THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES

We spent our last night as a group in Victoria Falls and had a little poolside pizza party. Our guide Solomon joined us for dinner, and so did our Victoria Falls guide, Thembie.  Blair and I were both shocked when the hotel staff came over singing with a beautiful birthday cake with our names on it, to celebrate our 60th birthday. It was a great way to cap off this dream trip with such a great group. We had so many laughs together, I know I will be smiling and chuckling to myself whenever I think of our month together. 

If I had to choose my favourite days, I don't think I could. We had so much fun in Amsterdam, ( it seems so long ago ) and the excitement of finally, after a year of planning, reaching Capetown.

 I loved our visit to the Hope Africa school, and being swarmed by the kids. 

I loved the pre dawn game drives, feeling like a kid again, the excitement of getting up early and wondering what we would see. I loved our bush lunches, with King Solomon bringing out the table cloth and the wonderful food packed by whatever lodge we were at at the time. And as we ate, I loved the animals parading past us, as if they were looking for Noah's Ark....

I loved just sitting still sometimes, and taking in the vastness of the land, the sounds of the wildlife around and saying to myself "remember this". 

I loved the joyfulness that radiates from so many African people, especially when they sing and dance.

"Safari" is Swahili for "journey", and this was a truly incredible journey, and the fact that I got to share it with family and friends was the icing on the cake. When Tom, Jane and I were in Kenya in 2008, Jane said "let's come back to Africa for our 60th birthday". I am so grateful that we were able to keep that promise.

The trip may be over, but we have a lot of memories, pictures and stories to keep us smiling for a long time.

Cheers to the "Awesome, Original Six".....

THIS IS BOTSWANA

We really enjoyed our week in Botswana. I don't want to play favourites, because each country we have visited has given us very special memories, but it is very easy to love this country. I think we all felt a level of comfort that we didn't quite get until we were here.

Chobe National Park was amazing, from almost the minute we entered it, animals were very plentiful.

3 lionesses enjoying their afternoon siesta.

Mababe was one of the private concessions, or reserves that we visited.

We have just crossed the border back into Zimbabwe, leaving Botswana behind. As we drive down the road, I have a lump in my throat and a few tears in my eyes. Botswana is a beautiful, beautiful country, and the people are gentle and friendly souls.

We saw a few elephants in the distance and I thought to myself, these might be our last elephants, as we are heading back to Victoria Falls ( a one hour drive ) and will regroup and repack for our long journey home which starts tomorrow. Five minutes later we see an elephant on the road, and then one by one, they parade across the road, in front of us. There were 7 or 8 of them, with a few youngsters, including a baby about one month old. Such a special memory to tuck away. Thank you elephants! 

One elephant hung back on the other side of the road and then crossed in front of our van, never taking his eye off us.

Our guide through Botswana, King Solomon, or Solly as we liked to call him. A very knowledgable, patient and good humoured man.

The huge Boabob trees in Botswana are magnificent, and live for hundreds of years, some over a thousand years old. The are nicknamed " the tree of life"....people make food, clothing and medicine from it, animals eat the leaves and fruit. The trunk is often hollow (but still grows) and offers protection from bad weather. At one of the border crossings, they had a Boabob tree with a hollow trunk that they used as a jail cell.

Jane is standing beside this Boabob, you can see how big it is....

GHOHA HILLS

We had the best day......we were in the 4x4 for most of it, but the views and the sightings broke up the drive .....

....and made for an unforgettable day......ok, we might want to forget the part where we got stuck in the Kalahari.....in leopard territory......and we all had to bail out and help dig, collect wood to put under the tires, then push. After an hour in the hot sun we were off again as if nothing had happened, and on to the next adventure.

We stopped for lunch at one of the designated "stretch" points......or what we call bush pee spots.....and the girls were in the process, when the guys started waving us back.....a herd of elephants was fast approaching our tree.....and then comes a dazzle of zebras..... The next 20 minutes were spent in awe, eating our lunch and watching the bush theatre unfold before us......

Psst, Can I tell you a secret.....

We came across over 1,000 Cape buffalo on the move, as far as the eye could see.....searching for water. It is so dry here.

We spotted these giraffes, and it was obvious the male was wanting a bit of affection. We waited and waited, and finally they sauntered off behind a tree for privacy.....sorry guys, we just thought it would make a good picture....oh well.

At about 3pm, we arrived at our lodge for the night, Ghoha Hills Lodge..... And what a treat it was....

High tea....

Nanette, our hostess was a lovely lady, and along with her staff, made us feel so welcome. She joined us for dinner as the most brilliant orange moon rose in the sky. As Nanette said, "when you have seen the moon rise over the Kalahari, you have seen the most beautiful moonrise ever"...... We certainly thought so.

The staff gave us a thermos of hot water at bedtime, to make morning coffee. We sipped our cup of joe watching this sunrise, and feeling so thankful for this day and this experience.

Saying goodbye to Nanette.....stay tuned

TENTING ON THE RIVER KHWAI

It just keeps getting better and better.  We stayed 2 nights at the Mogotlho Safari Lodge, on the banks of the river Khwai.....and yes, we did cross the bridge....oh wait, different country, different continent.

The girls at the lodge greeting us in song, with wet towels and drinks.

The tents were laid out along the river which is very low right now, but still deep enough for hippo's to bathe in. 

When we arrived, I loved the fact there was elephant poo right next to our tent, but when I woke up at 2 am, and was listening to all the noises outside, I wasn't so keen on the thought.

There are no fences here, ( so only a piece of canvas between us and the lions, leopards, elephants, etc) so the animals were all around us. We all enjoyed laying in our tents at night, listening to the wildlife grunting and snorting, the most interesting sounding birds, and monkeys chattering. We had some great game drives with amazing sightings. Our first sighting yesterday, 5 minutes out of the lodge was 2 female lions, one very pregnant and the other with 4 cubs....what a way to start the day.

Lunch in the bush, ( delicious rice, vegetable curry and meat quiche)  watching elephants wander by.....pinch me!

Spider webs, African style.

Bush pee break....

We had a great sighting of the endangered African wild dogs, with pups.....

On the viewing deck.....

We had our sundowner on the first night down by the river watching a large bloat of hippo's entertaining us....

And as if the hippo's weren't enough, we were given this beautiful sunset!

The second day at Mogitlho we did a game drive through Moremi Park.

Termite mound...

Sitting around the fire before dinner, enjoying the last few rays of the sun....

Blair and Lisa spotted a leopard one night just before dinner, which brought us all running. We missed the leopard, but luckily no beer was lost on the race to the viewing deck.

Both nights before dinner, the staff came into the dining room singing and dancing, we just loved it.

We all thoroughly enjoyed our two days here but time to move on....stay tuned