Trip to Africa
Hi all,Nice to be here. Here is my African journal. Hope you like it.
To many people, Africa equals poverty. When I was advised that I would be sent to South Africa, that was what I thought as well. In order to have a better understanding of what South Africa really is, I decided to go to the library and borrow some books on South Africa. After going through several books, some on history and some on its tourism, the image of South Africa becomes much clearer to me. It seems that the country has been going through a history which is similar to those of the New World, countries that were “explored”, occupied, “developed” and finally went independent. My trip to South Africa turned out to be truly an eye-opening tour.
Altogether, I stayed 10 days in Africa Continent: 9 days in South Africa, thee largest country in Africa, and 1 day in Swaziland. As some of you might have known, I was sent by my employer, Goway Travel, to go there on a “Feminization Trip”. Since there is no direct flight from any of the cities in Canada, I flew from Vancouver to New York, on 13 May, 2003. And then, my journey continued on South African Airlines from New York to Johannesburg, the capital city of South Africa. It took almost 24 hours before I landed in Johannesburg.
Cape Town, known for having Cape of Good Hope, wine and cheese, as well as the Table Mountain, is our first stop. Two full days sightseeing kept us busy. With excellent road, nice and clean street, Cape Town seems to be an ideal place for first-time visitors to start their trip in South Africa. In Cape Town, the most interesting sightseeing spot is the “Afrikaans Language Monument”. Afrikaans language was made of languages of Holland, local natives, German and English. The monument witnesses part of the history of Africa, with the involvement of many major European countries. What impressed me most was seeing people stood up, created their own language and meanwhile lived peacefully with those who spoke different languages and had cultural backgrounds. My tour in Cape Town included wine and cheese tasting, which was again my favorite! Unique geographic location, together with European “technology” makes the area one of the most suitable places to produce wine and cheese.
While in Cape Town, we also visit Table Mountain and Cape of Good Hope. Standing in Good Hope, seeing the two Oceans joining each other made me marvel the wonder that our nature offers. It reminds me the phrase that Tourism South Africa uses in promoting South Africa: “One World, one country”, meaning that people can come and see what the world looks like in South Africa. In addition to the Cape of Good Hope, we also took a cruise to a Seal Island. This is my first time, seeing seals, grouping with unbelievable numbers, staying live in icy Atlantic. I now come to see why ancient Chinese suggested: “Readings should be accompanied by traveling.” Isn’t that true that we should all travel to experience and understand other parts of the world so as to live and study more wisely?
After two days tour in Cape Town, we took bus to Knysna, a small but eloquent coast city. The bus trip to Knysna seems like a journey through a picture, the sceneries along the way seemed just unreal. One hour, we were in a barren land, and the next, we came across jade-green forests, beaches dotted with flowers and birds. Locals name the trip “the Garden Route”, which I fully agree.
We arrived into Zululand after one overnight stay in Kynsna and Durban. Entering the land of Zulu seems like opening another chapter of the book. A chapter shows the other side of South Africa. Due to limited time, we only visited Dumzulu Traditional Village. In the village, we saw how the locals built houses, defended themselves, met and greeted their guests. The Zulus are very proud of their own culture, and they retain well their customs and traditions which have been passed down generations ago. I wish we could stay there longer.
On 21 May, we finally arrived into Kruger National Park, where we would start our four-day trip of seeing the “Big-Five”: lion, elephant, leopard, buffalo and rhino. This four-day experience could hardly be described by words. Imagine having 8 lions roaring, playing, hugging and chasing each other around you? If this is not exciting enough, how about seeing a leopard stocking to you gracefully and stop just a few yards away from you?
Altogether, we did five game drives. We went out with six of us, companied by one ranger and one tracker. Our jeep brought us to Africa jungles, a wonder land of animals. To many of us, the stereotype of animals comes from the Hollywood movies. We would always think that animals are dangerous and they would always chase human beings. Our first few game drives were in Kruger National Park, where we mostly saw draraf and impala. After Kruger, we moved to Sabi Sands, which is another habitat with different animals. Interestingly, the first thing we did was signing a “waver” agreement, confirming to the property that we agreed to give up the right of suing them in the event of being “eaten” by animals. The property was built without fence in the reserve. So, our first don’t is to not to step out of the room without accompanies of security guides, which later proved to be very true. One afternoon, one of our team members was about to enjoy the pool when suddenly he saw a leopard, which was few steps away from him. Apparently, the leopard was also confused as to who the “new fellow” was. So the gentleman, as he later described, bent down gracefully like what we see in films, backed out calmly without exposing his back to the leopard, and finally raced to the front desk to report his encounter with one of the big fives.
Most of the properties in Sabi Sands are not fenced. We were advised and later confirmed that animals won’t attach people unless we intruded their territory. When seeing an animal, the rangers advised, always stay calm and avoid entering the “intimate zone” of the animals. “They will only attach you when seeing you are threatening them”, the ranger said. However, people do get killed, mostly by rhinos, which mostly happen at night when the animals are active. So, African Survival Rule No. One: stay away from animals and keep yourself in the same zone.
In additional to the morning and afternoon game drives, we also did evening game drives. Seeing and observing animals in the evening was totally different as what we did in the day time. In Sabi Sands, unlike in Kruger, we were accompanied by one ranger and one tracker. Worked as a team, the tracker, as his name suggests, mostly tracks the prints, waste or rubbish, that animals left. By observing those, the tracker indicated the ranger where to go, when to stop. The ranger needs to pass different tests before getting a license to become a ranger. Our most unforgettable night brought us a union with eight lions. As usual, we saw the tracker carefully observed the surroundings while we moved along the road. Suddenly, the tracker raised his hand and indicated the ranger to drive the vehicle into a bush, where we saw two lions lying not far away from us. Apparently they were in their sleep. We waited for about 15 minutes, nothing happened. Ten minutes went by, again, we saw nothing but quiet, dark sky with shining stars. Suddenly, we noticed one lion raised his head. It seemed that he sensed something. Then, there came a sound of lion’s roaring from afar. We were later advised that the two lions were male and the roaring sound were their female counterparts. This is how the show started: First of all, the male lions stood up, met their female siblings. They hugged and started to chase. Everyone of us was quite relaxed and pleased until suddenly realizing that we were surrounded by lions, which apparently celebrated their reunion. To make things