FANTA GRAPE

Time to explore further than the borders of Swaziland! On Monday we hopped on a kombi to Manzini full of excitement for our holiday travels; we then reached Manzini and sat in the Durban kombi for over 2 hours while they waited for it to fill up. Angry, cramped and annoyed we finally set off – so 4 ½ hours after departing from Big Bend we found ourselves passing the exact spot we got the kombi from that morning... Damn Swaziland and its one tar road!
The excitement started kicking in again and I’m pretty sure we might have been those annoying people at the back of buses who make more noise than is actually necessary... oh well.
We had a lovely surprise at the border gate; a man with the world’s longest and dirtiest fingernails came to stand at our open kombi door asking for money. The front of his jeans was also non-existent; they might as well have been crotch-less chaps so we had a lovely view of everything hanging out. We all failed spectacularly when it came to keeping a straight face, so we left pretty promptly to walk to the border gate to hand over our passports to be scrutinised and questioned.

Entering South Africa wasn’t what we expected at all; the kombi was getting pummelled by torrential rain and thunderstorms, visibility must have been down to about 20% and we were getting nowhere fast... which is very surprising for a kombi!
Due to the slow going we were due to hit Durban at night... in the dark... not knowing where our backpackers was... with no alternate transport. F**k. Living in Swaziland we’ve been quite sheltered, but we’d been told that South Africa was much more dangerous, so we weren’t looking forward to wandering around Durban at night carrying everything that had any importance to us on our backs.
Luckily there was a couple on the kombi from Durban and they offered us a lift with them – thank god! The four of us crammed in the back of their truck with our massive backpacks and watched the Durban city lights pass us by. I felt like a fish out of water in the city; after being in Big Bend for 3 months the bright lights and large buildings felt overpowering and daunting. We drove past a huge casino complex that was lit up with LED lights and looked like it had been brought straight from Las Vegas, this felt more like America than Africa!
The couple entertained us on our travels with comforting anecdotes about living in Durban; “Yeah, I’ve been mugged twice, once with a knife to my throat and once with a gun in my face”, “Damn this area is risky, s**t, I don’t have my pepper spray either...” Great first impression of Durban.

We hit uShaka Marine World for the first tourist day of our holidays; dolphin shows, seal shows, the biggest aquarium EVER and a water park. uShaka boasts the tallest water slide in the Southern Hemisphere, so we were all buzzing for that! It was pretty high as well; you shoot over the edge at what I swear to be a 90 degree angle and by the time you reach the bottom you need surgical assistance to remove your bikini bottoms from unknown places.
That night we bought meat, rolls and ingredients to make a kick ass potato salad, and we set about having a braii on the roof of our backpackers. It was awesome. We had some spectacular views of the Durban lights, a few drinks, braii and some intelligent conversation with Jacob, a Canadian and the fifth person in our five person dorm.

Unfortunately for the next 3 days Ashley fell really ill and we had to cancel our plans to carry on down the coast and stay in Durban until she recovered; we took her to a private city hospital and after waiting for 4 hours we finally walked away with 5 bags of drugs that would hopefully pull her back around to reality!
Thankfully the medicine did its job and Ashley felt well enough to travel, so we each begrudgingly parted with E2500 (£180) for a Baz Bus ticket, and we set off for Port St John’s on Saturday morning.

Getting on the kombi was eventful in itself; Ashley and the Sam’s were already on the bus and I was trying to sort out a ticket problem with the driver outside. Then an actual kombi driver comes over and starts grabbing the Baz Bus drivers’ clip board, starts pushing him and is shouting for him to move the bus. “You need to learn how to respect another person” the Baz Bus driver keeps yelling, he wants to stand there and sort the tickets out before we set off... but this is getting pretty serious. There’s now an audience of people on the backpacker balcony watching the scene unfold below and I do not want to be involved in a street brawl between two fully grown African male kombi drivers. I politely tell them both to calm down, stop pushing each other and get the Baz Bus driver back on the bus to sort out the ticket problem when we have driven away.  Good call.

Port St John’s is beautiful and Amapondo backpackers has to be the most amazing backpackers in the world. Port St John’s itself looks like Brazil rather than Africa; large hills covered in dense jungle foliage make up 95% of your view, and just on the coast is a perfect bay with crystal blue waters. The backpackers itself is perched on the side of mountain, and you can see small homesteads everywhere, they look like Brazilian flavelas or small villages from a Pirates of the Caribbean film.  

That night we eat an amazing homemade Thai green curry, which turns out to be free because Sam Rutherford gets chatting to a guy at the bar and because Sam is Scottish he offers to pay for our meal!
Later on that night two ladies light up the firepoi and there’s a mesmerising impromptu fire show; it’s possibly the coolest thing I’ve ever seen so we all decide to have a bash at it! Not with the fire obviously, just with the practice ‘sockpoi’. Sam Thomas picks it up straight way and makes us really jealous with his skills; this infuriates me even further because I’m so uncoordinated and my left arm and hand are pretty much useless. Everyone goes to bed and I’m still stood there failing spectacularly but not willing to be defeated by these sock balls on string, it finally takes a flaming sambuca burn to the hand and I can’t carry on – so I call it a night and go to bed. 

Sunday brings English weather, so we hitch-hike into town to buy some food, and yet again have another KFC. I’ve eaten more takeaway food in Africa than I ever have in England – who would have thought.
Back at Amapondo I finally crack the sockpoi and my skills are on par with Sam’s, so I’m pretty chuffed with myself. We can’t do much though as a crazy thunderstorm lights up the whole valley, rain comes down in sheets and the power goes out. So we chill in the darkness and listen to the phenomena outside.

One week into travelling and I’ve seen some of the most beautiful places I may ever see in my life. Can’t wait to see some more!

Love Kate xx

(P.S. The way Ashley says fanta grape is really funny, so us impersonating her is now a running joke we have. So that’s the title for you. It’s not funny if you’re not here, sorry!)