Change In Plans

Greetings from Swakopmund, Namibia’s favorite Atlantic beach-resort town. Everyone in the family is asleep, after a very long day. Photos and a map are forthcoming, I promise.

Last night we stayed at a hyper-chic desert lodge called Little Kulala. It is only 70 kilometers north of Wolwedans, but it feels like it is on a different planet.

Little Kulala was featured on the cover of Elle Decor magazine. Everything is finished in gray stone, natural cement, or oyster-colored paint. It has a Rasilia commercial espresso machine in the main hall for guest use. The sofas are oversized, and covered in off-white cotton. Every wall that faces toward the huge sand dunes is made completely of glass. Wolwedans is classic, but Little Kulala is self-consciously au courant.

Little Kulala is also positioned hard by Namibia’s famous red sand dunes. It feels very much like being in the desert, particularly as the hot afternoon wind creates a sand storm that briefly blocks the view of the sky. The rock-lined path to Little Kulala’s designer chalets is nearly obliterated by drifting sand.

This morning we were roused from hyper-chic slumber at 5 o’clock. Little Kulala’s primary guest activity is a sunrise tour and walk through the sand dunes of Sossusvlei.

We rode in the dark in a closed Land Rover for about 45 minutes. We entered the huge Namib-Naukluft Park (fourth largest in the world) through a private gate about 20 km south of the main gate. Zola and India, being competitive, were thrilled that we had gotten a dune-viewing advantage over the crowds at the public-gate.

The highlight of the excursion was a long hike up a sand dune called ‘Big Daddy,’ which gave us access to a dried lake bed called ‘Dead Vlei.’. As the sun rose, we quickly climbed about 250 meters above the desert floor. From the ridge near the peak of the dune, Zola and Tallulah pitched themselves over the edge, jumping, tumbling, and sliding down in the soft desert sand.

One of my abiding memories of Zola will be him laughing away at the bottom of this giant dune, his face coated with the cinnamon-sugar colored sand. At that moment, he was as happy as a nine-year old can possibly be.

After an elegant picnic breakfast, in the rising heat of the dry Sossusvlei lake bed, we started driving back to Little Kulala. Our guide, Moses, almost immediately got the Land Rover stuck in the hot, loose sand. The Old Testament references flew as we dug and pushed and (critically) deflated tires to liberate ourselves.

We arrived back at the lodge at 12:30, having been out in the desert for nearly seven hours.

Little Kulala’s water system had broken during the night, so there were no showers for the returning desert sojourners. Instead, we all jumped in the small pool, and drank fruit juice on the sand-blown deck.

Despite our intention to leave at 1 pm, 3 o’clock found us still talking to other guests, saying goodbye to the staff, and checking out. Finally, at 3:30, we got on the road for the long drive to Swakopmund.

The estimates we had been given for driving the 360 dirt-road kilometers to Swakopmund ranged from two and a half hours (impossibly fast) to six hours (ridiculously slow). In the end, it took us just under four and a half hours, including two stops to buy diesel (one successful, one not for confusing reasons), two roadside bathroom breaks, and a family photo beneath the sign that indicated we were crossing the Tropic of Capricorn.

Neither kid slept in the car, but they were both remarkably well behaved. Aside from one “Stop copying me!” blowup, the drive passed without significant drama inside the vehicle.

Outside, however, the landscape was morphing dramatically every 30-40 kilometers: flat and completely barren plains, brutally rugged looking low mountains, expansive yellow grassland, a crazy quilt of steep hillocks and valleys. Namibia is wildly beautiful.

Several years ago, India and I came upon a fatal car accident on the road to Swakopmund. The memory of that Volkswagen Golf on its roof occupied our minds as we drove, and prompted India to say “Slow down!” every 90 seconds or so throughout the drive. It would probably have been fine to reduce the speed, and to have made the trip in five hours instead of four and a half.

After seeing the ocean and turning north at Walvis Bay, we arrived in Swakopmund just after sunset. We are staying in a beach house, on stilts over the sand, with the roar of Atlantic waves breaking nearby.

Having been in the desert for nearly two weeks, the cool, moist air of the coast feels wonderful. Swakopmund is a century old, heavily German, classic beach town. Except for a few who venture all the way to Cape Town, all of Namibia’s upper-middle-class holidaymakers converge on Swakop in the summer. It is great to be back here after so many years.

For dinner, Zola picked us a great restaurant on the water, which happened to be housed in a decommissioned tug boat. Both kids were asleep at the table before dessert arrived.

Another long, fun day in amazing Namibia.

Greetings from Wolwedans Lodge () , in the hot and dusty heart of Namibia’s NamibRand National Park.

We arrived here yesterday afternoon, after a longer-than-expected, 400-kilometer drive from Mariental.  We were never really “lost,” but we definitely  took the long way around a few times.

In a gentle and totally innocuous way, our short time at Wolwedans has laid bare the introvert/extrovert fault line that runs through India’s and my marriage.

Basically, India is an introvert with some extrovert tendencies.  She likes people fine, but her preference is to be alone, or in a small group, and to be outdoors.  When she was a kid, she wanted to be a game ranger, She also wanted to invent a head bubble that would let her eat lunch at school without needing to talk to others.   I am basically an extrovert with extrovert tendencies.  I like being in crowds, and particularly love being with a large group of people that I know. 

We have known this about each other for a long time.

India’s introvert tendencies have found their purest form of expression here at Wolwedans.  Let me try to explain.

• Namibia has (I believe) the lowest population density of any country in the world.  It has the population of New Hampshire, spread over an area about the size of Texas.
• Within Namibia, the population is concentrated heavily (~85%) in the North and East quarter of the country - Windhoek, the capital, and the area up toweard the Angola border and the Caprivi strip. 
• The remaining 75% of the country’s land mass has about 15% of the people - about 350,000 people spread over an area the size of Utah and Colorado combined (roughly).  Even the “big” towns, like Maltahohe, have no more than about 1,000 citizens.
• Relative to the rest of Southern Namibia, the NamibRand park is even more deserted.  For the last two hours of our drive yesterday, we literally did not see another person.

Once we arrived at the gate to Wolwedans, we drove another 20 kilometers in off the public road, to a small reception area in a huge desert valley.  The pale yellow dune grass, the red sandy soil, the mountains, and the pale-blue sun-washed sky are all we can see in any direction.

This sounds pretty isolated, doesn’t it?  Perfect for the introvert in the group?  Not quite. 

Being at the main lodge, with 3-4 other guests would have been too crowded.  India reserved the “Private Camp” at Wolwedans. Getting there required another 15 minutes of driving into the desert.  They even made me park our truck, and ride down in one of the game vehicles.

So, here we are, staying in a beautiful open-air tent/wood chalet, with only birds and gemsbok for company.  India is in a state of absolute bliss, having achieved the logical extreme of isolation.  She can run on the road (no predators here), read, lie in the sun, and spend time with me and the kids. 

I, on the other hand, am feeling very anxious.  This scenario strikes close to the core of extrovert nightmares.  We are physically trapped: no car, but “try calling in on the radio if you need anything.”  There is no BlackBerry or cell phone coverage.  We are  isolated from the rest of the lodge by 6-7 kilometers. Walking to the lodge across the desert would qualify as a definite survival situation.  The main lodge, of course, is already pretty isolated in itself.  We are in the oldest desert on earth.  We do not have any structured activities planned, just an open expanse of time and space.  Anyone want a drink?

We had the rangers take us to the swimming pool (beatifully set in the high dunes) yesterday afternoon.  It was a 40-minute Land Rover drive from our camp.  This morning, Zola and I came up to the lodge’s computer to do on-line math, and for me to reassure myself that the rest of the world still exists.

To be honest, once I got past my initial anxieties, it has been fun.  Both kids are thrilled to really be out in the desert.  The sunset last night was amazing, and the little camp is very elegant and comfortable. 

I am determined that I can survive this without going crazy.  I will also have more sympathy for India the Introvert, the next time we are standing on 5th Avenue and 57th Street.

Greetings from Gochas, Namibia.! We are about 200 km northwest of the border post with South Africa at Mata Mata.

We have had a wild few days in the Kalahari Desert: tracking lions, finding snakes and scorpions, camping in the sand, and enjoying (en famille) the company of a mysterious French woman of a certain age, travelling alone. Details and pictures (and a map) will have to wait until we have Internet access.

This morning we spent an hour watching four male lions with a giraffe they had killed last night. The lions were so full that they mostly lay on their backs in the shade. Every so often they would get up, glare at us through blood-matted fur, and move deeper into the shade. They were maybe 3 meters away from our bakkie. The giraffe, in its magnificent length, lay dead and disemboweled in the middle of a dry riverbed. As Tallulah said, “He has a big hole in his belly.”

Eventually we had to leave the Kgalagadi park and get on the road. We drove to the South Africa-Namibia border. India charmed her way through some potentially very inconvenient passport issues (my passport), we paid a tax with the remainder of our cash, and we were across.

Three kilometers from the border, we found a beautiful (sadly, dead) Cape Cobra snake in the road. We got out and had a long look at the snake. Both kids were fascinated with it, which may be a little weird.

On the 200 km drive to Gochas, we passed only three motor vehicles, and, again, two donkey carts. Aside from fences, and the road, there is practically no evidence of human presence in the desert. It is about 110 degrees Fahrenheit, and the direct sunlight has bleached all of the color from the landscape .

Gochas has a tiny hotel, Stoney’s Country Inn, where we were very grateful to get lunch and a drink. If we had blinked, we might have missed Gochas altogether. I ordered a ‘Stoney Burger,’ which came with two fried eggs, cheese, a quarter-pound of bacon, and a salad on it. Now that’s good eating.

We are driving another few hours west, and staying at a cheetah-rescue lodge near Marienthal. Namibia is truly the wild west.

My debit card was just declined at the bar (as happens in the land of dial-up connections, I think). I should go try and figure that out. Maybe we will be home sooner than expected!

PostScript-
The machine at Stoney’s Country Hotel declined all of India’s and my cards: credit, debit, charge. We had literally no cash (SA Rand or Namibian $), because the last working ATM was several days and several hundred kilometers ago.

The Stoney Country Inn’s proprietress, a heavyset Afrikaans woman in her mid-30s, had been very friendly and attentive up until this point. We were the only lunchtime customers. As card after card got declined, we saw her disposition change, and I could practically hear her thinking, “You deadbeat uitlanders with your cellphones and loud voices and fancy ways. There is no way you are going to cheat me out of the $26 you owe me for lunch”

Eventually, she suggested that we try to get cash at the “mini-ATM” over at the OK Bazaar supermarket. Failing that, we could try to get money “from Dicky at the petrol station”. I wasn’t quite sure what to make of the latter siggestion.

Regardless, I think she was planning to hold Zola and Tallulah hostage until we came up with the money. At that point, the gods of electronic funds transfer decided to smile on us, and India’s debit card got approved.

We went to the OK Bazaar, across the dusty main street, which had a little networked credit-card machine. In theory, you get a receipt for the withdrawal amount, take it to the cashier, and she gives you cash. Cool idea (saves the bank from servicing an ATM), but of course it rejected all of our cards as well.

The OK Bazaar’s manager called Dicky over at the gas station, and asked whether his credit-card machine accepted foreigners’ cards. Thankfully it did, and a few minutes later, the liquidity crisis had passed. Dicky hooked us up with N$ 1,000 (about US$ 100) with a quick electronic approval of my debit card, and we were back in business. Of course, we spent N$500 on Dicky’s diesel fuel and on cold drinks immediately after.

Getting the fuel was a huge relief, because running out in the Namibian desert would be unpleasant. Interestingly, all of the businesses in Gochas were white owned, in a country which is ~95% black.

We will get sufficient cash reserves, and sort out our credit cards tomorrow in the metropolis of Marienthal.

In the meantime, we are staying overnight at Bagatelle’s, the cheetah lodge. The sun just set, spectacularly, over the desert, and the stars are ablaze in the otherwise completely black sky.

Onward to the Namib desert and the high dunes of Sossusvlei tomorrow.

Greetings from Twee Rivieren, at the southern end of the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park. The park combines two national parks, in South Africa and Botswana, creating a huge desert wilderness area. I will try to incorporate some maps when I am not using my BlackBerry. “Kgalagadi” is the original (and now official) spelling of “Kalahari.”

This short post is about our first day and night here.

We drove about 200 kilometers from Tswalu, entirely over dirt roads. Including the two ‘towns’ we passed, we saw a total of about five motor vehicles, and three donkey carts, on the drive. We were glad to be in a new and reliable 4×4. Breaking down in the 100-degree heat and blazing sun would have been unamusing at best.

India and I stayed at the Twee Rivieren camp site nearly ten years ago, when the park was still just the Kalahari Gemsbok Park. Without going into too much detail, we have reason to believe that Zola was conceived here, a belief that we memorialized by making his full name ‘Zola Atticus Kalahari Baird.’ We explained a little of this to Zola yesterday, but it raised more questions than we were ready to discuss.

Last night we stayed in a desert camp called Kielie Krankie, about 45 dirt-road kilometers in from the park entrance at Twee Rivieren. “Kielie Krankie” means “almost sick” in Afrikaans. Not an auspicious place name for a family that just spent a month in India (the place).

Ten years ago, India (the person) and I saw practically no animals when we were in this park. Times have changed.

Like many South African game parks, this one features “self-drive safaris.”. This means that you rattle around on the dirt roads looking for animals. It is very democratic (ie, inexpensive) and fun.

On the drive in to Kielie Krankie, we saw hundreds of gemsbok (oryx), wildebeest, and springbok. More exciting, we found a pride of ten lions resting in the late-afternoon shade by the road.

As we watched the lions, a large herd of wildebeest ambled down the valley, about 300 meters upwind. The lions suddenly became very alert, and arrayed themselves along a low ridge to observe their potential dinner. For about an hour, we watched the lions watching the wildebeest. The confident, murderous intent of the adult lionesses was clear, although the cubs seemed to be sort of playing along. The wildebeest, meanwhile, seemed oblivious to the danger: they drank from a watering hole, they wandered aimlessly, their babies ran and played.

Unfortunately, we had to leave before the drama played itself out. We were required to be at Kielie Krankie by 7:30 pm, or be stuck sleeping in our truck. Our guess is that there are one or two fewer wildebeest in that herd this morning.

Just before we arrived at the desert camp, Zola spotted a family of bat-eared foxes coming out of their den to hunt in the twilight. They were about 150 meters off the road, on a low hillside. Excellent spot, Zola.

Kielie Krankie is an unfenced group of four small bungalows. Each is half building and half tent. The gate to each bungalow locks, and the outdoor space is a deck about two meters above a desert hillside. This is believed to be adequate protection from lions. There is a ranger, named Willem, in a fifth bungalow, and he gave us a whistle to summon him (with rifle, presumably) if we got into trouble. Wild.

As we moved into our bungalow, a huge thunderstorm was brewing in the west. As at Tswalu, it created a spectacular show of lightning and desert sunset, deep reds and blues punctuated by streaks of white.

As we were cooking dinner, the wind began to blow hellaciously. I doused our cooking fire, which was spraying embers all over the dry vegetation in the valley, and we closed all of the windows and tent flaps. A few minutes later, la deluge terrifique. The rain came down in sheets, as lightning flashed and thunder boomed. Both kids tries to be cool about it, but it was a little scary. We ate our dinner on the floor of the kitchen, with rain leaking into the bungalow all over the place.

The rain stopped after an hour, and we all dropped off to sleep. Having only two twin beds made it a tight squeeze.

Greetings from Tswalu!  Unfortunately, we are leaving this desert paradise around noon today.  We will be driving for about four hours to a tent camp in the Trans-Frontier National Park, and staying there for the next few days.  This short post is about what we have been doing in our last 24 hours at Tswalu.

Yesterday afternoon, once we figured out that Zola had gotten the poisonous sap from the tree euphorbia in his nose and mouth, Jason, Samuel and I shifted our afternoon game drive into a quest for bushman medicine. 

Jason dug a succulent root from the side of the road, cut off the outer skin, and gave Zola a piece to chew.  Jason’s insistence that the root “tastes just like warm water” was a bit generous (I tasted a piece myself), but Zola’s mouth felt a little better.  Later, on the theory that the poison was a mild acid, we pulverized some limestone, and made an alkaline mouth rinse.  This didn’t work very well (Zola swallowed a big mouthful, which caused him more anxiety).  A limestone poultice seemed to really help the mild acid burn on his face, though.  Finally, Jason cut us some hoodia, which is a succulent known for giving energy and suppressing appetite (now available in U.S. drugstores).  Again, Jason’s characterization of the taste -”very pleasant, like licorice”- was too charitable, but I definitely felt the stimulus effect.

We did not see a lot of interesting game (except a small buffalo herd), but it was fun finding the bush remedies.  The best part of the drive, though, was watching the spectacular sunset from the top of a small sand dune.  Jason, Samuel and Zola dug up scorpion holes, hoping to find one of the occupants to inspect.  Eventually they went off to look at a dead Oryx by the side of the road.  Tallulah played in the sand.  India and I sat with our drinks and admired the beauty of the desert, and the electric drama of gathering thunderstorms.  We could see 10-20 kilometers in every direction, but could not see evidence of any other human life.  Once again, we got soaked on the drive back to the lodge.

This morning, we slept until 6, and then drove down to the stables.  Like everything else at Tswalu, the stables were absolutely top class.  They had riding boots and chaps waiting for us, and a string of beautiful horses were saddled.  Most exciting, Tallulah got to ride her own horse (with a lead line), and we walked off into the desert.  We saw a sable, a few Nyala, and two grumpy old male buffalo down by a water hole.  The scenery was spectacular.  We saw a burned patch of about 20 acres, where a lightning strike had ignited a brush fire a few months ago.  Apparently, this brings out the entire Tswalu staff of 150 people to light backfires and beat out flames.  If the reserve burnt down, it would be bad for conservation and for business.

On the ride, Jason told a story about when the (now-deposed) King and Queen of Nepal visited Sabi Sands, and he took them on their game drives.  The two Nepali generals who were acting as bodyguards got very nervous every time Jason reached for his rifle.  This is reasonable, given that the king’s predecessor (and brother) died in a hail of gunfire.  Jason said that the king was not very pleasant company, shouting “Drive, just drive!” when Jason stopped to look at any animal not to his regal liking.  As the group sat and watched a mother leopard feeding its cub, the king flicked a lit cigarette next to them.  A team of rangers had to drive off the mother leopard, and beat out the small fire that he had started.  A few months after the king’s visit, the Nepali Maoists finally deposed him, and sent him into internal exile.  Jason said, “I don’t wish bad on anyone, but when I saw that news on CNN, I figured it served the king right.”

On the way back from riding, we saw two male warthogs fighting ferociously on the road.  They butted heads, slashed at each other with their tusks, and generally mixed it up.  Eventually, one warthog backed away warily, while his victorious opponent sprayed sand in the air and grunted triumphantly.  After breakfast, and some on-line math (Zola and I are cranking), Jason and Samuel took the kids to do archery.  Zola shot the arrows, and Tallulah ran to retrieve them.

Tswalu is just great.  We are sorry to be leaving, but are excited about heading back to Namibia.  The long drive begins today.

Greetings from Tswalu!  This short post relates a few of the stories/facts that Jason, our guide, has told us during our game drives in the last two days.

Last January, after our holiday in Cape Town, India came to Tswalu with her parents and our kids.  I had gone back to work in San Diego.  They had a guide named Jason, who each member of the family seemed to fall in love with a little bit.  Aside from the game drives, he accompanied India on walks and runs in the desert.  He took Zola to ride horses and do archery, and he talked with him endlessly about snakes.  He carried Tallulah, told her funny stories, and let her be a big girl.  The prospect of having Jason as our guide again was a big draw for our return to Tswalu this year.

Having gotten over my slight prejudicial jealousy (I really wish I were a better person), I have been wildly impressed with Jason.  The depth and breadth of his knowledge is truly phenomenal, and his boyish enthusiasm for being out in nature is infectious.  Mostly, though, the stories that he tells, and the facts that he imparts, have been remarkable.  Most are delivered in an off-hand way, in reference to something we are walking by or driving by.  Here are a few examples:

Pink-billed Ostrich

- this morning we saw a male ostrich with a bright pink bill.  Jason remarked that this was a sign of very high testosterone, and that his shins would be colored pink as well (they were).  When male ostriches are looking to mate, they get these pink markings, and, apparently they get very aggressive.  ”I had to shoot one once in the Kruger Park, you know.” Jason said.  He was leading a group of guests on a walk, and a lust-crazed ostrich attacked them.  He fended off the ostrich, using his rifle as a club, but the ostrich started to kick at him.  An ostrich’s kick as as dangerous as a horse’s.  Jason radioed for a vehicle to come rescue the group, but was told it would be 20 minutes.  ”So, unfortunately, I had to shoot him before he kicked my ribs in.  It was too bad, really.  He just wouldn’t leave us alone”

Tampan Ticks and the Shepherd Bush - A Shepherd Bush is a low, scrubby plant that has high protein and Vitamin A content in its leaves.  As we drove past the zillionth one, Jason remarked “the ground around them is filled with Tampan ticks.  Very dangerous.”  These ticks sense the carbon dioxide that an animal or human emits, and they crawl up out of the ground and bite whatever is resting in the shade of the Shepherd Bush.  The real risk, though, is that “from the anti-coagulant in a few of those bites, you get temporary paralysis.”  If no one hauls your temporarily paralyzed self away from the ticks, they would essentially bite you to death.  Not a pleasant way to go, but very uncommon.  Most people pull off the ticks and walk away before the paralysis sets in.

Radiating gnu

- the wildebeest, or brindled gnu, has alternating stripes of thick/black and thin/brown fur along its sides.  This pattern is the “brindling.”  Jason says that the sun heats the thin and thick fur to slightly different temperatures, and that the heat exchange between them creates a very slight cooling convective effect.  I would want to see the paper describing this, but it makes sense.

Elephant and Ecologist

-A British woman with sixteen years of experience as an ecologist was killed by an elephant in Sabi Sands a few years ago.  She and Jason worked together for eight years, as she studied the habits of an elephant breeding herd.  In one of her thousands of encounters with the elephants, the matriarch started charging toward her.  Her colleague ran for shelter, but she clapped her hands loudly, which had stopped that same she-elephant on many previous occasions.  This time, the elephant knocked her down and trampled her to death.  Jason said, “I arrived a few minutes later, and there was really nothing left of her, just a red spot in the dust.”  After shooting the elephant (standard operating procedure), the rangers boxed the woman’s remains, and held a sad and well attended burial service on a hill in the Sabi Sands.  A few days later, the elephant herd, with a new matriarch, spent the entire day at the grave site, “scratching at the dirt, and paying their respects.”  I asked whether they knew that the ecologist was buried there, and Jason said, “Of course.  Elephants are extremely clever, and they would have done this for one of their own.”

It has been fun riding and walking round in the Kalahari, tracking animals and listening to stories.  I had not gone on safari in Africa for about three years, and I had forgotten how much pure fun it can be.  With a guide like Jason, and a tracker like Samuel (more on him later), this is as good as it gets.

PostScript- to avoid embarrassment (my own), I asked Jason whether these stories were, in fact, true. He said “gospel truth,” after I read each one. He specified that the late ecologist was named Kay Hickox.

In the meantime, Zola managed to poison himself (very slightly) by jabbing holes in a cactus with a porcupine quill. Turns out that the milky sap from the cactus, a tree euphorbia, is highly toxic. The indigenous KhoiSan use the sap to poison their darts. By touching the quill point and his nose and mouth he has had an unpleasant few hours of burning sensation. It is absolutely not dangerous, but he probably won’t do it again. We are off to make a mild alkaloid bush remedy from pulverized lime. Once again, India and I ask ourselves, “is this responsible parenting?”

KALAHARI DESERT SUNSET

Greetings from Tswalu Nature Reserve, Northern Cape Province, South Africa. We have been at Tswalu Motse, an amazing safari lodge, for just over a day. This post is about five things I have seen here that I had never seen before. Photos to follow.

I am writing this on my BlackBerry from our windswept, open-air campsite on the top of a little hill, in the middle of the Kalahari Desert. All four of us are lined up on army cots under the stars. We are about 10 kilometers from the main lodge, having driven out after dinner.  We will never forget this night of sleeping out.

Here are the five new things, in no particular order:

1- Zola playing Risk and solving pre-algebra math problems

. Suddenly his brain has switched on in a new way. We are halfway through his first-ever game of Risk, and the kid is crushing me. I would like to say it is all luck, but he is playing well. More important, his on-line math curriculum vaulted him into a new level of problem-solving complexity today. He grumbled, but stepped up. I am suddenly encouraged.  It is great that Tswalu Motse has Risk (and about 50 other board games) in its game room.  It also has great satellite broad-band access.

CHEETAH OBSERVED ON FOOT FROM 3 METERS

2- A cheetah with a freshly killed steenbok, observed on foot from three meters away

. Our guide and tracker jumped off the vehicle on this morning’s game drive, tracking wild dogs on foot into the off-road bush. They did not take a rifle. Ten minutes later, they emerged from the undergrowth, slightly shaken. Our guide, Jason the Great, was clutching his Leatherman tool, with its 8 centimeter knife blade out.  He had improvised the tiny knife as a potential weapon against a cheetah they had surprised in the bush. This struck us all as very funny.  We all walked back in (Lu on my shoulders) and tracked the cheetah to a little temporary lair. Cheetahs are the weakest of the big-cat predators, and their kills are taken away by other animals (eg, hyenas, lions, even large birds of prey).  As we watched, the cheetah got comfortable with our presence a few feet away, then started to eat the tiny deer in its jaws. Amazing.

3- a pride of lions feasting on a baby mountain zebra.

We watched from about three meters away in our Land Rover, as a male lion and four cubs ripped their kill to shreds. The rest of the pride, two lionesses and four other cubs lolled and licked blood from each others’ faces nearby. Very primeval, and very dramatic.  We all sat quite still and silent, but Tallulah (wearing a giraffe-print dress) shifted around some in my lap.  The big male lion started staring at her with considerable interest, which was very unnerving.  Jason started the engine and got us out of there quickly.

4- a spectacular 360-degree lightning show

. At sunset, we started seeing huge and dramatic lightning strikes in the distance. We have not heard thunder, or felt rain (good thing, given our al fresco sleeping arrangements), but the sky is alight all around us.  Apparently, the high iron content of the Kalahari soil draws lightning like warm meat draws flies, or free beer draws frat boys, or a pre-Christmas sale draws Wal-Mart shoppers.  Choose your metaphor, it is pretty amazing to look at.

ZOLA IN THE TRACKER

5- a game lodge as cool as Tswalu Motse. We are basically the only people here. This is a 100,000 hectare nature preserve, handed over to the Baird Family for a few days. Want to go for a walk in the desert at mid-day? Sure.  Want to let Zola ride in the tracker’s seat on the Land Rover’s hood for a while? No problem. Want to camp in the desert instead of sleeping in your big rondavel? Absolutely. Want to ride horses instead of driving around in a Land Rover?  Let me call the stables.

This is a phenomenally great place. Our guide and tracker, Jason and Samuel, and the rest of the staff, are all unbelievably good.  The landscape is dramatically beautiful, and the reserve is loaded with healthy game.  It is even worth the 5 am wakeup call.

Who knows what we will see tomorrow. Today has been pretty spectacular.

Late-night PostScript: about an hour after I posted this, the heavens opened up, and we got thoroughly rained upon.  Maybe the tentless camping wasn’t such a great idea after all.  We packed up our camp quickly, and drove back to the lodge in the open Land Rover, getting wetter with each kilometer.  Tallulah slept through it all.  We will be up again in about 4 hours for the morning game drive.

[Note: Written on 7 January, but only published on 8 January]

Greetings from Upington, South Africa.  This short post is about our trip from Cape Town, and our short stay in Upington.

Our flight was delayed about 20 minutes, but eventually we boarded a bus and rolled out to the airplane.  Except for us, everyone on the bus was speaking Afrikaans.  There were no children, and no obvious tourists.  A man about my age asked, in English, “Are you lot really going to Upington?  Are you sure?”  I guess there is a reason that there is only one flight per day.

Stepping off the plane in Upington was like walking into a wall of heat.  It was just over 40 degrees Celsius, or 105 Fahrenheit.  Welcome to the desert!  As they say, “It’s a dry heat.”

Upington International Airport is about the size of a two-bedroom Manhattan apartment.  Occasionally flights land from Namibia or Botswana, giving it “International” status.  The Cape Town flight must have been the last of the day, because as soon as we had collected our luggage, and walked out to the parking lot, the airport staff all left and locked the door behind us.

There is a row of six small sheds which house the representatives of six different rental-car companies.  We found Gustav, from Hertz, and he checked us in to our Isuzu 4×4 pick-up truck (invariably described as a “bakkie” in South Africa).  I asked Gustav if it had been busy during the holidays, and he said that we were his first rental in the last seven days.  My guess is that Gustav gets a lot of reading done, and/or has an awesome Facebook page.

We stayed over at a guest house called Le Must.  When I called for directions, and I described where I was, Natasha, Le Must’s manageress, said, “Ag, you are too far away for me to tell you how to get here.  Call back when you see the Absa Bank on Schroder Straat.”  Literally ten seconds later I was in front of the bank.  Sixty seconds after that, we were driving past a series of curiously named guest houses along the Orange River: “The Hadeda,” “The Burger House,” “Biki B&B,” “Nirvana.” And sixty seconds after that we were in the driveway of Le Must.

Upington is a dusty, old-fashioned, South African town.  The streets are still all named after Afrikaner settlers, and the stores carry the necessities of living in a hot, dry climate.  90% of the population is mixed race, what the apartheid system used to classify as “coloured.”  Virtually everyone speaks Afrikaans.  The biggest building in town is the Dutch Reformed Church. It does not appear to have changed much in the ten years since I was last here.

Le Must guest house, rated the best in Upington, was small, and comfortable, and unbelievably inexpensive.  The total cost for two rooms, including breakfast, was about $50.  Hallelujah!  We went for a short swim, then drove back into town for a heavy but good dinner outdoors at Le Must’s restaurant.   The menu warned us, “You are in meat country.  The fish has been frozen.”  By 9pm, we were all in bed.

Leaving Cape Town seems to have been more traumatic for Tallulah and Zola than we had anticipated.  Tallulah has been clinging to three Barbie dolls as if they were a life raft in a stormy sea.  At dinner she sat under the table for most of the meal, playing with the dolls in the rocks and sand.  She insisted that this was OK, because “Sienna’s daddy said it was OK in Cape Town.”  That night she tossed and turned and talked in her sleep.

Zola has been moody and uncommunicative since we left for the airport in Cape Town.  He was sorry to leave Winston, our Llandudno neighbor and his constant companion of the last week.  Also, as we have realized, Zola likes stability and predictability.  Having a “home” in Cape Town, and having some semblance of a daily rhythm really suited him.  Now he is alone and in constant motion again.  We hope he will cheer up once we get out to Tswalu (also familiar turf for him), and we start tracking animals.

India is in high spirits.  She loves game drives, and she loves the desert.  She is ready to get moving again.  As usual, I am somewhere in the middle.  We had gotten very comfortable in our little home by the sea, and in our vacation-bubble faux normalcy. 

It is getting hot again, and we need to get on the road.  It is a three-hour drive to the gates of the Tswalu Nature Reserve.  The bakkie is loaded, and we are ready to go.  Tot siens, Upington.

Greetings from the Cape Town International Airport! We are sitting in a giant air-conditioned tent at the edge of the runway. This is the temporary domestic terminal for the next several months, until the big, new, state-of-the-art terminal gets completed. We all hope that they finish before the Fifa Soccer World Cup starts in 2010.

This short post is about our (temporary) departure from the Llandudno house, as we go off for a few weeks to the Northern Cape and then to Namibia.

Fortunately, we are returning to the exact same house at the end of January. The owner was kind enough to let us store ‘a few things’ in the garage while we are away. What we discovered is that during our four stationary weeks in Cape Town, we have somehow accumulated a colossal amount of stuff. We are traveling reasonably light for the next few weeks, but we have stowed more stuff in Llandudno than four average college students would take to furnish their dorm room. We will purge and ship boxes when we return to Cape Town.

We spent most of the morning packing, but Zola, Winston (his new BFF) and I got in one last boogie-boarding session on Llandudno beach. Zola tried using flippers for the first time. In the words of the surfer turtle dude from “Finding Nemo,” the flippers were “Like, totally awesome, dude.”

This afternoon, we are flying to Upington, a small town about 800 kilometers north of Cape Town. Tomorrow morning we are picking up a rented 4×4 desert vehicle, and driving about 3 hours to a private game reserve called Tswalu, in the Kalahari Desert. India and the kids went to Tswalu last January, and they have all been anticipating the return trip eagerly. The plan is to go on a lot of game drives, ride horses and hike, shoot bows and arrows, and feast in the desert. It should be a great few days.

On Saturday, we are driving from Tswalu through the Kalahari Desert. We will cross into Namibia through one of the seldom-used desert border crossings, and then camp for a few days in the desert. For about two weeks we will be driving all around the country: to the old German port towns on the west coast, to the huge orange sand dunes neas Sossusvlei, and to the Etosha National Park in the north.

India and I did similar long drives around Namibia four or five times in the past, but neither of us has been since before Zola was born. Someone told us that it hasn’t changed much, but now there are fancy places to stay.

My father and step-mother visited us in Cape Town the year before he died. My Dad loved Namibia, in part because its German colonial heritage reminded him so much of his own childhood. I still get teary eyed watching the videotape that he shot in the Namib desert, and listening to his voice on the goofy commentary.

Our time in Cape Town has been truly wonderful. Even if we didn’t have to retrieve our stored luggage, I would be thrilled that we are going to have another week here at the end of the month. On the drive to the airport, India said, “Next time, more butternut lasagna and more hiking. That’s what I’m talking about!”

In the meantime, desert adventure and long drives await us. Go Namibia!

ONE OF THE GREAT JOBS

Greetings from Cape Town.  Many South Africans are going back to work today: the old, European-style, four-week summer holiday seems to have gone away in the post-apartheid transition.  This has made Zola and me think about some of the truly terrible jobs that we have observed in our travels.  

In a clumsy parent psychology way, I am sort of trying to have Zola make the connection between doing well in school and not having one of these awful jobs.  Of course, in many places (including South Africa) the unemployment rate is so high that any job would be better than no job.  Also, I’m sure there are many truly terrible, dangerous and physically demanding jobs (eg, in Indian agriculture) that take place away from tourists’ eyes.  This list is only a sampler.  By a global standard, any of us who get to work with our brains, in a safe and comfortable environment, are incredibly lucky.

In no particular order, these were the lousiest jobs that came to mind for Zola and me:

Tannery worker in Fes, Morocco -  These men stomp around in big open-air vats, mixing pigeon feces and dyes into animal skins.  It is a brutally hot, tedious, and physically demanding job, hazardous to the health, and it smells terrible.  Within reason and legality, it doesn’t get much worse than this.

Punkawallah in India (largely obsolete) - “punka” is the Hindi word for a big fan, and the punkawallah was responsible for fanning the maharajah or other important person, to keep them cool.  It is a fun word to say, but must have been a terrible job.  Most of the royal punkawallahs were also eunuchs, which would be a definite negative.

Head-tote porter in Kathmandu - for some reason, it seemed that Nepal uses a lot of human labor in moving heavy things around.  Loads that would be carried by donkeys in a few countries, or by some wheeled vehicle (motorized or not) pretty much everywhere else, are carried on the backs of Nepalis, attached by a rope to their foreheads.  I think the rope is called a tump line.  This would be a terrible job.  We met a tiny girl carrying a heavy load of wet laundry this way, and Zola tried, unsuccessfully, to strap on the basket and walk 20 meters.  

ZOLA AS TUMP-LINE PORTER

Escalator Greeter in Japan - Many escalators in Japan have two greeters, one at each end, who bow as you get on and get off the escalator.  Standing and bowing appear to be the extent of their responsibilities.  This job is safe, indoors, and physically easy, but pushes the concept of monotony to a new level.

Domestic-route pilot in Nepal - this job is just flat-out dangerous.  The equipment is ancient, the routes are hazardous (mountains and weather), and the airport infrastructure is poor.  These planes seem to crash with alarming frequency.  Next time we will drive, thanks.

Elaborate-design craftsperson (Tangka painter in Nepal, stone-inlayer in India, mosaic-tile maker in Morocco, rug weavers in multiple countries) - the men and women who do these jobs may love the beauty of the finished products, and for the opportunity to approach perfection over their careers.  In many cases, these skills are handed down from generation to generation, performed by large families.  In each case, however, the work requires painstaking attention to tiny details, and endless task repetition, usually done in an uncomfortable position.

Anything cow related in India - the skinners of natural-death cows, and the collectors of cow dung are very low caste.  If anything bad happens to the cows, they seem to get blamed.  Occasionally, the dead-cow skinners are attacked by Hindu fundamentalists who think that the skinners killed the cows.  Cows are so weighted with religious and cultural significance that it seems best to steer clear of them generally.  

Shopkeeper in Moroccan medinas

- this is another job where the tedium and the sense of unfulfilled human potential would be stifling.  Seeing a row of ten identical small shops, each with shopkeepers who have practically nothing to do, and no way to differentiate their products, was depressing.  Maybe the physical ease and the social element (everyone you know walks by) would be enough to offset the negatives.

We also saw many jobs which would be fantastic to have. Two of the best were:

Bollywood star in India - Indians seem to adore and cherish their entertainment celebrities far more than Europeans or even Americans do.  The biggest stars (eg, A. Bachchan) are treated like deities, rivaled only by cricket stars.  Doing the dancing and the wet sari scenes would be fun too.

Gulet captain in Turkey - less grand that being a Bollywood star, but this would be a terrific job.  The captains motor and sail their magnificent boats around in beautiful places, they meet interesting people, they have the on-board chefs and stewards to a lot of the more difficult work.  It would be a fun job, and only requires about six months of work each year, leaving time for something else on shore.

Now it is time to get Zola started on his math work, so that he ends up as a Bollywood star rather than a punkawallah, I guess.

TALLULAH AND SIENNA RUNNING ON THE BEACH