Nothing Like a Campfire in the Canyon

We had a pretty busy day yesterday, hitting a lot of spots in the north of Nicaragua, all the way to the border.

We are staying in the town of Esteli, Nicaragua for the last couple days, having a look around the area.  Our hotel here is old and grand and really nice, shown in the above photo.

It's pretty mountainous here in this region, with volcanoes all around.  The Panamerican highway runs right through here, but it's just another road in these parts. 

We started out the day with a walk in the plaza.  Every city, town, and village in Central America has a cathedral, and this one is no exception.  It's a beautiful old building, and the plaza also contains the local farmer's market, where we bought some food for a picnic planned later in the day.

 

We made our way up into the hills, with a goal of finding a property that TK and Jenny are interested in possibly purchasing.  They are keeping their options open here in Nicaragua, and might want to have a place of their own.  

Directions are iffy here, but we did eventually find the place and took a walk around.   Property here is inexpensive by US standards; this place is seven acres, with a couple of wells and reservoirs, three house dwellings, 400 trees (several varieties, mango, banana, papaya, other fruits), entirely fenced and cross fenced.  Price tag? Somewhere under $25,000 - but it is REE-Mote, and far away from anything.  

Another destination of the day was the Canyon of Somoto.  This is a highly regarded location in the mountains, with "spectacular" views ...

 

I mean, it was okay, pretty cool, but not great.  I try not to compare places, so I won't here either, but it was maybe worth the drive.  One really fun thing we did was to have a camp fire on the banks of the river and roast some sausages from Oregon. 

   

 

WE brought these sausages from home, they were from pork that TK raised at his farm in Jefferson.  We just gathered up some wood and started a little fire and used sticks to cook the sausages.  It was very ... rustic!

Since we were not far from Honduras, we made our way to the border just to have a look (sometimes I don't have the best luck crossing borders so we just got a picture).  We did get hassled by the police when driving back to Esteli, which is par for the course. In almost every developing country, the police establish roadside check points and they generally harass the local citizens, this time including us. Maybe I'll tell the story when I get the chance.

We returned to the city after dark, and went for a walk to dinner. The plaza had been transformed into some kind of big noisy event, with a concert and fireworks.   All in all, a pretty full day. 

  

Climb The Volcano! - Ride Down on an "Ash Board"!

Always ready for another adventure, we decided to try Volcano Boarding ... !

Here we are in Nicaragua, and this place is full of volcanoes.  It seems like the entire country is comprised of volcanic activity.  

So we decided to seek some excitement and climb one, and then use "snowboards" to get back down - quickly. 

It was only me and my son TK on this thrill ride, Fiona and Jenny (TK's wife) said they wanted to sit this one out.  Fiona you may recall is fresh from a death defying Zip line ride in Africa. 

It's not quite as easy as it sounds (does is sound easy?) and we arranged an early pick up from the hotel to make our way to the base of the volcano.  We figured if we started early it wouldn't be hot already, did I mention that it's always hot in this country? and humid.

The ride out was rough in the Landcruiser, but eventually we found ourselves ready to start climbing.  But first we had to load up with our stuff, including the board.  It looked a little silly - and it was a long way up - but everybody has to carry their own stuff.  

Oh, and they told us we had to wear a bandana, because of all the smoke, dust, and gravel that we would encounter.  I put mine on early - I didn't need it till some time later, Ha!  There wasn't really any snow there, it's too hot.  In fact, there is no snow in the entire country. 

So this is an active volcano, I can't remember the name, it was a Spanish / Mayan combination word.  Anyway, it last erupted in December ... yikes!  Is it gonna blow again soon?  It was a reasonably mild temperature in the morning, but as we got near the top, it got hot from the steam and other hot stuff emitting from the crater and the ground around it.  

It took some time to get to the top, but we enjoyed the fantastic view of the surrounding area and eventually the crater itself.  

And then it was time to make our way down.  Okay!  Ready or not!

So the volcano is made of black sand and gravel, with some big rocks thrown in.  You basically sit on the boards, or stand if you're really good, which we weren't.

The board are kinda home made, you can't buy them at a local sporting goods store (if there was one).  The idea is to sit down and ride that sucker all the way to the bottom, they advise you not to stand up unless you really know what you're doing.  It can take anywhere from three minutes at top speed, to more like ten minutes (at my speed).  

After some brief instructions, we had to put on these funky jumpsuits because you can get hurt.  The volcanic gravel is pretty abrasive.  TK and Jenny had recently met a girl that had done this and gotten pretty cut up and scraped.  So you also wear goggles, gloves, and the bandana.  

Like a lot of things, it seemed like a fun idea at the time, but once you get there it looks scary steep.  It looks like it's straight down.  How on earth do you stop if you have to?  Our guide "Manny" gave us a few tips and off we went.  

TK took off like a rocket. He was flying down the volcano!  I was ... a little more conservative.  It was wild, with rocks flying and dust and a spectacular view of the landscape below.  

You can really gain some speed, I was concerned about losing control.  "Manny" was an experienced expert, he's done this for six years.  He stood up like a snow boarder and zig-zagged his way down like a pro.   They say you can go up to 40 or 50 miles an hour  

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Before you know it, we were down at the bottom.  TK arrived before I did, and he looked like ... somebody who had just boarded down a volcano, with sweaty dirt and dust in his face and eyes and mouth.  

We stayed around for a bit to watch some other people come down and this one young woman just killed it and was hurling down the mountain.  She hit a large bump near the bottom and became airborne!  It was hilarious!  She really biffed it, and had a mouth full of gravel, but a big smile on her face.  

The whole thing was a blast!

Hey! Who Turned the Lights Out?

So we were greeted on our arrival to Nicaragua with a surprise ... There was no electricity at the Airport!

Fortunately, it's not as far to get to Nicaragua in Central America as it is to get to Africa.  The flights were relatively short from Portland to Atlanta to Managua.

But as we were landing, things got a little rough, and there were some flashes of light outside the airplane.  It was lightning.  There was a storm, but we were able to land okay.  

Unfortunately, it knocked the power out at the National Airport. 

So as we landed, they couldn't get us off the plane, the jetway didn't work!  We finally climbed down some stairs and walked in the darkness into the terminal! 

 

They had to get us through the immigration and passport control, and of course it was dark, so they used flashlights.  It was ... interesting.   That went okay, but as we walked into the baggage control area, it was pitch black.  People were using their cell phones to see, so that you wouldn't bump into someone. 

A Nicaraguan airline representative explained that they couldn't get the bags into the terminal because the conveyor belt didn't work. So we waited.  We were able to spot our son TK and his wife Jenny, who were waiting outside, so at least they knew we were there.  

But what was the plan?  Was there even a plan?  It was rather chaotic, and we had to wait in the darkness, but finally they explained that they would bring the bags into the terminal by hand on carts and we could find our bags (hopefully) in the darkness and get going.  The lights began to come back on, and off, and on and off. 

This luggage arrangement sorta worked, but it was rowdy, with pushing and shoving and shouting ... Ha! Ha! Ha! ... actually kinda funny but confusing. Much to our surprise, we found our three bags.  

 

We made our way out to the waiting area and embraced TK and Jenny.  They were happy to see us and laughed ... welcome to Nicaragua!

As we left the airport TK asked:  "If there was no electricity - how did they land the plane?  Did they even have runway lights?"  ... good question ... not quite sure ...

A Day At the Ruins

So we set out this morning to drive to the North of Nicaragua, making our way through the crowded and lively capital city of Managua.  It took a while, but we eventually got on the highway heading north.  It is hot and humid here, but with air-con in the car it was a pleasant drive.  

 

Our destination was Leon, an historic city in the foothills.  There are a lot of volcanoes in Nicaragua, and the landscape is really interesting, with lakes and hills and such.  We decided to stop at the "ancient" ruins in Leon Viejo, or "old Leon" which was about 40 miles away from the city.  

 

Ancient might be a misnomer, but they were over 500 years old, from back in the days of Columbus.  The Spanish built a settlement that was destroyed after 85 years by an earthquake, and lost for several hundred years.  This area is very geologically active and volatile, with regular volcanic eruptions, etc.

The ruins were unearthed in the 70's and are being restored.  We walked among the ruins with the backdrop of the Momotombo Volcano, which is releasing gas and fumes into the air at the present time.  

At the end of the visit to the ruins, we made our way to the present city of Leon, which is only around 400 years old ... An eventful first 24 hours.   

We captured this photo of TK and Jenny at a sidewalk cafe where we had dinner.  

  

 

Why Don't You Have Any Trees? An Essay

Trees are not a bad thing, and shade is always welcome when it's hot

 

This blog post is a departure and not directly about our travel adventures, but more about taking a look at the belief systems and culture in West Africa. Of course, we don’t want to make the mistake of lumping all of Africa together. It’s a large and diverse continent with many religions and cultures. West Africa is much different than southern Africa, or the north which is mostly Arabic. 

But it's surprising how superstition is such a big part of their daily lives and what they believe. I was surprised on our last trip there how many people use superstition or old wives tales or rules of thumb or "traditional ways of thinking" (or whatever you want to call it) to justify their activities. Sometimes you run smack into these superstitions when trying to make a point or achieve something.

I need to give you an example. We are very active in developing market gardens to enable the locals in the villages in Senegal to grow not only enough nutritious food to eat, but also to generate enough surplus to sell. It has enhanced their quality of life and standard of living.

We have encouraged them to plant trees in the gardens and for some reason we get a lot of resistance to this idea. Keep in mind that this region is extraordinarily hot much of the time and the ground is flat and dry and hard. Trees would provide not only needed shade, but fruit and other benefits, and they don’t require much maintenance. Once they’re started, they grow on their own.

Based on the above description of the landscape, it can look desolate and barren, so trees help aesthetically to add life and green vegetation and variety and attract bees and butterflies and so on. All good.

We have tried to get them to plant more trees, without success. And to our dismay (see below), they even cut down or cut back the few existing trees that already exist!   Why? When we asked this question, we got vague answers like “well, you know ...” or “the shade blocked the sun for the vegetables” or “so-and-so did it, not me.” Hunh?

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Another brief example: When we tried to get them to plant watermelons in the gardens, they balked. Why? Because watermelons don’t grow in a garden - they grow in a field. Everybody knows this, they said. We tried to explain (in that climate) watermelons grow wherever you plant them. 

At this point, there are still no watermelons in the gardens. 

 

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Let me debunk one concern - that the trees block the sun. In this region of Senegal, the sun is blistering hot for much of the year. It is very dry and often windy, which sucks the moisture out of anything (including people!). Because it is so dry, much of our effort goes into providing a reliable source of water year round to make gardens possible.

To fear that there is not enough sun is just not realistic. It shines all day long and the temperature often run well over 100 degrees. When we were there last month it was 108 degrees. The heat and sun can be brutal, even for the locals who are used to it. They usually take the afternoon off (like a siesta) because it’s too darn hot to work.

So to be concerned about trees blocking the sun simply doesn’t hold water (pardon the pun). In fact the opposite is true, the shade produced by the trees can protect the plants and help them hold moisture. In many hot regions of the world, they use fabric mesh to block the harsh sunlight and give sensitive plants a better chance to grow. And there is so much sunlight that the ambient light even in the shade is more than enough. And the sun moves across the sky obviously, so the shade is somewhat temporary. In short, trees are not a bad thing, you need trees!

Despite all this evidence and reason, they are still resistant. This is where superstition or belief systems come into play. It is difficult for reason to prevail when there are such deep seated “feelings” or cultural beliefs about something.

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So we talked about planting more trees and they said the shade of the trees would affect their Gardens. Then they said the trees would take too much water (they don’t because their roots are much deeper than the vegetables). Then they would drag their feet and just not do it.

We said we would pay for the trees (they don’t cost much). We tried to explain that trees wouldn’t be much of a problem. It would benefit the plants, cool things off, plus if you put in the right kind of tree you can have fruit - mangoes, papayas, lemons, limes, bananas, etc. - almost year round.  You don’t have to keep planting them like vegetables and they take very little maintenance once they are established. We’re not talking about an orchard here, just a few trees here and there.

Not only that, but guess where the ladies hang out when they’re working in the garden and they get too hot and want to take a break?  Under the trees, in the shade - if they have any.

So we were surprised when they were still resistant and reluctant to plant more trees. We even pointed out that we went to visit several other Gardens with lots of trees and they were doing fine - even thriving. It seems a little bit of shade actually helps provide some relief from the relentless brutal heat and searing sun.

We investigate it further and ... it turns out that some of them said that they believe that trees bring shade and a wind which would bring disease and illness. What? You mean like Bad Luck? They seemed to be serious. We are always careful to not directly confront or dismiss any of their beliefs, but this was a surprise. We were just stunned. Do they actually think this? Or maybe they’re just making up an excuse? We’d never heard this before. Sounds like a bunch of mumbo jumbo.

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At one point the next day, we were traveling around with a Senegalese professional, an educated man who helps design and install the solar panels to pump water in the gardens. He turned to me and asked, why aren’t there more trees in the gardens? I felt like hugging him! We talked about our frustration in getting them to plant more. I told him about their “beliefs” and he rolled his eyes. It’s nonsense, he said.

He has experience in many other gardens and said even from a simple economic standpoint trees produce fruit year round that you can sell in the slow season. And many trees provide herbs and medicine.

I asked him to explain this to our garden team. Being Senegalese, he spoke their language, and went on to explain to them the benefits of trees in the garden. When he asked them why they didn’t have more trees, they looked down, shuffled their feet, and didn’t make eye contact.

When gentle persuasion doesn’t work, you have to use stronger persuasion (force?) so we gave them a directive:  we want more trees and we will pay for them. It doesn’t cost much. In fact we bought some trees before, but they haven’t been planted yet. Stay tuned. 

What? You are cutting the few trees we have?

You can see the trees in the back that have been chopped and defoliated

 

In closing, I will describe another episode that illuminated the lack of worth they attribute to trees. One of our newer project sites is blessed with a whole bunch of existing trees. Indeed, this property has the most trees in the entire village. Trees take a while to grow in this harsh climate and you need to take care of them - they are valuable.

When we arrived to the site on our trip, we were horrified to see that the trees had been cut. Not cut down (Thank God) but severely hacked and butchered. What’s this? “Oh, some guy always comes along and cuts the trees back every year and so we let him do it”. What? Who? And how is he cutting them? Turns out he is using a machete and just climbs in the tree to just hack and whack without much reason or rhyme. And he is not even a local, he is one of several nomadic cow herders ... who cut the trees to feed their cows!

Frankly, we were rather outraged. This is madness! Who gave them permission to cut the trees? Again, this was met with shuffling of feet and staring off into the distance, no comment. They realized we were upset and didn’t want to take responsibility.

At any rate, we told them this needs to stop. This is not even a local villager, just some guy passing through. Tell him no more cutting of trees. “Okay ...,” they sort of reluctantly agreed.

Senegalese are rather indirect at times and avoid confrontation in social situations.

Much to our astonishment the cow guy shows up the next day while we were there, and asks one of our crew if he can cut the trees. Our crew member says “sure, no problem”.  They talk quietly and we don’t understand this exchange in their local language.

Soon we hear the guy hacking on the trees. What the ... ? Are you kidding me? We are incredulous when we see what is happening. Didn’t we just have a long conversation about not cutting the trees? 

Were we not clear about this?

And again our staff members are slightly mortified. They are torn between their cultural sympathy for the nomadic cow herders, and the directive from the “management”. One of our guys slowly wanders over to the tree butcher and tells him he has to stop. The guy wonders why and our staff member embarrassingly shrugs and points at us. The tree hacker climbs out of the tree, and goes off the property ... to a nearby tree, and starts hacking on that one.

Culturally, it seems to be accepted that you let nomads cut on your trees. But trees are too hard to come by.  Go feed your cows on grass or something else.

Lesson learned ... the hard way.  It's hard to believe ... what they actually believe.

Epic Day! At Long Last - Victoria Falls! ... and more! Zim-Zam-Zip ... read on

Where do you start with a day like this?

One of the target destinations - in fact THE target destination - of this trip to southern Africa was Victoria Falls.  Unfortunately, as the schedule went, we came here last.  We went and saw a bunch of wonderful things in the last ten days (after leaving Senegal) but always in the back of our minds was this place. 

But today was the day ... in more ways than one!

We set out early from here in Zimbabwe in the town of Victoria Falls.  We had a full day planned, as we start for home tomorrow. It's our first time in Zimbabwe, and our hotel here is within walking distance of the Falls.  You can see the mist fill the sky and you can hear the Falls. 

We were not disappointed.  Victoria Falls is one of the natural wonders of the world and is a gigantic cataract set of waterfalls, in fact it is almost like a giant curtain of water.  It stretches over a mile wide.  You can hear it before you see it, and currently it's high season for the water flow, the highest of the year.

You are first met with a statue of David Livingstone, the Scottish explorer who discovered the Falls in 1855, and for whom the nearby town in Zambia is named.  History buffs might recall the famous saying when Henry Morton Stanley finally encountered the explorer and calmly stated: "Doctor Livingstone I presume?"

At one end of the Falls you find the voluminous Cataract Falls, that cascade over the edge of a 300 foot drop.  The Falls are so intense that they send up a continuous plume of water vapor that sometimes obscures the view.  

In fact, at certain points in the hike along the edge, you get soaked.  Everyone wears a poncho, even though it's 81 degrees F and bright sunshine. 

The volume and size outweigh almost all other waterfalls in the world, with the exception of Iguazu Falls in Paraguay/Brazil (been there!) and Niagara Falls (been there too).  

We enjoyed the hike for three hours and were amazed by the views. At one point, we came across at gazelle/impala critter right by the path.  Normally they are quite shy in the wilderness, but paid us no mind. 

At the end of the hike on the Zimbabwe side, we came to the Victoria Falls Bridge, a spectacular structure built across a wide and deep gorge, with it's own rainbow underneath.  More on this gorge later - stay tuned. 

We eventually walked across the bridge, which is a famous spot for bungee jumping (we did something almost as exciting - read on). From the bridge you have a great view of the other end of the Falls, in the Zambia side.  

It's one of those places where you just cannot get enough of it and could watch it all day.  But we had other things to do and eventually left the bridge and the Falls and headed to our next destination, with a high degree of anticipation.

Zimbabwe, Zambia, and a Zip Line across the gorge ... !

So Fiona had her birthday last week, you might have seen the video of her wonderful serenade by the hotel staff.  I gave her a gift that we had both thought about - a zip line excursion for her (along with me) across the Victoria Falls gorge.  

This is a major canyon, we could see it from the bridge, it's probably close to a thousand feet deep!  Yikes!  This ain't no tree top zip line, it's major league!  But we were committed to it, and walked the trail to the edge.  All day long we had thought about this, and were surprisingly calm ... until we got there. 

Now keep in mind that neither I nor Fiona are the dare-devil types. In fact, I have a bad time with heights, and Fiona doesn't even like the rides at carnivals.   We are WAY out of our comfort zone. 

There are some experienced local crew guys there waiting at the sign up desk, and I asked "Do you guys have to do anything to get ready for a Zip Line trip?" and they said "No, we are ready"  

So I said "Let's do this! (before we change our mind)"

They started strapping the gear on us and it seemed kind of ... flimsy?  It's just a harness.  We're going to jump off a cliff and this is all there is between us and death?  Suddenly we both begin to rethink this whole idea.  

But these guys are very calm and confident.  They do this all the time.  We march off across the side of the cliff to the jump-off point, and by this time Fiona is getting a serious case of "I Can't Do This!!!" but I try to calm her down and say ... "sure you can ... if we don't make it, at least we'll be together!" ...

We are going to do this tandem, in other words we will jump together and cling to each other and hope for the best.  

So we are at the edge on this platform staring down into the abyss, and Fiona is petrified.  I am sort of ... ahem ... "apprehensive?"  HA HA HA - Who's idea was this?  

Next thing you know we step off the edge and ... we plunge ... downward rapidly ... like a free fall, until the zip line begins to pull us across the canyon.  It's freakin' scary as hell, but rather exhilarating at the same time (at least for me, I think Fiona wet her pants - just kidding!). 

We travel a long ways to the other side, and begin to ascend, but of course with this type of zip line you kind of roll back down, you don't stop at the other end.  Then we roll back up ... and roll back up ... and back and forth until we are sort of stopped in mid air suspended over the canyon.  We were way up there, and you begin to look down and think ... okay, now what?

But this is part of how the whole thing works.  Soon, along comes one of the crew.  He slides down and he snaps a line to us, and begins to haul us back up to the starting platform!  I didn't exactly know that's how they did this.

Dude, it's a long way back up there! Fiona is praying hard and just wants to be done with this.  And we have to turn around in mid-air, and face the other way, which is extremely difficult, probably the scariest part.  

Eventually we get back to the platform and have to clumsily climb up hanging over the edge of the cliff.  We get back on the standing platform and - we have survived!  There is always something about staring death in the face and coming out okay.  It was definitely one of the more frightening things either one of us has ever done. 

(by the way, didn't get many pictures - selfies are the last thing on your mind in the middle of this) 

Okay, now time for some relaxation and ... tea?

Not far from the Zip Line experience, there is one of the world's great hotels - The Victoria Falls Hotel.  We had planned to go there after the jump, and have a look around.  

Only when we got there, the place is fantastic, one-of-a-kind.  So we decided (well, Fiona really wanted) to have High Tea on the outdoor terrace, overlooking the whole Victoria Falls vista.  It was amazing.  What a great way to wind down after a heart pumping, adrenaline-laced, out-of-character jump of a lifetime. 

We were able to calm down and actually laugh about the whole episode and congratulate each other on our - courage? stupidity? foolishness? adventure?  

Anyway, it was one of those days when it all comes together and almost falls apart, but ends well.  Jolly good fun!

  

Remember, Don't Run Unless I Tell You To Run ...

Moving right along, we're at the Okavango Delta in Botswana

Today's Geography Lesson:  This delta is unique because the Okavango River flows from the highlands of Angola, through Namibia, and into the landmass of Botswana - it does not flow into the sea.  
It empties into the flatland of northern Botswana, which eventually further south turns into the Kalahari Desert.  The river spreads out and becomes an immense area of wetlands and islands to form one of the world's largest inland deltas. 

We went there today from the small town of Maun, Botswana.  It was a fairly distant hour-and-a-half ride in an open jeep that led to an off-road adventure deep into the bush.   When we got to our first stop, we got out of the jeep and were met by some locals in small dug-out canoes. 

This is something we anticipated, because that's how you get out into the Okavango Delta, by small man-powered boats (full disclosure, the boat we were in was actually coated in fiberglass, but I don't want to ruin the vibe).   We set off in two boats, with another couple, Luke and Yana. 

These boats are "pushed" along by experienced guys called "polers" who have a long stick that they use to push off the bottom to propel the boat forward.   Frankly, the boats seemed real tipsy, and we were warned not to move suddenly or shift our weight.  It took a while to get used to them, it felt like they could tip over at any moment. 

It was a sublime adventure, as we wound our way through long patches of open water, only to find ourselves in very narrow channels of deep grasses in a labyrinth that seems impenetrable.   The weather was perfect, warm, sunny, and big billowy clouds.  

We had one rather disconcerting moment on the way out to our destination.  We came around a tight bend in a narrow channel, and the two boat pilots got excited and we came to an abrupt stop. We were in the front boat (and I was in the front seat) and the guides were very concerned that there was a hippo in front of us in the water.  

Hippos are huge beasts and can be very dangerous if provoked. We stopped and waited ... there were bubbles coming up out of the water.  We waited for the hippo to move.  The boat pilots made a bunch of noise to scare the hippo away, to no avail.  It got kinda tense.  If a hippo attacked us in these little boats in the middle of this grassy marshland, we were goners.   

We eventually quietly passed through the spot, never seeing the hippo.  They can stay underwater for ten minutes or more.  It was especially unsettling for me, because if that big dude attacked, I would be the first to go ...

Eventually we arrived at terra firma (dry land), and got out to commence our next episode - a game drive on foot.  We were going hiking.  This was a really cool way to go out and find animals - by walking around and looking for them.  

The pilot of one of the boats became our walking guide.  He gave us many instructions - one of which I will quote here: "Remember don't run unless I tell you to run, please wait until I instruct you to run, and then run fast!"

We were on an "island" and in theory there were potentially a bunch of animals.  We walked a long ways and didn't see anything, but just when we thought we would come up empty, we saw a giraffe, and then some zebras, and then two more giraffes.  And before long, we encountered a huge pod of hippos at a watering hole.  I counted somewhere near 36 of them.  Awesome! 

Keep in mind we were on foot.  We got real close to one of the giraffes.  This was one of the highlights of the trip so far.  We were within fifty feet or so. 

And one final bit of excitement - when we got back to the boats and got ready to set sail for home, there was a hippo in the water just out from the boating launch.  Not good.  We could definitely see this one, and the boat guides said we had to find another way to put the boats in. 

So we had to carry them a couple hundred yards and put in at another spot some distance away.  

Tomorrow will be a travel day, not sure if there will be much to report ...

In The Jungle ... the Lion Sleeps Tonight ...

So We Pick Up Where We Left Off ...

I promised a lot of photos - this is a picture fest 

I was in the middle of the previous blog post when the internet died, but tonight we are in Maun, Botswana, and we have decent broadband available.  I will attempt to catch up.

So it's picture time.  The last couple days included some game drives, and some river cruises - for the purpose of finding and observing the animals of Africa.  This took place in Zambia and Botswana.  

These monkeys below were actually just outside our room at the lodge by the Chobe River.  They are active little buggers so you better not leave anything outside your room!  The big guy in the middle was about four feet tall. 

This region has a lot of water, which makes it popular with animals. In this rare shot from the River, you can see an elephant on the shore and hippos in the water.  

 

One of our favorite African critters is the giraffe.  They are so big and unusual, yet graceful and they move in slo-mo, which makes them rather mesmerizing.   This shot captured them with some neighbors. 

 

We actually got to the see - the grand prize of animal viewing, a pride of Lions!  

Often you can spend a lot of time looking for lions without results.   They are not fond of cameras or people, so it's hard to get a good shot. This is the best I could do.  

The first picture shows a large male, with a big dark mane.  The second shows two females.  They were hunting and we just missed a shot of them in a high speed chase of a warthog!

 

 

Of course, this being by the river, there are numerous warning signs to beware of Crocodiles.  We saw several and fortunately they were not super close.  This one is relaxing on the bank of the river.

 

There are a number of large, and small, animals such as Kudu, Gazelles, Springboks, and such, and they tend to run in herds.  This Kudu was big, as big as a horse, and had some seriously twisting horns.   And there were Impalas everywhere, like the one in the second picture below, with a warthog in the background. 

 

 

So we talked about the graceful and elegant giraffe - except when they're drinking water.  They are so tall that the water is a long way down and they have to do the splits to spread their legs enough to reach the water.  It's pretty funny, especially from behind.

 

And you get some amusing views during the day, like this shot of the elephant on shore and the boat in the water.  I thought about making this a caption contest, you know, where you supply a humorous caption for this photo ... but ... 

 

Speaking of hippos, we got a picture of this bad boy in the marsh near the Chobe River.  These guys can weigh up to 3,500 lbs and they can run faster than you think. 

And anyone who follows this blog will not be surprised by yet another sunset photo, but this one has a twist.  We are at the conjunction of four countries - Zambia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Namibia.  

So this photo was taken from the Botswana side, as the sun set over Namibia.  Our boat guide explained to us that "the sunset belongs to Namibia, but the view and reflection? They're ours!"

 

So this is not exactly a selfie, but an elephant came into our tent camp this morning and friends of ours captured this moment - with us waving in the background from the porch of our tent. 

 

More to follow soon.  Tomorrow we go to the Okavango Delta for a dugout canoe trip and some hiking.