Seeking to put a little extra flash in the dash between the dates on our tombstones, Christine and I are off via Amsterdam, to explore the Republic of South Africa and the small landlocked Kingdom of Swaziland.
Amsterdam’s labyrinth of streets and canals easily disorient, and trying to locate our lodging on the corner of Herengracht and Keizersgracht we stop to ask for directions. The strangulated gargle of the Dutch language gives us the impression locals are suffering from a serious bronchial infection; either that or have a dragonfly lodged in their throats!
Exploring about the ‘city of canals’ we stumble into the legendary maze of alleyways and skinny dwellings forming the notorious Red Light District. The world’s oldest profession is in full swing here as the area of ill-repute is a magnet for visitors from abroad or perhaps more accurately, for a broad! The sex saturated scene is home to a bounty of live porn shows, haze-filled marijuana ‘coffee shops’, and bountiful sex shops filled with erotica and anatomically correct dildos on display.
This lewd lair offers a whole new perspective on window shopping, with almost 300 ‘window brothels’ illuminated by red lights being rented by a plethora of prostitutes provocatively parading their naughty. Wearing smiles promoting pornographic promise, the bedspring squeakers ‘John-fish’ from their windows, while potential clients interested in getting some lipstick on their dipstick or joining genitals negotiate to lease the ladies lips and loins.
Without warning we are abruptly stopped in our tracks when a door violently bursts open right in front of us. Out jumps one of the carnal creatures, clad only in a tiger print G-string and stiletto heels! With her arms up and fingers curled to imitate claws, the fleshy fem-fatale aggressively starts growling at me like a wild tigress through red-painted lips. Now that’s what I call a genuinely ‘titillating’ start to the day!
The city has some 1,500 bridges, and rather than drive a car, most folks pump through the narrow streets straddling heavy bikes with big-ass seats, upright handlebars, and an assortment of box-like additions for carrying kids or cargo. Pedaling is obviously a way of life in A-Dam, and cyclists even have their own bike lanes and traffic lights. Renting a pair of these Dutchie bikes we cycle past a smattering of scenic old windmills along the Amsel River on our way to the village of Ouderkerk.
Marijuana in A-Dam is as readily available as a quart of milk, and grocery shopping for a joint is definitely a new experience. The pungent aroma in town is so rampant one can almost get ‘medically enhanced’ just wandering about! For our Happy Hour we stock up with cheese, dates, and figs to accompany a tasty bottle of rum we kidnapped from back home in the land of mountains, moose, and maple syrup.
Walking home we pass a young girl sitting in a chair with her feet in the air while a young man lathers them in peanut butter! Apparently there will be no tiptoeing through the tulips for her, as this is some silly Dutch game requiring the girl to be carried across town by friends without her feet ever touching the ground. To us the spectacle looks rather gross, and not unlike she’s been walking barefoot through a dog park!
Heading to the airport at 6 a.m. when most hookers have long since closed their legs for the night, we notice a mistress of the mattress still sitting in a window and displaying a wealth of womanly epidermis. The eager beaver is obviously hoping to find an early riser strolling down mammary lane. OK Scotty, beam us up!
A niggling case of the Johannesburg jitters sets in when the plane’s tires bite the tarmac in South Africa, knowing full well this is the second most dangerous city in the world. According to police reports, for the last year in and around Jo’Berg there were 4,216 murders, 7,900 attempted murders, and 12,000 rapes. In addition there were 8,884 car jackings, which staggeringly equates to 24 a day – for every day of year!
Just before midnight we collect a rental car and our African adventure begins. All keyed up, we leave the security of the airport and search for the first of several roads leading to our pre-booked lodging. With the night as black as a raven’s rump, I’m driving on the opposite side of the road, shifting with the left hand and mistaking windshield wipers for turn signals. Struggling to decipher unknown road signs and aware of the possibility of getting car-jacked, I’m thinking that this makes about as much sense as sandpapering a lion’s ass dressed in pork chop underwear!
Only five minutes outside of the airport and we’re already victims of our erroneous directional decisions. This time of night is trouble prime time, and our uncertainty has us as nervous as chickens in a pillow factory. After several botched attempts we find the proper turnoff, and with all senses on alert, follow directions to the guest house. Not a moment too soon we arrive at the tall electrified barbed wire fence. Vigorously stabbing the bell and rattling the locked steel gate we manage to wake up a coal-black security guard who groggily permits us entry to the compound. Halle-fricking-luiah, we’ve made it!
We ask him about the safety of drinking tap water. ‘Oh ya’ says he, ‘we half da turd best drinking vater in da vorld’; so we take a drink, brush our teeth, and call it a night. Next morning at breakfast a manager tells us to be careful to not drink any tap water as there’s a Typhoid outbreak in an underground reservoir nearby and nine locals have already died from it! Perhaps the guard was pissed we woke him up?
Continuing the long jittery journey across the country we quickly notice the aggressive foot-to-the-floor drivers. We are clocking in at the speed limit of a buck twenty, but motorists flash their lights and scream past us in their metal missiles as if we are parked.
Anxiously maneuvering the slender roads towards Swaziland’s Oshoek border crossing we dodge pedestrians, on-coming lumber trucks, goats, and kamikaze cattle. After showing our passports and car documents at the border we have to pay bribe-minded officials some ‘taxes’ before they let us pass.
The Kingdom of Swaziland is the smallest country in Africa and landlocked between Mozambique and South Africa. Its desperate conditions are reflected by statistics showing an 80% illiteracy rate, 40% unemployment, and 40% HIV infected (highest in the world). Also, 70% of the people live on an average daily income of $1 or less, with 30% needing food aid for survival. It is definitely a country of second thoughts, and has us pondering whether we should have opted to visit Switzerland instead of Swaziland!
The failing Kingdom is controlled by King Mswati III, a corrupt to the core tyrant recently voted one of world’s ten worse dictators. Raping the country while his people starve, he enjoys a ludicrously lavish lifestyle with private jets, and has a fleet of high end Mercedes cars for all his many wives. Yup, if you want evidence of a waste of four billion years of evolution, I reckon this ‘digestive exit’ should definitely be Exhibit A!
The polygamist pervert has the loyalty of a praying mantis, and each year chooses a virgin teenage bride to marry at the ‘Reed Dance’, which he actually stages himself to add another little coco goddess to his stable. Last month more than 50,000 bare-breasted virgins were vying to become the King’s 13th wife. Obviously into screwing more than just the country, this tapeworm in a tiara is a textbook example of someone who ought to be neutered to prevent any further spawn!
Not surprisingly, few foreigners travel to this catastrophic country, and with our white skin we stand out like a giraffe in a duck parade. Stern locals never initiate a wave or say hello unless we do first, because apparently it would be a sign of disrespect. Appropriately, we always make an effort to initiate a greeting, and the smiles returning from the licorice-black faces are so bright they look like the sun coming out.
We luckily find some sweet lodging called Malandela’s, located on a large sugar cane plantation in the town of Malkerns. Early morning our car bounces over pothole-wounded roads on the way to the laughably named village of Hhelehhele; home of the Mkhaya Game Reserve.
Right outside the office an ugly warthog suffers the daft indignity of having a horrid head so heavy that the beast has to dine with front knees on the ground. Meanwhile, an ostrich sashays toward us and starts hopping about with monstrous two-toed feet scratching in the dirt, so we decide to name the flightless fowl Patrick. Yep, ‘Patrick Swazi the Dirty Dancer’.
We learn that today is going to be our lucky day, as of their five vehicles, ours will be the only one in use. Better still, we’ll be the only ones in it. A private safari in Swaziland, how good is that! After a couple of quick strokes of the pen absolve the camp of any potential injuries or death, we’re introduced to our Swazi driver and tracker named Siprakeen.
His well experienced transport has paint looking like a bad case of mange. The dashboard, windshield, door handles and panels are all missing; plus the decrepit jeep looks like it’s been attacked by a can opener, as the roof has been amputated! Oh well, at least there will be nothing to impede the view!
On the dusty tracks we first spot the usual suspects of wildebeest, antelope, and zebra. Then, using ‘bush eyes’ born of long habit, Sip spots an amazing sight. A rare black rhino and large Cape buffalo stand nose to nose in some sort of stare down! Sip thinks they may both be old loners, as black rhinos are solitary animals and older buffalo are ostracized from their herd. Perhaps having found each other alone in the bush the undainty odd couple merely craves companionship.
The two seemingly love-struck beasts inch closer and closer to each other until actually touching noses. The rhino lets out a snort and gives the buffalo a mighty shove backwards. Perhaps this is crude foreplay, as the beasts slowly come together once again. Even Sip is captivated, having never in his many years of tracking, seen this cross species drama before. Quite an auspicious start to our Swazi safari!
Sip next spots elephants, and our sloppy jalopy proceeds hither and thither in pursuit over a road trying to shake loose our internal organs. Christine and I hang on tightly to minimize the chance of being thrown out of our frontier-era seats. We drive to within a couple of meters of the ‘Gods of Girth’, and being close enough to hear the 13’ foot and 13,000 pound behemoths breathing we feel as insignificant as gnats!
The jeep’s engine is off to help keep them calm, but with the potential of a trampling should the ‘Ellys’ decide to throw a tantrum we’re as nervous as worms in a fishing derby. As they chew up the spiny thorn tree branches, their monstrous schnozzle is back in the tree ripping off their next mouthful; clearly naturals when it comes to multi-tusking! The plus-sized pachyderms focus beady eyes on us until their wrinkly rumps increasing the turf between us as they lumber off in search of fresh twigs!
Our bucket of bolts continues rattling over parched ground until we come upon a herd of Cape Buffalo. Their horns perfectly mimic a flip-style 60’s hairdo giving them a deceivingly docile look, but they are responsible for about 200 fatal attacks on humans every year. The grouchy heavyweights prefer to charge first and ask questions later; which has me wondering if perhaps my darling wife’s genes may contain trace elements of Cape Buffalo DNA when it comes to the next-level preposterousness of her shopping!
Being within spitting distance, we observe Oxpecker birds hopping about the buffalo’s faces as they peck for parasites. The little birds have more guts than a slaughterhouse floor, and actually get into the animal’s ears, nostrils, and occasionally even their mouths in search of a tasty birdie morsel.
What makes our day so special is being alone with nature, and having the luxury of spending as little or as much time as we want at our sightings. We stop for around midday at a place called Stone Camp, where a solo table has been set up on a dried river bed, and wildebeest sausages are grilling over an open fire pit. Justifiably anxious as Africa’s perfect predator snack food, svelte impala graze nearby with ever-vigilant eyes, and when spooked they powerfully leap across the plains as if on pogo sticks.
Rumbling along in the jeep continuing a game of ‘I Spy’, our eagle eyed tracker notices the caramel spotted coat of an Alp-tall giraffe. Since we’re not quite close enough for a good picture, Siprakeen says to me ‘you want closer’? Figuring he will drive a little further, I tell him ‘sure’. His replay is ‘OK, come’, and since none of the doors open, jumps out of the vehicle.
Sticking our necks out we follow him into the bush, and hopefully not the food chain! With the quiet legs of a heron on the hunt, we patiently tiptoe towards the stratospheric animals. However, about 50 meters from the vehicle Sip suddenly thrusts up a hand and says ‘STOP’!
The snap of a tree branch causes an ‘uh-oh’ moment and we realize our perilous predicament. With blood pumping, hearts thumping, and knees bumping, we turn our heads sideways and find ourselves face-to-face with two tons of menace in the form of a mother rhinoceros and her calf!
Standing a mere 6 or 7 meters away from the beasts’ nose horns with simply air between us, I assume they are less than pleased with our two-legged trespass. Armed with only a ballpoint pen and paper, I believe our concern is justified, knowing these bad tempered goliaths have yet to familiarize themselves with the intimidating power of a small hand-held writing instrument!
Our moral mandate is to flee back to the jeep, but Sip tells us not to make any sudden movements and just slowly return to the vehicle. On the outside cool as a cucumber – on the inside squirrel in traffic! Owl-eyed, and heads twisting backwards Linda Blair like, we’re almost back at the jeep when nature’s armored tanks slowly lumber toward us; perhaps believing our battle-scarred transport a long lost relative!
You know, it’s actually quite amazing how fast one can get into a vehicle with no doors, given the right motivation. Gentlemen, start your engines! Whew, the shortcoming of our deodorants has definitely been exposed during this pulse-pounding, sweaty-palms, and hoping-we-don’t-die safari experience!
Appreciating a day sprinkled with magical ‘remember-when’ moments back at camp, we bid a fond farewell to Sipraken, and begin the 75 km drive back to Malkerns. With it now late-afternoon I acquire an urge to bang back a bevy of barleys, and since beer is an important food group to me, make a questionable pit stop at an impoverished food store. Christine locks herself in the car while I optimistically enter the building.
Turns out that the store does not sell beer, but a dreadlocked dude eavesdropping nearby says; ‘You want beer; I help’. The store worker chimes in ‘you go with him’, so I follow the Rasta lookalike around behind the store and down a dirt path leading to a shack. The door opens, and over the shoulder of the two people inside I lock eyes on a big crusted iron door padlocked shut. ‘Come in’ he says.
Attempting to judge his genuineness, I frisk him up and down with my eyes, concerned about a potential robbery or having my internal organs sold on the black market. My intestines then clench with the hinges skreeking open in complaint as a woman in a filthy dress opens the locked door revealing a dirt floor, a nasty mattress, and a fridge. To my relief she opens the fridge door and removes three large bottles of beer!
The beer and I stroll back to the car, and Christine offers a mumble-swear of a most unladylike nature for disappearing out of sight. I relate the episode to her, and not for the first time, she simply shakes her head at me. We later learn it is illegal for most stores in Swaziland to sell beer, and what we visited is called a ‘Shebeen’; a place to purchase bootlegged booze that is purposely hidden from the Swazi police.
Savoring Brie with black cherries and chicken camembert mains in front of a mammoth logs-ablaze fireplace back at Malandela’s, I propose a toast to what has been one of our most fantastic days ever! Christine, my honey-tongued little supplier of awesomeness, seconds the motion and with a syrupy sweetness purrs ‘except of course my darling for the day I married you!’ Yes, sir, that’s my baby, Sugar in Shoes. There are days when I love dat woman right down to the marrow!
We awake to a chorus of frogs voicing their pleasure in fields of cane next door. For the first time in months rain is falling and dimpling newborn ponds. During the night I’ve also been hearing what sounds like a grunting pig, but questioning staff at breakfast I draw blank stares because they don’t know the word pig.
As I offer my best snorting pig impersonation they open the fridge and pull out bacon, thinking I want to put more pork on my fork. My conundrum remains unsolved, and the noise occurs several more times before my pig-norance finally comes to an end. It turns out my mysterious pork chop in waiting is nothing more than a rumble strip on a road hidden behind thick bushes. My face radiates a scarlet pig-mentation, because to my chagrin, Christine cannot resist persistently heckling me about my mysterious ‘Swazi swine’!
Our time in Swaziland hurries past, and before we know it we’re bound for South Africa’s border post at Jeppes Reef. Ascending the mountain road in an unkind chill, our attention is drawn to a mud and stone hut displaying soapstone carvings for sale. The owner has the gnarliest hands we’ve ever seen, and after warming our hands over his open wood fire we purchase three beautiful carvings.
Further down the road we make another unforeseen stop beside some little tykes wrapped in skirts made of leaves, dancing to the beat of an older fellow whacking a hide-stretched drum. We leave them enthusing over a supply of new pencils and continue on to the South Africa border. Thankfully, after all the driving during our stay we’ve managed to avoid the sleazy Swazi police, who crookeder than a barrel of fishhooks, will prey on any foreign visitors to fleece them of cash.
Our first layover in South Africa is Komatipoort, a town marking the border with Mozambique. This is the last place to purchase food supplies for our four day sojourn into Kruger National Park. Africa is well known for its tyrants, tribes, and trauma; but we’re here in search of its astounding assortment of animals.
On Lower Sabie River we spot a bloat of twitchy-eared hippos in grave need of a consult with Jenny Craig! Despite being practicing vegetarians they have a grim reputation for killing more humans in Africa than any other animal. Since the hurried heap of hostile cellulite are capable of outrunning humans on land, and have monstrous tusk-like teeth that can bite a person in half, we quickly bye-bye the snorting hippopotami.
After breakfast in camp it’s time to get intimate with the Kruger, and excitement surges as we immerse ourselves in the vastness of a five million acre wildlife park studded with horns, tusks, antlers, and claws. Prudently we smear on Mosquito repellent as protection against malaria, the ‘silent tsunami’ in Africa responsible for over 1.5 million humans leaving life early each year.
With the rubber rolling we soon encounter some with mammals we’ve always looked up to. The magnificent giraffe are the rangy supermodels of the bush, and elegantly strut about with their beautifully patterned hides, movie star eyelashes, and outrageous non-stop legs and necks.
After passing a troop of bad-tempered baboons flashing sizeable ivories we stop beside a group of foraging elephants. Almost immediately things turn tense. A massive bull displays his orneriness by flapping his mattress-sized ears and aggressively false charging us! With the distinct possibility of a tromp-and-stomp, I pop the clutch and gun the motor to avoid a possible crushing by ‘Forest Plump’. WOW, what an adrenaline rush to end our first day in the incredible Kruger!
In camp we are sequestered behind a high electronic fence to keep out any life-snuffing critters prowling about in search of a two-legged dinner. It’s like a reverse zoo, where we are the ones in the cage, but it does prevent an otherwise open invitation for human hors d’oeuvres.
Cloistered away in our bare-bones hut we have hot and cold taps but no shower. This means splashing on water before soaping up, and then with the dexterity of a contortionist in a game of Twister, stuffing body parts under the tap to rinse the ripening essence of the African day off our skin.
Not wanting to cook at Skukuza camp tonight, we mosey over to a rail station where no trains depart and none arrive. Abandoned long ago, the station has only one defunct steam locomotive plus a few tables serving as a makeshift restaurant. I try ordering a hamburger but the African waiter named ‘Doctor’ won’t hear of it, insisting ‘Man must have rump’! Though he is of course referring to rump steak on the menu, I can’t help butt snigger at the comment.
Seeking to make the most of our pursuit of fur and fangs we rouse ourselves at 4:30 in the morning and head out the door. Our first sighting is two bloated male lions swaggering down the road wearing goatees of blood. These fierce ‘meat-a-tarians’ have our pulse sprinting as we roll down the window to shoot them with a camera. Obviously, there’s no getting out of the car into landscape intent on eating you. This is a dog-eat-dog world, and we are the ones wearing the Milk Bone underwear!
On a flawless day with a canary yellow sun radiating down from a robin’s-egg blue sky, we stop beside a muddy river bank to watch a few smug-looking crocodiles with large overlapping teeth locked in a perpetual grin. During our sentinel of these shoes and handbags in waiting, several fur-bearing animals warily wander past, trying to avoid ending up in the digestive tract of one of the prehistoric lizards.
Driving back to camp along a seemingly empty stretch of road we glance in the rear mirror and notice our day being taken to new heights. We look up. They look down. Yup, we are being tailgated by a tower of giraffes – another of so many inspiring encounters occurring in the legendary Kruger!
Partaking in our now habitual ritual of rehashing the day over a few ‘sundowners’, we decide to do our own cooking tonight; convinced last night’s dog-toy tough charred cow was none other than a fried flip-flop! After scribbling in my travelogue I get the idea of scattering some bread crumbs on the ground and my bread-spread works im-peck-ably. It attracts an array of fancy feathers, and the true star of the show is a yellow-billed hornbill with a jumbo yellow beak giving it the appearance of a bulky flying banana!
Regular vehicles are not permitted in the Kruger after dark because as night snuggles around the plains it multiplies the threats, so tonight we’re in a large open-sided vehicle on a sunset safari. We cruise by a large dead tree with skeletal branches hosting vultures silhouetted against the paprika sky. Coming to a group of Elleys, one of the big male tuskers trumpets a warning and the entire herd quickly closes ranks around two babies for protection. The ranger tells us that this occurs when they catch the scent of danger from a lion or leopard, or perhaps in this case, a whiff of my socks!
The so-called ‘Big 5’ (lion, leopard, Cape buffalo, elephant and rhino) are so named for being the most dangerous beasts to encounter on foot. Tonight we’re elated with our ocular achievement; having spotted all of the fearsome five-some, including an elusive lithe leopard languidly lounging on the limb of a lofty tree.
At sunup we drive 55 km north from Satara Camp to Oliphants Camp through an area referred to as the ‘killing fields’ due to the carnage of big cats. Waylaid by a roadblock of cantankerous Cape buffalo, we’re forced to wait out the gridlock of the blunt-brained behemoths with the patience of a bomb diffuser.
Having cleared that hurdle we experience an Animal Planet moment where the law of the jungle has recently prevailed. A massive male lion has recently taken one of these same Cape buffalo away from life. The buffalo’s under belly is torn open and the apex predator is lying beside his kill, resting his head upon it as if it were a pillow. With our car windows down just a few meters away, our voyeuristic view is the cat’s derriere for a mesmerizing lesson in felinology!
Suddenly the gazers become the ‘gazees’ when the huge cat turns towards us with mandibles dripping drool. In a predatory stare his enormous golden eyes appraise us as if we may be tender prime rib in a four-wheeled display case, and hint that if we’re not careful, we too could easily qualify as organ donors!
This killer’s ‘catitude’ is frightening and since we don’t much fancy him picking his teeth with our rib bones we leave him be. Bone appetite big fella! The ‘un-fur-gettable’ encounter convinces us that when it comes to formidable fauna that can cripple and kill, the Kruger is definitely the ‘greatest show on turf’.
Abandoning the jaws and claws of the Kruger, we enter Mpumalanga and drive the scenic Panoramic Route to the town of Sabie. After spending the night we are about to head out on a morning run when the owner cautions us that the gnarly trail we’ve chosen is well known black mamba turf! Now I am always up for trying a new trail, but not so much with the possibility of a pre-breakfast injection of neurotoxins from the largest and most venomous snake in Africa!
As an alternative, we opt to mountain bike to a waterfall, and huffing along with unabundant shade, a raucous troop of monkeys scold our passage. The rock-strewn trail eventually becomes impossible to ride with terrain on the threshold of requiring a grappling hook, but having come this far we make an impromptu decision to carry the hefty bikes.
Having absent-mindedly forgotten to bring drinking water, dehydration from the broiling heat wreaks havoc on Christine. Suddenly she faints, and like a stringless marionette, lands face-first on the trail narrowly missing the rocks! With immense luck an infrequent hiker passes by and kindly offers some water which seems to revive her. After a brief rest she dusts herself off and we cautiously pedal back to town.
In an peculiar Sabie restaurant I make the erroneous decision to order a steak with ‘monkey gland’ sauce, which for unfathomable reasons seemed like a good idea at the time. In point of fact, it is a thought needing a longer incubation period! The alien ingredient is an inferno ambush lurking on a plate and tastes like liquefied lava! With my eyes dribbling tear-water I vow from now on to approach Africa’s devil condiments with a whole new level of vigilance!
Owing to a malfunction of my internal compass today we end up lost in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it township of decaying dreams just outside Lydenberg. Concerned about our safety in the gloomy surrounds I stop and roll my window down to ask for directions.
Looking like she has just dismounted from her broomstick, a disheveled one-eyed old woman approaches. Pointing a bony black finger at us, and sounding like a bullfrog with emphysema, she croaks out ‘you – back town’! We’re unsure if this is meant as a threat, but with the old crone glaring at us with a cloudy evil eye we opt to sort out our logistical woes elsewhere!
Finally back on the right tract, we arrive in the high-altitude town of Dullstroom, but uneasy with the feel of the place, push on through a curtain of fog to the mining town of Belfast. Sadly this is another place to cheer you down, having the suck factor of being one of the coldest towns in all of South Africa, but with my eyes blurring from fatigue it’s time to halt for the night.
We never thought about Africa being cold, but just after finding a room the power goes out and it feels like we’re in a damn igloo. A bottle of rum is removed from our bag, and during a liberal lubrication, one drink leads to another, then another, and we soon find ourselves getting bombed in Belfast by the IRA (Inflicted Rum Alcohol).
Longing for a hug from the sun we’re joyful to show the frigid town our taillights at dawn. However, the roads leading to Pretoria are certainly fatal to boredom, and give us another reason to shiver. Passing shantytowns of corrugated tin shacks bleeding rust my foot rests heavier on the gas pedal when seeing bold highway signs reading; ‘Danger – Hi Jacking Hot Spot’!
Pretoria is dubbed ‘Jacaranda City’ due to its 70,000 Jacaranda trees; now in bloom and shedding carpets of purple snow. Making it to a friend’s 1930’s estate house we immediately notice the obvious safety concerns. Cemented walls studded with broken glass protect the house, along with razor barb-wire, and an electrical fence. The owner informs us she also sleeps with a loaded gun under her pillow!
Keen for a further fix of fur, Christine and I drive an hour outside of town to a wildlife reserve for an up close and purr-sonal with tiger and lion cubs. People are taking pictures from outside, but after signing an indemnity form and paying a fee, I am given permission to venture inside the caged area. The monster mousers are only 5 to 7 months old, but it is a great thrill to be able to tussle about with them.
Roughhousing in a game of rope tug-o-war with a gorgeous Bengal tiger cub, it astonishingly drags my full body weight across the ground with not a lot of effort. Totally smitten by the over-sized kitten, I cannot possibly contemplate the strength of a fully grown tiger! Another lesson learned is how quick the cuddly carnivores can be. Engaging in mock combat with a playful lion cub, it pounces and punctures the flesh on my hand giving a trickle of blood some fresh air. Mauled by a lion in Africa – I absolutely love it!
Driving back to Johannesburg, where our Africa adventures all began, we return the rental car and meet up with our friend Wiggy. The Afrikaner lives in the city, but before taking us to his place he decides to drive us past some very undesirable looking real estate. The sprawling township of Soweto is a propagation of shacks looking like an inverse Shangri-La; dirty, dense, and dangerous!
Our keenness is further diminished when he next drives us into the bowls of ‘Joburg’ for a wander through the eclectic and intense city market. As mementos, Christine and I purchase a bone necklace and an Angola Chokwe mask from a couple of characters looking every bit as hazardous as anything seen in the Kruger.
In ‘Joburg’ we take Wiggy and his wife to the appropriately named ‘Carnivore Restaurant’. Though there are no cows on the menu, there certainly is a lot of roast beasts. A massive circular fire hosts 52 Masaai tribal spears adorned with sizzling Fred Flintstone inspired racks of flavorful flesh; including crocodile, ostrich, kudu, wart hog, zebra, and giraffe. The only thing missing seems to be a hip of hippo!
Waiters carve the bounty of the jungle onto our plates until we can eat no more, at which time we cease clanking our cutlery and lower a white flag on the table to surrender. The lavish beast feast brings an end to our time in Johannesburg, but with a few African days still remaining we fly to Capetown aboard the low-cost high-humor Kulula Airlines. Friendly staff dressed in jeans has passengers giggling as they read out their humorous in-flight announcements before takeoff:
‘Welcome Kulula fans, and a special welcome to all our brand new super heroes. Here at Kulula we pride ourselves on having the best crew in the industry, unfortunately due to staffing problems..…’
‘In case of an emergency, masks will drop from the panel above. Once you have stopped screaming, put the mask over your nose and mouth and for God’s sake, breathe baby breathe! Then put masks on to any children that you are traveling with. If you have two children, decide which one you love most now.’
‘When you leave the aircraft please take all your personal belongings with you except for the expensive stuff – cameras, laptops, etc. which will be divided up among the crew, although this doesn’t apply to children – they will be sold as slaves’.
‘We’ve sure enjoyed taking you for a ride today, and remember Kulula fans; nobody wants your money more than kulula.com’.
From Cape Town, Christine and I opt to ride a rough coastal train to the end of the line and the old naval hamlet of Simon’s Town just to see what’s there. We purposely leave our valuables behind in the hotel as the controversial gang-tagged train has a lousy safety record due to sporadic muggings. Purchasing our tickets we immediately question our decision as actually printed on the bottom of the ticket is an advertisement for funeral arrangements!
After snooping about Simon’s Town we retrace the tracks to Muizenberg and get off to walk the beach to Kalk Bay. A couple of hours later the train returns, and getting back onboard we are followed on by three menacing looking black guys, who assuredly are not ‘Citizen of the Year’ material. As the train begins to pull away, two burly well-armed security guards jump aboard, causing the three ne’re-do-wells to bolt out the back door of the car!
The ever cautious guards obviously knew we were being stalked with dire intentions, and ride the rails with us until we are safely back in Cape Town. Beholden to our saviors we thank them profusely for their protection; recognizing that once again we have been fortunate.
Our four days in Cape Town includes visits to the vineyards of Stellenbosh, Kirstenbosch Gardens, Chapman’s Peak, Blouberg, Cape of Good Hope, and Table Mountain; before culminating with a 100 km drive to the former whaling station of Betty’s Bay. Why? Well to see the penguins of course! Penguins in South Africa, I know I know, you suspect I’ve been into the spirits again, right?
Actually, Betty’s Bay is populated by hundreds of ‘Jackass Penguins’! The name given to these well-grounded little fellows is because of the tendency of the sex-starved males to bray like a donkey whenever they want to get laid. It is uncanny how similar they sound to a donkey and we can’t help but chortle each time we hear one of the endearing little waddlers making an ass of himself!
And so ends our unforgettable days on the exciting continent of Africa. We have absolutely adored our exhilarating escapades here, and now secure in the knowledge that our adrenal glands are fully functional, we can return back home to our tamer Canadian turf to unwind before pondering, picking, and planning next year’s exploits.
Mark Colegrave October 2005