|
Journal
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Friday, July 31, 2009 Friday sunrise - good bye July 
Thursday, July 30, 2009 Sunrise on Tuesday 
Wednesday, July 29, 2009 One of my favorite images from the trip so far, ironically it is also the absolute LAST shot on Andy's camera. As we were leaving Xigera (the two hour Mokoro ride back to the airstrip) we passed several white-fronted bee-eaters. Bird photography is SUCH a challenge and being in a moving canoe didn't simplify things, but we were luckier on this trip than usual. 
Tuesday, July 28, 2009 I'm still the process of going through all of our pictures from Botswana (well, to be completely accurate we still need to go through pictures from South Africa !). In the mean time, here's some video of our morning spent walking with the lions in Zambia.
Thursday, July 23, 2009 One of the best parts of visitng Mokoro Trails Camp was the willingness of the camp staff to teach us about Botswanan culture and traditions. One afternoon Chris, Chiyo, and Chaplain showed us the traditional way of making fire by rubbing a stick into a block of wood to send a spark into nearby wad of tinder (elephant dung and dead grass). Then the men in our group gave it a try.
Friday, July 17, 2009 Sunrise on Friday 
To be absolutely clear about our camping expedition to Botswana, we weren't exactly roughing it. We pretty much showed up with our 40 pounds of luggage and everything was taken care of from start to finish. Each of the three camps had a top notch staff that basically catered to our every whim. The chefs did a phenominal job cooking everything from fresh baked bread to the best fried chicken and vegetarian lasagna I've ever had - quite a feat considering that everything was cooked over an open fire! The camp staff also went out of their way to entertain us with traditional song and dance and teach us local traditions including basketweaving and the traditions and click language of the San bushmen. Each time we arrived at a new camp we were welcomed with a cheerful song and by the time we left three days later it felt like we were leaving old friends. 
Tuesday, July 14, 2009 Sunrise on Tuesday 
Sunday, July 12, 2009 As I think I mentioned earlier, the last camp that we visited required a transfer from the airstrip via mokoro. In fact, all activities at this camp involved the mokoros because the few roads that did exist were submerged in water due to a prolific rainy season this year. I shot some video to try to share the experience of riding in a canoe through the reeds and water lilies - so here's the first video from Botswana.
Friday, July 10, 2009  Sunrise on Friday - it exploded with color for about three minutes and then it was gone and grey. 
Wednesday, July 08, 2009 Killing time in the London airport, we finally have a free moment to go through some of the images from our trip. We started our trip in Livingston, Zambia, and having no idea how to spend our free day, we sought the advice of the lodge manager who made a few suggestions. Options included helicopter tours of Victoria Falls, elephant back safaris, bungee jumping, or walking with lions. HUH??? Of course we signed up for the lion walk. We spent an hour and a half with three lion cubs that were about a year old. It was wild to be on the ground (out of a vehicle) around lions, and though they were habituated to interacting with people they certainly weren't trained circus animals or anything. Exhilarating for sure, and at the same time they seem so much like giant housecats. Do not attempt this on your own :)    More pictures here.
Tuesday, July 07, 2009 Greetings from The Grace Hotel in Johannesburg. We arrived yesterday after an almost legendary travel day. We began the day at a camp in the Okavango Delta and were transferred to the airstip via a two hour Mokoro ride through some of the most beautiful landscape that I have ever encountered. Our "poler" Chaplin expertly guided the traditional dugout canoe carrying Andy, me, and our carryon luggage through the papyrus-lined canals which were more like hippo trails (and we did see a hippo or two, as well as lots of bird life and herds of kudu and red lechwe galloping through the water). With the exception of intermittent insect issues, traveling by mokoro is a blissfully peaceful multi-sensory experience (the sound of the water, the smell of the reeds, ok, and the smack of the reeds and occasional bug hitting your face). I'm sure to him the delta looks like downtown Chicago, but I have no idea how he was able to find his way. Once at the Xigera airstrip, we boarded a 12 seater single prop plane for the 30 minute flight to Maun. There, we transferred to an Air Botswana ATR (double propeller) plane to Johannesburg. The flight took off 30 minutes early and the in flight snacks were Simba nuts and beef biltong :) We landed in Johannesburg around 4:45 and even though there was a bit of a line at passport control, we were through it in under 10 minutes (including having our photo taken for body temperature). We collected our bags and had no problem finding our handler after customs and were at the hotel by 6pm. We definitely needed looked like we'd been camping for 10 days, so we showered and utilized all of the bath products and wash cloths before heading out to dinner at the Grillhouse. The food while we were camping was surprisingly good, and there was plenty of it, including fresh baked bread at just about every meal, but we still treated ourselves to a great dinner last night anyway :) Today we wandered over to the attached mall ("the mall at Rosebank") for some much needed moisturizer and also to peruse the "African Crafts Market". We traveled exceptionally light on this trip given the small plane (and canoe) transfers so we bought another small carryon that Andy deemed the container in which all of the things that I buy must fit. A challenge...
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 A picture every few days or so... Subscribe 
XML 
The postings on this site are our own and don’t represent our employer's positions, strategies or opinions.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
