The Trip Home :(

I apologies for the late entry for the trip home, it was kind of a whirlwind and not really all the much exciting happened.

So I shall begin with our trip out of the Delta. We ended up waking with the sun, and hung out on the little porch that over looked the river. it was a nice relaxing way to end our trip. As we sat there enjoying the sounds of the birds watching the sun rise. I heard a lion roaring, then another joined in. It sounded so close, but lion roars can travel up to 3 km, so they were close but not in the bushes!

As we got ready to leave, we noticed there were HUNDREDS of ants on the bed! The whole time we'd been there we had not seen bugs in the bed! I think the ants woke up and decided that investigating the bed was a great idea! Thank goodness we were leaving that morning!

Our original pilot was the one to bring us back to Kasane. Same tiny little plane, this time a much bumpier ride. Once we got to Kasane, the rest of our luggage was suppose to arrive from Chobe Game Lodge, we did see our game driver... but no luggage. Thankfully it was coming with another vehicle with people who were catching the flight to Johannesburg as well.

The one thing I hate about traveling, is the waiting to just start travelling part. Every time we were sitting at an airport, I kept saying in my head the same saying I was told while at Cadet Camp "Hurry up and Wait", it was a big joke at camp that we were always in a rush to wait... I feel like that's what it's like to travel via plane.

Our flight was very uneventful to Johannesburg. Jonathan and I arrived at our hotel dressed in what we were wearing in the Delta. I had hiking shoes, army green shorts, a tank top on and hair I hadn't brushed in three days, when we got out of the car at the hotel I felt severely under dressed! We stayed at the Michelangelo in Nelson Mandela Square, it's pretty fancy!

We got to meet up with friends of ours that we had meet two years ago while traveling in Italy. That's one of the great things about doing the travel groups, you get to meet people from all over the world and if you want stay in contact with them, we still see and speak to a few of the people that we have meet.

The hotel was attached to a mall, we weren't being picked up until about 3pm, so after waking up at 5am we unpacked our luggage and repacked them again. By ten, we decided to see if we could extend our check out and wander around the mall. We gave up on the mall by 1pm and decided to just veg in the room until we got picked. Our flight out of Johannesburg was scheduled for 8pm, bu on our way to the airport it got delayed to 10:30pm. So as we got to the airport, ridiculously early as we checked in with our flight and checked our luggage (I had to pull out 1kg of stuff cause I was just over) the guy at the counter offered us tickets on the next flight, hotel and a voucher for SAA. Since, I was to be in for work Wednesday that was a no go.

We wandered around the airport forever! We managed to spend most of our Rand one some additional last minute curio things, we had to complete our Big Five things. While waiting for our already delayed flight, it got delayed again. Now our flight was at 11:30pm and we had only maybe an hour and a half of layover time before our next flight from Munich to Toronto. Thankfully there was no additional delays and we managed to get to Munich in time.

Thankfully, due to Jonathan's flight status we got upgraded to a premiere class, bigger seats, good food and the seats recline just that much more -not full lay down but good enough. I slept really well on the first flight and managed a good snooze on that second. However, with about two hours left in our flight, my stomach didn't feel well. I wasn't sure if I was just getting sick because I had been on the plane too long, if I was tired, or if I was going to be sick. Thankfully, while on the plane I didn't get sick. As we were standing in the line for customs I didn't think I'd make it, I thought I might be violently ill, but again I made... Once we hit the luggage pick up I had a great burp and I was like, Oh, was that it??

It was not. As we were in the cab on our way home, we were about 10 minutes away and I knew this was not going to be good. I cannot think of a day where I have been that sick. I'm pretty sure it was food poisoning. Instead of having a great afternoon of running around and getting stuff done and just unwinding... I was curled up in a ball being sick.

BUT, we're home! I'm better now, stomach is still not the happiest of campers but at least I'm not being sick anymore.

Jonathan and I still have TONS of photos to go through and will be posting them in the Gallery, so stay tuned for those! I think Jonathan is also planning a review of the places we stayed at.

Till the next adventure.
~Audrey

Last Lodge: a two day blog

We left the Chobe Game Lodge and headed out to the delta. We knew we had a very strict weight restriction for luggage and that it would be a smaller plane. However, I was unprepared for how small, it was literally had 8 seats, including the pilot. 

We had one other couple with us which we dropped off half way to our location. The runway was just a sand strip and a shed for a hanger. As we landed an elephant was crossing the end of the runway, thankfully not the middle. I asked the pilot what happens if animals are on the runway, he said that they either go around them or the pick up vehicle chases them off the strip. He did say that a zebra was hit once, and they lost the back axle on the plane, everyone was fine, with the exception to the plane and the zebra. 

As we got dropped off, we were loaded into a boat, after a windy way along the river we came to out island lodge! Sorry, no wifi or internet here (hence the late posting). 

It's a beautiful rustic lodge, we apparent got one of the better rooms with the view of the river. 

Our sunset ride was actually a canoe ride, I can't remember what it's called but it's basically a canoe. I'm not accustom to not paddling so it took me awhile to relax and enjoy the ride. 

Believe it or not, that's a full grown frog in the photo above. 

The lodge is run on a generator, so they shut off the power over night, which meant no a/c in the night! It wasn't too bad the first night, I managed to sleep through the night and didn't really want to get up! Haha. Although last night it got quite humid and the moon was telling me I should wake up! 

Our first full day we went for a long bush walk where we saw a bull elephant, a large number of baboons, numberlus birds and hippos in a small pond area. 

We had a relaxing afternoon,with nap and then headed out to the hippo pool for the evening. We saw three different pods of hippos and as we were heading back from watching them, one hippo decided that he wanted to chase the boat. He didn't get close, but it's kind of surprising how far out of the water the hippos can get for their size and they move quite quickly under ththe water!! Sadly I didn't get a video or photo of it but it was definitely something I'll remember. 

Happy kitty...sleepy kitty....what part of sit down and shut up do you not understand??

Four days left!  Will definitely be sad to leave this place.  We only have one more lodge left, perhaps the coolest place yet, in the middle of the Okavango Delta. This is a pretty wet swampy area from my understanding in the Moremi national park here in Botswana. But I jump ahead.  Today we had a couple of drives that we saw a lot of cool stuff on.  Before I get to that though a story.

One of the biggest things on Safari game drives is the safety rules.  First and foremost on all drives the number one rule has always been if we are by animals, the big cats in particular, that you stay seated in the vehicle and don't move around. This is because they don't see the vehicle as a threat, so if you are a part of it they mostly can't tell. I can't lie it is a bit unnerving when a lion is playfully looking straight at you.  

Secondly you minimize the talking until the animals basically go back to ignoring you, and even then keeping it down is a good thing. Many such as elephants have poor eye sight. The key is that you don't want to scare them as they are unpredictable, especially when they have young ones near by.  Momma don't like if her babies are threatened at all and can be super aggressive

With all of the previous drives we have been on the people have been good, and the Rangers very strict.  Rightly so, the first time you are beside a lion, only 5 or 6 feet away, it's definitely an adrenaline rush, a mix of holy crap this is awesome and holy crap that's a lion.  I can honestly say I never felt scared at all previously after the initial rush the first time. In South Africa the rules for rangers are very strict and penalties harsh.  Here however although I never felt scared I was a bit nervous a couple of times due to people in our car and other vehicles that didn't seem to get the rules.  They kept moving, talking when they should be quiet, and my most hated pet peeve, using flash (cuz flashing a big cat or elephant is a great idea... :s).  Honestly cameras should have flash disabled almost all the time. But I digress.  

There were a couple of times that the lions got spooked as a result of both other vehicles and people in our car.  Lucky the fight or flight urge in lions almost always results in them getting the hell out of there which sucks if you are trying to get pictures.  Let me say this no picture is worth endangering yourself or more importantly others.   Although you can't control other vehicles you can sit down and shut up, the rangers are great at moving the vehicle so everyone can see.

Anyways ending the rant about stupid people.  The game drives were great otherwise. Master you have done so many of them the animals the self don't have the wow factor as much unless they are doing something cool. The first thing we came across today was a pack of lions:

And like all cats apparently they love the kitten pile:

The prides love the roads as the breeze is cooler and often in the morning you see them in them until the sun is up when they go find shade.  Audrey has a pic of a 6mo old cub who is getting a bath by mom and is like "no mom, no more" will post that at some point, so cute.

The rest of the drive was pretty status quo with the animals.  It's funny, people have coined the acronym NAFI (Not Another F'ing Impala) as they are everywhere.  Haha.  Much like everything the more you see the more you are desensitized to how cool it is to be among them and see them. Thus we were setting goals of I want to see x or y, a leapord in a tree, a hunt, whatever it may be. 

Today, we met four of these things. Randomly we came across a leapord who was in a tree with the remainder of his meal.  It was super far away, but Audrey got some amazing shots with Burtha:

We thought, whoa, that's sweet.  After that on our afternoon drive, we saw a giraffe drinking:

We then saw a pack of lions with a few week old cubs, so cute and sweet.  We got to see and hear them feeding, I will post the video when we are home, but omg so awesome.

And then finally, we saw a leapord who had JUST taken down an Impala right by the road. I was not 10 feet away from it.  Never saw the kill but it looked so proud:

All of these things are very hard to see. It's not like you can schedule that you want to see them happen. Randomly it happened that we came across them on our drives yesterday though, showing us yet again that although we have seen the big and the ugly 5 animals already that there is always something new and amazing to see. Regardless of the idiots out there who don't seem to understand that this is nature and it is amazing.

Hopefully we will have internet at our next place...although we are not gonna hold our breath, as it is only a bush plane treck away today.  If not we will post our next blog when we get to Johanesburg in a few stays before leaving for home!

-Jonathan

Lense Envy

We've done about a total of twelve game drives, I'm counting last nights boat ride as a game drive. And each time we've gone out with a new group there is at least one person who comments on my lense. Below is what I have been using on the game drives.

As I have said in a previous blog, I'm lucky to have parents who are photographers. I'm no pro, but I'm at least taking photos in manual mode and learning. It has given me the ability to take some awesome photos, as you have seen on the blog. ( also, I post more on Instagram @aushagirl, if you want to have a look (shameless plug, I know)). I usually get asked what my photo looks like and how much closer is my photo then theirs. One guy has told me I'm going to cost him a lot of money, cause now he wants a longer lense, if you're going to be using it go for it but if you won't use it often it's an expensive accessory.

Our first game drive at Chobe was actually a river boat ride. We came across two Buffalo just lounging in the river and a number of elephants playing in the river and on the riverbank. 

We saw many birds, and a crocodile! 

It was different then the regular vehicle drives. While on a boat you're constantly moving and are limited to where you go, mainly cause you'll bottom out and you don't want to have to swim in croc and hippo infested waters... You might not make it to shore. 

~Audrey 

Walking across the border just to get moist...

Where to start...so yesterday we left the stunningly beautiful Lion sands Tinga lodge, and drove to the airport closest to Kruger.  Leaving was hard, but we were on our way to see Victoria falls.  I should have known when I had to get visas for Zambia as well as Zimbabwe, that it would be interesting.

The boarding was normal, even the flight was good.  There were some super idiotic Germans infront of us who kept moving around when landing to try and get a good view of the falls, the flight attendant looked defeated by them.  All you could see was the mist...no good views or anything. Once we landed and walked across the Tarmac, we were greeted by a massive lineup waiting to go through customs.  We waited probably 15 minutes, and the 4 lines were not moving at all. People were standing there just getting frustrated.  So Audrey walks up to ask, because we already had our visas, and he doesn't say a word and just stamps her visa and does the same for mine. Much to the annoyance of the crazy lines of people.  

Turns out that they are ridiculously slow at processing payments, and not overly motivated.  Glad we got the visa before hand or we would have been there for some time. We then got to our ride which we had to drive to the border and cross to Zimbabwe in.  I am totally used to our land borders that are all  stay in car style.  These you have to stop, get out go into a building for exiting the country, drive across the border, and do the same thing again.  

In the middle however you go across a bridge that people can bungee off of. There were tons of crazy there.  Once we got to the Zimbabwe border checkpoint, we get the passports stamped and get greeted by our second driver.  Apparently the one company doesn't go into the country.  Thus Thompsons our tour company was waiting and we had to walk across the border him pulling our luggage through the soft sand...one of the strangest things I have ever had to do in my travels to just enter a country.. as it was outside and disorganized. 

There is not much else to say, we went to a traditional place for dinner and had some fun stuff.  So far we have had ostrich, warthog, kudu, springboch, crocodile, impala, and of course beef and chicken. Most have not been bad I even had warthog again tonight.

Today however the fun began.  We set out early with a few others to our falls tour.  The falls is definitely huge and much like Niagara, Canada cersus the US, views, Zimbabwe has the superior views to Zambia.  So if you are thinking of going Zimbabwe is the better choice.  The only thing that requires the Zambian side was if you wanted to go swimming in the Devils pool.  

So our first views were cool:

As you can see it was super misty, it is the high season for water...so much was not able to be clearly seen all the time.

The path has many viewing points which show the full length of the falls. Here are some pics:

Now we weren't told that this is not like Niagara or even Iguassu, where sure you may get misty or damp if you say do the maid of the mist boat ride..but other than this you are fine.  This one there is almost a certainty that you will not get a bit misted, but completely soaked with little notice.  Like I am talking we could have got into a pool fully clothed and still been less wet than we got...lol

Lucky Audrey was quick acting and got the good camera away with little issue.  My own point and shoot I have been using is a tough Olympus cam, and that thing needs a lot more than water to bereaved it.

We did have ponchos, but because we were struck so suddenly, it was sorta like, meh, I'm already wet why be super hot and sticky wearing plastic too.

We also saw some People wearing maid of the mist ponchos actually...hit close to home.  :) suffice to say we went back to the hotel and changed.  If you are doing this wear quick dry stuff or a bathing suit,  don't bring expensive cams if not waterproof, and wear sandals that you don't mind getting wet.  

After this we went to lunch and the open markets. The bartering gets a bit much though.  The people have halarious English names though, we met a peanut, a label, a surprise and many other random names, or even just words.  

We then relaxed for a bit before a sunset cruise.  Quite nice African sunset with drinks

Overall awesome day.  We even saw the elephants come to the hotel watering hole:

Tomorrow we leave to Botswana to Chobe where they have tons of elephants as well as after that to the delta a swampy area.  Only 6 days left.  The time has definitely flown by!

-Jonathan 

Any hippopotamus will do....

Today's day started out pretty amazing, aside from waking up at 2am because I had to pee super badly and the moon was like a spot light to the face. 

Our morning game drive picked us up from the tree house and we went out looking for animals. We ended up coming across a hyena and followed it along the road for awhile till we came across the rest of its group. As we were sitting there, a group just a head of us spotted wild dogs! So we got to see the wild dogs again, they were actually hanging out in the roadway calling each other and everything. As we sat there the hyena group came along and the dogs took off. Our guide thought that the hyenas were following the wild dogs, as the wild dogs are quite efficient hunters. While we watched the dogs take off and the hyenas wander around, two males came out from a different area, we were sure that a fight might break out but they ended up taking off with a few females in tow. 

 

We continued to tour around. And saw a young bull elephant cross the river and a number of birds. 

After the drive we ended up going for a bush walk. We didn't see anything alive on the walk, but we did learn about who poops what and the different types of tracks. It was ridiculously hot today!! After the walk we cooled down in our private pool and then had a massage! No napping today! Basically once we were done with massages it was time for our evening drive. 

We basically saw so many hippos! We saw them once it started getting dark munching away on the grass. They are massive beasts! 

Tonight's dinner, was at a bbq pit. I had some springbok which was fantastically delicious! As one of the guys in our jeep said, it tastes like Canadian beef in technicolour! 

Audrey

When the moon hits your eye like a spotlight in the sky

So long day yesterday, and didn't get a chance to write the blog.  We started the day again on a game drive and the sky was stunning.

Some hippos as well, were seen:

We got back to our room around 10 as we went out into Kruger to see the famous male lions that we're all together.

After his we saw mr leapord again and Audrey got these shots of him yawning.

Definitely a beautiful cat...

We then actually had a treehouse night booked.  This has possibly been one of the coolest things we have done.  So beautiful and so many stars:

And of course Audrey being classy:

There was so many stars that it was amazing.  Audrey and I both took some great shots we will post when home. The moon was so bright that it was almost light out in the misleading of the night.  We even saw a hippo on the ground infront of our treehouse. Really fun night.

We are getting closer and closer to the end...:(...sadly we leave this place tomorrow.  We fly to Zambia and drive into Zimbabwe for Victoria falls.  Before I go for now though, here is an elephant playing in the mud...

- Jonathan