Napoleon the Safari Legend

Plans to take the kids from Injabulo and Moriah to Hlane Royal Nature Reserve on school trips had been underway for quite some time; and finally the time came and we had two weeks filled of children, nature reserves, wild animals and stress.

Injabulo School Trips

To make things even more difficult on ourselves we decided to do something nice for the kids at Injabulo; I do enjoy doing lovely things for them, it’s just that you have a really great idea and then you realise that you have to repeat that really great idea at least 60 times. So, we hit PEP once again (the shop workers in there are basically our family now) to buy 60 blank t-shirts on which we were going to write ‘Injabulo Preschool’ and ‘Hlane 2013’ – yes, that’s right, PRESCHOOL TOUR T-SHIRTS!
After a full weekend of nothing but writing these exact words on t-shirts over and over again I was so sick of it that I would be happy if I never have to see another t-shirt again in my life... however that would be rather impractical.

Hard work paid off!

Teacher t-shirts ;)

To make everything easier on ourselves we stayed over at Nelsiwe’s house on the Tuesday evening to cook the food and get up early for the first trip on Wednesday! We were up at 6am to dish the food into take away boxes and then it was time for another naked basin wash, squatting in a large plastic tub of water in Nelsiwe’s bedroom... at least this water was hot as it had just been boiled in the kettle, which is more than can be said for the showers in hostel on a morning.
So we pack all of the kids into the hired kombi and head off to Hlane! Hlane is a small nature reserve when you compare it to the likes of Kruger (well, compared to the likes of anything as Swaziland itself is tiny!) but we saw Lions, giraffes, elephants, impala, kudu, nyala and even had our road blocked by a herd of white rhino. One Lion we actually saw lying with a dead impala, so we had obviously just missed a kill! Probably for the best really, some 4 year olds might have walked away slightly traumatised after seeing a Lion murder a small impala in front of their eyes.

Crocodile Class

HLANE 2013!

We also took them to Swazi Secrets where they process the oils from the marula nuts to make beauty products, unfortunately they weren’t doing any production while we were there, but the kids seemed to have fun pushing the crushing machines around and wearing marula lip balm.  

The second Injabulo trip was pretty much the same as the first; apart from the fact that Hlane was so busy with about 4 school trips we had to wait hours for our safari. In the mean time we took the kids down to the reception which was teeming with American tourists and we had them all singing and dancing! Yes, we actively paraded our cute preschoolers in front of tourists for entertainment, but it meant that they weren’t getting up to any mischief and the tourists now have lots of pictures and videos of our awesome kids to show people back home.

'Thishela' - teacher in SiSwati.

Ashley’s Birthday!

Friday 19^th sees Ashley joining the land of 19 year olds! To celebrate we had planned to have a joint preschool party for Ashley and Nelsiwe’s daughter Ciara; what we didn’t realise is that Nelsiwe’s plan was to have the party ‘after’ preschool hours, which she failed to tell us. So we muddled through the day with no other teachers and random people in party dresses and presents turning up around 12 o’clock. Failure in communication and Swazi Time... obviously the day was never going to go as planned. 

In the end it was really great fun and absolutely crazy! Nelsiwe had made enough food to feed all of the kids at preschool, all of her children (who stayed off school for the occasion) and all of the guests she invited. There was also a huge birthday cake for Ashley and Ciara, and after the cutting of the cake and making a wish Ciara nearly took off the face of one of the preschoolers as she started jumping up and down with the gigantic knife still clutched in her destructive little hand. This is the girl who can completely wreck my classroom with her bare hands in 10 minutes, rips up worksheets, chews on laminated resources and sucks on the blades of scissors... she should never ever be given anything weapon-like!

Little devil!

We head to soup kitchen with another huge cake that Ashley bought from Matata Spar to hand out, everyone’s eyes (especially Aunty Vinahs!) light up when they see the massive black forest gateaux and everyone gets a slice. 

Mmmm, licking the box clean.

When we arrive back to hostel the girls have a little birthday surprise for Ashley... they drag her outside armed with ketchup bottles, they absolutely COVER her in it before they take a bucket of cold water and dump it over her head. They then proceed to turn on the tap that is used to fill the pool and drench her past drenched! I’m so glad I was in Botswana on my birthday, these girls are merciless!

Ketchup attack

Water attack

Moriah Centre School Trips

With the small Moriah kombi that we drive we were only able to take one class per day... so that’s 4 classes, add that to our Injabulo trips and we would’ve been to Hlane 6 times in 2 weeks! No. We took opposite days for some light relief from driving around all the time.
On both days that Ashley went to Hlane she returned with photos of the watering hole with elephants, giraffes, hippo, rhino and basically everything else all together drinking in a really African scene. When I went there was either nothing at the watering hole, or a few rhinos. Looks like she had the luckier days!
However we did see a Lion and two Lionesses running through the grass towards our kombi, and when they slowed down the Lion basically brushed himself along the back of the kombi... safe to say I was pretty nervous in the driver’s seat!

Moriah Crocodile Class

Other developments at Hlane with Moriah Centre revealed that Aunty Sphiwe (the other teacher of my class) had the hots for Napoleon our safari guide! I could totally tell that they were flirting in SiSwati and then the next trip I went on she told us that we had to get his number for her... PULLED!

Things are crazy as ever here, but I’m going to miss it when it ends.

Kate xx

P.S. At soup kitchen this week Aunty Vinah’s Mum was wandering around with 3 kittens in a bag begging us to buy them for E5 each. That’s £1 for 3 kittens to you. Unfortunately we couldn’t as we have nowhere to keep them, and I was heartbroken leaving them there... but the great thing is we were talking about it at Sisekelo and one of the sports coaches decided he wanted to buy them!
So the next time we were at soup kitchen we bought 2 of the kittens (the 3^rd apparently disappeared or was eaten or something) and brought them back to hostel for him! They’re called Ashley and Kate. Score. 

N'AAAWWWWW <3

“This is a disaster, Debonaires aren’t delivering.”

So we’re back on holiday for some more travelling! Ahhh I love to travel after a long stint of hard work. Instead of trying out some place new we decided to revisit one of our favourite stops from our Christmas travels down the coast. COFFEE BAY.
This time around we managed to stay in Coffee Shack; probably one of the best known backpackers in all of South Africa and we were reunited with a fellow PT friend! Sally works in Mthata (about 1 hour away) so she came down to Coffee Bay for a bit of a party with us on the Friday night before she had to go back to work. The night was joyous, with flowing drinks and many pool challenges; I was even so lucky to find R300 on the floor of a toilet cubicle, but in my stupidly truthful drunken state I insisted in finding the owner of the money instead of just spending it on drinks... which was the worst idea ever looking back now because I’m pretty sure the girl I ended up giving it to was just lying. I think I should just stick with the mantra of “finders keepers” in the future, for I have never been so lucky.

Anyway, the next morning was actual hell, we woke up early in order to get ready for the ‘beach day’ we had booked; a fun filled day of beach activities, surfing and toasties, which was just the perfect thing to be doing with a massive hang over. Despite our less than fit states we actually had a really great day sunbathing, napping and surfing! We really did surf too, stood up properly and everything!

After our great weekend in Coffee Bay getting reunited with the locals and their colourful business pitches, haha, we headed off to Mthata to meet Sally on her project! Bethany Care Home is an orphanage for babies and children and provides them with education and a safe place to stay. THE BABIES ARE THE CUTEST THINGS I HAVE EVER SEEN ON THIS PLANET. I know that I say it all the time, but I really really really would steal one of them back to England if I could get away with it.

So we stayed with Sally for a few days and helped her out on project; it’s basically a room filled with babies and toddlers and you just get to play with them! And obviously wash them, feed them, sniff them for bad smells and change diapers. So this was my first experience looking after babies as an ‘adult’ and I have to admit that the diaper thing was pretty disgusting the first time, and the second time... actually, it was disgusting every single time but once you’ve started getting to know the babies you don’t mind as much because they are just so adorable! Now I know that it’s probably bad to have favourites but I couldn’t help it; one little girl completely stole my heart with her Asian looking features; she apparently has no Asian in her what-so-ever so I don’t know where the look comes from but she was totally irresistible. She was gorgeous but always looked sad; until the evening where I helped Sally on night shift, for some reason at 3:00am in the morning she was the happiest little baby ever and that was the only time I ever saw her smiling... well, and the time she sharted on me but that was probably more of a grimace than a smile.  (And for anyone who doesn’t know; a ‘shart’ is the word for when someone farts and follows through, i.e. a shit-fart. Just clearing up any confusion).

See, look how happy she is!

...but this is what she normally looked like. So sad :(

And this was after the 'shart' - tactically holding her away from my body here! Hahaa.

The girls at Bethany have their hands full all of the time, it felt like being a full time Mother to about 11 babies all at once, so many demands! I now feel like I’ve had an introductory lesson into how to be a Mother, and I can tell you right now it does not seem easy – thank god this is far in the future for me! Being with the babies kind of reminded me of when we used to take the neighbour’s dog for a walk... they’re cute and you want to play with them but as soon as they go to the toilet you can’t wait to pass over the poop bag and the responsibility to someone else. I guess what I’m trying to say is that I loved being on the project for a short time, but I don’t know if I could handle the puking, pooping and crying every day... yeah, the girls do a fantastic job.

So now the visit is over, and it’s time to go and meet my family to Johannesburg!

Kate xx

“I just had s-s-s........” aaargh!

Good things never last forever, and now that our departure date is coming ever closer I am more and more aware of just how much I am going to miss this place when we do have to leave. I’ll just be contently working on project watching as my kids work away and all of a sudden the thought of the last day here hits me... The moment where I say bye to them for the last time, the moment where I’ve hugged the last child and put them down, the moment I turn around and have to walk away, and the moment I lose sight of them as we drive around the corner; my heart is breaking at the thought of these things and stopping impromptu crying in front of children has become quite a regular occurrence in my daily routine.

All our work at Injabulo is going great and the kids are even better, I actually feel like a proper teacher! The best thing is that we’ve had someone else instil their own opinion in us which has boosted our confidence of how brilliantly we are doing on project. It might seem obnoxious of me to say that we’re ‘brilliant’ but when we take a look at the progress we have made this year; the improvements to the school, the increased knowledge of the children and the more advanced English that they are learning there’s really only one word for it! Being at Injabulo makes me glow with pride, it is literally our school and we can do whatever we want with it, which means that it can go two ways; you either constantly make improvements or you let standards slide. I absolutely love being there and you get out twice as much as you put in, and we’ve really been throwing ourselves into the place, and the children are absolutely wonderful because of it. Their level of knowledge is wonderful, not their behaviour though! Haha.
Two workers from the Lutheran foundation came for visits to Injabulo and they congratulated us on the job we were doing there; they said that we were one of the smallest and least supported care points that they had visited but we were also one of the best! They thought that we did a fantastic job with the children and that their English was some of the best they had seen for their age group; we couldn’t have been happier.

I’m afraid this is another short one; I’ve just been so busy educating young minds ;)

Don’t hate on me :)

Kate xx

P.S. The title is from a rather unfortunate event at Injabulo; the Lutheran workers were over and holding a meeting with parents from the community. We had all the children playing outside and were playing music from my laptop for them to dance to... ALWAY BE WARY OF SHUFFLE. Anyway, a rather inappropriate song by The Lonely Island popped on the shuffle list and began to play out full blast in front of children, parents and well, basically everyone. I have never hurled myself at the pause button so fast! I made it just in time.

Watch out Polokwane, the Swazi’s are here...

SOUTH AFREEEEKA AGAIN. So we’re having another pit stop in Pretoria the ‘student city’ before hitting Polokwane. After a terrifying ordeal of our taxi not turning up and fearing we might miss our bus the staff at the backpackers find us a ride and we make it to the bus station on time with minimal shit in our pants. Obviously a saying, Ashley and I aren’t incontinent.

View over Pretoria

The bus pulls into Polokwane at ‘Mall of the North’, the BIGGEST shopping centre I’ve seen since the last time I was at the Metro in Newcastle, which was a long time ago. This shopping monstrosity is only 2 minutes walk from where the girls work; Mitchell House. No wonder none of them have any money, they’ve all developed an addiction to a shop called ‘Factorie’ which I admit is fantastic as it is on the level of Topshop, but when you convert the price tag you’re paying more a New Look price... and if you shop on the sales rack (haha, me) you find yourself paying Peacocks prices for awesome clothes!  Needless to say Ashley and I treated ourselves to a little bit of retail therapy while we were in Polokwane.

Mitchell House is a private Primary School and High School with an Enrichment Centre for children with disabilities; the Enrichment Centre is where the girls are working. They have a Junior class, a Senior class and a Life Skills class for the older students; the girls have a really full on day and work from 7:00am until 5:30pm with incredibly challenging children.
They have small classes as the children need constant one on one attention so there are a lot of hands on deck; the children themselves are lovely, no matter what their disability is it doesn’t  affect how friendly, funny, witty or loving they can be!

Our last day in Polokwane was spent at Mitchell House and then going for pre-drinks at Spur Steak Ranches with the best waitress ever – Dudu. Ashley and I also joined in with the new rule that the girls have set up; everyone who visits them in Polokwane is expected to go and get a piercing. Not too sure where this originated, but we obliged and Ashley braved the tragus whereas I just settled for the second hole in the lobe. Nicola also joined in and had her tragus done too, just the thought of it makes me want to be sick, I don’t know if I could handle it!
So after our visit to the jewellers some pain relief was in order... we hit the liquor store just before closing time and then made our way back to the girls apartment to get ready for our night out!

In true British style we braved the cold African winter night in dresses and skirts, determined to look good even if it meant suffering. We then hit one of their regular bars called Ngunies (which came as a shock to Ashley and myself because it was very white, something we haven’t experiences in a loooong time!) and proceeded to dance embarrassingly. We all had a good time, but I regretted it the next morning when we woke up at 6:00am to catch our bus to Johannesburg. 

We must have looked pretty worse for wear because as we sat on the concrete parking lot of a petrol station wearing last night’s makeup waiting for our bus a man approached us with a loaf of bread asking if we were okay... we assured him we were okay but he insisted that we take the bread anyway. After taking bread off a stranger I realised that I felt the lowest I’d ever felt in my life, in turn  this made me feel awful because this must be what homeless people feel like on a good day when someone is actually being kind to them.
To make the story even more unbelievable the same man returned 5 minutes later with two portions of MacDonald’s fries and insisted that we take them as well, he’d driven to MacDonald’s to buy them especially for us. This is the single most crazy thing that has ever happened to me; technically I felt like I should be mortally embarrassed, obviously we looked such a mess we appeared to be either homeless, in trouble or attack victims (or a combination of the three), but it’s hard to take a moral high ground when you’re sat on concrete with a hangover and your hands have just been filled with a portion of steaming hot FREE fries. Silver lining, yep, I see it.

So after the rough journey back to Swaziland via our favourite Park Central Station in Johannesburg we spend a comfortable night in Manzini at Kathy and Richards house, complete with homely meal, warm shower and actual bed before arriving back at hostel to throw ourselves onto our beds, sigh relief, wash our bag full of stinking clothes and sleep.

Holidays, you are wonderful. But is sure is good to be home.

Kate xx

BOTSWANA! “I know it’s video.”

First things first, Botswana is a HUGE country yet it seems there’s not all that much there. Apart from the delta, amazing National Parks and the odd few largish towns the rest appears to be full of sand, donkeys and annoying compulsory road blocks. At these road blocks you have to open out all your possessions, be declared ‘meat free’ and then proceed to dip all of your shoes into a white chemical substance. Something about trying to prevent the spread of foot and mouth... but it’s a right pain in the arse. Plus they confiscated and orange off me, an orange, not very life threatening – they probably just get the munchies and abuse their position of power. :(

Anyway, after a tedious 7 hour journey on a public bus that stopped at every microscopic village and only had 40% of the seats actually attached to the chair frame we arrived in Shakawe. Shakawe is a small village one hour and a 10minute ferry ride away from the boys project, they met us there in a massive pickup truck with Ben the German (another volunteer at their project), and quite severe sunburn. Even though it had been nearly 5 months since we had last seen each other we picked up from exactly where we had left off, basically ripping each other about everything and I just knew that the next 5 days were going to be hilarious and brilliant.
After a hairy drive in the dark to Bana Ba Metsi we were greeted (or rather not greeted) by a group of nervous boys sat in the kitchen and then proceeded to meet Mr Peter Dow the boy’s host and shown to where we would be staying.

Ferry Ride

Unlike Ashley and I the boys live in their own little house; they cook, clean (or not) and braii by themselves and have a shower outside. It really is a lovely little place and you can feel the Project Trust presence from the years of writing on the walls and sticking up letters, messages and photos. Ben lives in a fancy tent set up on a house on stilts on the very edge of the school compound; you can sit on an elevated balcony and watch the sun set over the bush. Ben chivalrously gave up his beautiful home to us for the 5 days to go and sleep with the boys in their house and we had the place to ourselves, also equipped with an outside shower. I have to say, I love taking outside showers, you feel free... however, showering in the early mornings in the freezing cold with cold water isn’t ideal, so best to wait until midday! 

The Sam’s (and Ben) do a really great job on their project, they’re teaching at a primary school level to teenage boys around their own age and from sitting in on them teaching they have a really difficult job with it! Keeping the boys attention and motivating them to do work seems near impossible and they don’t get much appreciation in the classroom from their students. However watching them do manual with the boys is another story – in the afternoons they are split into groups and set physical tasks to do, mainly maintenance and improvement of the school and its facilities. They’re currently making urinals, and they’ve constructed a building complete with a traditional thatched roof, what they’re teaching the boys in invaluable, workmanship skills that will help them later in life and they are undoubtedly learning just as much in return.
They also do sports with the boys at the school; swimming, football, table tennis and volleyball – I sat and watched on a ‘swimming lesson’ and it seems to be 45 minutes of boys throwing each other into the pool and wrestling in the water, but they seem to have fun and that’s what it’s all about.

Bana Ba Metsi school is also well known in Botswana for its marimba band, they travel to Maun and Gaborone (the capital) to play concerts for people, and they really are fantastic. If you don’t know what marimba is imagine the colourful xylophones that we all had as children... okay, right, now image that it’s larger, made of wood and actually sounds nice. The boys come to the school and learn marimba from the other boys who are there, there’s to music to read, they just learn off one another and work by ear. They play typical African marimba tunes but can also play renditions of some chart favourites such as Waka Waka by Shakira and Whistle by Flo Rida!

Luckily I was at Bana Ba Metsi for my 19^th Birthday and even more luckily for me the 1^st May is some sort of African Independence day and is therefore a national holiday! That means so school, no teaching for the Sam’s and we get to go out on the delta on the schools boat!
It was the most insane birthday ever, we cruised along the Okavango waters for 4 hours or so with drinks on board, sunbathing on board, driving the boat, stopping off at a lodge along the river for more drinks and getting off to explore an island that the boys know. We spend a decent amount of time swimming in its pools while on constant lookout for hippos and crocodiles as they’re known to be in the area... Luckily we didn’t have any unfortunate run-ins with any dangerous animals while on the water however we did see a massive crocodile on the sand banks and stumbled upon a herd of 15 hippo up out of the water within the reeds! It was an incredible sight and we doubled back for more, unfortunately they had scarpered and the humongous bull hippo had slid into the water pretty close to our little boat... so then we scarpered!
We had a lovely lunch at the Dijo Deli, one of Shakawe’s best kept secrets off the beaten track and then hitchhiked back over from the ferry to Bana Ba Metsi.
Definitely one of my most awesome birthdays to date, and what an amazing place to have it! My 19^th will be forever unique. Making things even better Ashley and the boys had made me a birthday video which they showed me before we went out on the boat... hilarious and I will always have it as a reminder!

After another hellish public bus journey back from Shakawe to Maun we camped at the Old Bridge backpackers for 4 nights. Old Bridge has to be one of the most idyllic places that I’ve ever had the pleasure of visiting, perched on the banks of the Okavango you can literally sit on a sofa less than 1 metre from the water or lie on a hammock half dangling over the water! I spent many glorious hours prostrate on that hammock, happily filling myself with copious amounts of salted peanuts and raisins while watching episodes of How I Met Your Mother. Everyone’s idea of perfect. 
Oh yes, I feel obliged to inform you of my very sudden and incredibly violent peanut addiction; I’m really not sure how it came about between travelling on buses and jumping off gorges but it has appeared. I can’t get enough of them; I’ve taken to destroying a 150g bag in less than 10 minutes which drives Ashley crazy because she hates peanuts and can’t stand the smell. I’m addicted, what can I do. They are simply delicious.

Most of our time in Maun was spent relaxing and putting off travelling to the next place; apart from one day when we went on another boat trip. Animal spectation wasn’t really the aim of this trip... rather it was alcohol, and sort of harassing locals. We were with a crazy guy we met at the backpackers who called himself ‘Captain Bob’, and we were now part of ‘Captain Bob’s Drunken Safaris’ where he sets off into the beautiful African landscape to get completely smashed and make mental videos. We had a wild time with Captain Bob and the rest of our crew! Ashley jumped ship to take control of a mekoro boat (dugout canoe) full of Motswanan children, we made a slight scene at a family gathering when Captain Bob decided to don a pair of bright red bikini bottoms he found in a bush and our boat driver got do drunk that he went arse over pecs and ended up half out of the boat, so Ashley and I drove to boat back to the lodge to ensure that no one died. No one died, we were brilliant. 

After leaving Maun we had a pit stop at the best hidden backpackers in the world (honestly didn’t think it even existed after our fruitless search with a pretty peeved off taxi driver) in Gaberone before heading to South Africa the next day.

Before I came to Africa my expectations of what it would look like are exactly like how Botswana looks; covered in sand, minimal vegetation and animals roam everywhere. Botswana has definitely got a donkey problem (I think I mentioned the donkeys already, oh well); I have never seen so many donkeys in my life.

What I have come to realise is that my initial impressions of Africa were incorrect; yes, Botswana is hot and covered in sand and wild animals but it is so far the only place I have visited that is like this. I’m sure other countries are similar (Namibia I’ve heard), but Africa also has its fair share of lush green areas! Prime example is Swaziland itself... we’re defiantly under informed about this continent in our Westernised countries! BBC, sort yourselves out and get over here, I’ve heard David Attenborough recently took the trip, so I hope all you British people at least have a better idea about what Africa is like!

Crack onto the internet and educate yourselves, Africa is a collaboration of literally every climate and landscape in the whole world, it’s awe-inspiring.

Kate xx 

Zimbabwe

I am breaking my pattern of posting my blogs on a Sunday to cover the previous week; but breaking up the holidays into blogs of the countries seems to make more logical sense, so here it goes...

First impressions of Zimbabwe were not great; sat at a border post at 3:00am in the morning with our luggage open waiting for 2 hours for a bag check. In the end they barely even looked in anyone’s bags, they just signed our declaration sheets and we had to pack everything back up again. I was cold, tired, annoyed and quite frankly surprised that I walked away without getting piles seeing as there was nowhere to sit apart from on the road.
We eventually got away at 5:00am, only to reach Bulawayo in the afternoon and have to wait through a 3 hour delay for our next bus! Sometimes I just hate travelling.
We reach Victoria Falls and finally get to our backpackers, which turns out to be one of the best places to go for a night out in the town so it’s totally buzzing! Definitely a decent choice.

The falls themselves are absolutely amazing, they are called ‘Mosi-Oa-Tunya’ which is taken from the Lozi language and means “The Smoke That Thunders”... and thunder they truly do!
Victoria Falls is among the Seven Natural Wonders of the world; along with the Aurora Borealis, Grand Canyon, Paricutin Volcano, Harbour of Rio de Janeiro, Mount Everest and the Great Barrier Reef, so if I count the times that I’ve seen the Aurora Borealis from Darlington or Scotland (although they won’t be to their full beauty unless seen from further North), I’ve technically experienced 2 of the 7 Natural Wonders! Now I shall add the remaining 5 to my bucket list.

Oh yeah! Darlington is on an information board in ZIMBABWE.
Now that's a pretty decent achievement for Darlington. 

Walking into the falls there are many shops selling crafts, and the guys owning the shops are trying to get you to hire hideous ponchos to protect you from the spray; feeling brave Ashley, Matt and I (Matt’s a guy from our backpackers) shook our heads and decided we were just going to roll with it. Turns out that the spray was a little more than just ‘spray’, it started out quite light but as we progressed along the viewing platforms and came closer to the falls it became heavier and heavier... So heavy that it felt like you were standing in monsoon rain! We were drenched through, our bags and everything in them were soaking wet, my camera stopped working and my passport suffered slight water damage.

Simply Soaking

The falls give off so much moisture that the land directly close to them is thick rainforest, huge ferns drape themselves over the pathway glistening with droplets of water, flowery vines strangle the mottled trunks of thick trees in whose canopies monkeys and baboons skip chatter and dance. It really is another world. 

The falls can be viewed from both Zambia and Zimbabwe, however I can’t imagine what can be seen from the Zambian side seeing as we were stood at the very point where the falls cascade over the edge of the rock... you can see the water thunder down in all its glory and watch as the spray rises like smoke from the bottom of the gorge to obscure your view and engulf everyone and everything. The very best viewing platform was one called Knife Point; its entrance path was graced with a ‘Danger – Slippery Cliff Edge’ sign, and it wasn’t joking. Moss grew on every drenched stone and we waded our way through puddles with the edge of the cliff merely 1m away. The pinnacle of Knife Point was a high sharp rock (it had a definite likeness to the one in Lion King, so that’s awesome), we blindly fought our way to the top, eyes closed against the spray battering our bodies and hands groping for some sort of security that our feet were failing to provide. Visibility was 0%, it was like we were standing inside a cloud. There was nothing left to do apart from stand tall with our arms spread wide, listen to the waterfall roar past us and savour the spray as it bounced off our bodies.
Just as we turned away to leave Knife Point I took one look back and caught a rare ‘spray free’ moment, the white fog lifted and I could see the whole expanse of waterfall thundering barely 10m away from the sharp pointed rock that we had been standing on. Absolutely amazing.

Another spectacular thing about the falls is that multiple rainbows form in the gorge due to all the spray and the wonderful African sunlight, as you walk along you can see the rainbows stretching from one side of the gorge to the other... how many times are you above a rainbow?!

After a calming morning at the falls we set off for a little adrenalin rush! We had both booked to do a flying fox from the Zimbabwe side of the falls to the Zambian side, but when we got there and I laid eyes on the gorge swing I knew I just had to pay more money and do it instead!
Similar to a bungee you jump off a high platform and fall quite a distance; but unlike a bungee you are not connected by the feet... no, you are connected by a harness at the chest and you freefall with all your limbs flailing into a gorge. This was so much more terrifying than a bungee because there’s no control! I honestly felt like I was on a suicide jump off a building and I screamed like an ignored baby the whole way down. I think that the dogs in Zambia were aware of my presence.
Anyway, so you’re in freefall with your arms and legs waving around like an epileptic in a disco and the water is coming faster and closer to you, just before you reach the water you reach the length of rope and swing in a huge arc over the thundering rapids. My pants were all but soiled but I felt amazing! Scaring the crap out of myself is definitely one of my favourite pastimes.      

Flying Fox, amazing view!

The next day we went for an activity that was arguably safer but just as amazing! We booked ourselves in for an Elephant ride. The Elephant ride is definitely one of those ‘once in a lifetime’ opportunities and we were not going to be disappointed. The elephants were led along in what can only be described an elephant convoy, decked out with their babies and all! After taking photos with the elephants and getting to touch them we were taken to the largest mounting stand you have ever seen and we climbed onto our elephants with our riders. Our rider was called Amos and we were riding elephant Tendai, who had her baby along with her too and was always by our side! We spent an hour touring around the nature reserve; being on an elephant has its advantages because the other animals are used to their presence – we came really close to herds of giraffe and buffalo and could observe them on their own level! 

Tendai and Amos waving bye, cute!

After the elephant ride we had the unknown surprise of meeting Sylvester the Cheetah, he is the only surviving cheetah from a litter that lost its Mother and was attacked by a Lion. He is used to educate people on the risks of animal endangerment and plus we were allowed to stroke him! TOUCHING A CHEETAH NOW HOW COOL IS THAT.

Seeing and being with these animals in the flesh is something that I would never have expected myself to do, coming to Africa touches your life in many many different ways, and it makes me feel sad that most people go through life without ever having the chance to explore further afield and experience these things for themselves. Yes we see these animals on TV and in photos, but nothing can beat the surprising realisation of touching the rock hard leathery skin of an elephant and feeling it’s disgustingly wet truck sucking at your hand after taking a drink of water! These places, animals and people are real and they’re in our reach to visit – I’m so grateful that I’ve been lucky enough to get to experience such things.

One thing that stood out about Victoria Falls to me was the freedom of the animals; I’m not sure whether it is to humour the tourists that visit or because it’s a really ‘African’ place but it isn’t normal (even for Africa) to walk along the street and be faced with baboons sitting on the pavement. Nor is it normal to walk out of the Mama Africa restaurant after eating a delicious dinner of spicy beef and crocodile tail to be faced with a fully grown elephant just chilling on the street outside. This IS Africa, but not everywhere is as crazy as this!
I know what you’re thinking... what does crocodile taste like?! Honestly, it was delicious, it tasted like chicken with the tiniest fishy hint and you chew on it like it is beef. I also have no idea what African seasoning was on it but Ashley and I could not get enough!

So that’s a little bit of Zimbabwe for you!

Kate xx

“SHUT UP. Justin Beiber’s DEAD?!”

First things first, let’s talk about New Years Eve!

During the day about 20 of us decided to head down to the beach at Camps Bay; unluckily for us there was a strong wind blowing over the ocean, and it was crashing angrily into the sandstorm of a beach... no sunbathing and swimming for us then. We decided to go to a nice restaurant for a pizza and cocktails instead, it was a little pricey for our backpacker budgets but it was NYE, so I didn’t feel guilty indulging myself on the culinary delights.

That evening we pre-drank in the backpackers to save some money when we were out; our usual pubs and clubs had put door fees on for the event, so we were going to be a little more strapped for cash than usual. Pre-drinking quickly turned into a massive game of ‘Never Have I Ever in Africa’, which was basically an opportunity for everyone to reveal things about their partners to the rest of the volunteers, which is both hilarious and embarrassing! 

I headed straight out of the backpackers and straight into Bob’s; as it turned out that was where I spent the whole evening, it was mental. Free giveaways on the door (not so free when you realise you’re paying to get it) included a plastic whistle, a colourful wristband and a chupachup, those whistles were blown all night long by every person in that club... The noise was still ringing in my ears 2 days later; it was so bad I was pretty damn sure that I had tinnitus. 

My two highlights of the night are as follows; (the first) I was dying of heat and possibly dehydration but the bar man refused to serve me anything other than alcohol, so he decided that the way to cure my problem was to dump a jug full of iced water over my head – what can I say, it did help! The second highlight, and possibly my favourite includes the free whistles, drunk volunteers, Maccy D’s and everyone’s undoubted love for Gangnam Style. After Bob’s we were feeling pretty hungry, so about 7 of us headed up to McDonald’s at the other end of Longstreet; we suddenly realised that once you walked a few buildings away from Bob’s no one had whistles, so we took advantage of that fact. We whistled the tune to Gangnam Style whilst proceeding to do the Gangnam Style dance up the middle of the busy (but traffic jammed, so perfectly safe) road. A few drivers and passengers were probably harassed on the way, and we received some dirty looks from the classier establishments that we passed... but it’s New Years Eve! CELEBRATE IN STYLE PEOPLE. More precisely... CELEBRATE IN GANGNAM STYLE.

2013 baaaby!

The last day and night in Cape Town were spent in the beloved Mitchell’s Scottish Ale house, and a rare early night was taken due to the fact that Ashley and I had to be up at 4:45am (along with the Outward Bound girls and two of the Polokwane girls) to catch the Intercape bus to Sedgefield... we were going to visit their OB project!
Nicola and Amelia (Polokwane) slept in and we had to ask the bus to wait for them, Intercape leaves at 6am on the dot and they woke up at 5:45 in their backpackers. After running to the bus station with 100 litre backpacks on not only had they just completed some kind of impossible physical feat due to adrenalin, they managed to make the bus. Close call.

Sedgefield

Due to last minute plans Ashley and I didn’t actually have a place to stay in Sedgefield, we thought that it should be fine if we tagged along with Nicola and Amelia to their backpackers hoping that there were some free beds or sofas that we could crash on. Typical that the one backpackers we don’t book into has the most unhelpful and unfriendly manager EVER. Since travelling in Africa I have realised one thing, backpackers are awesome and the people who work in them are normally pretty cool and laid back. If you walk in and there are no beds they ALWAYS sort you out, and don’t treat you any differently from those who booked a place.
This woman was a different story. Oh no, we were the biggest inconvenience in the WORLD. The annoying thing is that she had one bed, so the only issue was that there was one extra person. Ashley and I offered to share the bed but both pay the full price (pretty good deal for her I’d say), but noooooooo, we can’t share a bed, if we do it everyone will want to do it. Really? Even if they did want to it would mean she’d be making twice as much money on the same amount of beds, idiot. Not a great business mind in my opinion.
Anyway, after a lot of huffing and puffing she agreed to put out a mattress in one of the dorms (hallelujah), but we could only stay for 2 nights, on Friday morning she wanted us out. She put it just about as nicely as that too. For the two days she treat us like we were the plague, granted she did eventually get around to any queries we had, but it was with a face that looked like a baboons arse.

Then again the backpackers had jacuzzi's on the roof... So all was well. 

We head to La Piazza on our first night in Sedgefield to meet up with the OB girls for dinner; they’re really close with the owner, Gary, who is a little bit of a legend but keeps buying us shots all night even though we’re on our Cape-Town-Come-Down. This is what I’ve decided is the best way to describe the feeling when you’ve stopped partying and your body has gone into some sort of shock from the lower levels of drink ingested. You start to feel tired early on in the night, your throat hurts and you are blocked up from your toes to your brain – pressure centred in the nose area.
We all down the shots and decide it’s time to head home. Everyone apart from Ashley. She’s been on the Jager all night and isn’t ready to go anywhere, so she stays at the restaurant herself and parties with Gary and his staff. In the morning I discover her hungover in her dorm wearing a Jagermeister t-shirt, cap and lanyard with another top strewn on her bed. The story is that she was dropped off at the backpackers at 4am after being bought free drinks all night. I don’t know how she does it, she’s a machine. I was almost sleeping on the table in La Piazza at 10:30.
The amazing thing is she’s up for it again our second night there! We wind up playing beer pong with some guys from our dorm in the backpackers, and she doesn’t seem fazed by the hangover at all. I have to admit, I didn’t really feel like drinking that much but beer pong is awesome! I will definitely be cracking that one out a parties when I return – so be ready everyone, cause I am goooooooood. Well, I’m okay but Ashley and I both managed to throw the ball at such an angle and speed that it span around the inside of the target cup before plopping into the drink, I wish more people had seen it, it was pure skill. Remember those charity machines in supermarkets when we were younger; where you pushed the pound coin in and it span around and around in circles before dropping down into the hole at the bottom? IT WAS LIKE THAT.

The girl’s Outward Bound base is gorgeous, there’s a lake surrounded by rolling hills and paragliders are always floating just above the hilltops. I was a tiiiiiiiiny bit jealous because I had been really interested in Outward Bound, but I love my project too much to be envious of it! We had a lovely swim in the lake to Reeds Campsite (our accommodation for the night since that morning we had been made backpackerless), and emerged from the lake looking like Chewbacca because all of the mud and dirt in the water sticks to the fine hairs all over your body. Sexy sight! 

The Chewbacca lake!

After swimming we decide to set up camp early so that we’re not wrestling with poles and guide ropes in the dark; on our walk down to the campsite we get a lovely surprise in the form of a completely naked old couple driving their car in what they clearly expected to be a very rural area, the smiles on their faces indicated what they had been up to, and they clearly hadn’t been expecting any company! The part that ‘topped it off’ (hahaha, you’ll get this in a minute) for me was that we all saw the lady lean over to her (I presume) husband who was driving and strategically place a basketball cap over his ‘man-parts’, that’s right lady we all saw you! What makes this story even better is that once we got to the campsite there was another car, two people were already inside and the third was stood outside of the car finishing off dressing themselves... what can I say, there are a lot of randy pensioners in sleepy Sedgefield! You DOGGERS.

Our spot at Reeds Campsite!

Despite having two 2 man tents Ashley, Lucy, Lauren and myself (the happy campers) decided that we could all squash into one. This was lovely and cosy when we first got there and it was freezing cold, however as the night and film we were watching progressed the layers started coming off and our small tent turned into a sweat box. I had a cramped and restless night’s sleep, I could not find an angle where the tent was long enough for my body and getting out of that tent into the cold night to go to the empty one was not an option.

Sedgefield is a beautiful little town on the Garden Route and is home to the fantastic Wild Oats Farmer’s Market, seriously the food there is to die for and there are hundreds of little stalls with jewellery, bracelets and crafts – so as girls we were all in heaven.
It didn’t really feel like we were in Africa though, it’s very Westernised and there were so many white people! Most of the population is white, which was really strange for us compared to Big Bend. It felt more like a little town in the Lake District (but with better weather of course) than South Africa.

In Transit

Intercape, we meet again. As we’re lining up we realise that it’s assigned seating, damn, we’re going to get a really rubbish place. Or are we? The one in a million happens, the lottery win of coach seats, the creme-de-la-creme of over-night travelling... we score top deck front seats! Not only is this the prime road viewing position, but we have at least twice as much legroom as anyone else on the bus. I could not be happier. This lasts until my iPod runs out of battery... 30 minutes in.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Intercape company, please allow me fill you in on a few facts. Intercape are a company with STRONG Christian beliefs, beliefs that they don’t keep to themselves. They pray before we set off travelling, and they pray once we have reached our destination. But that’s quite nice, I respect that, it’s just everything in the middle that drives me crazy. All of the content that is fed over the speakers or shown on the TV is Christian; Christian songs, Christian cartoons, films with plots that are biblical and the very worst are the short VT’s of American farmers from the deep south giving their views on passages from the Bible. First the accent then the opinions – it’s enough to make me throw myself straight out of that top deck front window. By all means keep your beliefs to yourself; just don’t use cheap travel as a way of trying to convert people.
To escape this I did the only thing left to do, I slept. We arrived in Johannesburg at 7:50am Sunday morning; I had not been looking forward to this part of our travelling as we have heard our fair share of horror stories about J’burg. Unless you’re in the very rich areas you have quite a high chance of being axed to death in the car-park of Shoprite (true story, this year’s J’burg volunteers saw this happen with their own eyes). We were in Park Station, not a rich area and not a white area, I’m not going to lie, I was very apprehensive about getting off that coach.

Thankfully our Christian coach conductor found us ‘a guy’ and he walked us safely through Park Station to where the Swaziland bound kombi’s were parked. All was well and we made it back to Swaziland in two pieces, one named Ashley and the other named Kate.

Swaziland

J’burg was NOT what I needed to be worried about! Getting off the kombi in Big Bend felt like I had just been happy slapped by a bag of burning hot coals. The heat was immense; I have never felt anything hotter in my life. 47 degrees Celsius, whaaaaaat?! I should be the hottest thing around here ;) Not like that though, I mean body temperature. Anything over body temperature should not be allowed. Ashley and I almost died walking from the kombi park to Sisekelo laden like donkeys with our large backpacks on the back, small backpacks on the front, and two shopping bags in each hand... the only positive thing was that we were excellently counter balanced.
24 hours of travelling later and 48 hours of not sleeping in a proper bed meant that we both crashed out almost instantaneously.

South Africa, you were brilliant. But it’s good to be home.

Kate xx

P.S. The title of this blog is yet another quote from Ashley. A few people were discussing some news that a paparazzi guy had been hit by a car and died while trying to photograph Justin Beiber. Upon only hearing part of this story Ashley jumped up from her seat and screamed the words “SHUT UP. Justin Beiber’s DEAD?!” No Ashley, calm down. She is rather a fan, her trauma was visible. It was pretty funny and deserved some recognition, so here it is.