the garden route, part 1
I write to you from the town of Knysna. "How in the heck do i pronounce that?" you say. i reply : "nize-na." "Thank you ever so much, Amy." "Of course. no worries."
so here i am, in the midst of the much-touted "Garden Route" on the southern coast of South Africa, making my way towards Capetown, one Baz Bus stop at a time. For the uninitiated (which i assume is most of you), the Bas Bus is a hop-on-hop-off bus that plies the major routes here - especially the garden route, and you can buy a ticket for 7 or 14 days which allows you back and forth trips, or a one way ticket between two points, which is what we did. Port Elizabeth was our starting point and there we saw elephants at the Addo Elephant Park (a baby! I saw a baby one! it was still bigger than me, but a baby elephant!). There were also ostriches and warthogs (Pumbah, baby. hakuna matata), swirly horned kudu and red haartebeast. cool. and just the tip of the iceberg. there are gonna be so many animals... just you wait for the pictures. :)
Also in PE, we did a township tour that took us into the "black" area just outside of the suburbs. these "townships" are areas Soweto, where the black population was relocated by apartheid governments. we went with our guide, Mzolise ("Amy, help!" "okay, okay: "em-zo-lee-say" "What would i ever do without you?"), into the Warner township outside of the fancy white Warner suburb and saw the nice commmunity center, the place where the men undergo initiation rights (ouch, boys. circumcision at the age of 17 or 18, no anaesthesia, just 20 of your closest friends and acquaintences with a knife), a shebeen (local tavern - people just sit around and shoot the breeze - we were welcomed by a talkative counselor for the township - he kept calling nabia other names: first "bia," then "abby," but he never quite got the "n" in. he was friendly though, and loved to spout like a politician on the wonders of the Democratic Alliance, which is the opposition party to the ANC, which is now in power - Mandela's party), and yummy dinner at his comfy house. There's a big govt funded development project going on over there - they're replacing the tin shacks (these things are air tight patchworked pieces of aluminum) with concrete houses and flats. he said people are happy about it. i saw some happy people dancing and laughing inside one of the patchwork tin huts.
What else, what else? we had our first baz bus ride that took us down the coast to Storm's River Village. We slid from tree to tree in the forest canopy, 30 meters off the ground, harnessed to zip lines, and it was fun. our guides marius and richard kept calling us all monkeys. in the process, we got an invite from the jo'burg family on the tour to stay with them when we return there. nice. they have horses, apparently. we could ride them. The town was tiny and cute. we made some lovely british friends who turn their "th"s into "f"s, as londoners do, particularly a tall one named Chris. Our second night, when we'd relocated from the smokey awkward backpackers to the fun nice backpackers, we spent the evening with him and two other Brits who had completed the world's highest bungy that day and were still riding the high (and wearing the t-shirt). there was some dancing, i got to play a bit of dj, plenty of laughing, some showing off in sign... good times. the "springbok" is apparently the national animal and also a national drink - it's a shot with chocolate liqueur and peppermint schnapps. you have to do a dance before you drink it and down it with no hands (your hands are busy being antlers, of course). i say this not from experience, don't worry or get too excited, but from my sideline observations. anyway, good times. dancing keeps the cold out. especially when it's to michael jackson and james brown. hey! i feel good...
also in Storm's River, there was a Big Tree. seriously, they call it "the Big Tree" and they charge 5 rand to get in. it was big. truly.
moving on, we stayed one night in Nature's Valley (yes, same name as the granola bar people). it was tiny and there's only one shop. we stayed in a dorm that looked like a girl's school dorm - rows of beds down a long hall, but it was quite cozy. we did a lovely walk up to a lookout that took in views of the lagoon and the beach and the whole little grid of a town. then we descended into a valley with banana trees and i heard something big moving through the bushes. na said she saw something. i asked her what. she said it looked like "a big cat." Keep in mind, now, we're in lion, cheetah, leopard country. leopards are the only ones of those that travel alone, but by all accounts, it apparently could have been one of those. i did the rest of the hike with my knees shaking a bit, scanning the trees for draped leopards (they hang out up there). We lost the trail a little at one point, but managed to find it again. it was nice, anyway. on our walk back from the one restaurant in town (chicken wings, garlic bread type place), there was clearly a party going on, and we danced to "who let the dogs out" as we walked down the street under the light of the bright full moon.
Next stop was Plettenberg bay. we did one of the best best hikes ever ever. it was so great. i can't tell you about it now cuz we have to go to the Spar supermarket and buy some groceries for dinner, but i'll getcha next time.
lataz.
amy
email me
so here i am, in the midst of the much-touted "Garden Route" on the southern coast of South Africa, making my way towards Capetown, one Baz Bus stop at a time. For the uninitiated (which i assume is most of you), the Bas Bus is a hop-on-hop-off bus that plies the major routes here - especially the garden route, and you can buy a ticket for 7 or 14 days which allows you back and forth trips, or a one way ticket between two points, which is what we did. Port Elizabeth was our starting point and there we saw elephants at the Addo Elephant Park (a baby! I saw a baby one! it was still bigger than me, but a baby elephant!). There were also ostriches and warthogs (Pumbah, baby. hakuna matata), swirly horned kudu and red haartebeast. cool. and just the tip of the iceberg. there are gonna be so many animals... just you wait for the pictures. :)
Also in PE, we did a township tour that took us into the "black" area just outside of the suburbs. these "townships" are areas Soweto, where the black population was relocated by apartheid governments. we went with our guide, Mzolise ("Amy, help!" "okay, okay: "em-zo-lee-say" "What would i ever do without you?"), into the Warner township outside of the fancy white Warner suburb and saw the nice commmunity center, the place where the men undergo initiation rights (ouch, boys. circumcision at the age of 17 or 18, no anaesthesia, just 20 of your closest friends and acquaintences with a knife), a shebeen (local tavern - people just sit around and shoot the breeze - we were welcomed by a talkative counselor for the township - he kept calling nabia other names: first "bia," then "abby," but he never quite got the "n" in. he was friendly though, and loved to spout like a politician on the wonders of the Democratic Alliance, which is the opposition party to the ANC, which is now in power - Mandela's party), and yummy dinner at his comfy house. There's a big govt funded development project going on over there - they're replacing the tin shacks (these things are air tight patchworked pieces of aluminum) with concrete houses and flats. he said people are happy about it. i saw some happy people dancing and laughing inside one of the patchwork tin huts.
What else, what else? we had our first baz bus ride that took us down the coast to Storm's River Village. We slid from tree to tree in the forest canopy, 30 meters off the ground, harnessed to zip lines, and it was fun. our guides marius and richard kept calling us all monkeys. in the process, we got an invite from the jo'burg family on the tour to stay with them when we return there. nice. they have horses, apparently. we could ride them. The town was tiny and cute. we made some lovely british friends who turn their "th"s into "f"s, as londoners do, particularly a tall one named Chris. Our second night, when we'd relocated from the smokey awkward backpackers to the fun nice backpackers, we spent the evening with him and two other Brits who had completed the world's highest bungy that day and were still riding the high (and wearing the t-shirt). there was some dancing, i got to play a bit of dj, plenty of laughing, some showing off in sign... good times. the "springbok" is apparently the national animal and also a national drink - it's a shot with chocolate liqueur and peppermint schnapps. you have to do a dance before you drink it and down it with no hands (your hands are busy being antlers, of course). i say this not from experience, don't worry or get too excited, but from my sideline observations. anyway, good times. dancing keeps the cold out. especially when it's to michael jackson and james brown. hey! i feel good...
also in Storm's River, there was a Big Tree. seriously, they call it "the Big Tree" and they charge 5 rand to get in. it was big. truly.
moving on, we stayed one night in Nature's Valley (yes, same name as the granola bar people). it was tiny and there's only one shop. we stayed in a dorm that looked like a girl's school dorm - rows of beds down a long hall, but it was quite cozy. we did a lovely walk up to a lookout that took in views of the lagoon and the beach and the whole little grid of a town. then we descended into a valley with banana trees and i heard something big moving through the bushes. na said she saw something. i asked her what. she said it looked like "a big cat." Keep in mind, now, we're in lion, cheetah, leopard country. leopards are the only ones of those that travel alone, but by all accounts, it apparently could have been one of those. i did the rest of the hike with my knees shaking a bit, scanning the trees for draped leopards (they hang out up there). We lost the trail a little at one point, but managed to find it again. it was nice, anyway. on our walk back from the one restaurant in town (chicken wings, garlic bread type place), there was clearly a party going on, and we danced to "who let the dogs out" as we walked down the street under the light of the bright full moon.
Next stop was Plettenberg bay. we did one of the best best hikes ever ever. it was so great. i can't tell you about it now cuz we have to go to the Spar supermarket and buy some groceries for dinner, but i'll getcha next time.
lataz.
amy
email me
posted by theonetheycallamy at 8/21/2005 09:38:00 AM
4 comments
