get cozy. it's a doozy.
so we're here. back in capetown after a brilliant journey on four wheels through western south africa and much of namibia. i'm accustomed to four of us packed into a toyota corolla overflowing with camping equipment and crackers. now our party is back down to two, as the Tammy and the Kelly departed from Capetown International Airport yesterday afternoon amidst hugs and promises to write and call soon. we've relocated from various backpacker establishments on long street in the center city to the haven of shaul and eilat's house outside of town. they are wonderful and provide a perfect spot to sort through our things and just relax, melt into their squishy white couch, eat some stir fry, watch some good television, sip some south african rooibos tea from the 500-teabag box we picked up from Rooibos International on our way up to namibia...
it's tough times at the moment. i find myself teary and wanting to go home and not wanting to go home and wishing i'd done this and that and nervous about transitions and loneliness and being overwhelmed and having everything to do and having nothing to do and being independent but not at all ... yipe! it's a brainfull for sure.
but i know you really want to hear about namibia. i've written so little about it thus far. sharing it with kelly and tammy made it feel sometimes like i didn't need to write as much. but i do. and now i'm sad i've left it this long, for the experiences have faded a bit to memories. the crisp contrasts of the paprika-colored dunes of the Namib desert against the bright blue sky, wind whipping the top layer against my face, are that much harder to recall. i know i've written bits and pieces, so i'll try not to repeat myself toooooo much.
so anyway, here goes: our itinerary took us up along the coast of the Western Cape of South Africa to start. we went up through scrubby brushland through the area that transforms every august into a wildflower-carpeted paradise. we missed the bulk of the blooms, but stopped once or twice to walk through some roadside fields, knee-high in yellow and purple and orange blossoms. we kept to the coast all the way up to Paternoster, where we had lunch #2 (it was getting too late, we were getting too hungry, so we had some bobotie and asparagus quiche as lunch #1 back in Darling near the wildflowers) of deLICious fish 'n' chips (oh those brits and their cuisine) on the beach, surrounded by whitewashed homes of fisherfolk that would've reminded me of greece if i'd ever been there before. we kept on driving. as the day finished up, we drove along the cederburg mountain range, just a few hundred kilometers from CapeTown by the main highway. the mountains were lit orange by the setting sun. we had just a 30km or so left to go as it got dark. the scent of night jasmine told us we were in the right place (or maybe it was the orange trees in that citrus valley). we stayed at Gekko backpackers, and it was good.
next day, we went to Rooibos International, south africa's largest rooibos processing plant. we watched the little promotional video and sipped our free tea before buying them out of stock completely (not really). but we did buy a lot of tea. it was a challenge to fit it in the car, but we did. too bad we know now we could've picked it up on the way back. alas.
next day we travelled further up towards namibia. stops along the way for lunches and snacks (magnum ice cream bars are refreshing treats!) and supplies and finally we stopped in the town of Springbok. we stayed in a somewhat froofie place slightly out of our price range, and i slept on a mattress on the floor, but we had a nice dinner at a nice restaurant and that was that.
onward into namibia. huge rock cliffs and the odd contrast of the green orange river valley against the dry red dirt of the rest of the country greeted us. easy border crossing. used to be "the same country" i guess. namibia was "south west africa" for those who are uninformed, as i was. the UN asked south africa to babysit namibia as a developing country but instead south africa just kind of took it. as a result, namibia imports and exports everything to namibia, one very costlyly and one very cheaply. also, afrikaans is widely spoken, and many south africans still enjoy privileges on their holidays there. politics section complete. for a more accurate and in-depth description, google it or something. so we made it to Fish River Canyon and stayed in a campground at Ai-Ais, which looked much more like a parking lot, but had pretty good facilities (as well it should, for what it cost! national park fees went up 50 rand per person per day in the past few months - that's almost $10. that's a BIG difference). we cooked mac and cheese on a real stove they had, and charged a camera battery at the power point next to the camp site. the ground was a bit hard, but sleep we did, and in the morning we shooed the stray cats out from the engine of the car (luckily tammy saw one crawl in there - otherwise the term "food kitty" has a new meaning) and drove out to see the canyon itself. it was nice, but not as breathtaking as i'd hoped. waimea on kauai was breathtaking. this was... nice. a big huge canyon. yes. but just.. nice.
after feeling like we'd gotten our money's worth, we proceeded onwards. camped the next night at a random french(?) castle called Duwisib with a nice campground and a big tree over our site. little did we know that little wormies liked to fall from this tree onto unsuspecting heads. kelly's dinner (we rotated who was in charge - just easier that way) cooked sur camping stove was a delicious chickpeas sur cous cous concoction. we ate it out from under the tree. otherwise there'd be accidental extra protein of tree wormies. ick. soooo... we went to sleep in the tent. and no that wasn't rain on the fly. it was.... wormies. serioulsy, it wasn't THAT bad, but kinda gross.
next day, we picked up some apple pie at reception on our way out and made it all the way to Sesriem (gateway to the Namib desert and the dunes and everything) by mid afternoon. we splurged on the buffet lunch at the Sossusvlei Lodge (SHMANCE) across from the entrance to the park. it was a good buffet. we all gorged ourselves on the fresh vegetables. there were artichokes! stuffed, we went to set up our camp after grudgingly handing over the large national park fee once again.
after a quick relax, we piled back in the car and made our way down the long, under construction, half gravel-half tarred road into the desert. there were dunes on either side, if far, and it was very neat. we were looking for a dune that was supposed to be right near the entrance - you can climb it and watch the sunset. but we must've missed it and i'm glad we did, cuz we made it 45 kilometers into the park and found ourselves at the famous Dune 45, one of the tallest in the world (maybe?) and we were mostly alone (one spanish guy waiting for his disappeared friends - only their shoes were left at the foot of the dune). we climbed and played and got sand EVERYWHERE (i mean that.) and watched a stunning african sunset. huge orange sun, silhouetted tree, silence... the whole deal. sun down, we jetted back to the entrance and collapsed into our tents pretty quickly. oh. i went for a swim first. alone in the pool. nice stars out there in the desert.
next morning up EARLY cuz it gets hot in the desert. oh, you didn't know? yeah. the desert is hot and dry. we drove in, walked once we weren't allowed to drive further in our trusty two-wheel drive corolla, and found ourselves climbing a dune. over the not too tall hill (littered with huge blue beetles that skittered across the surface leaving cool little tracks behind) was an old salt pan. we kept climbing, walking now along the crest of the dune, so it was downhill on two sides, but still up hill to a higher point. there were moments i thought i might vomit from the heat and pounding heart, but eventually three of us made it up there. Tammy tumbled into oblivion, but she told us to go on without her so we did. no really, she went back and found some shade like a SMART person. Kelly, Nabia and I traipsed up and up and up until we finally reached the apex, where a tour group full of people of a certain age were walking across the other way. huffing and red-faced, we sat on our bums and watched them go. then we took some pictures of the amazing contrast below: another old salt pan - Dead Vlei, they call it - so wide and flat and white, skeletons of dead acacia trees proving that there was once water while also providing the perfect third to the trio of colors: orange-red of the dune sand, cracked white of the salt pan, and dark brown of the acacias. gorgeous. we made our way down and out, barefooted on the shady side, sinking our feet into the cool sand, and hotfooting it (quite literally) across the sunny side (nabia cooked her toes!). eventually, we made it out, though the three of us decided we deserved a ride back to the parking lot and our car, so we paid The Man and took the crazy 4WD shuttle back.
exhausted from sun, there was pool. pool was refreshing, as one might expect. then we drove. first we got some apple strudel in a cute little "town" called Solitaire. it was damn good apple strudel, let me tell you. we also got some gas. conveniently, the whole town WAS the gas station/store/applestrudelseller. brings a whole new meaning to one-stop-shopping, i guess.
onward! to walvis bay. on the coast. much colder. we made it there just after dark and found out after several gas station requests that the backpackers' establishment to which we were headed was, in fact, no longer in existence. so we got a recommendation and made our way to Lagoon Chalets. we had our own little chalet, with 6 beds (a master bedroom, two twins in the dining area, and two in a loft), and kitchen. so what it if there were a few roaches crawling about? right? right... it was fine. we were exhausted, as usual, but we had a lovely time, actually. a bit o' the old time - the four of us, sitting around a table, relaxing, eating together (my food night found us with moose bread from solitaire-of-the-apple-strudel and olive oil and dukkah. yummmmeeeee) and laughing. sleep.
next morning, tammy, nabia and i went to the lagoon to see the flamingos. greater and lesser, both. the lesser ones are pinker. the greater ones are... bigger. there's magenta and black under their wings and you can see when they take off or land. hundreds upon hundreds of them. they dance to find their food. a little shuffle.... backwards, forwards, sideways. they scruff up the sandy bottom (don't say sandy bottom) and then eat the little morsels that are floating around. it was hilarious. don't worry, we took video. french toast a la nabia. excellente.
1/2 hour drive only. what a luxury! now in swakopmund. most developed city in namibia, perhaps, though i didn't see enough of windhoek (the capital) to really compare. anyway, we stayed in a lovely place, Villa Wiese. we did laundry (even though it was a sunday and the whole world was closed - we found the one open place - the municipal laundry. a very odd place with video games and a scantily clad lady painted on the front). Nabia made a GORGEOUS dinner - we all chipped in, of course- and there was a huge salad and chicken satay and yum yum yum. AND we made a big pasta salad to take with us on the road. quite productive, i'd say.
further north now - next we had the luxury and rare pleasure of driving through a rainstorm in namibia. lightning in the distance and all - it was quite a sight. eventually it passed and we made it to our campsite of Aba Huab - community run and quite nice. most of the good sites were taken, but we got one right near the restaurant and it started to drizzle while we hurriedly set up camp - trying desperately to get our pegs to stick in the sandy ground. the woman at reception told us we could sleep in the restaurant if it was raining too much. we almost took her up on at. instead, we sat watching the storm through the second floor open windows, like most of the other campers, as we assembled turkey sandwiches by candle and headlamp light. the rain passed and we slept in our tents after sitting by the communal fire, listening to the staff ladies click and chat across the flames. next day we visited twyfelfontein and the rock engravings and paintings therein. this one valley has literally thousands of sites. it's quite cool. horned rhino, longnecked giraffe, dancing kudu, noble elephant: all were present, including their foot/hoof prints. perhaps the flat rocks were the first blackboards? perhaps creative expression? who knows...
As we were driving towards the cheetah farm and thinking maybe we wanted to visit a cheetah conservation park instead of a touristy "farm," driver kelly asked if the others had found the gravel roads very slippery at all. tammy turned on her superhuman hearing and asked kelly to pull over. sho'nuff, we had a flat. luckily, tammy had been working as a mechanic for a bit, so the changing of the tire (much like the changing of the guard) went without a hitch and with stone straight faces (har har). we rerouted to go to outjo (a main-ish town with several garages) to replace our spare tire and it was kind of on the way anyway. stayed at Ombinda Lodge, which was really a fancy lodge which allowed camping on a spare lawn on the side. just lovely. surrounded by squawking guinea fowl (these birds are ridiculous and just BEG for cartoon spoofs of themselves. seriously. ethan, look into it.). kelly whipped up a roasted vegetable feast on the campfire and we stuffed ourselves with ginger butternut squash, lots of beets, potatoes, cauliflower, and other stuff, i'm sure. yummers.
next day we were on to Etosha National Park, our final destination of sorts. we'd heard amazing things about this place - huge numbers of animals of all kinds. it was a high expectation to live up to. we saw zebra as soon as we'd driven in that afternoon. kelly was on the lookout for giraffe and it wasn't long til plenty were spotted close to the road. short screams of excitement followed by a flurry of photo activity. the first campsite was a bit spare and dry (but hey, it's namibia, what do you expect) but the waterhole was unbelievable. there were kudu (huge brown antelope with big ears, delicate white stripes down their sides, and the males have enormous swirling antlers, gemsbok (oryx - long graceful straightish black horns curving out of the heads of black and grey and white horselike antelope), TONS of zebra, BILLIONS of springbok (small delicate antelope with white faces - Heidi, these are the animal i've decided you are. more details to follow), elephants (a whole herd came eventually - two groups actually, mommies with BABIES!! and later da bachelor boys), later joined by four or five black rhino. amazing. you could just sit on the benches and watch the show, the animals seemingly oblivious to the huge floodlights and all the cameras staring at them from behind the small wall. we even saw two lady lions from a distance in the binocs. whoa. we were really excited. i thought that was to be the only lion sighting and i was pumped. two lionesses! but little did i know what was to come... that day, there was swimming and more waterhole watching, as well as a short drive at dusk (you're not allowed on the roads after sunset, but dusk is an active time for animals cuz it cools off but it's still light enough...) and we saw a bunch of giraffes and zebra, tons of springbok as usual, but some of these springbok got a little excited, and they pronked. now amy, you're making up words again. i know i know i make stuff up - but this is serious. springbok pronk. one moment they'll be trotting away, then they put their little delicate heads down and bound up and down on stiff legs - like cartoons. it's amazing. and positively HIlarious. AND you get to say "pronk." go on, try it. nobody's listening. say it out loud. "pronk." "pronk pronk." onomatopoeia rocks. and i'm not just talking about my college a cappella group.
the next three nights were spent exploring Etosha National Park. tons of animals everywhere and it was really exciting. highlights include two very close male lion sightings. very close. walking up to just a few meters away kind of close. close enough to see the beautiful amber eyes kind of close. roll up the windows close. but wow. they are amazingly beautiful creatures. Life in the wild revolves around them completely. When approaching a waterhole, animals are tentative because there might be lions around. always because of the lions. always looking, watching, giraffes awkwardly tumbling out of their necessarily-splayed water drinking poses, springbok bounding back, even elephants freezing mid drink. kings of the jungle, indeed. we also heard a more distant male lion clearing his throat. whoa. that sound carries. we ALSO saw a group of male and female lions hanging out under some trees (they looked so overheated!), but sadly no cubs. :(
out of the park and sad about it, we drove only as far as Tsumeb, just to the southeast of the park. we stayed in a backpackers there, ate at a very strange "cafe" that had burgers that were more bread than meat, and chatted to the WorldTeach volunteers that took up the rest of the rooms that night. interesting interesting. there are so many good non-profits.
Yeah, so the next two days were LONG driving days, but really good. we listened to the iRivers happily, passed the Yahtzee electronic game around (i held out til almost the end...). oh yeah - we visited the Cheetah Conservation Fund. cheetahs are beautiful. they have a great little museum there. we saw a few adult ladies. but no cheetah cubs. sad. anyway, we drove and drove, covering most of the north-south distance of namibia in one day. Tsumeb to Keetmanshoop. we drove just a bit in the dark at the end - stopping at a rest stop to get out and gaze at the unbelievably clear stars. keetmanshoop was utterly seedy, so we proceeded only 14km to our next destination: the quiver tree forest. these quiver trees are cool lookin trees that store water very well, and for some reason though they usually grow quite far apart from one another, there's a particular patch of land where they grow quite close. hence the quiver tree forest. we stayed at the forest - they have a campsite there- it's actually a private farm. we couldn't see the trees or much of the place at all when we arrived - but it was ok cuz we were so very tired from a full day of car and our greasy gas-station dinners were sitting heavy in our bellies (grilled cheese/tomato and gherkins!). slept with the fly off the tent that night- the stars were just too beautiful and the breeze was finally cool after so many hot days in the north.
up for sunrise and the trees were lovely in the light. make-up nap in the car, very deep, and waking up to much more sunlight, some campside chatter, and oatmeal cooking up on the campstove. we sat around the little rock-table at our campsite and mixed in the nuts and dried fruit we had left over from our trail mix, and we sipped our rooibos tea from our camping cups. camping's kinda fun. i kinda like it. i might have to buy a little tent...
soo.... then we drove again. made our way (sad) out of namibia, easy crossing again, and back into south africa, where we put pedal to the medal and made it all the way back to the citrus valley and Gekko backpackers again. it's nice to come back to a place like that - makes it feel full circle. i cooked a HUGE meal of sauteed veg (cauliflower, sweet potato, eggplant, zucchini, mushrooms (canned, but it worked), lots of garlic, butter... and the rest of the cous cous. anyway, the meal was a hit and then we all collapsed as usual. in the morning we ate as much cream of wheat as we could to clean out our stores in the cooler, but it tasted a bit like plastic... maybe it'd been baking in the rear window of the car. heh...
anyway, we had a lovely leisurely last day back to capetown because of our two marathon drives the previous days. we took the scenic route through some of the Cederburg mountains and then found Bovlei winery estate in Wellington OPEN after our failed attempt at a visit before our tour - it's Kelly and Tammy's most favoritest wine and they stopped selling the Gewurstraminer in their town. we found it. it's there. free tasting and the lady was nice. i told her only three glasses though she had four out and she filled the fourth with sparkling grape juice. :)
then back to capetown and long street. we had a hilarious and wonderfully long evening at Mojitos restaurant (it's pretty much "our place" now - we even took a photo with the waitress) and then played cards (wizard - a trump game somewhat like buck euchre), laughing and competing. nabia overtook my lead at the very end. alas.
sleep.
one more day in capetown all together (that was two days ago) - slowness and switching rooms and errands and then a lovely dinner with shaul and eilat in rondebosch - vegetable soup and survivor. we then drove to sea point cuz tammy's aunt who used to live here wanted her to meet and give a bit of cash to an ex-employee/friend of hers, Rhoda. she was a very sweet woman with a great deep laugh and big teeth - gums practically tumbling out of her mouth. we stood by the side of the road cuz everywhere else was closed, and she gave us all hugs at the end and we went back to long street to our private dorm at Cat and Moose (btw it's cuz there's a cat named Cat and a dog named Moose).
yesterday we drove them to the airport. then we moved yesterday afternoon to shaul and eilat's house, spreading out and taking it over with all our crap almost immediately. we did laundry, thus covering the backyard with drying items, and we were organizing in the living rooms, madagascaran baskets and cds and various purchases strewn about. but they forgave us and last night was another lovely evening of couch and tv and tea and giggles and warmth.
today's been tough. i'm at a hard juncture. home is coming on fast, but it's not gonna be calm for at least a week afterwards. there's running around like a madwoman, just as i'm doing out here, just after i get back. in NYC, down to DC and back... i'm going to be quite dazed and confused, i think. not to mention the emotions that are going wild inside my head and heart - independence, exploration, dependence, creativity, branching out, feeling at home.... how to combine all these things.
one thing i really admire about many of the people i've met and come to know out here (and something i think i'll observe and admire about many of you at home too now) is the ability not to define themselves in black and white. not to use the words never and always. not to put themselves in a box. it's something i most certainly struggle against. as though if i drink alcohol (a "never" for me), i won't be me anymore. if i go without a plan (an "always"), i will cease to be amy. i understand, in the front of my brain, that we are fluid - that we change, that we are most certainly living in the gray area. but in the back of my brain - in the depths, and in my heart, i don't get it. that's the thing i need the most work on, i think. and i'll get there. it'll just be a tough journey. but that's life, right? journey? right.
ok. that's it. i'm drained utterly and completely. tomorrow we fly to paris. farewell to africa. it's been absolutely wonderful.
and as for home? i'll see you in less than a week.
amy
email me
it's tough times at the moment. i find myself teary and wanting to go home and not wanting to go home and wishing i'd done this and that and nervous about transitions and loneliness and being overwhelmed and having everything to do and having nothing to do and being independent but not at all ... yipe! it's a brainfull for sure.
but i know you really want to hear about namibia. i've written so little about it thus far. sharing it with kelly and tammy made it feel sometimes like i didn't need to write as much. but i do. and now i'm sad i've left it this long, for the experiences have faded a bit to memories. the crisp contrasts of the paprika-colored dunes of the Namib desert against the bright blue sky, wind whipping the top layer against my face, are that much harder to recall. i know i've written bits and pieces, so i'll try not to repeat myself toooooo much.
so anyway, here goes: our itinerary took us up along the coast of the Western Cape of South Africa to start. we went up through scrubby brushland through the area that transforms every august into a wildflower-carpeted paradise. we missed the bulk of the blooms, but stopped once or twice to walk through some roadside fields, knee-high in yellow and purple and orange blossoms. we kept to the coast all the way up to Paternoster, where we had lunch #2 (it was getting too late, we were getting too hungry, so we had some bobotie and asparagus quiche as lunch #1 back in Darling near the wildflowers) of deLICious fish 'n' chips (oh those brits and their cuisine) on the beach, surrounded by whitewashed homes of fisherfolk that would've reminded me of greece if i'd ever been there before. we kept on driving. as the day finished up, we drove along the cederburg mountain range, just a few hundred kilometers from CapeTown by the main highway. the mountains were lit orange by the setting sun. we had just a 30km or so left to go as it got dark. the scent of night jasmine told us we were in the right place (or maybe it was the orange trees in that citrus valley). we stayed at Gekko backpackers, and it was good.
next day, we went to Rooibos International, south africa's largest rooibos processing plant. we watched the little promotional video and sipped our free tea before buying them out of stock completely (not really). but we did buy a lot of tea. it was a challenge to fit it in the car, but we did. too bad we know now we could've picked it up on the way back. alas.
next day we travelled further up towards namibia. stops along the way for lunches and snacks (magnum ice cream bars are refreshing treats!) and supplies and finally we stopped in the town of Springbok. we stayed in a somewhat froofie place slightly out of our price range, and i slept on a mattress on the floor, but we had a nice dinner at a nice restaurant and that was that.
onward into namibia. huge rock cliffs and the odd contrast of the green orange river valley against the dry red dirt of the rest of the country greeted us. easy border crossing. used to be "the same country" i guess. namibia was "south west africa" for those who are uninformed, as i was. the UN asked south africa to babysit namibia as a developing country but instead south africa just kind of took it. as a result, namibia imports and exports everything to namibia, one very costlyly and one very cheaply. also, afrikaans is widely spoken, and many south africans still enjoy privileges on their holidays there. politics section complete. for a more accurate and in-depth description, google it or something. so we made it to Fish River Canyon and stayed in a campground at Ai-Ais, which looked much more like a parking lot, but had pretty good facilities (as well it should, for what it cost! national park fees went up 50 rand per person per day in the past few months - that's almost $10. that's a BIG difference). we cooked mac and cheese on a real stove they had, and charged a camera battery at the power point next to the camp site. the ground was a bit hard, but sleep we did, and in the morning we shooed the stray cats out from the engine of the car (luckily tammy saw one crawl in there - otherwise the term "food kitty" has a new meaning) and drove out to see the canyon itself. it was nice, but not as breathtaking as i'd hoped. waimea on kauai was breathtaking. this was... nice. a big huge canyon. yes. but just.. nice.
after feeling like we'd gotten our money's worth, we proceeded onwards. camped the next night at a random french(?) castle called Duwisib with a nice campground and a big tree over our site. little did we know that little wormies liked to fall from this tree onto unsuspecting heads. kelly's dinner (we rotated who was in charge - just easier that way) cooked sur camping stove was a delicious chickpeas sur cous cous concoction. we ate it out from under the tree. otherwise there'd be accidental extra protein of tree wormies. ick. soooo... we went to sleep in the tent. and no that wasn't rain on the fly. it was.... wormies. serioulsy, it wasn't THAT bad, but kinda gross.
next day, we picked up some apple pie at reception on our way out and made it all the way to Sesriem (gateway to the Namib desert and the dunes and everything) by mid afternoon. we splurged on the buffet lunch at the Sossusvlei Lodge (SHMANCE) across from the entrance to the park. it was a good buffet. we all gorged ourselves on the fresh vegetables. there were artichokes! stuffed, we went to set up our camp after grudgingly handing over the large national park fee once again.
after a quick relax, we piled back in the car and made our way down the long, under construction, half gravel-half tarred road into the desert. there were dunes on either side, if far, and it was very neat. we were looking for a dune that was supposed to be right near the entrance - you can climb it and watch the sunset. but we must've missed it and i'm glad we did, cuz we made it 45 kilometers into the park and found ourselves at the famous Dune 45, one of the tallest in the world (maybe?) and we were mostly alone (one spanish guy waiting for his disappeared friends - only their shoes were left at the foot of the dune). we climbed and played and got sand EVERYWHERE (i mean that.) and watched a stunning african sunset. huge orange sun, silhouetted tree, silence... the whole deal. sun down, we jetted back to the entrance and collapsed into our tents pretty quickly. oh. i went for a swim first. alone in the pool. nice stars out there in the desert.
next morning up EARLY cuz it gets hot in the desert. oh, you didn't know? yeah. the desert is hot and dry. we drove in, walked once we weren't allowed to drive further in our trusty two-wheel drive corolla, and found ourselves climbing a dune. over the not too tall hill (littered with huge blue beetles that skittered across the surface leaving cool little tracks behind) was an old salt pan. we kept climbing, walking now along the crest of the dune, so it was downhill on two sides, but still up hill to a higher point. there were moments i thought i might vomit from the heat and pounding heart, but eventually three of us made it up there. Tammy tumbled into oblivion, but she told us to go on without her so we did. no really, she went back and found some shade like a SMART person. Kelly, Nabia and I traipsed up and up and up until we finally reached the apex, where a tour group full of people of a certain age were walking across the other way. huffing and red-faced, we sat on our bums and watched them go. then we took some pictures of the amazing contrast below: another old salt pan - Dead Vlei, they call it - so wide and flat and white, skeletons of dead acacia trees proving that there was once water while also providing the perfect third to the trio of colors: orange-red of the dune sand, cracked white of the salt pan, and dark brown of the acacias. gorgeous. we made our way down and out, barefooted on the shady side, sinking our feet into the cool sand, and hotfooting it (quite literally) across the sunny side (nabia cooked her toes!). eventually, we made it out, though the three of us decided we deserved a ride back to the parking lot and our car, so we paid The Man and took the crazy 4WD shuttle back.
exhausted from sun, there was pool. pool was refreshing, as one might expect. then we drove. first we got some apple strudel in a cute little "town" called Solitaire. it was damn good apple strudel, let me tell you. we also got some gas. conveniently, the whole town WAS the gas station/store/applestrudelseller. brings a whole new meaning to one-stop-shopping, i guess.
onward! to walvis bay. on the coast. much colder. we made it there just after dark and found out after several gas station requests that the backpackers' establishment to which we were headed was, in fact, no longer in existence. so we got a recommendation and made our way to Lagoon Chalets. we had our own little chalet, with 6 beds (a master bedroom, two twins in the dining area, and two in a loft), and kitchen. so what it if there were a few roaches crawling about? right? right... it was fine. we were exhausted, as usual, but we had a lovely time, actually. a bit o' the old time - the four of us, sitting around a table, relaxing, eating together (my food night found us with moose bread from solitaire-of-the-apple-strudel and olive oil and dukkah. yummmmeeeee) and laughing. sleep.
next morning, tammy, nabia and i went to the lagoon to see the flamingos. greater and lesser, both. the lesser ones are pinker. the greater ones are... bigger. there's magenta and black under their wings and you can see when they take off or land. hundreds upon hundreds of them. they dance to find their food. a little shuffle.... backwards, forwards, sideways. they scruff up the sandy bottom (don't say sandy bottom) and then eat the little morsels that are floating around. it was hilarious. don't worry, we took video. french toast a la nabia. excellente.
1/2 hour drive only. what a luxury! now in swakopmund. most developed city in namibia, perhaps, though i didn't see enough of windhoek (the capital) to really compare. anyway, we stayed in a lovely place, Villa Wiese. we did laundry (even though it was a sunday and the whole world was closed - we found the one open place - the municipal laundry. a very odd place with video games and a scantily clad lady painted on the front). Nabia made a GORGEOUS dinner - we all chipped in, of course- and there was a huge salad and chicken satay and yum yum yum. AND we made a big pasta salad to take with us on the road. quite productive, i'd say.
further north now - next we had the luxury and rare pleasure of driving through a rainstorm in namibia. lightning in the distance and all - it was quite a sight. eventually it passed and we made it to our campsite of Aba Huab - community run and quite nice. most of the good sites were taken, but we got one right near the restaurant and it started to drizzle while we hurriedly set up camp - trying desperately to get our pegs to stick in the sandy ground. the woman at reception told us we could sleep in the restaurant if it was raining too much. we almost took her up on at. instead, we sat watching the storm through the second floor open windows, like most of the other campers, as we assembled turkey sandwiches by candle and headlamp light. the rain passed and we slept in our tents after sitting by the communal fire, listening to the staff ladies click and chat across the flames. next day we visited twyfelfontein and the rock engravings and paintings therein. this one valley has literally thousands of sites. it's quite cool. horned rhino, longnecked giraffe, dancing kudu, noble elephant: all were present, including their foot/hoof prints. perhaps the flat rocks were the first blackboards? perhaps creative expression? who knows...
As we were driving towards the cheetah farm and thinking maybe we wanted to visit a cheetah conservation park instead of a touristy "farm," driver kelly asked if the others had found the gravel roads very slippery at all. tammy turned on her superhuman hearing and asked kelly to pull over. sho'nuff, we had a flat. luckily, tammy had been working as a mechanic for a bit, so the changing of the tire (much like the changing of the guard) went without a hitch and with stone straight faces (har har). we rerouted to go to outjo (a main-ish town with several garages) to replace our spare tire and it was kind of on the way anyway. stayed at Ombinda Lodge, which was really a fancy lodge which allowed camping on a spare lawn on the side. just lovely. surrounded by squawking guinea fowl (these birds are ridiculous and just BEG for cartoon spoofs of themselves. seriously. ethan, look into it.). kelly whipped up a roasted vegetable feast on the campfire and we stuffed ourselves with ginger butternut squash, lots of beets, potatoes, cauliflower, and other stuff, i'm sure. yummers.
next day we were on to Etosha National Park, our final destination of sorts. we'd heard amazing things about this place - huge numbers of animals of all kinds. it was a high expectation to live up to. we saw zebra as soon as we'd driven in that afternoon. kelly was on the lookout for giraffe and it wasn't long til plenty were spotted close to the road. short screams of excitement followed by a flurry of photo activity. the first campsite was a bit spare and dry (but hey, it's namibia, what do you expect) but the waterhole was unbelievable. there were kudu (huge brown antelope with big ears, delicate white stripes down their sides, and the males have enormous swirling antlers, gemsbok (oryx - long graceful straightish black horns curving out of the heads of black and grey and white horselike antelope), TONS of zebra, BILLIONS of springbok (small delicate antelope with white faces - Heidi, these are the animal i've decided you are. more details to follow), elephants (a whole herd came eventually - two groups actually, mommies with BABIES!! and later da bachelor boys), later joined by four or five black rhino. amazing. you could just sit on the benches and watch the show, the animals seemingly oblivious to the huge floodlights and all the cameras staring at them from behind the small wall. we even saw two lady lions from a distance in the binocs. whoa. we were really excited. i thought that was to be the only lion sighting and i was pumped. two lionesses! but little did i know what was to come... that day, there was swimming and more waterhole watching, as well as a short drive at dusk (you're not allowed on the roads after sunset, but dusk is an active time for animals cuz it cools off but it's still light enough...) and we saw a bunch of giraffes and zebra, tons of springbok as usual, but some of these springbok got a little excited, and they pronked. now amy, you're making up words again. i know i know i make stuff up - but this is serious. springbok pronk. one moment they'll be trotting away, then they put their little delicate heads down and bound up and down on stiff legs - like cartoons. it's amazing. and positively HIlarious. AND you get to say "pronk." go on, try it. nobody's listening. say it out loud. "pronk." "pronk pronk." onomatopoeia rocks. and i'm not just talking about my college a cappella group.
the next three nights were spent exploring Etosha National Park. tons of animals everywhere and it was really exciting. highlights include two very close male lion sightings. very close. walking up to just a few meters away kind of close. close enough to see the beautiful amber eyes kind of close. roll up the windows close. but wow. they are amazingly beautiful creatures. Life in the wild revolves around them completely. When approaching a waterhole, animals are tentative because there might be lions around. always because of the lions. always looking, watching, giraffes awkwardly tumbling out of their necessarily-splayed water drinking poses, springbok bounding back, even elephants freezing mid drink. kings of the jungle, indeed. we also heard a more distant male lion clearing his throat. whoa. that sound carries. we ALSO saw a group of male and female lions hanging out under some trees (they looked so overheated!), but sadly no cubs. :(
out of the park and sad about it, we drove only as far as Tsumeb, just to the southeast of the park. we stayed in a backpackers there, ate at a very strange "cafe" that had burgers that were more bread than meat, and chatted to the WorldTeach volunteers that took up the rest of the rooms that night. interesting interesting. there are so many good non-profits.
Yeah, so the next two days were LONG driving days, but really good. we listened to the iRivers happily, passed the Yahtzee electronic game around (i held out til almost the end...). oh yeah - we visited the Cheetah Conservation Fund. cheetahs are beautiful. they have a great little museum there. we saw a few adult ladies. but no cheetah cubs. sad. anyway, we drove and drove, covering most of the north-south distance of namibia in one day. Tsumeb to Keetmanshoop. we drove just a bit in the dark at the end - stopping at a rest stop to get out and gaze at the unbelievably clear stars. keetmanshoop was utterly seedy, so we proceeded only 14km to our next destination: the quiver tree forest. these quiver trees are cool lookin trees that store water very well, and for some reason though they usually grow quite far apart from one another, there's a particular patch of land where they grow quite close. hence the quiver tree forest. we stayed at the forest - they have a campsite there- it's actually a private farm. we couldn't see the trees or much of the place at all when we arrived - but it was ok cuz we were so very tired from a full day of car and our greasy gas-station dinners were sitting heavy in our bellies (grilled cheese/tomato and gherkins!). slept with the fly off the tent that night- the stars were just too beautiful and the breeze was finally cool after so many hot days in the north.
up for sunrise and the trees were lovely in the light. make-up nap in the car, very deep, and waking up to much more sunlight, some campside chatter, and oatmeal cooking up on the campstove. we sat around the little rock-table at our campsite and mixed in the nuts and dried fruit we had left over from our trail mix, and we sipped our rooibos tea from our camping cups. camping's kinda fun. i kinda like it. i might have to buy a little tent...
soo.... then we drove again. made our way (sad) out of namibia, easy crossing again, and back into south africa, where we put pedal to the medal and made it all the way back to the citrus valley and Gekko backpackers again. it's nice to come back to a place like that - makes it feel full circle. i cooked a HUGE meal of sauteed veg (cauliflower, sweet potato, eggplant, zucchini, mushrooms (canned, but it worked), lots of garlic, butter... and the rest of the cous cous. anyway, the meal was a hit and then we all collapsed as usual. in the morning we ate as much cream of wheat as we could to clean out our stores in the cooler, but it tasted a bit like plastic... maybe it'd been baking in the rear window of the car. heh...
anyway, we had a lovely leisurely last day back to capetown because of our two marathon drives the previous days. we took the scenic route through some of the Cederburg mountains and then found Bovlei winery estate in Wellington OPEN after our failed attempt at a visit before our tour - it's Kelly and Tammy's most favoritest wine and they stopped selling the Gewurstraminer in their town. we found it. it's there. free tasting and the lady was nice. i told her only three glasses though she had four out and she filled the fourth with sparkling grape juice. :)
then back to capetown and long street. we had a hilarious and wonderfully long evening at Mojitos restaurant (it's pretty much "our place" now - we even took a photo with the waitress) and then played cards (wizard - a trump game somewhat like buck euchre), laughing and competing. nabia overtook my lead at the very end. alas.
sleep.
one more day in capetown all together (that was two days ago) - slowness and switching rooms and errands and then a lovely dinner with shaul and eilat in rondebosch - vegetable soup and survivor. we then drove to sea point cuz tammy's aunt who used to live here wanted her to meet and give a bit of cash to an ex-employee/friend of hers, Rhoda. she was a very sweet woman with a great deep laugh and big teeth - gums practically tumbling out of her mouth. we stood by the side of the road cuz everywhere else was closed, and she gave us all hugs at the end and we went back to long street to our private dorm at Cat and Moose (btw it's cuz there's a cat named Cat and a dog named Moose).
yesterday we drove them to the airport. then we moved yesterday afternoon to shaul and eilat's house, spreading out and taking it over with all our crap almost immediately. we did laundry, thus covering the backyard with drying items, and we were organizing in the living rooms, madagascaran baskets and cds and various purchases strewn about. but they forgave us and last night was another lovely evening of couch and tv and tea and giggles and warmth.
today's been tough. i'm at a hard juncture. home is coming on fast, but it's not gonna be calm for at least a week afterwards. there's running around like a madwoman, just as i'm doing out here, just after i get back. in NYC, down to DC and back... i'm going to be quite dazed and confused, i think. not to mention the emotions that are going wild inside my head and heart - independence, exploration, dependence, creativity, branching out, feeling at home.... how to combine all these things.
one thing i really admire about many of the people i've met and come to know out here (and something i think i'll observe and admire about many of you at home too now) is the ability not to define themselves in black and white. not to use the words never and always. not to put themselves in a box. it's something i most certainly struggle against. as though if i drink alcohol (a "never" for me), i won't be me anymore. if i go without a plan (an "always"), i will cease to be amy. i understand, in the front of my brain, that we are fluid - that we change, that we are most certainly living in the gray area. but in the back of my brain - in the depths, and in my heart, i don't get it. that's the thing i need the most work on, i think. and i'll get there. it'll just be a tough journey. but that's life, right? journey? right.
ok. that's it. i'm drained utterly and completely. tomorrow we fly to paris. farewell to africa. it's been absolutely wonderful.
and as for home? i'll see you in less than a week.
amy
email me
posted by theonetheycallamy at 10/27/2005 09:44:00 AM
2 Comments:
I'm pretty much speechless after that entry....it was beyond incredible.
What am I going to read now without your blogs?
Love, mom
You have made this an amazing year for yourself, and for your family and friends. We are all so much wiser because of it. I love your friends' comments too. More good things are coming to you, or you to them, I'm sure. The adventure continues.
Hugs, and love, Barbara
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