A Boy and his Hyena

There's more to Snake Camp than snakes. There are also crocodiles, a rare narrow snouted alligator, injured endangered owls and hawks. Their newest edition was acquired 9 months ago when the local Maasai killed a striped hyena and found a helpless 4 day old pup. The Maasai didn't know what to do with it so they gave it to the camp. Striped hyenas aren't just endangered but they're almost never seen in the wild because they're skittish solitary hunters, much more elusive than cheetahs. A simple inquiry and we found ourselves locked into the makeshift space between the snake cages with a gray and silver furball energetically bounding directly at us. She was a pretty sight with all the hair on her back sticking up, wild wide black eyes, black stripes traveling up the legs, and a big gaping mouth full of sharp teeth. You could tell she was being playful and at the same time sense that she was wild. At nine months she was as big as a grown lab and you couldn't help but wonder when her instinct would overcome her domestication. She was romping on Steve, using him as a chew toy and teeth sharpener. First she had her jaws wrapped around his ankle then caught his forearm with her canines. The more she played the more aggressive she became and you could tell her self restraint was waning. The guide wasn't able to calm her down so he said it was time to go. In two weeks the hyena would be handed over to a group that would release her back into the wild so we were lucky to catch this rare opportunity.

- Mary

Morbid Curiosity

Just outside Arusha, Tanzania we stayed at a compound called Snake Camp. And you betcha they had snakes. They had an impressive collection of deadly reptiles including pythons, vipers, cobras, and mambas. The owners were kind enough to arrange a feeding frenzy for us. One by one guinea pigs and baby chicks were tossed to their doom. Some of the snakes struck before the furry snacks ever landed on their feet. Others slowly slithered toward their cuddly new friends, tasting them with their forked tongues before lounging at them with lightning fast attacks. One, two, even three bites! No mercy. We all watched with gruesome interest, yelling instructions to the guinea pigs to play dead and a chick to stop pecking the black mamba in the head. It was really neat to see the hoods on the cobras expand before the strikes. Once the critters were paralyzed by venom the snakes opened their hinged jaws and ever so slowly swallowed them whole. We could see the muscles of the python undulating beneath the skin as it wound itself tighter around its gerbil turned marshmallow.

Seriously, little buddy, don't peck at the viper.

-Mary

Cheetah Stalking

The highlight of our second trip into the Ngorongoro crater was a cheetah sighting. We were wow'd by how close we were able to get to the gorgeous creature. Her spotted skin and supermodel skinniness gave her a sleek stealthiness. We followed her to a patch of grass from which she surveyed the green plain. Then something in the distance caught her attention and she rose with purpose. Her target was a lone gazelle cluelessly fattening itself up. The cheetah quickened her pace, lowered her stance, and never took her gaze off her prey. Whenever the steak paused from grazing to look up the cheetah immediately stopped and ducked under the grass. She was down right sneaky. But it was effective because she was within striking distance and we were all holding our breath in anticipation. Then a stupid LandCruiser got too close to the gazelle and spooked it off. I think I actually saw the dismay in the cheetah as she watched her filet mignon hop off into the distance.
- Mary

Overland Truck part Deux

We've spent the last week back in Nairobi doing a bunch of research for our travels post Africa and getting ready for the next overland truck that will start on Feb. 9 (tomorrow) and take us down to Cape Town, South Africa over the next 2 months. We will cross through Tanzania, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Botswana and I forget what else. We're nervous about meeting our next group and crew but at least we've got the camping part down (if our cheap tents from Cairo survive).

After the last 6 weeks on our own we've grown accustomed to clean rooms, bathrooms, and sleeping on beds so it'll be hard to go back to questionable/lacking hygiene. That and we won't be able to have bacon everyday for breakfast any more. That may be the hardest adjustment of all. *sigh*

Island hopping in East Africa

From Zanzibar we continued our island exploration first in Pembe, Tanzania then Lamu, Kenya. Our tans needed to be refreshed but its kind of hard in muslim countries where skin is definitely not in.

In Pembe there was nothing to do but dive in their hurricane class currents and wait for the next home cooked dinner. Seriously, its so untouristed that there is literally nothing to do but watch each other perspire in the heat. We did a lot of that because the power would sporadically go out, alot taking the oscillating fans out with it.

From there we flew back to the mainland and took the long bum bruising bus ride to Lamu. This small island off the coast of Kenya is still deep in swahili culture but the tourists were running rampant. That detracted the charm of the island for me but they had awesome fresh fruit drinks for basically free. Our favorite combo was mango and passion fruit. The crab was barely edible though, but the seafood samosas were deliciously dripping in grease. Atleast here the electricity rationing was scheduled so we could plan ahead for dark, dark nights.

Crab People

Generally speaking, the food in Zanzibar sucks eggs. Considering the island is historically famed for spices and is now completely overrun with Italian all-inclusive resorts, there's just no excuse. Stonetown has a couple decent places. We were tipped off to a good Chinese restaurant (Pagoda) and a great gelateria and pizza shop (Amore Mio). Good stuff - ate a lot of gelato here. But that's two restuarants and it doesn't matter because we're staying over an hour away. The rest of the island seems to offer very few truly local restaurants and the hotel / resort establishments offer sub-mediocre fare.
But thinking ahead, we picked our hotel by stomach. Our bungalow complex is an Italian family run joint (Rosa dei Venti) and Francesco can cook. Dinner orders have to be in by lunchtime so he can pick everything up fresh daily. Did I mention neighboring Nungwi is a fishing village and we'll see locals walking down the beach with 10-20 pound tuna?
Seafood, the saving grace of Zanzibari cuisine. The fish is good. The lobster yummy. The calamari is great, but the crab takes the cake. We have spent the last two weeks almost literally surviving on calamari and local mangrove crab. The crab claws are as big as Mary's head. Really. I'm afraid to get back in the water. Francesco serves up a killer grilled crab plate and the chinese restaurant cooks them in a ginger/onion sauce to die for. I have eaten more crab in the last two weeks than in my entire life. Seriously.
Forget the white sand beaches lapped by warm waters and cooled by soft breezes. Nevermind the culture or fresh fruit. Ignore the diving. Come to Zanzibar for the crab.

Our Vacation from Travelling

(not quite paradise with this kinda scene going on, eh?)

After two months on the happy bus and two weeks of fast paced safari driving in Kenya and Tanzania, it was time for a break. We've been settled in the remote beach town of Kendwa on the northwest coast of Zanzibar for the past couple weeks.Well, we found isolation. It takes us half an hour walking on a rocky dirt track to get to a bus stop to wait for a daladala (bus) that'll take over an hour to get to the islands only real town (Stonetown) depending on how many cops the driver needs to bribe. But the powdery white sand beaches and relaxed atmosphere make up for any minor inconveniences. Best of all, there's not much to do. Lots of sleeping or reading on the beach. A bit of scuba diving. Walking down the beach to the nearby village of Nungwi for skewers and fresh fruit. That's a fine point missed in the travel literature: Kendwa is not so much a village as it is just 6 shacks on that rocky dirt track half an hour from the main road with absolutely no services. Have to walk to Nungwi for anything your hotel can't provide. Of course, the beach path to Nungwi is covered in a foot of water crashing against the rocks around high tide.That's ok because the beach moves around during the day. Zanzibar is a shallow island that very slowly rolls off into the ocean. On our west side, low tide can move the ocean out 20-100 feet. The east coast is much worse. We drove over for lunch one day and the water must have been a kilometer off the beach. Major bummer.Getting around the island is a bit crazy. It's only 50 miles or so from top to bottom, but that's a 2-3 hour drive in the rare rental car or maybe 4 or 5 hours if you tried to bus it. Driving the rental Isuzu 4x4 was a blast. Pavement is available for 25km out of Stonetown, but then it is pothole ridden dirt road and periodic unimproved rocky mess. Driving is a constant balance of hitting the potholes, pedestrians, bikers, cows, swerving cars, maniacal daladalas or chickens - or just driving off the road in disgust. Oddly, it's actually not too bad as everyone except the potholes and cows seems to know how to get out of the way.But maneuvering the roads is necessary if you want to check out Stonetown, with it's mix of old world Europe and Islam. It looks so cool in the brochures, but it's so riddled with rundown buildings, masses of souvenir shops, tshirt salesmen and other annoyances that you've really got to work hard to see anything real. We'll run into town for gelato and Chinese food, then head back to hide on the beach.We did get off our beach beds for a little diving. The visibility is low (15'-40') but the reef life is good and makes diving worthwhile if you're here, but you'd never come here just to dive. We played with a few turtles and saw some new fish species, but no big scary predators to keep Mary interested. Although we did run into absolutely the biggest puffer fish that we've ever seen. Must have been three feet, all covered in battle scars and with big buck teeth. I had the camera practically in it's mouth and it didn't budge. Just not afraid of anything. Tomorrow (1/20) we go to the nearby island of Pemba for some more diving. It sits in a deepwater channel and is surrounded by mangroves instead of beach. It's supposed to be home to hammerheads, mantas and other biggies with teeth. Of course, by telling you that, I just jinxed our chances of seeing anything...

White man can jump, with flare

One of the touristy side trips to do when going through the game parks is to visit a traditional Maasai village, called a boma. These are villages made of sticks, mud, dung, and hides with all the huts facing inward forming a protective circle. The Maasai take turns living there for 2yrs at a time to show tourists their culture while lighten their wallets. Our steadfast inclination was to avoid these genuine fake abodes, but in a moment of weakness mixed with mild curiosity and fear of missing out we held back our cynicism and found ourselves standing outside their thorny acacia lined fortification. A group of women and men came out to greet us chanting and parading as if we were coming back from a successful lion hunt we were told. Right, we just came from their hole of an outhouse. I suppose that's adventure in itself. We follow them inside where the women are standing in an open area to the left and the men just opposite. Both groups take turns ceremoniously singing and jumping. Then the mzungus were invited to join in the exercise. Steve hops in and starts bouncing like a bean in a hot skillet, flashing a boyish grin on his face. I get my turn over as soon as possible. Then we are led into one of their chest height homes where our guide, the chief's son, chats with us about their way of life, how to hunt a lion, and the many ways we could give him money. Yes, it was hokey but we were glad we did it because we learned interesting things about the Maasai that we wouldn't otherwise have. For example Maasai warriors still hunt lions, their food staples are blood, milk, meat, and fat, and the women rebuild the homes every eight years.

-- Mary

And now the picture Mary didn't want you to see

The lion, the itch, and the dirt road

We spent two weeks with my mom and brother John on safari in Kenya and Tanzania. We hit all the big parks, Ngorongoro, Maasai Mara, Serengeti and several of the lesser known ones. We saw all the big including lions, leopards, hippos, rhinos, crocodiles, and a cheetah (from far far away). After a while the elephants, giraffes, hyenas, gazelles, impalas, jackals, baboons, wildebeest, and zebras got a little blasé. It's amazing how close you can get to the animals. In fact we downright hunted them down in our 4x4s, going offroad to loom over lions that were trying to nap and leopards looking for a good tree to climb, at least until the rangers spot us then we had to hide. Yeah, you're technically not supposed to harass the wildlife, but the drivers get bored and find ways to entertain themselves.
We got to stay in some cool safari camps where bats lived in our bathroom and rangers armed with bow and arrows escorted us back to our tent to protect us from curious predators. All good fun, but the animals we feared were the biting insects that feasted on us despite the DEET.
This was supposed to be dry season but all of East Africa had a late and extraordinarily heavy rainy season. The problem with rain is its affect on the otherwise crap dirt roads. Other than the typical spinning out and getting stuck in soggy mud so the Maasai had to push us off their farmland, we also waited 3hrs in a queue 30 cars long to be towed by a tractor across a road turned river where the water actually flowed into the cab when we crossed. That section of road was so notorious that government reps had flown out in helicopters to watch the full extent of carnage. Our night game drive at Serengeti stranded us in the exactly nowhere with nothing in site but the waning moon, lighted only by our headlamps in the pitch dark when our open top truck careened into a mud ditch after 11pm. At Ngorongoro we drove into mud that tilted the car 30 degrees to the left, stopping at the verge of tilting. Steve hopped out and pushed the left side of the LandCruiser up while our driver dared forward. We made it through but another after us actually fell over and had to abandon the vehicle. Good thing we carried a Steve with us.

Happy New Year!

We just finished the Kenya half of our safari tour through Kenya and Tanzania. There's a couple stories to tell about being buried in mud and dragged through a raging river. But for tonight, I'm happy just to get some pictures of Uganda and the Kenyan national parks posted.
Too early tomorrow morning, we set off for Tanzania's Lake Manyara, Serengeti and Ngorongoro national parks.

New photos just in time for XMAS!

We finally got some time on SLOW internet to upload some blogs and pictures for you. Pictures of our quick run through Kenya, Uganda and into Rwanda to play with the gorillas are up. Sudan and Ethiopia pix are still to come. But they're not as cool as the gorillas...

Just in case we don't get another chance to blog in time, Merry XMas and Happy New Year!
Steve and Mary (Kenya)

Gorillas in our Midst

There's something like 400 mountain gorillas left in the world and they all live in the mountains at the intersection of Rwanda, Uganda and Congo. The family of 36 gorillas we visited live in Rwanda's Parc National du Volcans. To our surprise, the trailhead for our hike started in a maize field with our guide and a couple AK47-toting soldiers (two days later, we heard about a couple who went tracking on the Congo side of the mountains and were robbed by a band of guerillas.) Fifty feet into the maize field, we passed a stone wall and found ourselves suddenly in a thick bamboo jungle that wasn't even visible five minutes prior. We hiked through the jungle for an hour or so until we caught up with the trackers who had caught up to the gorillas. Our next steps were into a clearing with four foot tall grass and stinging nettle. But no gorillas. Then suddenly we saw a path of grass in the distance being cut down in our direction. Before we knew it, the head of a big gorilla was visible above the brush and heading right at us. He came within 10 feet of us before stopping for photos and then continuing on through us. At one point, only the width of our tracker separated me from this giant silverback. As if to express his disinterest in us, the silverback raised his right hand and gently pushed the tracker out of the way so he could continue on to the good bamboo behind us - just like you'd put your hand on someone's shoulder as you move through a crowded shopping mall. Imagine a 400 pound beast "gently" moving you out of the way.

The range of human behavior they displayed was absolutely amazing. We met the #2 silverback in the troop, who sat calmly and watched us suspiciously. The two year old twins snarled at each other and tumbled around awkwardly like children. We passed a mother holding her four month old infant that could have passed for any human mother and child. Most fun were a pair of male youths who chased each other and wrestled the entire time. It was just like watching any adolescent brothers you've ever met (Nelson, Filipe.) Finally we came across the dominant silverback in the group. And it was just what you'd expect. He sat in his grassy lounge chair and didn't do a thing but eat and scratch himself. He could have passed for Al Bundy sitting in front of a TV.For me, there were two aspects of the visit that really caught me off guard. The first was their humanity and the consciousness you could see in their eyes. The second was the gentleness they exhibited. Any one of these creatures could have easily crushed us at whim, yet I don't think any of us felt threatened or even afraid at any point during the visit.

Not for the squeamish --- EWWWW!!!!!!!

While everyone was sorting over visa fees and entry forms at the Kenya-Uganda border I noticed an odd spot on my left index toe. It was a white spot with a dark center. I don’t remember having a scab there. So I brought it in for a closer inspection. I poked at it with my fingers, squeezed it like a zit, and felt absolutely nothing. It seemed highly peculiar to me so I brought my toe right up to my eyes and noticed a faint dark line pulsating within the white bubble. It instantly felt somehow wrong so while everyone was bustling about the truck I asked Steve for the pocket knife. Yes, I need it now even if it’s buried in our stuff. Using the makeshift scalpel pricked at the spot in the middle but it was futile so I got brave, or desperate depending on how you look at it, and took the blade to my toe. As soon as I sliced it open white fluffy fleshy stuff bursted out of my skin. My first reaction was oops, I'm spilling out. But I figured I wouldn't be able to shove my stuffing back if that's what it was, and I didn't remember having white filling last time I cut myself so I yanked and peeled at it until it ripped away from my insides. I kept thinking I was going to pull a nerve out and was expecting my body to send a pang of pain to convince me to stop. That never happened so I proceeded.
With the white fluff gone I could see a black dot in the midst of some blood red pulp. A little digging and a small amount of dark blood spilled out so I immediately started yanking what turned out to be a small sack. Well, that's pretty gross I thought. My fingers were smeared the fleshy bits I had ripped out so I figured I might as well finish the job. By then someone saw me digging at my toe with a knife and asked me what in blazes I was doing. I started explaining my epic to them and as I was digging out a chunk of tough meat from my incision I told the crowd that had gathered what I had refused to admit to myself, that it probably wasn't a scab or blister. Infact, it probably wasn't me at all. That's when Steve inspects the latest bit I pulled out of my toe and said it looked like the carcass, or the sack of remains of whatever was living off my toe. I poke a little more at the pink spot left under my skin and finally feel a stabbing pain so I decided that was a good sign I finally reached where I started and whatever else ended.
Kat yells out jealousy, 'You got the first parasite of the truck!' Lying to myself that it was a scab helped me through my extraction but it was time to face the fact that there was a parasite living in my toe, growing off my flesh, and that I ripped it to pieces with my bare fingers and the unsanitized pocket knife that we had used to cut salami just two days before. Gary's Africa health book revealed that I had a jigger flea stowaway for who knows how long. If I hadn't accidentally caught it the jigger would have reached maturity in my toe, laid eggs and multiplied into what would look like a big blood blister that would itch madly and have to be removed by a doctor. I still get the heebie jeebies when I think of the bursting white flesh and foreign pulse flood my mind. Now I can check that off 'parasite' and 'self mutilation' off my African experiences list. Done and done.

Race to the Gorillas

Only about 40 people a day are allowed to visit mountain gorillas, so getting permits ahead of time is a must. It turned out that ours were issued for earlier than we had anticipated, so we had been rushing since Aswan. Now we needed to race through Kenya, Uganda and into Rwanda to meet our date. Northern Kenya has historically had trouble with local and Somalian guerillas preying on vehicles crossing the vast empty expanse from Isiolo to the Ethiopian border. We took two armed soldiers onboard for a couple days as we made our journey to central Kenya. Along the way, we picked up a hitchiking Imbili tribesman to complete our collection of soldiers and warriors. Along this treacherous stretch of soft dirt 'road', our driver finally met his match. Within two seconds, we went from bumpy bumpy road to being pitched at 30 degrees from vertical and stuck in over a foot of mud. We spent an hour and a half digging out the wheels and laying in steel tracks to drive on. None of that was enough by itself, and we were saved only by a passing truck who was willing to give us an extra little tug for $80USD. That's all good, except once we were pulled free, he slammed on his brakes and we crashed into him bending our stairway into the truck into a disfigured mess.
The rest of Kenya was a blur. We raced through towns and national parks on our way to the Ugandan border. We did see a group of three giant giraffes right on the side of the road, a herd of zebras and several herds of impalas and various gazelle-like animals that we agreed to call 'deer' for simplicity's sake. Uganda and Rwanda are strikingly lush and covered in farms. Rwanda, in particular is remarkably beautiful with hills and valleys covered in a patchwork of fields. We were quite surprised to find mile after mile of tea planted there, as well.The people in Uganda and Rwanda are great. The children wave and jump up and down yelling "mzungu mzungu mzungu!!!" (means 'white people' in Swahili) as we drive by. I hate to say it, but there isn't much funnier than watching a pudgy little kid with a huge smile jumping around and waving so violently that they fall down. And that happened more than once. Maybe this isn't so different from Kenya on the surface, but there was a sincerity in Uganda and Rwanda that I don't feel in the more heavily touristed Kenya and impoverished Ethiopia.

Is that your hand in my pocket or am I just happy to see you?

I've never been pickpocketed and never understood the stories from people who talk about having their wallet stolen in a crowd. I guess I spend a fair amount of concentration on whose hand is on my butt, so it never made sense to me that you wouldn't notice an extra hand in your back pocket. Well, I finally got a chance to test my reflexes in the Addis Ababa market. The 'mercato' is claimed to be the largest market in all of Africa. Whether or not it is the biggest, it is certainly a monster that extends forever in all directions around you and is well known as a center for petty crime. Down by the live chickens, we were getting pressed through a narrow space between a few henhouses and a passing truck when I noticed something near my pocket that wasn't me. I spun around to find some dude's hand about to go into my pocket. After grabbing him and giving him a good talking to, I wasn't sure what I should do next short of walking a couple kilometers looking for a cop, so I just let him go. I was surprised to turn around and see a crowd had gathered and was motioning that I should have pummelled him. I should've known that vigilante justice would be approved of here. In the end, I was amazed to find that although his hand wasn't getting in my pocket without my noticing, he was able to unbutton my pocket. Lesson learned. Back at camp we learned that of the 5 groups that went out 4 had pickpocketing experiences, but only 1 was successful.