Wednesday, November 28, 2007

The rest of Africa in one blog entry

So I never had time to blog about the safari Pete and I went on in Botswana (including Victoria Falls) and also my travels in Namibia with Bruce and his friend Mike, but here are some links to pics on kodakgallery.com:

3 albums (Joanne alone, Joanne and Pete on Safari, Namibia with Bruce and Michael)

As expected, it was an amazing experience. Our group consisted of Gunther, this 70ish year old German guy, Linda and Roger, Marcus and Lilian, and our guide Richard. The safari started out with a lot of safari drives in a huge 4x4 truck that held all of us - Richard, who's been doing this for 20+ years and is one of the best, was an amazing driver. Although there was a slight mixup and we were forgotten for the first half of the first day (and we missed Victoria Falls), we eventually caught up with the rest of the group and got taken to this awesome lodge. The next morning we set off! I'm not going to describe it in detail, but it was the same stuff I think everybody does on these safaris... game drives, river cruises, game walks, and mokoro canoe trips (people pole you around on traditional mokoro canoes). Highlights included an awesome game walk by a real San-person, almost getting chased by a huge bull elephant, coming scarily close to a hippo pod in the mokoro canoes, seeing two leopard sisters playing together, all the sunsets over the desert, the Okavango Delta, and everything else. With my brother in Namibia, we had an awesome game dinner, went on the most awesome hike I've ever been on in the Namib-Nauklauf park, climbed up the red sand dunes of Sossusvlei for a sunrise, and quadbiking and sandboarding near Swakopmund in the deserts of Namibia.

Amazing and unforgettable.