dune, it was even more work since the sand was untouched. We stopped about ¾ of the way to catch our breath and take in the view and then powered on to the top!

It was totally worth waking up at the crack for this view, and upon our descent we were welcomed with a tasty, hot breakfast made by the talented and immensely patient, Maretha. We were all massive pigs, gobbling up every last bit in preparation for our desert outing.

I cannot say enough positive things about the Sossusvlei desert walk we did with a man by the name of Boesman. He grew up in the desert where his father worked as a tour leader. As a young boy his father taught him everything one needed to know about the desert, but Boesman went away and got a fancy desk job, only to quit years later to return to his true passion, the desert. He was incredibly enthusiastic about the desert, practically running to the next great thing! This is the view we had of him when he wasn’t explaining something to us.

As a further demonstration of his oneness with the desert, he wore no socks or shoes. The rest of us were instructed to wear closed toe shoes since the sand could get hot enough to give us blisters, but he knew just how to walk on the sand without scalding his feet. Impressive!

Before we get to some of his lessons for surviving in the desert, let’s take a minute to gush over this incredible scenery!

Boesman explained to us that the desert tells a story that is easy to follow if one is paying attention. Here we can see which animal walked by first and which other animals crossed it’s path.

He could even tell that a mouse was sitting in the sand because he could see the tiny, practically imperceptible line made by its tail. It definitely would have escaped me before, but not now. I’m practically Bear Gryls.

In keeping with the Bear Gryls theme, let’s discuss what one should eat if stranded in the desert. If you think ants and beetles are a good idea you’re in trouble because they have no nutritional value. In the desert things are classified into 3 categories: dangerous, food, and not worth it. Ants and beetles fall into the last category. Instead of the bugs, go for the lizard and you‘ll be all set. Got it? Good.

Let’s gush some more, shall we?

One thing we didn’t see, but we learned about was the golden mole, or sand shark. This fascinating creature lives beneath the sand and catches its prey via vibrations in the sand. In fact it has become so adept at this way of hunting that it doesn’t even have eyes or ears anymore. It’s literally this hairy faced animal with no eyes or ears. Cue the song, Obsession, please!

Next it was time to see the Dead Vlei, which may look a bit familiar if you’ve seen the movie, The Cell. Creep central, but so cool!!!

That’s right, I walked the walk of Jenny from the Block.

The trees, Camel Thorn Trees, have been dead between 600 and 900 years. They are one of the few trees able to live here and that’s because their roots go between 70 - 90 m deep.

How ‘bout a lil’ black and white action?

Cool, but I think it’s better in color!!!

This tiny little circle is a spider’s nest. Don’t ask me how Boesman found this in a sea of sand…the man is good!

The spiders are neat freaks and hate it when sand gets into their nests, which are held in tact by their spider silk lining. Boesman enraged the spider when he popped the top and sprinkled in a little sand to get the spider’s attention. It quickly came to the surface and within seconds closed the lid on its nest.

After learning desert survival skills Boesman shared some wonderful and sometimes tragic stories about the Bushmen who used to roam these lands. They were only 1.5 meters tall, but despite their small stature, they were eating powerhouses, able to chow up to 10 kg of meat in one sitting. If meat sits in the heat it rots, if it’s left next to you it’s stolen by jackals, so you might as well eat it was their theory. Not to mention it helps one sleep, which is certainly helpful when one doesn’t have blankets, pillows, or even shelter for that matter. Instead of these creature comforts, the Bushmen told stories to distract them from the cold temperatures. Wow! I feel pretty confident that I wouldn’t make it as a Bushmen.

One of the first things a mother would teach her child was the look of her footprint in the sand, as no two footprints are the same. That way if a child wandered off, he/she could always find his/her way back to mom. Sadly though many times parents had to leave their children and the older generations behind when traveling through the desert in hopes of finding a new food source. It’s a dog eat dog world out there so they couldn’t risk the entire tribe for one child or one grandparent so they simply had to turn their backs and keep walking, choosing to never look back and never discuss it in hopes of making it less gut wrenching. In the evenings following such tragic events, grieving mothers would strategically sit where the smoke was wafting from the campfire so that if someone asked them why tears were falling from their eyes they could blame it on the smoke. Awful!!!

As you can probably imagine, the Bushmen were exceptional hunters, able to sit still for hours without so much as swatting away a fly or wiping sweat from their brow in hopes of catching their prey. Unfortunately the hunters became the hunted when Europeans came, and as per usual, started some trouble. Europeans didn’t understand the Bushmen ways and so they feared them, taking their fears to a new extreme by hunting the Bushmen for sport. In fact, there were laws that allowed people to shoot Bushmen until 1928. Um….what? Disgusting! When the Bushmen were first being hunted they used their expert hunting skills to defend themselves so Sossusvlei, pronounced with a T in front, actually means place where people disappear. It was given this name after countless Westerners would go into these lands, but never return. As my Aussie, Kiwi and British friends would say, “Good on you, Bushmen.” Sadly, the Bushmen’s numbers dropped dramatically when they were being hunted, but some still exist today and I was lucky enough to meet some when I was in Botswana. Don’t worry, I took tons of pictures, but we won’t be viewing those babies until we get to Botswana. For now, it’s Namibia and Namibia absolutely rules so I know you won’t be disappointed to wait.

After the desert we headed over to Sesriem Canyon for a lil’ stroll.

We arrived back at camp exhilarated, but exhausted, rewarding ourselves with a swim and an absolutely delicious braii dinner. A braii (roll the r, please) is a South African BBQ, but don’t let them here you call it a BBQ. It’s a braii and it’s Raymond’s specialty.

After our tasty braii and some beverages we enjoyed another stunning sunset. Africa definitely knows how to do sunset!

Once the sun went down the sky became even more spectacular with perhaps the most star-filled sky I have ever seen in my life. It was literally like a dome of stars, kind of like you are in a planetarium, but the real deal. I sat out there for a long time just gazing up at the sky and taking it all in! I hope more skies like this are to come because I cannot get enough of them!

The next morning we were up early to head to Walvis Bay for lunch and then set up camp in Swakopmund, a German town that dubbed itself as the adrenaline capital of Namibia.

On the way to Walvis Bay we stopped in a tiny town by the name of Solataire (population between 11 - 15 people), which has this fabulous German bakery known for their apple strudel. Don’t mind if I do!!! We also passed the Tropic of Capricorn so of course we needed to pull over for a photo shoot.

Here are our fun and fabulous guides, Maretha and Raymond! We love you guys!!!

At last we arrived at Walvis Bay with high hopes of watching flamingos as we enjoyed our lunch. Luck was on our side today because the flamingos were in full effect. Check it out!

As I mentioned, I love flamingos so here are some more pics for you! Along with the pics, I’ll give you a flamingo fun fact. Actually, let’s test your knowledge a bit here instead of me just spoon feeding you. Do you know why some flamingos are white and some are pink? If you said it was determined by diet you are a genius. As a lil’ cherry on top, the white flamingos are called Greater Flamingos and the pink ones are called Lesser Flamingos. I’m becoming quite the animal expert here. Maybe I should get my own show.

After checking out the flamingos we headed over to Swakopmund to learn about the many death defying ways we could entertain ourselves for the next few days. They played a DVD for us, highlighting the various activities and for some reason sky diving was kind of calling to me. I definitely had not planned on sky diving, but a wild hair must have shot up my buns somewhere along the way because now I found myself seriously considering it. Who am I? What the hell could I possibly be thinking to throw myself out of an airplane?

As I was trying to decide whether or not I should do it, I was nervously pacing around the room, walking up to people in my group who I have only known for a few days, grabbing them by the collar of their shirt, shoving my face into theirs, and asking them with crazy eyes if I was insane to consider such an adventure. After getting their response I would resume my psychotic walking back and forth for a few seconds before bursting into conversations between others to glean whether or not they thought I was a lunatic to attempt such a scary thing. Am I an idiot to invite potential disaster? Let’s just call me a loud maybe who remained as such for a good 20 minutes. Once I finally made my decision though I was eerily calm. Thankfully, within minutes of making my decision to jump, we were loaded into a van and whisked away to the jump site. The date was Dec. 3rd and the time was approximately 4 PM. That will remain etched in my mind forever.

As we were driving like a bat out of Hell to the jump spot, our driver, Nils, was asking everyone where they were from. Mark, an Aussie, was received warmly as were Line and Rami from Denmark, but when I piped up with “I’m from the US”, his tone dramatically changed to one of utter disgust. He groaned and I think vomit may have actually risen up his throat, but he was able to compose himself briefly enough to inform me that he hated Americans. Special. Let’s hope I’m not jumping with you, Mr. Negative. When I inquired as to why he hated all Americans he claimed it was because we lived by our watches. Really? That’s it? Geez, hate seems a bit extreme don’t you think, sir?

We were invited to go to the bar to have a pre-jump beverage and load up our cooler for our post-jump celebratory beverages and when I entered the bar I was immediately encouraged b/c my fave booty rap song of the moment (another Luda jam) was playing on the stereo followed by other sweet booty rap jams. “Ok, ok it’s a sign that everything’s going to be ok. Why else would my fave song of the moment be playing?” Whatever it takes to keep calm, right?

Thankfully, I wasn’t alone. Here are my jump buddies who I will never forget: Mark, Rami, and Line.

Within minutes of arriving at the jump sight we were given a brief, 45 second explanation of what was going to happen when we got into the air. Essentially, when we reached 10,000 feet, we would scoot over to the open door of the plane, grab the straps on our shoulders, turn out head to the side and place it on our jump master’s chest/shoulder, and then do the banana out of the plane. The banana involves tucking your legs under the plane and dangling in mid air. Of course we were strapped to our jump master, but our bodies were physically dangling out of the plane. Amazing! Why the hell am I doing this again? Once we were both out of the plane we were to extend our arms out to the side and just enjoy the ride until we were instructed to lift our feet for the landing. With the explanation completed we were then put into body suits and marched into the plane. Game on! Fingers crossed all goes well. Here we go.

As I mentioned, I was eerily calm once I made the decision to jump, but fear did start to creep in as I watched Mark and Nils approach the door.

One minute Mark was there and then the next he was gone, tearing through the air and hopefully having a ball. Within seconds we were scooting towards the door, I was doing the banana out the plane, and the next thing I knew I was falling through the air. We were free falling for 30 seconds at 220km/hr and I couldn’t believe that I was really doing it. Dries was great, screaming and cheering and inviting me to give a big thumbs up to the camera on his wrist. I was right there with him screaming and loving every second of it. I will admit that it was probably the longest 30 seconds of my life and I actually thought to myself that it was a bit long that we were falling through the air, but then the next thing I knew the chute had been pulled and we were gliding through the air. It was quiet and beautiful. It actually took my breath away. I couldn’t help gushing over and over to Dries about how much I was loving it. He gave me the reigns for a few minutes, allowing me to twist and turn the chute as I pleased. I was a bit mellow with my driving so he pumped things up a bit by pulling hard on the chute, which resulted in us spinning like crazy! I adored it and was screaming in approval as he did it again and again. Before I knew it Dries was instructing me to lift my legs for the landing, which was spot on. We were like ballerinas, barely touching the surface.

I met Mark on the tarmac and we high fived a million times, hugged and screamed about how awesome it was and how we couldn’t wait to do it again!

Rami and Line were after us so we stayed in our outfits so we could have a group photo together after. Here are some pics of Rami and Line in the air.

Once they both had landed Mark and I made our way over to see them, but we could immediately tell that Line wasn’t sharing our post-jump elation. Poor thing is afraid of heights so as you can imagine she looked majorly shell shocked. Good on you, Line, for overcoming your fears and throwing yourself out of a plane. I really don’t think it gets more hard core than that!

Here’s me and my fabulous skydive master, Dries.

Dries was wonderful from start to finish. When we were in the plane he would squeeze my shoulders and arms from time to time, telling me it was going to be great, that I’d love it, and we were going to have so much fun. Throughout the jump he was screaming words of encouragement and joy! I couldn’t have asked for anyone more reassuring and positive. Thank you, Dries! I will never forget you.

We each purchased DVDs of our jump, which we watched over a couple of beers at the jump site bar. They are awesome and totally bring you back to the experience. I wish I could post it for you, but you’ll just have to take my word for it that it rocks. If you find yourself in Namibia and you want to skydive, I highly recommend that you go with Ground Rush Adventures. They were fabulous!!!

On the drive back to our lodge, (yes I said lodge…2 much appreciated nights off from the tent.) poor Line got sick. As I mentioned, she is afraid of heights so she was still coming to terms with what she just accomplished. After yacking she felt better though so game on, friends.

When we returned to the lodge everyone was all dolled up for a dinner in town. We were still in our grimy clothes from the drive and then the jump, but we were too exhilarated to bother showering. We just jumped out of an airplane and survived so let’s celebrate. Maretha booked us reservations for a proper dinner at Napolitana. I made the mistake of getting pizza, but I tasted the springbok and kudu dishes and knew what I’d be getting the next evening. The game here is so delicious and always better than other things on the menu. Lesson learned.

After gorging ourselves we dropped some folks off at the lodge and then headed back into town to get our freak on. I was still super skank in my hiking boots and driving clothes, but who cares? I was still on a massive high from the jump and ready to boogie down. We had a great time at the club, dancing our faces off for hours. These pics are courtesy of Tarmo AKA Mr. Lobster. Thanks, Tarmo. I love these pics. What a hysterical night.

I was so surprised and happy to see Line arrive. What a trooper! You go, girl!

This dude was a total freak and was all about busting a move with our crew. You will see his favorite dance move featured below. It's kind of Thrilleresque with the arms up like a zombie.

The next morning Mark, Fabian, and I boarded a boat for a cruise with the dolphins in Walvis Bay. It was kind of overcast and chilly, but the dolphins did not disappoint. Neither did the pelicans, seagulls or seals.

This one seal learned that if it jumped up on the boat it would be rewarded with fish. He was loving it and hamming it up big time for more treats. Notice the gross gash on its backside. It’s mating season so there’s been a bit of fighting among the males.

Here’s an oyster farm.

After seal mania we were ready to see some dolphins. There’s no guarantee that we’ll see the dolphins, but thankfully they were out and about today and ready to play. Initially they steered clear of the boat, but once they were ready to play we obliged. Dolphins love swimming in the wake of the boat, leaping through the water with those cute, little smiles on their faces.

After hanging with the dolphins we were treated to a lovely snack platter and some champagne. Don’t mind if I do. Then it was off to check out some more seals that love relaxing on this one beach. As we made our approach we were practically knocked unconscious by the skank smell emanating from the shore, which we were informed was the excrement from all the seals on the beach. Yummy! The foul odor became a distant memory though once we spotted the baby seals. There were tons of them on the beach, some so new that they could barely walk. Watch this little guy as he attempts to walk. Insanely adorable!

Oops...

There are actually more seals than people in Namibia. Now that’s a lot of seals.

After our cruise we headed back into town to check email and top off our supplies for the journey ahead. It was a fabulous 2 days in Swakopmund! Who knew I’d be leaving here a sky diver? It feels great. Keep the good times coming.

I have a ton more to share with you so stay tuned for more updates shortly. It’s great to be back in touch with you all. See you soon!

#Namibia #sky diving #wildlife #Africa #overlanding #eating game #Orange River #Swakopmund #Sossousvlei #Desert #animal facts

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Waka Waka!!!!

Hey peeps and greetings from South Africa where I am meeting up with LWM for yet another adventure! Consistent with previous visits, LWM was kind enough to bring me some critical supplies for the upcoming leg of my journey, including the all important fruit and nut granola bar! Granola bars are the perfect snack on the go and impossible to find in most of the countries I have visited. As a result, I have made a point of requesting (ok, ok demanding) that anyone visiting me from the US must bring me a fresh supply. LWM has had the honor and pleasure now three times. Of course, I needed a few additional supplies for the African leg of my journey so I went buck wild with online shopping and had boxes of all kinds of goodies shipped to his house. Allow me to elaborate on what exactly I mean by goodies: 2 camera lenses (obviously I need a zoom lens for the wildlife), a sleeping bag (sister is camping for 54 days so this is a must), and some sunscreen (in case you haven’t noticed I’m a bit on the pale side). LWM graciously brought all of this for me so I’d like to extend a huge thank you to him for not only lugging a ton of stuff from the States, but also taking back an even larger load from Cape Town to the US. Three cheers for LWM!!!

As a side note, I have changed LWM’s name to Lottery Winning Millionaire so moving forward please think of him as such.

Now that we’ve got all of that sorted let’s jump into our South African adventure, shall we? Yes, let’s do that! Our first stop was to the V&A Waterfront, which was conveniently located only a few minutes from our super mack daddy apartment. It’s a lovely place to be with tons of bars, restaurants, and shops as well as this fabulous art installation made from something near and dear to my heart. Any guesses?

OK, I’ll give you a clue. Atlanta was the birthplace of the product advertised on these crates. So, any guesses?

Ok, in case you haven’t guessed it yet, I’ll give you a closer look.

Yep, it’s Coke crates and in case you didn’t know it, Atlanta is the birthplace of Coke. As you can see, LWM nearly caused an international incident by threatening to topple the Coke statue, but thankfully he did not succeed. Geez, LWM, way to get us in trouble on day 1.

We spent the rest of the day walking around, eating some delicious food, and then taking a little visit to Crazytown with many bottles of wine. I happen to love wine, but it has been either difficult to find or super expensive in most of the countries I have visited so I have had to go without. Not here in South Africa though. It’s wine mania here so you better believe that I’m going to sample as much as I can.

While imbibing the nectar of the Gods, we entertained ourselves with lots of story telling and of course stupid pictures. Here’s a pic of the puppet I got for LWM in India. Notice the nose ring. Hello awesome! I like this pic too because she kind of reminds me of Janet Jackson in her Rhythm Nation days. Work it, girl!

Throughout the trip LWM and I had fun with this little lady, who actually becomes a man if you flip her over. She generally made her appearance late in the evening after enjoying many glasses (ok, ok bottles) of wine.

The next day we decided to take the city sightseeing bus around town to get a better lay of the land. Our first stop on the tour was to Kirstenbosh, a stunning botanical garden that is filled with gorgeous sculptures, flowers, and breathtaking views of the mountains. Check it out.

There are also a ton of trails around the garden so we hiked the Skeleton Gorge for about an hour before turning around after discovering that we had about another hour to go with no water in our packs. Remember, we had a bit of wine the night before so no water plus another 3 hours hiking is probably not the best idea.

Next, we hit the Imizamo Yethu Township, which houses 16,000 people. Whoa!

While in the Township we visited Ikhaya le themba (www.ikayalethemba.com), which offers holistic care in an after school setting for children affected by HIV and AIDS. The air was filled with laughter and screams of joy as the kids packed the trucks for their big camping field trip. They were so adorable and stopped to give us hugs as they raced towards the trucks.

By the time we finished the Township tour it was late in the afternoon and we were ready to gnaw our arms off from hunger. Since nobody likes a hungry Tiffany, we stopped in lovely Hout Bay for a tasty seafood lunch. No eating meditation today. I couldn’t get the food down my throat quickly enough. Who’s attractive and feminine? Thankfully, LWM was equally as starving so he was right there with me, except of course that he takes ages to eat his food. Ok, enough about the food, let’s check out the views.

We ended the evening with another fabulous dinner and of course some wine.

The next day we visited Robben Island where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned. It’s a creepy place that can only be reached by ferry. Prior to being a prison, it served as a leper colony.

Our driver was fantastic and gave us all kinds of fun facts that weren’t part of the official tour. The crown jewel of the unofficial tour was the story of this bus.

When Robben Island was turned into a museum it struggled to stay afloat financially so a fund raiser hosted by Bill Cosby was held. Dignitaries like Kofi Annan and Hillary Clinton were to attend, but when their handlers visited the island in advance to inquire how these VIPS would be shuttled around the island it was revealed that this bus was to be their sole means of transportation. The handlers viewed this broken down bus as unsatisfactory so a posh bus that was insured for 2 million dollars was purchased for the event. They tried to bring it by ferry, but that didn’t work so they decided to air lift it by helicopter instead. Unfortunately, the straps holding the bus gave out and the bus came crashing down into the sea where it remains to this day. When the insurance company was approached about covering the accident, the claim was denied on the grounds that the bus was never intended to be airlifted by a helicopter. Wow! So after all of that the VIPS ended up being shuttled around in this beaten up old bus. Cool story, huh?

Here’s a pic of Mandela’s cell.

The guides on Robben Island are former prisoners, making the tour even more fascinating. Here’s a pic of our guide showing us the approved meals for the various ethnicities. Gross.

That’s not the worst of it though. The prisoners had to work in the quarries without sunglasses, sunscreen, or proper shoes. To this day, many of former prisoners suffer from eye problems due to the massive amounts of dust from mining the quarries. Thankfully this prison is no longer in operation.

It was a pretty intense day so LWM were thrilled to relax with yet another fabulous dinner and ridiculous amounts of wine.

The next morning we met up with Amar.

Yep, it's the same Amar who I traveled with for 3 weeks in India. Hey, Amar!!! Welcome to Cape Town. LWM and I are excited for another playmate. Let the games begin!

Our next stop on the South Africa sojourn was to Simon’s Town, specifically Boulder Beach, to visit the penguins who live there. Yes, I’m serious and I agree that it’s totally awesome! The colony started with just 2 breeding pairs in 1982 and the penguins have obviously been getting busy, as the colony has grown to about 3,000 in recent years.

One thing I learned about penguins is that they are a monogamous species and take lifelong partners. It is adorable to see them hanging with their mate.

Notice how they put their arms around each other. It’s so cute!

It’s easy to spot the penguins that don’t have a mate. Dude, someone is in desperate need of a little grooming.

Oh no I didn’t…

Yes, I did. Sorry, but sometimes the truth hurts, man.

How about another penguin fun fact? You know you want it. This penguin was previously named the Jackass penguin because of its donkey-like braying, but since several species of S. American penguins also make the same sound, these Cape Town penguins have been renamed African penguins since they are the only example of the species that breed in Africa. Interesting, huh?

Of course no trip to Cape Town would be complete without a visit to the wineries so the next day LWM, Raj, and I headed out to Stellenbosch to sample some of Cape Town’s finest wines. Delicious! Our favorite wine of the day was Le Bouquet, which came from Boschendal, the 2nd oldest winery in the country. Another highlight for me was the cow’s milk white rock with apricot cheese from the Fairview winery. Yummy! I had to have a few samples of this tasty treat.

We got home right before sunset, which meant that Amar had to make a mad dash to his hotel before all the crazies hit the streets. Unfortunately, Cape Town has a major problem with crime and come nightfall the freaks come out in full force. LWM actually had a knife pulled on him his first night in town, but the assailant was only 14 years old so he was able to grab him by the wrist and avoid injury. Nice save, LWM!

The next day we visited the District 6 Museum. In 1950 District 6 was declared a white group area, and by 1982, 60,000 people were forcibly removed from their homes, which were later flattened by bulldozers. Gross! Prepare yourselves, as the next few pictures are pretty disgusting.

A quilt project was started once the museum opened, featuring memories and hopes from the former residents of District 6. Since the ink kept fading, they decided to sew the words onto the quilt. As you can imagine, it was pretty powerful.

After the museum, we attempted to visit Table Mountain, but the winds were too strong so the mountain was closed. LAME!!!

Here’s a fun fact about Table Mountain for you. Now, they aren’t 100 % sure, but it’s believed that Table Mtn is at least 6 times older than the Himalayas, formed under the sea approximately 600 million years ago. How ‘bout that? Another interesting thing about Table Mountain is the meteorological phenomenon they call tablecloth, which causes clouds to tumble down the mountain slopes like billowing fabric. Here’s a view of the tablecloth from our balcony.

Legend has it that a retired pirate, Jan van Hunks, encountered the devil on the mountain, and in order to save his soul, challenged the devil to a smoking contest. They stoked their pipes and have been smoking ever since. Since the mountain was closed, we headed over to Camp’s Bay to check out the spectacular white beaches and turquoise water.

We walked along the coast for several hours gushing over the stunning views. Some of Cape Town’s most expensive real estate is located along the coast and it’s easy to see why. I’d love to wake up with this view every morning.

At last it was time for sunset. Bring it, baby! I’m ready for my first Cape Town sunset.

We finished the evening off with a tasty dinner of grilled calamari! We had a calamari appetizer while waiting for the sun to set and it was so delicious we returned after sunset to hook ourselves up with the entree portion. I just can’t get enough of this amazing seafood. Keep it coming, baby!

The next day was Thanksgiving so LWM and I took ‘er easy with a little shopping around town. We were super fired up for our Thanksgiving dinner at this highly acclaimed restaurant at the waterfront called Baia. OMG, words cannot express how much I adored this meal. It was, hands down, the best seafood I have ever had. Our server created a platter for us featuring their signature items and every single morsel was scrumptious.

LWM surprised me by treating me to this seafood extravaganza! Aww, thanks, LWM. I will never forget this Thanksgiving dinner. I wish I was eating it again right this second.

The next day we decided to give Table Mountain another go and fortunately for us the weather cooperated. Yeehaw!!!

The view from the top is gorgeous and LWM and I selected the trail that offers 360 degree views of Cape Town. Love it!!!

After losing our minds over the views from Table Mountain, we headed over to the waterfront to grab Amar who was supposed to be visiting Robben Island. Unfortunately though the ferries were experiencing some difficulties, which delayed his trip by a few hours. If he had taken the last ferry he would have missed sunset atop Signal Hill so obviously that was a no go. Signal Hill is the perfect place to see sunset and since it was such a stunning day, it was packed with tons of picnicking locals and tourists who arrived early to grab a prime location. Behold, Signal Hill.

After sunset we headed back to the waterfront to enjoy a tasty Thai dinner followed of course by lots and lots of wine. I’ve got to get in as much wine as possible before I start my 54 day overland camping trip through Africa, right?

Sadly, we’ve come to our last day in Cape Town. It has been such a wonderful trip and I absolutely adore this city. The 3 amigos joined forces for a farewell dinner. Tears…

Bye LWM and Amar! It was so much fun hanging with you and I can’t wait until we hang again. LWM, safe travels back to the US and thanks again for lugging so much of my crap back to the States. Amar, have a ball in Kruger and on your African journey. I’ll keep my eyes peeled for you at camp in case our paths happen to cross in Tanzania.

As for me, it’s time to embark on my 54 day overland camping trip throughout Africa. Seeing as I’ve never camped for more than 2 consecutive days, this certainly promises to be an adventure. Go huge or go home, right? Keep your fingers crossed that I survive. I’ll be in touch during my brief visits to civilization. Big hugs from Africa.

#Penguins #South Africa #Cape Town #District 6 Museum #wineries

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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My Final Days in India

It has been brought to my attention that I forgot to reveal the champion of the rummy match between myself and Amar.

Drum roll, please.

It was me!!!!!!!!!! High five. We played a few final matches in Goa and I not only took the lead, but maintained it as we added more rounds to give Amar an opportunity to catch up. Phew, I was getting a little worried there for a while, but the stars aligned and victory was mine. Sweet!

There are a few other things I forgot to mention as well. The first is that on Oct. 21st I celebrated one year of being on the road. It’s hard to believe that an entire year has gone by. I have to say that it has been one of the most memorable, special, eye-opening, and inspiring years of my life and I am so grateful to have the means to do a trip of this nature, my health, a loving family, and fantastic friends who support me in my journey. I am also so thankful for the wonderful people I have met while on the road who have helped me to learn more about myself, see things through a different lens, and be grateful for the many gifts and liberties that I enjoy. I have every confidence that my path will cross with many of these people again, as genuine friendships have been made.

The other thing I forgot to share was this ridiculous story that took place on my bday. Amar and I were walking from Baga up to Calangute and along the way we were approached by tons of people asking us to do this scratch ticket thing. We declined each time, but finally asked one of the guys what it was all about. He explained that it was a scratch and win ticket to celebrate some anniversary of this big hotel chain and that we could possibly win some prizes with no obligation whatsoever (um, yeah right). In our weakened condition from the previous night‘s festivities we decided to give it a go and it turned out that I was a big winner. The guy saw my ticket and lost his mind, jumping up and down and whooping and hollering that he had never seen anyone win the “big prize” that I had supposedly just won. If I went with him to collect my big prize, which could be any of the following: an Apple computer, $200 cash, a free trip, or a DVD player, he would get 2000 rupees, which is about the average monthly wage in India. Of course now I had to go just so this guy could get his reward. He was ecstatic and explained that in order to get my prize I had to listen to a hour presentation about the property, but there was no obligation to buy. Essentially it was a time share pitch and at this point Amar and I had no other choice but to give it a go.

Evidently there were some additional perks for the guy based on the “quality” of the people he brought in so he coached us to tell them that we were a couple that had been together for a year and we now lived together. Whatever, dude, let’s just do this. Fast forward about 2.5 hours later and we are finally wrapping up the presentation. I finally collectedt my prize and unsurprisingly it was the “free trip” which allows me to stay at one of their properties in Thailand, India, or Indonesia. There’s a ton of fine print with hidden costs so it’s not the greatest, but I’m happy we could help this guy earn a little extra cash. It’s a pretty funny story too so all in all I’d say it was worth it.

OK now that we’re all caught up, let’s dive right into my last 2 weeks in India.

Cue the music from the Incredible India commercials, please.

After leaving Goa, I headed down to Ft. Cochin to meet up with Karthik who was leading a Beaches and Backwaters tour through Kerala. His tour started the day after I arrived so we had the evening free to enjoy a tasty dinner with some of the drivers who he works with on his various tours. They were all so warm and welcoming and I immediately felt at home. They were making a mean fish curry that was finger licking good. It's such a treat to have a home cooked meal.

I love this picture! Three cheers for our psycho chef. Hahaha!

Whiskey...rarely a good idea.

We busted out a game of Indian rummy and I am pleased to say that I pulled out a victory here as well. Yeah! I’m on a roll.

The next day it was time to meet up with the group. Everyone seemed very nice and pumped up to get the tour started. The first item on their agenda was the Kathakali dance, which I had seen on my previous tour. Natalie, who was part of the tour, had been in Ft. Cochin for a few days and had already seen the Kathakali dance as well so we bagged the performance and enjoyed a leisurely evening in town. To assist us in full relaxation mode, we attempted to grab some Kingfishers, but the first day of the month is a holiday in Kerala so no beer can be served. What? How can this be? There must be a mistake. After trying about 3 other bars/restaurants we were pretty convinced that our efforts to obtain cold beer weren’t going to work so instead we enjoyed some limeade and great conversation.

We met up with the rest of the gang after the dance performance and Darren and Peter expressed a desire to grab some beers as well. Nat and I broke the holiday news to them and then asked Karthik if there was any way to get around this pesky first of the month holiday. I mean, it’s India, so anything is usually possible. Karthik said he would do his best, but he wasn’t very hopeful. I said goodbye to everyone since I was staying at another hotel, but was delighted when about 10 minutes later Natalie was knocking on my door with the great news that Karthik found a tuk tuk driver who could hook up the beer situation. Oh yeah, it is on!

We sat outside praising ourselves and Karthik for the next few hours and I knew that I had found my crew for the next week. Yahoo! It turns out that all of us had flexibility in our schedules as well, which meant more time to spend in Varkala after the tour. I love it, love it, love it!!!

The next morning we set out on the bus to Alleppey in the backwaters. Most of my people shots are courtesy of Darren. Thanks, D, for sharing. These pics are fab!

It was a tight fit, but the close quarters were conducive to massive amounts of smack talking for the long journey. We all share a love of sarcasm so you can imagine the things that we flying out of our mouths. I’m sure the other people within earshot of our conversation were wondering WTF we were talking about, but who cares? We thought we were pretty clever and hysterical so that’s all that really matters, right?

The backwaters were every bit as gorgeous as I remember them and it felt good to be back in this warm and relaxed environment.

Along the way to our next destination we stopped by a coconut fiber factory where they make rugs. It’s great to see that every part of the coconut is utilized and in such a creative way.

After Alleppey we visited Periyar. I had already done the nature reserve walk, which started at 6 AM, so I decided to sleep in and have a leisurely morning. When Natalie, my roomie, returned from the walk and notified me that they were all covered in leeches as they made their way through the reserve, it reinforced what a fabulous decision I had made to stay home. Leeches…um, no thank you. Gross me out! We spent the rest of the day shopping, stuffing our faces with delicious food, and of course washing it all down with a couple of Kingfishers.

One of the big highlights of our day was the impromptu sex show we were treated to by some monkeys on a nearby roof. All of the sudden we watched the male monkey slam the female face down on the roof and smash her face against the roof as he had his way with her. About 12 seconds later the entire thing was over and the female walked up the roof to most likely tell her female friends what a crap lover that guy was, while the guy feasted on himself. Yeah, gross. It was like string cheese with a string from his lower region to his mouth. Um, dude, really? Gross and by gross I mean awesome story to tell the rest of the group!

When we returned from dinner everyone was psyched to hang so we gathered in this little nook on the balcony and cracked ourselves up for the next few hours. What a great day!

On the way to our next destination we drove through the ultra lush and refreshingly cool tea plantations. It is such gorgeous scenery and something I will always think of when I think of south India.

Finally we reached the last stop on our trip, the beautiful, relaxing, cliff side beach town of Varkala. I had heard wonderful things about this town and I have to say that it exceeded my expectations on all accounts. It is jaw dropping gorgeous and filled with warm and kind locals, fabulous shopping, and mouthwatering food. Our first night in town happened to be Diwali, the festival of lights, which is celebrated with fireworks!! Happy Diwali!!!!!

After whooping it up with some fireworks it was time to…

And rock n’ roll we did into the wee hours of the morning.

This is our favorite guy at the bar who we named Pirate (yeah, we’re creative) and who we would continue to party down with for the next few days. We love you, Pirate!

After closing down Rock n’ Roll we decided a swim in the sea was a brilliant idea and the perfect way to end our evening. Miraculously we managed to climb down the rocks without killing ourselves and within about 3 seconds we had all stripped down to our undies and were frolicking in the sea. It was so much fun!!! After who knows how long we returned to the beach to collect our clothes, but my dress was nowhere to be found. Um…wow. Did I really lose my dress? I mean, who loses their dress? Apparently me. Fascinating! It must have been swept out to sea. I feel like it’s pretty unacceptable to lose one’s clothing, but what can you do? Great story, right?

The next morning I checked the rocks again to see if my dress was possibly stuffed into some crack, but it was nowhere to be found. Oh well.

After a much needed greasy breakfast I hit the beach with Darren, Natalie and Peter to chillax in the sun and surf. Ahhh, life is good.

This was the last day of the tour, but Darren and Peter were staying for 2 more days and Natalie and I were staying for another week. Woo Hoo!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Let the good times roll, baby.

Sadly it was time to say goodbye to our other friends, but we had a delicious final dinner and a few drinks with our favorite Pirate back at Rock n’ Roll.

In the morning we said goodbye to everyone and then set off to our new hotel, Clafouti. Cue the music from the Jeffersons because we are definitely movin’ on up!

A huge shout out (please say out with a Canadian accent) to Natalie for finding this place because it was fabulous. Check out our home for the next week.

Here’s where Pete and Darren stayed.

Nat and I were across from them in

Here’s some artwork from our casa.

Our days were pretty leisurely, usually involving some time at the beach

Some shopping

and of course happy hour! We reserved our spot for sunset in the prime, tree house location.

It really was like we were living in paradise.

I cannot stop gushing about our time here. Everything about it was so fabulous!

Our last 2 days with Pete and Darren flew by, but we made the absolute most of them tearing it up one last time with Pirate and sending the boys off with bellies full of a tasty breakfast. Bye guys! Nat and I are going to miss you. I look forward to our reunion soon! It will no doubt be gorgeous and amazing, right?!? Safe travels back to London and please, please keep in touch.

And then there were 2.

After 4 days in Varkala with the boys, we had found our favorite restaurants for various meals and quickly fell into the routine of a leisurely breakfast at either Café Del Mar or Hungry Eye and a late lunch of either Thai green curry from Hungry Eye or vegetable dumpling noodle soup with pakora and/or fries from Sea Queen. We’d change it up a bit for dinner, but the chili prawns from Café Del Mar were one of our faves and definitely got some repeat visits. Both Nat and I are freaks for good food so if we weren’t shoving our faces with tasty treats, we were discussing when our next meal would occur and what we couldn‘t wait to be eating. Ah, simple pleasures.

In addition to gorging ourselves on fabulous food, we also filled our days with beach time,

Insanely cute puppy alert!

shopping and hanging out with some of the locals, fabulous massages at Lakshmi’s place, which was conveniently located right behind our bungalow, internet, gushing over sunset,

and finally ending the evening with a little movie night back at our place. I can‘t tell you how pumped we were to have movie channels. It‘s been ages since I‘ve seen a movie, and since Nat are I were having a little detox after the boys left, it was the perfect way to have a chill evening.

The beauty of being in this town for a while is that we had an opportunity to actually get to know some locals and make some friends. Allow me to introduce you to some of my posse.

This is Ali from whom I purchased a stunning ring and Natalie had some custom earrings made. He was on our route to the beach so we’d chat him up daily.

On the left is Ashok, our preferred vendor for these cool cards that had paintings done on leaves, and Linu who worked at one of the ayurvedic spas. Linu was thrilled to practice his English so we’d have a little hang session most days.

Here’s a pic of me, Linu and Reji John.

And this is Richard who worked at the Blue Marine restaurant and loved my hat.

I don’t know this little girl’s name, but she was adorable and had a special handshake that she’d do with Natalie each time their paths crossed.

The nice thing about these shopkeepers is that many of them are related either by blood or marriage. Here are some more of the friendly faces I’d see each day.

Finally I’d like to introduce you to a special boy named Laxman aka Lucky.

I promised him I’d visit his shop and though I tried to buy something from him he didn’t have my size. When it was time for me to leave his shop he got very angry that I was leaving empty handed and kind of started yelling at me for not buying anything. I cautioned him against yelling at his customers, reminded him that I had kept my promise to visit his shop, and said my goodbyes. On my way back from the beach I passed him sulking on the stairs and for the rest of the afternoon I couldn’t get him out of my mind. I returned to his shop later that day because I did want to buy something from him and while I was waiting for one of his coworkers to fetch me another size we got to talking. I could tell that he was very smart and asked him if he went to school. He said that he was working to save money so he could go to school. He was putting his 10 year old brother through school and taking care of his 5 year old sister as well. Both of his parents had died, as well as his uncle so these 3 were on their own. Laxman is only 12 years old. That’s a ton of pressure and responsibility for such a young boy. He went on to explain that school cost 3000 rupees (about $70) for the year and he didn’t have the money yet and he was leaving Varkala to go back home on the 18th. Today was the 12th. Now I can see why he was getting so upset when I didn’t buy something. I bought my shirts and said goodbye, but I had already decided that I’d like to cover his school expenses, but I needed to think about the best way to ensure the funds actually went to his school.

I discussed my idea with Rob over Skype and he agreed that the funds needed to go directly to the school, but since school was in another town several hours away, we’d need to be a little creative. I went back to Laxman’s shop to try to verify that the story Laxman had told me was true. I spoke with the lady who ran the shop, the stunningly gorgeous, Lakshmi

And she confirmed that Laxman had no parents, but he was her husband’s cousin’s something something so she was letting him work in her shop and trying to help him when she could, though she has 3 children of her own.

The story seemed to be checking out so when Karthik returned to Varkala a few days later with another tour group, I had him speak to Laxman in the local language and get a feel for the boy to see if he thought this was legitimate. He agreed that the boy seemed very smart and agreed to help me get the money to his school. I told Laxman of my plans and gave him my contact information as well as Karthik’s phone number and instructed him to have his school call Karthik to discuss how to transfer the funds into their account, provided of course that all of this was legitimate. I gave Karthik the 3000 rupees and am waiting to hear back from him about his conversations with Laxman’s school. Thanks, Karthik, for all of your help. I so appreciate it.

I told Laxman that if he studied hard and made good grades that I would continue to help him. I really hope that he follows up with Karthik and we are able to at least take this pressure off his young shoulders. My heart goes out to this boy and I hope that this turns out to be a relationship that continues to grow and blossom for years to come.

What a special way to end my time in India, in such a spectacular place and with such fantastic people. I absolutely adore this country and am genuinely sad to leave, but I know I’ll be back.

It was now time for me to say goodbye to Natalie who was headed further south to do a yoga teacher training course. Bye, Nat, I’m going to miss you and I can’t wait to come visit you in Toronto. Have a wonderful time at your class and in Mexico with your mom and sisters. See you soon.

Thank you, India, for all that you have given me. I cannot wait to return and reconnect with all the wonderful friends I have made there.

Next stop for me is Cape Town, South Africa where I’ll meet up with LWM. Yahoo! I’m so excited to see a familiar face. I’ll be with LWM for a little less than 2 weeks and then I’ll be doing 2 months of overland touring/camping throughout Africa. My internet is going to be pretty sporadic so don’t get concerned if you don’t hear from me for a while. This bush babe is going off the grid, but will be in touch when possible.　

Huge hugs!

#India #Varkala #helping children

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makinglemonade · 13 years

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Rockin' India with my friend, Amar

Hey, hey, hey!!! Have you missed me? I’ve missed you and I’m sending huge hugs from India where I continue to have a wonderful time. I absolutely love this country and am so happy to be here again. If you read my earlier post you know that I’m on a huge high from my incredible meditation retreat and I’m all fired up to meet my friend, Amar, who I met in Rajasthan back in March. Like me, Amar is on extended travel and just so happened to be back in India so we are joining forces again to see more of this beautiful country. How fabulous!

Prior to meeting up, we exchanged a few, brief emails about places we wanted to see, but not much more than that, agreeing that it was easier to just meet up and come up with a plan. Having been in India for several months now we felt pretty comfortable just winging it. Bring it, baby!

Amar arrived at the crack of dawn, but was considerate enough not to ring my room until a decent hour. Thanks, Amar, we’re off to a great start already. We met on the rooftop of our hotel

And took in the stunning view with a cup of delicious masala chai and started to hatch our plan. Mwahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!

We both were dying to see Ladakh and Kashmir, but the combination of violence in Kashmir and snow in Ladakh made those destinations less desirable. No worries. There’s plenty of other places to visit and we both fully intend to return to India again so we’ll get there one day.

Thankfully Amar had some down time while at the ashram where he was staying in the south as well as a guide book so he was kind enough to start outlining a rough itinerary based on the cities we had expressed an interest in seeing. Within a few minutes we had ourselves a sweet itinerary for the next 3 weeks. Yippie, yahoo, hooray, yeah puppy! We weren’t sure how long we wanted to stay in each city so we didn’t make any hotel reservations, deciding instead to pick a place when we reached each destination and play it by ear.

With our plans sorted, we set off into Dharamsala to see the sights. Of course our first stop was to visit the Dalai Lama’s temple complex, but along the way I made Amar pop into a shop I had spotted a few days earlier containing some earrings I loved to see if he could get a better price. Amar speaks Hindi so I thought he might get hooked up with local prices. As it turns out, the shopkeeper tried to charge him more than me, but they settled on my original price. Oh well. It was certainly worth a try and Amar picked up some cufflinks as well. Win, win all around, folks.

After Dharamsala we headed to Amritsar to see the famous Golden Temple, which is the Sikh’s holiest temple. Before entering any Sikh temple, one must first wash his/her feet and also apply a headscarf. Even the boys had to wear the headscarves.

The temple is beautiful, especially at night, but we’ll get to that later.

To see the inside of the temple we had to wait in this incredibly long line, but the priests inside the temple keep up a continuous chant from their holy book, which is broad casted throughout the complex. It’s actually quite relaxing and made the time in line fly by.

Upon leaving the temple, visitors are invited to have some sweets.

After visiting the temple we headed to the border between India and Pakistan to witness the famous Wagah border closing ceremony.

I had actually never heard of this before, but Amar was in the know and I’m so glad because the closing ceremony was quite a sight to behold. One can’t help take notice of the elaborate hat worn by the guards, but it’s the actual ceremony that takes it over the top.

Before the ceremony begins, the crowd is fired up with the chanting of “Hindustan Zindabad” (long live India) and booming music that results in the masses taking to the main avenue to boogie down. It was awesome! After a few songs the guards would reign in the crowds and instruct them to sit, but within seconds they’d crank up the music and everyone would again rush to the strip to shake their booties! I absolutely loved their enthusiasm and their pride for India, as well as the vibrant soul the Punjabi people.

As you can see, the India side was jam packed. Amar and I estimated that there were probably about 1,000 people there.

Contrast this with the Pakistan side. Crickets…

Even though the attendance on the Pakistan side was weak, when the ceremony got underway the attendees did get fired up. As the sun was setting the ceremony began.

I don’t even know where to begin with the ceremony, folks. It was insanely over the top and I adored every second of it. The female guards got things started with crazy speed walking

And exaggerated swinging of their arms. Their arms were shooting up so high that I’m shocked they didn’t dislocate their shoulders. No joke. It’s absurd, and by absurd I of course mean awesome! After the female guards paraded down to the border and back a few times it was the boys' turn to join the party. We noticed the men getting themselves all pumped up with forceful exhales and crazy eyes, but nothing could prepare us for what followed. The men would do some kind of stomping routine and then kick one of their legs up as high as possible. These guys were flexible too, frequently kicking the top of their hats with their boots. The head guy was so good I thought he might actually knock himself unconscious. After the leg kick they would walk as fast as possible at a 45 degree angle with the same exaggerated arm swinging the ladies displayed earlier. Sadly, I didn’t capture any pics of the leg kick, but I did manage to get this crappy one of their arms.

As you can imagine, the crowd was losing it! With all the people it was tough to see the Pakistan side, but we could see the guards were in similar outfits and they were also engaging in the insane leg kicks. After the parading back and forth for about 20 - 30 minutes, it was time to lower the flags and close the border for the evening. Who knew a border closing ceremony could be so fun? It was over the top awesomeness from start to finish and absolutely worth a visit! After the ceremony we headed back to the Golden Temple to check out the scenery at night. Gorgeous!

We were originally planning to stay in Amritsar for the evening, but decided instead to bang out a few hours on our long drive to Manali, finding a random hotel along the way. Our driver, Dinesh, knew of a place about halfway between Amritsar and Manali, which we reached late at night. It had the appearance of a nice place, but after about 2 seconds in the water in the shower slowed to a trickle and then tapered off further to a drip. Neat. Oh well, we were exhausted from our trip and just happy to have a place to sleep.

The next morning we set out for Manali, which is in the mountains and absolutely gorgeous. The air smelled so clean and fresh and we found a cute place to stay right in the heart of town. We had one of the best meals I have had since arriving in India, the tandoori trout. This region is known for their trout and the tandoori preparation was out of this world. Before the meal was even over I notified Amar that we’d be eating this exact same meal again tomorrow. Thankfully he was as pumped as I was about the meal so I we didn’t have to have a fight. Kidding!

After dinner we decided to sample some of the fruit wine, which is unique to this area. We tried apple (sick), pear (better) and strawberry (best) over a ferocious game of gin rummy. After two rounds it was neck and neck with one victory apiece. The battle for the rummy crown would continue throughout the journey, but the winner will not be revealed until later.

The next morning we were pumped to stretch our legs and do some hiking. The scenery was stunning and the weather was absolutely perfect.

We chose to do the Solang Valley walk, which follows the Beas river and meanders through many small villages. After all that time in the car it was wonderful to get some exercise, see the stunning countryside, visit some temples and meet some of the locals.

After the walk we gorged ourselves on some tandoori trout and then returned to the room to continue the vicious gin rummy battle. I sucked big time this night, allowing Amar to take the lead. Lame!

The next morning it was back on the road to Shimla, another charming mountain town and the capital of the state of Himachal Pradesh. The town is literally built into the side of the mountain and has a very colonial vibe.

We visited the Jakhu Temple, which is dedicated to Hanuman, the monkey god, and there are tons of monkeys all over the place.

Evidently they can get pretty violent so visitors are advised to walk with a stick and remove all caps, eye wear, etc. While we were there we witnessed a monkey rip the glasses off a woman’s face and scurry up the tree. They threw the monkey a snack to entice it to drop the glasses, which it did, but down the cliff. Suckage.

Amar and I made it out of the temple unscathed and spent the rest of the afternoon meandering down Mall Street, the main avenue with tons of restaurants and shops. We found a cute place for dinner with a spectacular view for sunset.

Amar and I both indulged in lamb, which we enjoyed, but not as much as the tandoori trout. Man, just thinking about it makes my mouth water. If you ever see it on a menu, order it immediately!! Of course you know we capped the evening with more rummy and I’m sad to report that Amar continued his lead, but don’t count me out yet because we have several more weeks for me to redeem myself…hopefully.

There are 3 toy trains in India and one of them happens to be in Shimla so you know we had to give it a go. We've both been on the one in Ooty so that leaves only one left to go in Darjeeling, which is totally on my list for next time.

We met up with Dinesh in the next town and continued our journey on to Rishikesh, which was made famous by the Beatles and is now the self proclaimed yoga capital of the world. Like Manali and Shimla, Rishikesh offers stunning mountain scenery and a laid back vibe.

We found a hotel right by the Lakshman Jula bridge and an adorable restaurant across the street, which had Mexican food!!! OMG, I was so happy to see Mexican food on the menu. There are few foods I miss, but Mexican is definitely one of them. While I can’t say that it was the best Mexican food I’ve had, it was pretty decent and a refreshing change from the same ole Indian menu we’d been seeing for weeks.

During the day we did some light hiking and touring of the town. The locals were gearing up for the Dussehra festival, celebrating the victory of the Hindu god Rama over the demon king, Ravana…essentially the triumph of good over evil. They erected this huge paper mache statue on the beach, which was going to be burned later that evening. Obviously, Amar and I were all about it!

The folks on the other side of the river were getting pumped up with firecrackers and wild screams.

Hanuman, the monkey god, was a good friend to Rama and helped him rescue his girlfriend, Sita, after her kidnapping and incarceration in Sri Lanka. As part of the Dussehra festival a huge parade of local boys dressed up as Hanuman and his monkey friends walked through the streets accepting blessings from shopkeepers and delighting everyone in their path. They were led by drummers who were going nuts on the drums to get the crowd fired up. It was awesome!!!!

Later that afternoon, we headed over to the mother Ganges to check out the sight for the ganga aarti ceremony (river worship ceremony) taking place at sunset on the riverside.

As you probably know, the Ganges is a holy river and sacred to Hindus. Pilgrims from all over India and the rest of the world come to bathe in its cleansing and healing waters. Amar and I have both been to Varanasi and we were both a little hesitant to let any part of our body touch the Ganges, but this region is where the Ganga actually starts so the water quality was about a million times cleaner. Like in Varanasi, pilgrims were bathing in its waters. The current was pretty strong in places though so bathers needed to hold on tight!

Notice the swollen foot on the guy in the shot and how he’s pouring the holy water over his injury to help heal it. I hope Mother Ganga works her magic for this guy.

Amar was all about the Ganges, perhaps a little bit too enthusiastic, throwing himself into the water and screaming like a madman, “Ganga Ma, Ganga Ma” (Mother Ganges) over and over again. It seemed a bit excessive to me and even the locals were looking at him like he was mad, but to each his own, right?

Ok so maybe I’m exaggerating a bit about Amar’s reaction, but I could tell he was pumped and probably thinking about something similar in his head.

The ceremony was similar to the one I attended in Varanasi, but more intimate, which I definitely preferred. The music being performed at the ceremony is beautiful. The singers voices are so crisp and clear you almost think you are listening to a CD, but it’s the real deal. It really feels special to be sitting along the banks of the Ganges taking in the blessings. Here are some pics of the ceremony.

There are tons of Sadhus around the Ganga. This guy was one of my favorites.

He must have been training this white guy you’ll see in the shot below. This dude seemed like he was new to things as he didn’t really know what to do, but when one of the songs that he knew was sung, he joined in with reckless abandon. That’s what I like to see.

Here is a pic of my offering to be released into the Ganges.

Amar and I both released offerings into the holy water.

Sadly, one of them hit a floating log and capsized. Deciding that can’t be good, we rescued the banana leaf boat and reinserted the contents and sent that baby on its way. Hopefully our wishes will come true.

After the ganga aarti ceremony we blasted back into the heart of town to catch the finale of the Dussehra festival where they light the statue on fire!!!

Burn, baby, burn! What we didn't realize as we were closing in to take photos of the fire was that the burning statue was actually filled with fireworks that shot into the crowd. Neat! I almost became Mask trying to get these photos for you so I hope you enjoy them. They are pretty sweet if I do say so myself.

What an amazing day!!! I feel so lucky to have been in Rishikesh during this ceremony. It was a huge highlight of the trip and something I will never forget.

The next day we headed over to Haridwar to take in the ganga aarti ceremony there, which is supposed to be even better than the one in Rishikesh. Amar and I were a bit skeptical of this when we arrived in Haridwar, which may very well be the dirtiest and most disgusting town I have visited in my 3.5 months in India. It was heinous. We actually saw a dog that had one of its paws gnawed off. I don’t know if the dog bit off his own paw or got into a fight with one of the hundreds of mangy looking dogs around town, but it was red and raw and totally grossed us out. Originally we planned to stay here overnight, but after walking around town and being grossed out by almost everything we saw, we decided it was best to just check out the ceremony and power through to Delhi where we’d catch our flight to Jodhpur the next day.

Here are some sights along the Ganges.

This little boy was super psyched for us to take his picture, busting out his Hanuman mask from the Dussehra festival.

At long last it was finally time for the ganga aarti ceremony.

We weren’t really sure how this was going to work since the shore was dry to allow folks to “clean up” a bit. It didn’t really seem like the emphasis was on cleaning up the shore, but what do I know?

Minutes before the ceremony was to begin, they allowed the water to flow. Ok, ok now we’re talking here. It seemed strange to have a ganga aarti with no ganga. You’ll see the guys in the shot below are shoveling away sand so that the offerings could flow freely.

I have to say that this was the best ganga aarti ceremony I have seen yet. Haridwar did not disappoint in this regard. Amar and I were both skeptical, but it delivered big time. Check it out.

After the ceremony concluded we hightailed it out of there and made the long journey down to Delhi. On the outskirts of Delhi we must have had some tire trouble because Dinesh pulled over on the side of the road to have our tires examined. The “tire shop” was just a stack of tires on the side of the road with a few dudes sitting in chairs screaming and laughing at nothing. Within seconds of stopping it was clear that the guys had been boozing their faces off for hours so that explains the senseless screaming and laughing. No judgment. Who hasn’t been there, right? Anyhow, these guys definitely were too hammered to properly fix the tire so after about an hour of sitting there we finally set off on our way. Cool.

The next afternoon we arrived in Jodhpur, the blue city, and were delighted to find this fabulous hotel, Devi Bhawan, complete with a swimming pool. Woo Hoo!!! We had stayed at some pretty meh places on this journey so it was a welcome change to stay in a nice place. Bring it, baby!

We threw our bags down in the room and immediately set out for the pool and a couple of Kingfishers. No sightseeing today. Just a little R&R. Ahhh, it was perfect.

In the morning we set out for Mehrangarh Fort.

One of the big draws of this fort is the sati marks, which are hand prints of the maharajah Man Singh’s widows who threw themselves upon his funeral pyre in 1843.

Here are some more pics inside of the fort.

After the fort we headed over to the Jaswant Thada, a white marble memorial to maharajah Jaswant Singh II.

Then we made a quick loop through the market area, where I was told by one of the locals that I looked like a doll, complete with sign language to show me that he did indeed mean a toy doll. Hmm, that’s a new one. Oh well, I guess there are worse things.

After the market we headed over to the “garden,” which was basically some grass and trees. Most of Rajasthan is a desert so maybe grass = garden there? Not sure, but Amar and I were a huge hit with the locals there. They couldn’t get enough of us, wanting to shake our hands, have us take their picture, and even have us photograph their new baby!

They must have been picking up on the doll vibe too because in addition to touching my skin and stroking my arm, a few of them even reached up to pinch my cheek like you would do to a small child. I’ve got to be honest, I wasn’t in love with the cheek pinching, but I did love these kids. They were so enthusiastic and sweet and made the gardens more interesting than a stroll on some grass.

For our last sightseeing adventure of the day we headed to the Umaid Bhawan Palace, which took 3,000 workers 15 years to complete. Geez Louise!

Later that night Amar and I had a delicious dinner and resumed the rummy playing. Much to my dismay, Amar not only retained, but extended his lead. It’s not looking too good for me here, folks, but the trip isn’t over yet so I remain hopeful that I can whip his butt!

The next morning it was off to Jaisalmer where we took in the sunset at the Sam Sand Dunes. Since we’ve both been on camels multiple times now we decided to skip the came ride and have our own fun to wait for the sun to set. The shots below were taken by Amar and they are definitely keepers.

We decided to have some fun with the timer. You can see our multiple attempts for the money shot!

Here we are walking back triumphantly, knowing that we got the perfect shot. Holla!

Ok, one more shot. Get ready...

get set...

go!!!!!!!!! Yep, this is def. the best shot of the evening. We rule!

Are you ready for sunset?

The next morning we visited the fort, which unlike in Jodhpur, has people living within. It’s actually quite cool with narrow streets and alleys containing shops, restaurants, and some Jain temples sprinkled throughout.

The Jain temples were the big highlight for me, as the carvings were so intricate and detailed out of the golden sandstone unique to Jaisalmer.

We also visited the Patwa-Ki-Haveli and the Gadi Sagar, which is interesting because it was created by a famous prostitute. Evidently she had asked the maharajah if she could build a gate leading to the tank that supplied water to the city. He refused permission on grounds that he’d have to pass under it to go to the tank, which was beneath him. When he was away she had it built anyway and put a Krishna temple on top to ensure that the king wouldn’t tear it down. You’ve got to give it to her, the girl’s got spunk.

After our day of sightseeing we capped it off with another sunset in the tiny village of Khuri. Let’s just say this village left a little something to be desired, but Amar did manage to find himself a nice Rajasthani girl that he may even end up marrying one day. Who knows what can happen, right?

Even though the town was kind of a dud, the dunes were great and such a fun place to see the sunset and watch the moon.

And now for the last part of our journey Amar and I will be heading down south to Goa and Hampi. We are ready for some serious chillin' and couldn’t wait to hit the beach. We had a delicious seafood dinner, a couple of Kingfishers and listened to the band play covers of songs we knew and loved! So relaxed.

The next morning we set out for the ruins of Hampi, stopping at a spice plantation along the way.

Let me see that thoooooooooooooooong...that thong, th-thong, thong, thong!!!

Hampi is a very unique landscape and unlike other places I‘ve seen in India. It was a very relaxed and laid back vibe too, which was definitely what Amar and I were looking for at this point in our journey.

This temple over here supposedly marks the birthplace of Hanuman.

After Hampi it was back to Goa, specifically Baga beach. Our driver to Hampi, Sachen, recommended this awesome restaurant called Mum’s Kitchen on the way back to Baga, which was absolutely fantastic. Pomfret is the local specialty here in Goa and it did not disappoint. We got the pomfret curry and it was spectacular. It’s definitely up there with the tandoori trout and if you are in Goa you must try this restaurant. It ruled!!! Of course you know we had to visit the churches of old Goa as well. Pretty!

The rest of our time in Goa was filled with eating, drinking, playing rummy, lounging around, and of course taking in lots of stunning sunsets. I couldn’t think of a better place to celebrate my birthday!

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday dear Tiff, happy birthday to me!!!!

Thanks to everyone for the emails and messages through Facebook wishing me a happy birthday. I was so thrilled to check email and see the outpouring of warm wishes. Thank you so much. It means so much to me. Amar and I celebrated my bday in style!

This is Oct. 26th, the eve of my birthday. Of course you know that once it hit midnight we were full on with my bday celebration. Neither of us felt awesome on my actual bday, but we pulled ourselves together and had another fun night.

Cow alert! Jenny, there are a lot of cows around here!!! Hahaha.

Now it's time for Amar's bday celebration. His bday isn't until Nov. 16, but as a fellow Scorpio we decided an early bday celebration was in order. I sneakily asked the staff to bring us some cake with candles and lots of embarrassing singing, but once our dinner arrived and it was enough to feed a small country I decided against the dessert and opted for something light and refreshing like a vodka shot. I asked the staff to whoop it up for Amar's bday and make a scene, but clearly something was lost in translation because one dude came over and just handed us both the drinks. Um, not really what I had in mind, guys, but whatever.

To Amar! Happy Birthday, my friend. May the next year bring you happiness, health and much success.

Here's the smiling bday boy who wasn't smiling quite as much when the band sang him Happy Bday and I proceeded to holler and clap like a freak with them. Whatevs, man, as if I'm not going to get pumped up for a bday. Pahlease!

On our walk home to Baga beach from Calangute where we sufficiently embarrassed Amar, we met the sweetest and most adorable dog we named Vasco, pronounced Wasco. There are tons of skank dogs running around Goa, but this little guy was so darn cute we couldn't help but give him lovin'. He loved us too and followed us around for the rest of the evening.

Drew and Rob, doesn't Wasco remind you of Lu and even Brandy a bit? Maybe this is part of the reason I was so obsessed.

These photos are also courtesy of Amar. Thanks, man!

Along the way we happened to see a fire dance. Sweet! Unlike my last fire dance viewing experience, this time the flame did not shoot out of the performer's hand and land in my lap. Phew!

Sadly it was time for Amar and I to part ways. We had such a great time traveling together and it was so nice to have a travel companion for such an extended period of time. Amar was off to Sri Lanka and I'll be heading down south to finish my last two weeks in India in a laid back and relaxed place.

Safe travels to Sri Lanka, Amar, and thanks for all the planning and translating you did to make our trip so easy and breezy. I hope our paths cross again in Africa. Take care and I'll see you soon.

As for me, I still had two days in Goa to slobber on myself, eat some delicious seafood, and of course take in some sunsets. No probs. That's totally up my alley.

Cheers to my last night in Goa. What a beautiful place to spend my birthday and finish up my fabulous trip with Amar. I'll be in touch shortly with more adventures from South India. Hugs!

#India #Rishikesh #Manali #Haridwar #ganga aarti #Shimla #temples #Amritsar #Goa #sadhu #Indian festivals

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makinglemonade · 14 years

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Thank You, India

Hello and greetings from Dharamsala, India where I am about to start my 10 day, silent meditation retreat at Z Meditation. I am so excited for this retreat and have been looking forward to it for months. I have always wanted to meditate, but each time I have tried by myself my mind is all over the place and I get frustrated and end up bagging it within a few minutes. One exercise Z Meditation recommends you try to get a sense of the restlessness of your mind is to inhale and think “Om” and then exhale and count down from 100.

So that’s inhale “Om”, Exhale “100”

Inhale “Om”, Exhale “99”

OK, I think you get the picture. When your mind shifts to some kind of random thought, stop yourself and start over again. Try it out and see what you discover. If you are anything like me you’re average will be somewhere around 96 - 98. In fact, I think my best was only 91. Wow! Not very impressive, Tiff.

In addition to learning how to still my mind, I wanted to learn more about being present. For years I had been hearing about the need to be present and mindful, but I’m not sure that I ever really understood what that meant. I mean, I’m not a total idiot. I do understand the concept of being present, but I wasn’t sure how to really tap into it.

I arrived a day early to catch up on some rest after back to back tours through Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco. The last thing I wanted to do was pass out while I was supposed to be meditating. I slept like a little baby and woke up to a delicious breakfast of hot cereal, dried fruit, and nuts. Yummy to my tummy!

A lovely lady from Delhi was also attending the retreat and invited me to join her on a little field trip to Tsuklakhang Temple, which is the residence, monastery, and temple of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama. Amazing!!! We hopped into a jeep jam packed full of locals and within a few minutes we were at the temple. I can’t describe how special it felt to be there. I have visited a lot of temples during my travels throughout Asia, but this place just had such a peaceful and warm energy emanating from it. I felt so lucky to be there. Here are a few pics from in and around the temple.

We arrived back at Z Meditation with about an hour to spare before meeting the rest of the folks on our retreat. I took the opportunity to write in my journal, something I sadly suck at doing on a regular basis, but manage to attend to every now and then, expressing my sincere hope that this retreat will help provide me with direction about what I want to do after this experience comes to a close. It’s actually been on my mind quite a bit lately and stresses me out every time I think about it, but since I’m not independently wealthy and cannot continue this adventure forever, I must start thinking thoughtfully about what comes next. Ugh!

Before we meet the group, how about I give you a tour of my home for the next 10 days. This is the view from the terrace right outside my door. Hello gorgeous! Talk about inspiring!!!

This is the terrace outside my bedroom. Those windows lead into my room. Talk about a sweet location!

These are the stairs leading up to the rooftop, one of my favorite spots at Z Meditation. I made a point of being up here at least once per day.

And here is the spectacular view from the rooftop!

This is the library, which had tons of inspirational and interesting books for us to read during our stay.

This is the meditation hall where we spent most of our time. My seat is the first one on the right, closest to the wall.

Here’s a view from the other side. You can see the yoga mats where we did our afternoon practice. My spot was on the back row, far right, closest to the window.

Of course you know Ganesh, the remover of obstacles, was there to help still our restless minds.

And this is the area where we’d clean our dishes after our meals.

Ok, now that you’ve got a lay of the land, let’s meet the rest of the group, which consisted of 5 travelers from the Czech Republic: Petr (the leader of the pack and translator), Dasha, Marek, & Roman (a mother and 2 of her sons), and Blanca (a lovely lady with a beautiful smile). Everyone was extremely friendly and I immediately got a wonderful vibe about the people and this experience. Suruchi, one of our hosts, welcomed us all and gave us the daily schedule along with some ground rules. We were given a chance to ask any questions we might have about the retreat and then the silence began. Fingers crossed that I can keep the silence. Even if you’ve never met me, you can probably tell from my posts that sister likes to talk her face off!

Here’s our daily schedule:

7:00 -8:30 AM Meditation Philosophy and Practice

Ajay, our other host, introduced us to the Deep Deconditioning Inquiry, a system for getting in touch with the deep and sometimes hidden emotions and feelings behind our “thoughting.” Thoughting is involuntary and consists of the random, mostly incoherent thoughts that run through our minds daily, frequently creating relationships that do not exist.

He taught us that in order to meditate we need to snap ourselves out of these daydreams and learn how to be aware, be present. Oh goody, learning how to be present. Bring it, Ajay!

An easy example that Ajay provided of how to do the inquiry involved this couple named Susan and Martin. Martin was supposed to remember to pack the soap for the meditation retreat, but he forgot and Susan was pissed. Each time Susan would attempt to meditate, her feelings related to Martin’s disorganization would invade her mind.

So, let’s apply the inquiry to the Susan/Martin example. Each time thoughting disturbs your mind (ex: I am annoyed that Martin forgot to pack the soap), ask yourself a series of questions to help you realize that what you were daydreaming about is not relevant, useful or conducive to peace in this moment. It is important to remember that this moment is the only reality. What happened in the past cannot be changed and what’s going to happen in the future is out of our control. Nature is in the driver’s seat as far as the future is concerned so there is no need wasting time now, fretting about what will be. What is, is and what will be, will be.

Live in the now and accept it fully. When you eat, eat and when you walk, walk. How simple, right? It’s easier said than done, but it’s something that you can continually remind yourself to do when you notice your mind drifting off.

Further, you are to identify the likes and dislikes represented in the thought (ex: I like when people are organized) and then dig deeper to see what other consequential feelings resulted from these likes and dislikes (when people are disorganized I feel anxious and annoyed). Then you are to think about the incompleteness equation that exists (I + hyper organization = completeness). The answer to this and all other equations that include something external as being the ticket to your happiness/completeness is always NO!! The correct equation is I = Completeness or I = C. After breaking down the incompleteness equation, you must discover what conditionings that you have received since birth that lead to the wrong thinking (ex: people should be organized and considerate). If you think this is right, you are wrong, pal! Time to change your thinking.

Finally, after identifying all the various factors involved in these incorrect thoughts, you are to flip the conditioning around (I accept people as they are) and internalize the correct response.

I‘m not sure if all of this makes sense to you or not, but I can tell you after 10 days of intensive explanation, examination, and practice it opened my eyes to an entirely new way of thinking and I was actually able to meditate for the first time in my life. Of course, I spent a lot of time doing the inquiry, but that’s OK, because it’s really helpful to see the kinds of things that consume your thoughts and keep you from realizing your best self.

8:30 - 9:30 AM Meditation Practice/Profound Assignment

After Ajay’s lesson we’d meet with Suruchi to meditate and practice what we learned in the earlier class and then we’d be given a writing assignment for deep contemplation. I loved the writing assignments because they really made you think about things and put them into words.

9:30 - 10:30 AM Eating Meditation

This was actually kind of hard for me. Like the other members of my family, I love to eat and I shovel it down my throat at the speed of light. There is zero time for reflection or even awareness about what I’m eating. Usually when I’m eating, I’m combining it with a million other things such as watching TV, talking on the phone or with my dinner colleagues, messing around on the computer, etc. I rarely pay any attention to the act of eating.

I have to confess that I’m not sure if I really got the eating meditation down. I’d create taste tests and contests for myself,

What is this fruit that I am eating? Do I like the yellow one or the green one better? Yep, I definitely prefer yellow, but I think they are the same fruit and the yellow one is more ripe.

or, as I was eating my peanut butter coated toast, I would be thinking things in the voices of cartoon characters like Homer Simpson,

mmm…melty, gooey deliciousness.

And sometimes, I’d think stupid things like

I’ve never really noticed an almond before. It’s actually quite pretty with these striations. If I was going to draw an almond, I would have just drawn a brown oval. Now I will know to add the lines.

Yeah, probably not what Ajay and Suruchi had in mind, but at least I was thinking about the food, right? A few days into the retreat, Suruchi reminded us to chew properly, gulp our liquids slowly, to eat mindfully, being aware of the taste, to eat with gratitude and thankfulness, and to just enjoy the experience. I’ve got some work to do in this department, but we’re all works in progress, right?

9:30 - 10:30 AM The Shower of Love

Yep, this is a shower. I’d generally take my shower after the creative meditation or after nap time later in the day before yoga so during this time I’d frequently sit out on the terrace and enjoy the beautiful scenery.

11:30 AM - 1:00 PM Creative Meditation

Each day we were given a topic and asked to contemplate it and then turn it into art. As I think I mentioned before, drawing is not really my forte, and that’s being extremely diplomatic. See what I mean…hopeless!

That which is inevitable does not disturb me.

Everybody is acting impulsively. I don't take anything personally.

May I be granted the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.

That black blob in the bottom left box is a brain. Nice! I realize my drawings are very literal and make me seem like such a simpleton, but as you can see my drawing ability is extremely limited, not advancing much past 1st grade when little kids draw their teachers pictures of rainbows, so I've gotta work with what I've got here, folks.

What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly.

I'm getting better here. Notice the shading of my hair to include both blonde and brown. Go Tiff!

OK, I won't subject you to any more of my brutal visual representations. I'm sure Ajay and Suruchi had to share some laughs each time they reviewed my "masterpieces."

1:00 - 2:00 PM Eating Meditation

2:00 - 4:00 PM Siesta/Study

All that meditating actually wears one out. I was thrilled to have time for a nap. Some days I’d have time for a walk as well, which was always great.

Here's a picture of the center. What an inspiring place to be!

On one of my walks these adorable little kids kept riding past me and finally got up the courage to talk to me and ask me my name. Not wanting to break the silence, I did some jacked up gesticulating to try to convey that I couldn’t talk. They looked at me like I was a total freak and biked away. Oh well. Whatevs, I kept the silence. Way to go, Tiff. You are awesome! Woo Hoo!!!

I have to admit that on the 8thday of the retreat I did cheat a bit and break the silence on a walk with one of my fellow retreaters. I know, I know, but I’m still pumped that I made it 8 days. Cut me some slack, I’m a work in progress.

4:00 - 6:00 PM Meditative Yoga

I loved this part of the day. As you know from earlier posts, I have done some yoga and really enjoy it. This yoga was very relaxed, focusing on breathing and paying attention to your breath. We did do some asanas, but nothing too hard core. That’s probably better for me too since my back is still a bit jiggidy jacked from when I messed it up in the States.

Petr sat across from me during yoga and we’d occasionally make faces at each other during some of the poses. Apparently I don’t just draw like a 6 year old, but I have the maturity level of one as well. I was generally able to keep my cool, but one day when we were doing the finger stretching exercise Petr surprised me by flicking me off, which sent me into a spiral of laughter. I don’t know why I found it so funny, but I just wasn’t expecting it at all. It just seemed so out of place in this peaceful, calm, and serene environment where we are being aware of our breath and mindful of the way our body is stretching. I couldn’t reign it in for a few minutes. Ever since I was a little girl I have had a hard time reigning in my laughter once it gets going in settings where laughter is totally and completely inappropriate. I teetered on the edge of composure for the rest of the class, keeping my eyes closed for fear of another outburst. Yikes, pull it together, Tiff!

6:00 - 6:30 PM Drinking Light

This was a little snack and some kind of tea or juice. After the snack, I’d zip out to the terrace or the roof to take in the sunset. We had some amazing sunsets here. Check out the various sunsets I saw over the course of 10 days. Hello, gorgeous!

One of the most beautiful sunsets was on my mother’s birthday, October 1st. I was really happy to be in this loving and peaceful setting on this day. While I cannot pretend that I wasn’t sad, I was in a healthier frame of mind than I was this time last year. I felt my mom’s presence with me as I looked out into the sky and my heart was filled with love.

These are my buds, Petr and Marek.

We’d frequently meet up on the roof to enjoy the sunset and sometimes goof off before the PM meditation class.

Is laughing out loud allowed during a silent mediation retreat? If not, then we are guilty of breaking the silence here yet again. As they say in Czech, saratchka!

6:30 - 8:00 PM Meditation Philosophy, Practice, and Q/A

This is similar to the 7 AM class. In addition to the inquiry, Ajay taught us 6 mantras that help our mind reside in the truth during meditation. The mantras are absolute truths that can be verified by anyone, anytime. When you say the mantra in your mind, you are to contemplate the meaning and integrate it into your life. If thoughting occurs, you are to stop and do the inquiry. They really work! Once we started to introduce the mantras into our meditations, I was actually able to be fully present with a still mind for a few minutes at a time. Of course, my mind would wander sometimes, frequently from me enthusiastically thinking to myself “you‘re doing it, Tiff. You‘re meditating. You go, girl,” but after checking myself or breaking it down through the inquiry, I could bring myself back to the moment. It was amazing!

8:00 - 8:45 PM Eating Mediation

The food here was scrumptious! I always looked forward to the eating meditation even if I sucked at the actual meditation part.

3 cheers for our lovely chef!!!

8:45 - 9:15 PM Story Time

During this time Suruchi would read us inspirational excerpts from the great masters. It was always insightful and a relaxing way to unwind.

9:15 - 10:00 PM My Life Meditation - Profound Assignment

This was another writing assignment where we’d explore a particular topic and relate it to our lives. As I mentioned earlier, I loved these writing exercises. When you are forced to write something down you really explore what’s going on in your head.

10:00 PM Yogic Sleep

I rarely went to bed at 10 because every night I was out on the terrace outside my room gazing up at the stars. Man, there are a few things I never tire of seeing and a vast, starry sky is one of them. Sunsets are another, which you’ve probably figured out by now given the hundreds of sunset shots I’ve featured in this blog over the past year.

The 10 day retreat flew by and before I knew it, it was time to say goodbye (insert tears). Here is a picture of our posse and our wonderful, inspiring, and patient teachers, Ajay and Suruchi.

Thank you for a wonderful, eye-opening and amazing experience. I feel like I have learned an entirely new way of thinking that will benefit me for the rest of my life. The Z Meditation approach to meditation is so clear and easy to understand. I am filled with overwhelming gratitude and appreciation for the invaluable knowledge and right understanding I have received over the past 10 days and I truly cannot believe how much I learned in such a short period of time. Thank you so much!

When I started planning my trip I knew I wanted to come to India and for some reason I selected February 14th, Valentine’s Day, to come to India for the first time. I just had this feeling that I would find love in India. I never dreamt this love would be with myself. I=C. How very beautiful.

We all hugged about a million times and gushed about how amazing our experience was together. Despite the silence and some language barriers, I felt an intense and immediate camaraderie with everyone on this trip. I am so grateful for this experience. My heart is bursting with love.

My new Czech friends were continuing on to Mcleod Ganj to do some hiking and catch one of the Dalai Lama’s teachings at the temple where I visited the first day. They invited me to come along with them so you know I jumped at the chance. Seeing the Dalai Lama in person at his home in Dharamsala following this beautiful and life changing experience at Z Meditation, count me in for sure!!!

We started with a visit to Chamunda. To get there we walked along this beautiful path right outside the center and then picked up a bus to the actual temple.

And here are some pics from Chamunda.

After visiting the temple we took a cab back to Z Mediation, grabbed our bags and said one last goodbye to Suruchi and headed off to Mcleod Ganj. The next morning we had the most delicious breakfast on the rooftop at Carpe Diem. What a fabulous name for a breakfast joint! The staff there is so nice and the setting is incredible.

After stuffing our faces we shot over to the Tsuklakhang Temple where we heard the Dalai Lama give one of his teachings and then later waved to him as he was whisked away in a car. Could someone pinch me please because I can’t believe this is really happening. How amazing, wonderful and special! I am floating on air!

Later that day we went to see the personal physician to the Dalai Lama for some general health tips. He would determine your Rx by placing 3 fingers on the inside of your wrist and asking you a series of questions. According to the Dr., my back injury wasn’t because I hurt my back, but because of weak kidneys. He gave me some all natural meds I could take to help my kidneys. Unfortunately, I don’t think I can mix these with my antimalarial meds, which I’ll start taking once I leave Himalayan India and continue with until I leave Africa in late January, but I can always take them after. Regardless it was really cool to be seen by the personal physician to the DL. The waiting room was filled with monks and tons of Tibetans. I loved it!

It was so fun spending all this time with my new Czech friends. They are the sweetest, most laid back, and friendly people. I adored my time with them and am so happy they invited me to join them.

The next day we took a lovely hike through the mountains on our way to visit the Tibetan Children’s Village (TCV).

What a wonderful day! Sadly, it was now time to say goodbye to my friends, as they needed to head back to Delhi and then back to the Czech Republic with an exception of Petr who was off to Nepal for some trekking. Goodbye, my friends. I love you and will never forget our special time together. I have no idea where I’m going to end up, but please know that my door is always open.

My friend, Amar, who I met on my tour of Rajasthan, is meeting me in a few days here in Dharamsala and we are going to travel around India for the next few weeks. Destination TBD, but rest assured it will be great!

Huge hugs! I love you, miss you, and will be in touch soon.

#Z Meditation #Dharamsala #India #Om #meditation

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