holiday
December 9- Travel to Pretoria from my site to meet up with travelling companions, Jillian, Meagan and Kelsey. I waited four hours for the taxi to fill only to have an unfixable flat tire 25 miles outside of my closest town and to wait another two hours for another taxi to come from town. Eish. Nothing like a stressful start to a holiday but at least this time I remembered my credit card. That evening we watched The Holiday.
December 10-Travel from Pretoria to Malealea Lodge in Lesotho with detours to the airport to drop off Meagan’s friend and grocery shop. The little red polo that we hired had a packed boot and any food that we bought ended up crowding those sitting in the back seat. Our five CDs were on constant rotation, and tiresome at the end of the trip, while a silver snowflake ornament dangled from the rear-view mirror and a “Happy Holidays” snowman magnetized to the boot. At the border crossing between South Africa and Lesotho I got hassled because my South African visa says that it expired on April 6, 2005 when it doesn’t expire until November 2007. The guard joked (I think? He sounded rather serious) that they should detain me overnight for questioning. [picture in our little car, driving through the Free State]
December 11, 12, 13- Pony trekking. Jillian is able to walk for hours day in and day out, but horse riding was not for her. I loved it. The four of us were led by guides along roads and passes into rural Lesotho. The ride was scary at times, along mountain sides with nothing to prevent the occasional slip over the loose rocks to turn into a 100 meter stumble down a cliff and our horses racing (mine liked to bite and kick) so that they weren’t the last horse that ended up getting hit with a switch. The first night we stayed in a very remote village. It seemed that the people living there spend most of their day merely sustaining life: fetching water, herding sheep, growing vegetables and cooking. As soon as the sun went 
down, everyone went to sleep. What else do you do when there’s no electricity and you worked hard all day? In the morning, a grandmother tending to two toddlers called me into her house. After greetings, she told me to take her baby with me when I left. How hard is your life when you offer your child to a passing stranger? The second day we re-traced our steps a little, going down a mountain pass we went up the day before: a thin path in a small crevice between peaks. All along the path calla lilies grew wild, in some places forming a white blanket of flowers. The second village we stopped in was visited more often by pony trekking tourists and the family had bought a solar generator for their speakers and boom box, ah, progress. From that village it was a short walk to a tall waterfall 
where we tried to bathe in the freezing water at its base. Back at the village, Kelsey made friends with one of the many long, curly-haired goats that men in the village shepherd into the mountains each morning and back into an enclosure at night. The last day we returned to the lodge (my horse and I were quarantined from the other horses because of his desire to kick everyone else) with a better taste of the superb mountain views and poverty that is Lesotho. The villages were different from the villages in South Africa because they never were moved from one location to the next due to Apartheid. The houses were spread out over greater distances, allowing more space between the houses for grazing animals and growing 
crops. People were kind and everyone wanted sweets. [from top: Jillian, me, Kelsey on our horses; best pit-toilet view in the world; village where we slept our first night; goats and sheep outside of second village; me, Jillian, Kelsey with waterfall]
December 14-Hike to Cascades with new friends we met at the lodge. We reluctantly took three young boys as our guides to the Cascades, telling them that we would not give them any money. The hike down was harrowing, the path was non-existent and often more similar to rock scrambling than walking. The Cascades themselves were awesome: a series of short waterfalls into shallow pools. From the top, you could slide down into the next pool as long as you didn’t mind losing a little skin on the 
not-quite-smooth rock. The walk back had us using trees as support over crevices and scrambling over more rocks. Our guides at the end of the hike decided to charge us 60 rand each, which we refused to pay, instead we shared our lunch and the friends we met at the lodge took them for cold drink and fat cakes. [pics, Cascades with our guides and friends of the day; chilling at lodge]
December 15-Drive to Semonkong, another lodge in Lesotho. The drive consisted of going almost back to Maseru (the capital where we crossed the border into Lesotho) and then down a road that deteriorated the further we drove. By the end of the drive, the bottom of the car scraped on rocks as we dodged potholes and drove through two-foot deep puddles. The road is considered one of the better ones in Lesotho and was improved over its condition a few months before. We wanted to find a good grocery store because we only bought food for the pony trek and were left eating rice, bran flakes and what we could scrounge from the village shops (not much). Alas, the best we could find was some more rice.
December 16, 17- Day hikes to huge waterfall. Semonkong Lodge is situated along a river and up a hill. Most of the accommodation was higher end but we stayed in the only dorm up at the top of the hill next to the end of the road. I liked to compare it to Rivendell as the last comely house before the wilds. It was comely. The dorm was large with eight comfortable mattresses and a nice shower for the four of us to share. During the day we would hike to a waterfall about an hour’s walk from our dorm. The Maletsunyane waterfall boasted the world’s longest abseil (you are roped into a harness and are lowered down along the sheer rock face) in the world, 209 m. It was a little too expensive for any of us to abseil but it was an awesome sight. At night we would listen to music, cook rice, stare at the stars and have serious chats. I’m learning a mix of Sepedi and Setswana at my site and I loved being able to kinda talk in Lesotho (they speak Sesotho, similar to both Sepedi and Setswana). [pic: Jillian, Meagan, Kelsey with waterfall]
December 18-Drive from Lesotho to Kestell in the Free State, back to the capital then out of the country! Kestell is a tiny little town close to the Golden Gate National Park and the northern Drakensburg. There’s a few Mom and Pop grocery stores, restaurants and a large square dominated by a church. Karma Lodge was lovely, we had the place to ourselves again and feasted on Christmas cookies that we made and jam made by the owner. Dessert seemed to dominate our meals, we started a vacation-long tradition of amarula and ice cream.
December 19-Day hike in the northern Drakensburg Mountains. After much debate (a group of four with different views on the ideal time to spend hiking) we choose to do a short hike featuring lots of little waterfalls and a scramble up ‘The Crevice.’ A good day.
December 20- We left the mountains in a LONG drive from Kestell to Kosi Bay. Kosi Bay is in KwaZulu-Natal along the Indian Ocean almost on the border with Mozambique. We stopped in Durban for lunch and groceries and along the way we stopped for road-side pineapple. Yummy.
December 21, 22- On both days the owner of the backpackers drove us (and other people staying at the backpackers) to Kosi Bay mouth where there is the most beautiful beach I think I have ever seen and a protected inlet. In the inlet, there are some rocks where tropical fish live (at some point it was probably a coral reef, but too many people have touched and moved the rocks and sand to keep the coral alive). The snorkelling was like sticking your head in a salt water fish tank: the fish might hide but they are so close that you could touch them. There were moray eels, lion fish, red fish, blue fish and aggressive ones that liked to chase after you and bite. The beach itself was practically deserted, clean and had great waves for playing in. We all got really 
sun-burnt. On the first night, three of us went on a tour to see leatherback sea turtles nesting. What happens is you walk up and down the beach looking for turtle tracks in the sand leading from the ocean up past the high tide mark. If you’re lucky, the turtle is still laying her eggs and hasn’t returned to the ocean. We saw one turtle right after she finished laying her eggs when she was busy filling in the hole and ‘disguising’ the spot where she laid her eggs. Disguising is a stretch, there is no way that a 500 pound animal designed for water can hide where she’s been on damp sand. It ended up being more of a dramatic flailing of limbs that kicked sand everywhere (including into the turtle’s eyes, onto her back and 15 feet away) and seemed 
more effective as a method to completely bury the turtle and the nest. Once done, she returned quickly to the ocean. She walked surprisingly fast on the sand and occasionally got side-tracked by flashing cameras. We kept walking and saw another turtle returning to the ocean. Loggerhead sea turtles also nest here, but they are much shyer and avoid coming up onto the ocean when they think there might be human, animal or bad weather present. [ pics: our sleeping hut; me, Meagan and Kelsey; turtle]
December 23- While Kosi Bay mouth beach was heaven, paying for the 4-wheel drive trip there and dealing with the owner of the lodge, who wasn’t consistent in charging for rooms or the drive and tried to be cool and friends with everyone (a recipe for disaster) was not. We left Kosi Bay with Nadine, our German friend. She did not have a way to get from Kosi Bay to St. Lucia and needed to be saved from the owner of the backpackers who was not-so-subtly trying to get into her pants. The drive was short and we had time for an evening boat tour in the St. Lucia estuary. St. Lucia is a system of lakes that empty into the Indian Ocean and brags over 500 
hippopotami and 70 percent of South Africa’s crocodile population. The tour was short and we saw lots of hippos yawning, sleeping eating reeds in the water, a few crocodiles’ snouts, it was too hot for them to be any where but submerged in the water, and lots and lots of birds. There are so many hippopotami that they wander the streets at night and crocodile attacks are a reality! [pics: hippo, Nadine, Kelsey, me on hippo/croc tour]
December 24, 25-We met up with two more volunteers, Emily and Jenny, making seven people in the little red polo to and from St. Lucia beach. St. Lucia was much more crowded with a stronger under current (less fun to play in the waves). The water was sandy from the outlet of the estuary. Still pretty, it was a let-down after gorgeous Kosi Bay. The town itself reminds me of my hometown with lots of restaurants, hotels and beach shops catering towards summer-holiday tourists. We were doing what all affluent South Africans do: spend Christmas on the beach with a braai (barbeque) at night. Kelsey surprised us with home-made stockings beside our beds when we awoke on Christmas morning!
December 26-We read that Cape Vidal was a beautiful beach set in a nature reserve about 20 miles outside of St. Lucia. The seven of us got up early and packed into the little polo hoping that we would get to the entrance gates to the park early enough to be let in. The park was having water issues and they would only let 20 cars into the park. When we pulled up to the line, we realized that the gates actually opened two hours before we arrived and there was little hope in making it into the park. Jillian scouted out the situation and spotted a near-empty 10-passenger van in the front of the line with only two people in it. She asked if we could join them, and they happily agreed. We hopped into their car, called the park officials to discuss the water situation and 30 minutes later were on our way into the park. The drive to the beach was interesting: lots of grassy planes with a few trees and lots of stumps as if the park rangers had burned a second-growth forest of non-indigenous trees. There were plenty of impala, which we quickly got bored of seeing and antsy for the beach. Then, we saw a rhinoceros about 10 feet off the side of the road lazily munching on grass and taking his time further into the bush. My first wild rhinoceros sighting! We continued to the beach, white sand, tall dunes and lots of deep sea fishing boats. We played in the waves and a little bit of Frisbee. The trucks and trailers that drove the fishing boats in had trouble driving up from the beach because they had to make it over a sand dune, almost like watching 50 trucks and manly men trying to look good while getting in a car accident, over and over again. One of the boats caught a 500 pound black marlin, enough fish for someone to be eating for years and trophy large too big for most houses. On the way out, we stopped at another beach in the reserve, Mission Rocks. It was very different from Cape Vidal with rock formations instead of sand. We saw another rhinoceros as we left. [pic: rhino on way to beach]
December 27-We left Nadine in St. Lucia and Jenny and Emily on their way to Mozambique so the four of us rode off in the polo back to the mountains. The drive to Swaziland was uneventful but with a few detours. One was to the largest supermarket in Swaziland (I think the only reason that it was the largest is because the counted the furniture store next door as part of the grocery store). The other was a scenic route to our hostel, we got lost. Sondezela Backpackers calls itself the ‘Rolls Royce of Southern Africa backpackers.’ It was nice. Clean beds and kitchen (complete with working refrigerator without food thieves unlike St. Lucia), a gorgeous view of green mountains and set in the middle of a game reserve (without any of the dangerous animals, ostriches and warthogs would routinely come into the backpackers).
December 28, 29, 30, 31- To my surprise and delight Becca and Alicia, the two volunteers closest to me, and Becca’s friend, Dawn, happened to be staying at Sondezela as well. The next couple of days followed a very relaxed pattern. In the morning, we would normally make an effort to go to a craft market or get some yummy coffee in town and in the afternoon there were short hikes in game reserve where we could get within three feet of warthogs and deer like things. (It was too close for my comfort, warthogs have tusks! They could seriously hurt me!) In the evenings, we would cook, swim and take in the amazing views and cool mountain air. One afternoon we went to a little Ncwala ceremony, a pre-curser to the most sacred of Swazi rituals and the beginning of the harvest season. The scandalous head princess of the royal family led the singing and dancing and to watch, we had to take part. I don’t really know how to describe it. The songs were slow and solemn and the dancing matched the pace of the songs. Much more interesting was the princess, she is known for being overtly sexual and wearing 
teeny-tiny skirts. She routinely gets in trouble in the press. On New Year’s Eve, Kelsey and Becca got really sick with fever, chills and diarrhoea. With a heavy heart (and listening to Kelsey’s worries that it was malaria) we went to a New Year’s Eve bash at the House on Fire called “Hollywood, Swazi-style”. In the daylight, House on Fire is awesome with elaborate art deco flairs and poetry on the walls. At night, it’s like any other club (sometimes they hold plays), packed with revelry except with a surprisingly white crowd. We danced some until the count-down. Once 30 seconds to midnight arrived, the DJ went crazy and started counting down as fast as he could, often having to start over from 30 because he counted to fast. I didn’t really realize that it was the New Year because I was laughing too hard at the DJ until I saw fireworks filling the sky. Afterwards, there was more dancing and pressure to stay until the House on Fire closed at 5 AM. We didn't stay that long! [pics: up-close and personal with warthogs and zebra; me, Meagan, Jillian joking after walk with warthogs]
January 1- Woke up too early after dancing and was a complete bitch for most of the morning. Unfortunately, we had to leave Swaziland and drive up to Kruger National Park so I wasn’t able to fester and get over myself alone and ended up snipping at everyone else. Alicia (Becca and Dawn are going elsewhere once Becca gets over the flu) is joining our group for Kruger, it is Alicia’s and my first trip there. Kelsey was getting healthier even though her appetite hadn’t returned. At this point, I had had enough of travelling with the same people for a month (as I’m sure, they had had enough of me). They’re all great, but I don’t think I like anyone enough to spend a month in their almost constant company. The border crossing was quick, and we spent a very short amount of time driving in South Africa before entering Kruger. Once in the park, we established a pattern: oh and ah over animals then realize that we need to hurry to our lodging before 6:30 to avoid a huge fine. We stayed in a little six rondavel area which had a good kitchen but without electricity, pots, utensils or plates. We managed by borrowing pots from neighbors and using Tupperware and pot lids for plates. Outside of the enclosure, spotted hyenas would circle because of the meat that they smelled. Their den was a few minute drive from where we slept. [pic: spotted hyena mom and cub outside of their den]
January 2- Drive around Kruger. We saw plenty of animals: white rhinoceros, cape buffalo, ground hornbills, spotted hyenas, impala, waterbuck, zebra, elephants, wildebeest, nyala, giraffe, crocodiles, warthogs, baboons, vervet monkeys and a lioness but there was a lot of time in between sittings and it just wasn’t as cool as getting up-close like we did in Swaziland. We kept stopping at a larger lodge to see the sightings board in hopes that we would happen along cheetah, leopard or wild dogs after guidance from other people. But, there were a lot of baby animals (baby wildebeest are surprisingly cute) and I got to drive the manual car for a little bit without scaring anyone too badly. That night, we could hear lions off in the distance.
January 3-We left early, with a couple of hours to drive around the park. Afterwards, we dropped Alicia off in Nelspruit, ate lunch at the mall, dropped Kelsey off at her site and finally arrived at The Oaks, Jillian’s village. Jillian has a cute square-devol to herself and a good relationship with her family and especially her family’s dog for the walks she takes it on.
January 4- Jillian and Meagan dropped me off in Tzaneen from which I took several taxis back to my site. I was lucky: each taxi left within 30 minutes of my arrival. My host mom greeted me with a smile and a hug, and I had a large stack of never-read before books collected from Jillian and mailed from home. It was a great vacation and yet I’m so happy it’s over.
December 10-Travel from Pretoria to Malealea Lodge in Lesotho with detours to the airport to drop off Meagan’s friend and grocery shop. The little red polo that we hired had a packed boot and any food that we bought ended up crowding those sitting in the back seat. Our five CDs were on constant rotation, and tiresome at the end of the trip, while a silver snowflake ornament dangled from the rear-view mirror and a “Happy Holidays” snowman magnetized to the boot. At the border crossing between South Africa and Lesotho I got hassled because my South African visa says that it expired on April 6, 2005 when it doesn’t expire until November 2007. The guard joked (I think? He sounded rather serious) that they should detain me overnight for questioning. [picture in our little car, driving through the Free State]
December 11, 12, 13- Pony trekking. Jillian is able to walk for hours day in and day out, but horse riding was not for her. I loved it. The four of us were led by guides along roads and passes into rural Lesotho. The ride was scary at times, along mountain sides with nothing to prevent the occasional slip over the loose rocks to turn into a 100 meter stumble down a cliff and our horses racing (mine liked to bite and kick) so that they weren’t the last horse that ended up getting hit with a switch. The first night we stayed in a very remote village. It seemed that the people living there spend most of their day merely sustaining life: fetching water, herding sheep, growing vegetables and cooking. As soon as the sun went 
down, everyone went to sleep. What else do you do when there’s no electricity and you worked hard all day? In the morning, a grandmother tending to two toddlers called me into her house. After greetings, she told me to take her baby with me when I left. How hard is your life when you offer your child to a passing stranger? The second day we re-traced our steps a little, going down a mountain pass we went up the day before: a thin path in a small crevice between peaks. All along the path calla lilies grew wild, in some places forming a white blanket of flowers. The second village we stopped in was visited more often by pony trekking tourists and the family had bought a solar generator for their speakers and boom box, ah, progress. From that village it was a short walk to a tall waterfall 
where we tried to bathe in the freezing water at its base. Back at the village, Kelsey made friends with one of the many long, curly-haired goats that men in the village shepherd into the mountains each morning and back into an enclosure at night. The last day we returned to the lodge (my horse and I were quarantined from the other horses because of his desire to kick everyone else) with a better taste of the superb mountain views and poverty that is Lesotho. The villages were different from the villages in South Africa because they never were moved from one location to the next due to Apartheid. The houses were spread out over greater distances, allowing more space between the houses for grazing animals and growing 
crops. People were kind and everyone wanted sweets. [from top: Jillian, me, Kelsey on our horses; best pit-toilet view in the world; village where we slept our first night; goats and sheep outside of second village; me, Jillian, Kelsey with waterfall]
December 14-Hike to Cascades with new friends we met at the lodge. We reluctantly took three young boys as our guides to the Cascades, telling them that we would not give them any money. The hike down was harrowing, the path was non-existent and often more similar to rock scrambling than walking. The Cascades themselves were awesome: a series of short waterfalls into shallow pools. From the top, you could slide down into the next pool as long as you didn’t mind losing a little skin on the 
not-quite-smooth rock. The walk back had us using trees as support over crevices and scrambling over more rocks. Our guides at the end of the hike decided to charge us 60 rand each, which we refused to pay, instead we shared our lunch and the friends we met at the lodge took them for cold drink and fat cakes. [pics, Cascades with our guides and friends of the day; chilling at lodge]December 15-Drive to Semonkong, another lodge in Lesotho. The drive consisted of going almost back to Maseru (the capital where we crossed the border into Lesotho) and then down a road that deteriorated the further we drove. By the end of the drive, the bottom of the car scraped on rocks as we dodged potholes and drove through two-foot deep puddles. The road is considered one of the better ones in Lesotho and was improved over its condition a few months before. We wanted to find a good grocery store because we only bought food for the pony trek and were left eating rice, bran flakes and what we could scrounge from the village shops (not much). Alas, the best we could find was some more rice.
December 16, 17- Day hikes to huge waterfall. Semonkong Lodge is situated along a river and up a hill. Most of the accommodation was higher end but we stayed in the only dorm up at the top of the hill next to the end of the road. I liked to compare it to Rivendell as the last comely house before the wilds. It was comely. The dorm was large with eight comfortable mattresses and a nice shower for the four of us to share. During the day we would hike to a waterfall about an hour’s walk from our dorm. The Maletsunyane waterfall boasted the world’s longest abseil (you are roped into a harness and are lowered down along the sheer rock face) in the world, 209 m. It was a little too expensive for any of us to abseil but it was an awesome sight. At night we would listen to music, cook rice, stare at the stars and have serious chats. I’m learning a mix of Sepedi and Setswana at my site and I loved being able to kinda talk in Lesotho (they speak Sesotho, similar to both Sepedi and Setswana). [pic: Jillian, Meagan, Kelsey with waterfall]December 18-Drive from Lesotho to Kestell in the Free State, back to the capital then out of the country! Kestell is a tiny little town close to the Golden Gate National Park and the northern Drakensburg. There’s a few Mom and Pop grocery stores, restaurants and a large square dominated by a church. Karma Lodge was lovely, we had the place to ourselves again and feasted on Christmas cookies that we made and jam made by the owner. Dessert seemed to dominate our meals, we started a vacation-long tradition of amarula and ice cream.
December 19-Day hike in the northern Drakensburg Mountains. After much debate (a group of four with different views on the ideal time to spend hiking) we choose to do a short hike featuring lots of little waterfalls and a scramble up ‘The Crevice.’ A good day.
December 20- We left the mountains in a LONG drive from Kestell to Kosi Bay. Kosi Bay is in KwaZulu-Natal along the Indian Ocean almost on the border with Mozambique. We stopped in Durban for lunch and groceries and along the way we stopped for road-side pineapple. Yummy.
December 21, 22- On both days the owner of the backpackers drove us (and other people staying at the backpackers) to Kosi Bay mouth where there is the most beautiful beach I think I have ever seen and a protected inlet. In the inlet, there are some rocks where tropical fish live (at some point it was probably a coral reef, but too many people have touched and moved the rocks and sand to keep the coral alive). The snorkelling was like sticking your head in a salt water fish tank: the fish might hide but they are so close that you could touch them. There were moray eels, lion fish, red fish, blue fish and aggressive ones that liked to chase after you and bite. The beach itself was practically deserted, clean and had great waves for playing in. We all got really 
sun-burnt. On the first night, three of us went on a tour to see leatherback sea turtles nesting. What happens is you walk up and down the beach looking for turtle tracks in the sand leading from the ocean up past the high tide mark. If you’re lucky, the turtle is still laying her eggs and hasn’t returned to the ocean. We saw one turtle right after she finished laying her eggs when she was busy filling in the hole and ‘disguising’ the spot where she laid her eggs. Disguising is a stretch, there is no way that a 500 pound animal designed for water can hide where she’s been on damp sand. It ended up being more of a dramatic flailing of limbs that kicked sand everywhere (including into the turtle’s eyes, onto her back and 15 feet away) and seemed 
more effective as a method to completely bury the turtle and the nest. Once done, she returned quickly to the ocean. She walked surprisingly fast on the sand and occasionally got side-tracked by flashing cameras. We kept walking and saw another turtle returning to the ocean. Loggerhead sea turtles also nest here, but they are much shyer and avoid coming up onto the ocean when they think there might be human, animal or bad weather present. [ pics: our sleeping hut; me, Meagan and Kelsey; turtle]
December 23- While Kosi Bay mouth beach was heaven, paying for the 4-wheel drive trip there and dealing with the owner of the lodge, who wasn’t consistent in charging for rooms or the drive and tried to be cool and friends with everyone (a recipe for disaster) was not. We left Kosi Bay with Nadine, our German friend. She did not have a way to get from Kosi Bay to St. Lucia and needed to be saved from the owner of the backpackers who was not-so-subtly trying to get into her pants. The drive was short and we had time for an evening boat tour in the St. Lucia estuary. St. Lucia is a system of lakes that empty into the Indian Ocean and brags over 500 
hippopotami and 70 percent of South Africa’s crocodile population. The tour was short and we saw lots of hippos yawning, sleeping eating reeds in the water, a few crocodiles’ snouts, it was too hot for them to be any where but submerged in the water, and lots and lots of birds. There are so many hippopotami that they wander the streets at night and crocodile attacks are a reality! [pics: hippo, Nadine, Kelsey, me on hippo/croc tour]December 24, 25-We met up with two more volunteers, Emily and Jenny, making seven people in the little red polo to and from St. Lucia beach. St. Lucia was much more crowded with a stronger under current (less fun to play in the waves). The water was sandy from the outlet of the estuary. Still pretty, it was a let-down after gorgeous Kosi Bay. The town itself reminds me of my hometown with lots of restaurants, hotels and beach shops catering towards summer-holiday tourists. We were doing what all affluent South Africans do: spend Christmas on the beach with a braai (barbeque) at night. Kelsey surprised us with home-made stockings beside our beds when we awoke on Christmas morning!
December 26-We read that Cape Vidal was a beautiful beach set in a nature reserve about 20 miles outside of St. Lucia. The seven of us got up early and packed into the little polo hoping that we would get to the entrance gates to the park early enough to be let in. The park was having water issues and they would only let 20 cars into the park. When we pulled up to the line, we realized that the gates actually opened two hours before we arrived and there was little hope in making it into the park. Jillian scouted out the situation and spotted a near-empty 10-passenger van in the front of the line with only two people in it. She asked if we could join them, and they happily agreed. We hopped into their car, called the park officials to discuss the water situation and 30 minutes later were on our way into the park. The drive to the beach was interesting: lots of grassy planes with a few trees and lots of stumps as if the park rangers had burned a second-growth forest of non-indigenous trees. There were plenty of impala, which we quickly got bored of seeing and antsy for the beach. Then, we saw a rhinoceros about 10 feet off the side of the road lazily munching on grass and taking his time further into the bush. My first wild rhinoceros sighting! We continued to the beach, white sand, tall dunes and lots of deep sea fishing boats. We played in the waves and a little bit of Frisbee. The trucks and trailers that drove the fishing boats in had trouble driving up from the beach because they had to make it over a sand dune, almost like watching 50 trucks and manly men trying to look good while getting in a car accident, over and over again. One of the boats caught a 500 pound black marlin, enough fish for someone to be eating for years and trophy large too big for most houses. On the way out, we stopped at another beach in the reserve, Mission Rocks. It was very different from Cape Vidal with rock formations instead of sand. We saw another rhinoceros as we left. [pic: rhino on way to beach]December 27-We left Nadine in St. Lucia and Jenny and Emily on their way to Mozambique so the four of us rode off in the polo back to the mountains. The drive to Swaziland was uneventful but with a few detours. One was to the largest supermarket in Swaziland (I think the only reason that it was the largest is because the counted the furniture store next door as part of the grocery store). The other was a scenic route to our hostel, we got lost. Sondezela Backpackers calls itself the ‘Rolls Royce of Southern Africa backpackers.’ It was nice. Clean beds and kitchen (complete with working refrigerator without food thieves unlike St. Lucia), a gorgeous view of green mountains and set in the middle of a game reserve (without any of the dangerous animals, ostriches and warthogs would routinely come into the backpackers).
December 28, 29, 30, 31- To my surprise and delight Becca and Alicia, the two volunteers closest to me, and Becca’s friend, Dawn, happened to be staying at Sondezela as well. The next couple of days followed a very relaxed pattern. In the morning, we would normally make an effort to go to a craft market or get some yummy coffee in town and in the afternoon there were short hikes in game reserve where we could get within three feet of warthogs and deer like things. (It was too close for my comfort, warthogs have tusks! They could seriously hurt me!) In the evenings, we would cook, swim and take in the amazing views and cool mountain air. One afternoon we went to a little Ncwala ceremony, a pre-curser to the most sacred of Swazi rituals and the beginning of the harvest season. The scandalous head princess of the royal family led the singing and dancing and to watch, we had to take part. I don’t really know how to describe it. The songs were slow and solemn and the dancing matched the pace of the songs. Much more interesting was the princess, she is known for being overtly sexual and wearing 
teeny-tiny skirts. She routinely gets in trouble in the press. On New Year’s Eve, Kelsey and Becca got really sick with fever, chills and diarrhoea. With a heavy heart (and listening to Kelsey’s worries that it was malaria) we went to a New Year’s Eve bash at the House on Fire called “Hollywood, Swazi-style”. In the daylight, House on Fire is awesome with elaborate art deco flairs and poetry on the walls. At night, it’s like any other club (sometimes they hold plays), packed with revelry except with a surprisingly white crowd. We danced some until the count-down. Once 30 seconds to midnight arrived, the DJ went crazy and started counting down as fast as he could, often having to start over from 30 because he counted to fast. I didn’t really realize that it was the New Year because I was laughing too hard at the DJ until I saw fireworks filling the sky. Afterwards, there was more dancing and pressure to stay until the House on Fire closed at 5 AM. We didn't stay that long! [pics: up-close and personal with warthogs and zebra; me, Meagan, Jillian joking after walk with warthogs]
January 1- Woke up too early after dancing and was a complete bitch for most of the morning. Unfortunately, we had to leave Swaziland and drive up to Kruger National Park so I wasn’t able to fester and get over myself alone and ended up snipping at everyone else. Alicia (Becca and Dawn are going elsewhere once Becca gets over the flu) is joining our group for Kruger, it is Alicia’s and my first trip there. Kelsey was getting healthier even though her appetite hadn’t returned. At this point, I had had enough of travelling with the same people for a month (as I’m sure, they had had enough of me). They’re all great, but I don’t think I like anyone enough to spend a month in their almost constant company. The border crossing was quick, and we spent a very short amount of time driving in South Africa before entering Kruger. Once in the park, we established a pattern: oh and ah over animals then realize that we need to hurry to our lodging before 6:30 to avoid a huge fine. We stayed in a little six rondavel area which had a good kitchen but without electricity, pots, utensils or plates. We managed by borrowing pots from neighbors and using Tupperware and pot lids for plates. Outside of the enclosure, spotted hyenas would circle because of the meat that they smelled. Their den was a few minute drive from where we slept. [pic: spotted hyena mom and cub outside of their den]January 2- Drive around Kruger. We saw plenty of animals: white rhinoceros, cape buffalo, ground hornbills, spotted hyenas, impala, waterbuck, zebra, elephants, wildebeest, nyala, giraffe, crocodiles, warthogs, baboons, vervet monkeys and a lioness but there was a lot of time in between sittings and it just wasn’t as cool as getting up-close like we did in Swaziland. We kept stopping at a larger lodge to see the sightings board in hopes that we would happen along cheetah, leopard or wild dogs after guidance from other people. But, there were a lot of baby animals (baby wildebeest are surprisingly cute) and I got to drive the manual car for a little bit without scaring anyone too badly. That night, we could hear lions off in the distance.
January 3-We left early, with a couple of hours to drive around the park. Afterwards, we dropped Alicia off in Nelspruit, ate lunch at the mall, dropped Kelsey off at her site and finally arrived at The Oaks, Jillian’s village. Jillian has a cute square-devol to herself and a good relationship with her family and especially her family’s dog for the walks she takes it on.
January 4- Jillian and Meagan dropped me off in Tzaneen from which I took several taxis back to my site. I was lucky: each taxi left within 30 minutes of my arrival. My host mom greeted me with a smile and a hug, and I had a large stack of never-read before books collected from Jillian and mailed from home. It was a great vacation and yet I’m so happy it’s over.
posted by Melissa @ 10:02 AM
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