13 April 2010
Longtom, Lois and Lions! Oh My!
Hello All!
I am just getting back to school after a wonderful holiday. It is absolutely amazing how fast time is going lately! We just hit the 21 months in country mark! Congrats to all you SA:18ers out there! And welcome to SA:21!
The holiday break started with the annual Longtom Marathon. About 50 other PCVs and I walked or ran the 21.1km from the top of Longtom Pass down into the town of Lydenburg. We even had 4 PCVs do the 56km Ultramarathon! The Longtom Marathon is a fundraising event for an organization called KLM; started by PCVs several years ago the organization provides scholarships for some promising learners to one of the best college prep schools in SA. It was a huge success this year! Thank you so much for everyone who donated! Plus I made it in 9 minutes faster than last year.
Next I had a quick visit from Grandma Lois (Nicholas) and her friend Mary Jane. They had been on a wonderful tour of Southern Africa including Botswana, Cape Town and Kruger Park. They extended their stay an extra couple of days to come up and visit my village. I think they were impressed with the infrastructure that SA has compared to surrounding countries and I hope the cows and roosters didn’t wake them up too early! It is always so wonderful to have visitors to the village. It is hard to describe what life is really like here, so the more people who can experience it- the better!
I then spent the last week of holiday break in Botswana with a few other PCVs. We started off driving way north to Maun for access to the Okavango Delta (the largest inland delta in the world). Our only mistake was not to fill up our gas tank when it was halfway empty. We ended up running out of gas in a cute little village called Motopi, 80km from the nearest gas station. Luckily the people were very nice and helped us find a guy who would sell us some petrol. It only cost us twice the price for 10L and a couple of cokes but we were back on the road!
The next day we took traditional mokoro boats poled by local Tswana guys out for an overnight in the delta. The mokoro boats are much like dug out canoes and are driven like gondolas (using a long pole to push off the river bed.) They sit low in the water, so we couldn’t see much but the tall reeds and plentiful lily pads. It was one of the most relaxing ways I have ever spent a couple of days. The Tswana guys also lead us on a couple of long (~25km total) overland hikes tracking animals. We came up upon a large herd of Cape Buffalo and lots of birds. But we also saw lots of spoors, tracks and dung from elephants, hyena and lions. And one evening we found hippos taking it easy in one of the deep pools of the delta. On our return trip to Maun we stopped by the village of our polers, and new friends. What a contrast to SA villages! There is a lot less money, and therefore infrastructure, in Botswana but it is made up for in the kindness and openness of the Tswana people.
Next we skirted around the saltpans, and more potholes than I have ever seen, to get to Kasane and Chobe National Park. As we arrive on the edge of town we spotted a large elephant herd on the road! There were nearly 30 elephants and about half of them were young babies. It was amazing to watch them eat and interact with one another. Elephants are incredibly social and intelligent creatures and these seemed to be pretty relaxed about a carload of cameras checking them out.
The following morning we got up before the sun, carefully checked for hippos in the campsite, and jumped into a safari truck to go see Chobe National Park. Chobe is known for the large population of elephants, as well as being home to 4 of the Big 5 (no rhinos.) Almost immediately upon entering the park our guide spotted a pack of 4 Wild Dogs! Wild Dogs are pretty rare and very hard to spot, so we were lucky that we got to see them. Besides the Wild Dogs we also saw lots more elephants, kudu, fish eagles, tons of baboon, giraffe and storks. We also saw a few of the national bird of Botswana the Lilac Breasted Roller, it has all the colors of the Botswana flag. On our way out of the park our guide took a little detour, the day before a leopard had made a kill near town and he wanted to see if it was still there. Sure enough, just off the side of the road to town, the leopard lazed under the brush digesting its meal. Another very rare sight!
That afternoon we took a boat ride down the Chobe River back into the National Park. The river is severely swollen; this is the most rain they have had in 30 years! It was amazing to see the animals as they came down to the river for a drink in the fading afternoon sun. We saw lots more hippos, elephant, fish eagles and even a very large croc. The highlight though was spotting a couple of female lions near the river. Can you believe I saw 4 of the Big 5 in one day!! (Lion, Leopard, Elephant, Cape Buffalo- Check; Rhino- still missing)
The long trip back was fairly uneventful. We got back through the potholes all without running out of gas again! We did change a flat tire at sunset but other than that it was smooth sailing. Oh! Except for my smooth talking us out a speeding ticket. I won’t go into details but instead of paying $100USD or going to jail for the night, I got the police officer to “forgive” us! That’s right smiling does pay off!
I am back at home now and getting moving on lots of projects! I am going to finish painting my world map mural this month as well as doing one more women’s health retreat and transition my classes to other educators!
We are in the last stretch of the count down to World Cup! If any Mexico fans have an extra t-shirt I would love one to wear when they play in Polokwane!
Stay well.
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