Zanzibar

I have been waiting for this all along - Zanzibar, the spice island. or as we say in German: "Da, wo der Pfeffer waechst'.
And I can say, I am not disappointed. The first place we stayed in was Stone Town - a world heritage site. Lots of narrow streets, old, beautiful but not very well kept buildings. It was a bit like Lisbon, but smaller and more Arabic influences. I loved the place. My favourite so far in terms of towns. Also, it has been by far the most cosmopolitan place i have seen in Africa so far. Yes, pople do look at you, but there are no stares. All the street sellers back of quite quickly when one says "hapana asante" (no, thank you). The fresh see food is also gourgeous. I am loving it.

After a guided Spice Tour we went up North to the beach. Beautiful white, sandy beach. The water is very nice and warm and unbelievably clear. Snorkelig was facinating! I really enjoyed this place... until we went back to Stone Town to catch the ferry back to Dar Es Salam. I went to get some money and Barclays seemed like a good option. Well, the ATM "ate" my credit card, after I put in my pin number. No foreign mobile phone would call through to Germany for me to be able to cancel the card. And due to a power outage internet was not working either. T.I.A - this is africa at it's best. However, I "rented' a local mobile and am now using my back up card. So all is good. Hakuna Matata - no worries :)

Victoria Falls and LAKE Malawi

Hello again, I have now finally arrived in REAL Africa: proper street markets everywhere, people hassling you to buy stuff constantly and people, yes lots of people. Not like Namibia, where only 1.8 million people live in a huge country. Also it is getting much greener and of course, we now also have mosquitos. Great fun. But on a serious note, since we entered Zambia, we have arrived at the heart of the dark continent. Much less European and much more African. People are really friendly but many do suffer from the "money tree" syndrom (white guys have unlimited funds, because they only go into their back garden and harvest th money tree, no work involved). I am getting very good at saying "no" indeed.

But back to what I have actually seen: the Victoria Falls in Livingstone (Zambia) are great. I don't know exactly how far the water falls, but I know for sure, that these are the biggest waterfalls I have seen so far in my life. As the rainy season is starting atm, we did have quite some water. Very lucky indeed.

After this we were just lazing around in Livingstone for 4 days. Very relaxing, pool, bit of shopping in town, some food, mentally preparing for second leg of the trip. One day we went to an Orphanage, just four of us. It gives one lots to think about. The kids were very friendly and the sisters were looking after them as best as they could. We basically just talked to the kids, playing ball with them. They really enjoyed themselves (and we were suffering in the heat). Well, it definitely made quite an impression on me.

After Livingstone we made our way into Malawi. The first campsite we stayed at, there was Zebras grasing around the tents - amazing. And the next one was right at the beach of LAKE Malawi in "Mango Heaven"! We put the tents up under a mango tree and got bombarded during the night - hehe :) I loved it!!! Had about 8 mangos that day. The beach was beautiful: white sand. And the water very warm. We went snorkling and jumping of cliffs (even so I have to admit, I am no good at this anymore. Must be getting old and scared). Lake Malawi and really the whole of Malawi is a real nice place. People are meant to be the friendliest in the whole of Afrika and I definitely think this is true. You are everyones "sister (or brother for that matter) of a different mother" and they joke around with you, even if you don't buy anything. In other places, people just get annoyed.Malawi is a very relaxed and laid back place indeed.

Okavango Delta - Umvuvu Camp

After having spent nearly 2 weeks in Namibia we now left it behind to go to the Okavango Delta in Botswana. after all the desert, mountains and vast plains this very green and lush place is a welcome change. We arrive at the campsite very late, as we had a ferry crossing over the Okavango river queuing for about 2 hours. The guys had a bit of a tea break or something. Well, T.I.A. as they say here: This Is Africa.
After a quick lunch we packed a day pack, our tents and mattresses and went to our bush camp in a dugout canoe "mokoro". The delta is very impressive. In contrast to other deltas this one does not end in the sea but in the dessert. For all you Germans it's a bit like "Spreewald" in Africa without all the tourism. We were warned not to go too far from our tents as there could be elephants, hippos, lions and all kind of other animals around. Chocolate in tents was also forbidden. Elephants have a great sense of smell... especially the people who go to the "facilities during the night were a bit scared. We had an investation of flying termites. Not very pleasant, but very interesting. The local guys were trapping them in a hole they dug in the ground, bagging them and taking them home. They got fried the next day and eaten as a snack - just like peanuts. Mhhhh ;)

While there we saw lots of the Delta as well as hippos and Crocodiles. amazing sunsets, too. But see for yourselves.

San Bushmen

From Etosha park we went up North a bit into the middle of nowhere to visit the San Bushmen. They are one of the (many) local tribes in Namibia and have only started a year ago to live of tourism. Although I was looking forward to this encounter I also felt a bit weird about it. It is a bit like intruding into somebody elses life. However, when we arrived (after we got stuck on the sandy road with the truck) we had about 30 children around us helping to set up our tents, wanting to take pictures and going round the place looking very cool with our sunglasses. It felt normal then and was real good fun.

We found ourselves visiting a kind of living museum rather than actually intruding into their homes, which made the whole trip far more relaxed. With the local guide "Henrik" (who was dressed in skin only) into the forest and were actually stuck in one of those little "wood and grass" huds for bout 20 mins as it started to rain heavily. One would not believe it but 16 people did fit into it! Very cosy indeed ;)
Once the rain stopped, we got a tour through the forest and learnt bout all the herbal remidies that were (and still are) used. Everything from curing a headache ("just slit the skin on your temples and rub in the powder of some local tree root") to roots that would be cooked as a tea and would make pregnant women have their baby straight away and without much pain to birth "control roots". It sounded very interesting, specially as everything would help "immediately". Maybe should go back and try some of the remedies myself. Would be a great business idea, hehe.

We also took part in a couple of dances. Not too keen on the rain dance, as it worked too well... But we are working on the rehearsal for the antidode - the sundance - momentarily.

All in all a great experience and especially the children made it very relaxed and "real". Btw, as we were having dinner, they were still hanging around the campsite and were waiting for the leftovers of our Spaghetti Bolognese. After Simon, our chef, made them queue to wash their hands everyone just grabbed a handful out of the pot. Life seems full of simple joy.

Etosha

Guys, it was amazing!!!!!!!!! We were told to be patient, might not see anything, ... But we were sooooo lucky. Won't even bother trying to describe that. Just see some of the (hundreds) of pics I took below.

Sorry guys, more to come, but uploading takes ages...

San bushmen and Okavango Delta next on the itineray. :)

Spitzkoppe

From Swakopmund, after having had some civilisation for 2 days including internet and laundry service, we went up to the Spitzkoppe mountains. It is very comparable to Ayers Rock (spelling??) in Australia but far less commercial. We had one of those nice bush camps again, drop toilet and no showers... But it does not matter that much, as everybody is smelly and so nobody really notices it, haha.
A couple Americans, the Italian Canadian and I went to hike up the mountains (without a guide - far more exciting to figure the way by ourselves). We gave it 4 hours and 2 litres of water and started at 8am. It was great. It was less hiking than climbing, actually, but real good fun. Some of the rocks are really big and steep. But one gets a very good grip on them as they are very coarse. The trail was not really a trail so we figured it out more or less by ourselves. We got stuck shortly before we reached the top, but it was amazing anyway.

Swakopmund

Hey guys, here I am again. Just a quick one to tell you about Swakopmund. Very funny town, lots of old Germnas and generally full of White people. It's meant to be the capital of adrenaline junkies. I passed on skydiving and other stuff and "only" tried Sandboarding. GREAT FUN!!! Even managed a jump - as it is sooooo much softer to fall in the sand! Only problem, we have to walk up the dune.... Just so you can imagine how hard it is: 37C in the shade (obviously no shade anywhere) and the dune is 90 m high. I made it up 8 times. I reckon that must be comparible with a whole day hiking in the alps>

Otherwise Swakopmund looks more what I imagine an American town somewhere in the middle of nowhere down South. There are even German newspapers over here: "Die Allgemeine Zeitung auf gut Deutsch" and in the supermarkets they play German music that has long been "forbidden" in Germany.

Next stop: Spitzkoppe mountains.

From Cape Town to Swapkomund

It's me again :)
Well, I am in Africa for 6 days now and have seen quite a lot already. We went to the Cape of good Hope first. This is the most South Western point of the African continent, bit like Land's end in the UK. Amazing views. I climbed down all the way and tested the water - the waves are really powerful and I got totally wet. But it was definitely worth it.

From there we went to a place called Trawal, still in South Africa. We camped in the middle of nowhere on a vineyard. Had a wine tasting and a Brai (South African BBQ) and a good chat to Sparky, the owner. The wine was very nice indeed... and helped with the bonding of the group, hehe.
First night in the tent was good. They got new tents, they are quite heavy but easy to put up and "Baboon - save" apparently.
From Trawal we went to cross the boarder to Namibia and stayed one night at a camp site called Felix Unite at the Orange River. We explored the River the next day whilst Kayaking. It's real good to get a work out after all the sitting on the truck.
Getting up at 6am gets second nature by now, we drive up to a place called Hobas in the Namib Naukluft park and are going to see the sunset over the Fish River canyon. However, the sky looked a bit like a typical Irish sky and it actually started to rain while we were having our dinner back in the camp. Donno, but it seems the weather follows me around. but even though a sunset would have been nice, it was preety amazing. This is the second biggest Canyon in the world and it is just unbelievably big. Also, I would have never believed that the sky does actually look bigger over here.

Next day is a long day on the truck. We reach Sesriem at 6pm, have dinner and prepare for an early start the next day. Till now we still have really good campsites (much better than some I have experienced in the South of France) with running, warm water and proper toilets. Surprisingly one can drink tab water in Namibia. It tastes much better than treated water from containes in the truck and noone in the group had had any kind of stomach problems yet.

Today we get up at 4am and head of to the Soususvlei, a place in the Namib dessert that has a huge amount of (non-moving) sand dunes. We climb Dune number 45 (yes, the place has been numbered by the Germans, who else would give dunes numbers???) and see an amazing sundawn. It is so beautiful how the colous change. The sand has a deep orange colour due to a high content of iron. We go up barefood and it is pretty cold.

After breakfast we get on a jeep - a bit like cattle - and drive further into the Soususvlei. We meet a local Bushman guide who has an amazing knowledge of the dessert. He catches lizzards, show us spider holes and tells us many stories of how he grew up  in the dessert. Really very amazing. Also, I would think I am wuite fit, but the pace he has got, is unbelievable. We climb a further couple of dunes, go into the Deadvlei and roll as well as jump down dunes. Very good fun indeed. Even though I had a shower back at the campsite, there was a little heap of orange coloured sand in my tent this night.

We leave the dessert to make our journey up North and camp in the dessert, in the middle of nowhere. First "bush camp" so far. Which means a drop toilet, no running water but an amazing view and we are all on our own. it is very windy and freezing cold over night. When I wake up in the morning, thick fog settled and it must be close to 100% humidity.

Today we are off to Swakopmund - a very much German influenced town at the sea side.

More in a week or so.

Settling in

hey guys, I have finally arrived in Cape Town after a long over night fly, short break in Dubai. It is colder than expected, about 17C and the taxi driver was saying something about rain.
I go straight to my hostel for the initial "meetin" with my group. There is 14 of us, German, Swiss, Canadian, American, English and Dutch. 4 couples and the fun people - hehe
We have to share rooms/tents and the English girl and Dutch girl are rotating - so everybody has some privacy as well as some company. Works well so far.
People are real nice but need to warm up a bit. after 4 days we start having good fun at the bush-dinners and afterwards at the fireplace.
The truck we are driving with starts to be our second home already, as MJ our leader suggested in the beginning. As we wanna see lots, there is quite some distance to cover. But we have our private library on the bus and time passes quickly. Also, there are the occasional animals to be spotted. So far I saw some Springboks, an Oryx, couple of Ostriches and obviously lots of smaller birds. Also saw some Dassies (see picture). There closest relation is an elephant - believe it or not. Though they are more or less the size of an oversized rabbit. I am trying to convince the cook to make dassie, as it looks quite tasty, but he has not agreed yet...
Btw, food is great. Cooked breakfast, sandwiches for lunch and real good dinner. Everyboy has shifts: sweeping the truck (lots of dessert sand in it by now), washing pots, helping with the cooking and organising the chairs and stuff. It's a bit like going camping with school, but real good fun so far.
The tents are quite comfortable and by now putting them up and taking them down next day becomes second nature. Nights are quite cold, a secoind jacket/Fleece would have come in handy. Who would have thought...
Overall, I am really enjoying myself, especially now the group is getting to know each other. Our guide is cool - so what else could I ask for :)

Preperations

Most of the preps are done. I got all my vaccinations, bought my Malaria tablets, a mosquito net and even some pepper spray - ready available on Amazon. Who would have thought that. My granddad did insist and I don't want him to have sleepless nights :) 

I will need visa for Zambia, Tanzania and Kenya. All should be ready available at point of entry. However, it was recommended to get the Tanzanian visa up front. So have sent off my passport and now anxiously hoping it will be sent back in time. After all, I have entry stamps and visa from Russia, Israel and the United Arab Emirates in it. Might  look like some kind of East German spy to them...

Not looking forward to going to the bank to exchange money. Seems I need Dollar bills that were printed after 2003. Bank clerks will really be delighted with such a request.

All part of the experience, I guess. In a funny way all this makes me realize, how handy it is to live in the EU. It's just dead handy to have the same currency and to travel around the place freely.

Route

Starting point is Cape Town in South Africa. From there I will go to see Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Malawi, Tansania, Zanzibar and Kenya. So basically I am going through the whole of Southern Africa. I will meet a group of backpackers in Cape Town and a couple of local guides. Together we'll tour to the Victoria Falls (Zambian side). The group will change there for the second part. There are a couple of nights, we will stay in hotels, but mainly we will be in campsites. This should not only provide an interesting and real experience, but might be challenging at time. But well, I do enjoy the occassional challenge as you might know :) So let's see how it goes. I am very excited about it already.