OnSafari: A Day of Lions!

April 2, 2015April 2, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Twenty-four lions and 4 cheetah as we moved from the southwest of the Serengeti into its center.

It was a fabulous day but the veld’s condition continues to disappoint. Despite the heavy rains that we’ve experienced the last several days, it’s so obvious there had been a long period of drought.

There is a patina of green everywhere, but as we move north it becomes less and less. At Naabi Hill there seemed to be a clear divide and we climbed the hill for a better look.

Sure enough, south of Naabi the green was more intense. North of Naabi it was still very dry looking.

I would have liked to stay up atop the hill longer, but Tumaini shouted up that there were lion on the path, so we all scurried down.

Dave Koncal, Jane Krug, Deb Weingarden, Cathy Colt & Lyle Krug

And lion dominated the rest of the day. We went first to the sacred cave paintings of the Maasai in the Moru Kopjes, where I explained the traditional morani’s matriculation from just being circumcised. There really aren’t many traditional Maasai anymore, but I remain so sad that these paintings of such historical importance aren’t being preserved.

Several times, by the way, I’ve been foiled taking people to the paintings by lion!

Then we went to the Ngong Singing Rock where I talked about the terrible shaft the Maasai have received probably for a thousand years. This was the rock where the last of the forced Maasai evictions took place in 1972.

Even today the government is talking about further evictions.

We left lunch and Ngong Rock on a tip about a buffalo kill by lion. We had seen innumerable Grant’s gazelle and hyaena, a family of four cheetah, lots of buffalo and lots of giraffe, so the group was anxious for beige fur.

We couldn’t find the kill, so we gave up and decided to take a short cut towards our camp. Alas, destiny was in control, and we came across a family of three females with three sets of cubs, 15 in all. The blood on their faces was a clear indication they had made the kill.

They were hyperventilating so fast. Lyle clocked them at 90 breaths/minute. And the two mothers on which cubs tried to nurse would have none of such nonetheless, growling at them and knocking them away. It had been a hard day!

We left the lion, hightailed it to our camp, saw more elephant, more giraffe and who knows how many more lion, at least two more prides of and one mating pair.

We also spent the day gathering information. I dare to say we think we know where the migration is. Tune in tomorrow to see if we’re right!

Most of our day was spent in these Moru Kopjes.

OnSafari: Rains Return!

April 1, 2015April 1, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

The quest for the big herds of the great migration began as we left Olduvai Gorge and crossed off-road past Shifting Sands onto the Lemuta plains.

It will not be easy this year. The veld is unusually dry, although just in the last few days heavy rains have been falling over the scorched veld.

In the first part of our Lemuta plains journey we saw hardly a handful of Grant’s gazelle. We past several dead cows with Nubian vultures nearby. For some reason there were hundreds if not thousands of Fisher Sparrowlarks jumping across the desiccated landscape.

Just opposite Lemuta mountain where we put lunch on a kopjes we noticed there were many Maasai cows in very large herds scattered across the veld. As we got closer to the kopjes you could see Maasai “flags” (pieces of blue cloth stuck from a pole) claiming almost every kopjes that looked good for a picnic.

We finally found one that wasn’t claimed and drove our vehicle around for security, then I popped out and walked around it. Lots of agama agama, some northern wheatear and Fisher sparrowlarks, but nothing else.

As we set lunch two Maasai crossed the veld and sat down on some boulders politely 20 yards away. I told my clients about current Maasai travails, quiet apart from the weather, including the proposed forced eviction of 4,000 from Loliondo.

Tumaini – who is Maasai – invited the men closer to our picnic area and they moved in quietly.

The Gibb’s lunch was spectacular as usual, and I told everyone before compiling the left over food to make sure to remove any chicken. Traditional Maasai believe eating fowl is satanic.

I then walked over to the two men with Tumaini, and we gave them the boxes of a substantial amount of uneaten food.

They were extremely grateful and several clients shook their hands warmly. Their gentle thank-yous were not in English but clear nonetheless. I told them – in Swahili which Tumaini felt they might understand – that I was specially happy the rains were coming.

That evoked robust nodding and lots of remarks that I couldn’t understand.

We then headed west towards Ndutu. There were a few more animals, but despite the Maasai’s protestations that they were being besieged by hyaena, we saw none. Likely the Maasai were not too kind to a visible hyaena, and we saw at least a half dozen other herds on our hour or so westwards journey.

In fact, we probably saw more cows than animals (except for gazelle, of course). Although the veld was dry, there were many pools of water, and the skies were ominous. I think the Maasai know the rains will continue, now.

We ended the day at my favorite lodge, Ndutu. Eva and Aadje were both there to greet us and Eva gave my group a short history lesson about Ndutu.

The next morning our dawn game drive encountered a female cheetah that was hunting. We stayed with her for several or more hours as she laboriously but unsuccessful stalked some Grant’s gazelle.

In the afternoon we braved the wet roads and went into Hidden Valley, a remarkable depression in the Kusini Plains west of Naabi Hill, in search of a giant python reported to be there. We found no python, but we did encounter another cheetah on our way back.

It’s been a beautiful two days at Ndutu, one of my favorite places in Africa. The herds have still alluded us, but the drama and brilliance of the returning rains was exhilarating.

Stay tuned, now, as on our final two days we search for the great herds!

OnSafari: The Vast Serengeti

March 31, 2015March 30, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Picnic on a kopjes overlooking miles of Serengeti.

Today Jim’s safari left established paths altogether as he went off road into remote parts of the far southeast Serengeti plains.

Jim is out of cell phone or internet ranges. Come back next Monday when his actual adventures will replace this post holder.

OnSafari: The Incredible Crater

March 30, 2015March 30, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Hyaena, hippo and the remarkable northern wheatear framed below the brilliant stormy skies of the crater were our special attractions, today.

Ngorongoro Crater has got to be one of the handful of most amazing places anyone can visit. Once the highest structure on earth, this super volcano blew its stack geologically quickly, causing untold devastation and leaving for us today one of the most awesome and beautiful structures on our planet.

The crater rim is 1600-1800 feet above a 100 sq. mile caldera that is a wildlife and scenic paradise. Totally wild, this crucible of wilderness changes radically with the least change in weather and so is a precious barometer of what climate change means.

Forced into smaller and smaller ponds because of the exceptional dryness of this year, we found a pod of hippo mothers with young! Now to understand how unusual this is, note that the normal behavior of a female hippo that has just given birth is to sequester herself and her offspring far away from other hippos.

Normally this means several weeks to a month alone and out of sight. The weather in northern Tanzania has been seriously dry, though, and particularly in the crater hippo ponds are substantially shrunk.

So we saw a collection of around 20 adult hippos and at least 5 very small babies (all under a month), crowded together and seeming to do very well. Was this a nursery herd, so to speak?

Hyaena have a heyday when the veld is stressed. Many predators do, but the hyaena especially since it eats almost anything it steps on.

We must have seen at least 100 hyaena. They were eating ankle bones, dead meat, harassing buffalo (!) and even daring to come into our picnic area! Clearly they were juiced up, and every one of them was fat.

The giant lion pride we saw was also fat, so that meant no action. The 20 in the pride on the table mountain on the west side of the crater were totally sacked out. Only the cubs gave us any action.

My personal highlight was seeing the bird in the crater that I regularly see in Alaska in June! The northern wheatear undertakes one of the most unbelievable migrations of any creature on earth: nearly 10,000 miles one-way (of course twice annually).

For the last several years the climate in East Africa (as throughout the whole world, I suppose) has been unusual.

Currently throughout most of northern Tanzania and southern Kenya it’s seriously dry. In the last several days we may actually have seen the dry spell breaking. We witnessed magnificent storms as we left Tarangire and throughout the day in Manyara, and game viewing today in the crater was a dosey doe with very heavy rains.

But if this is the end of the dry spell, the past effects will obviously linger for a while. I reckon less than half the usual numbers of animals were waiting for us today in the crater. Those that were there, several thousand wildebeest and twice or more than of zebra, had very young babies and were probably very late births, constricting them from moving.

None of the animals appeared sick or weak, as would be the case in a real drought. I’m sure we’ll learn more as we head now into the Serengeti for our last five days.

Stay tuned!

The Crater is the best place on earth to see UNFENCED black rhino.

OnSafari: Terrific Tarangire!

March 28, 2015March 28, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

First game drive Tarangire: 7 lions, leopard, maybe 300 (?) elephant, tons of impala, waterbuck … oh, before I forget, 17 wild dog.

The top half of the picture above shows a portion of that family zonked out towards the end of the day. They’d killed that morning and were basically sleeping it off.

Several weeks ago Steve Taylor leading an earlier EWT safari spotted wild dog in the Serengeti!

I think this marks the turnaround point for wild dog, and the successful work that several American zoos have been doing to stabilize their populations.

Zoos like Chicago’s Lincoln Park Zoo have painstakingly convinced Maasai who live on the periphery of the park to get their dogs vaccinated … free. It’s no easy job. (See bottom half of picture above.)

But the hard work has paid off. By vaccinating the peripheral dogs, wild dogs are staging a bounce back more resilient than expected.

Our safari stayed in the center of Tanzania, which I do with some trepidation this late in March because of the rains. But this year it’s been unusually dry. It’s not yet a crisis, but the veld looks like October more than March.

The Silale Swamp was only half green. We experienced sprinkles and I kept looking at the sky’s growing clouds wondering if the much needed rains would return.

It was also unusually hot. Humid, hot and extended dry conditions means more tse-tse and it was really among my worst experiences. But my travelers were incredible, never complaining, spraying on the DEET and getting on with the business of game viewing.

It was fantastic. Tarangire rarely disappoints because of its enormous elephant population, but we had a gorgeous view of a nearly full grown male leopard in a tree right beside the road within about ten minutes of starting our game drive!

We’d flown into the Kuro airstrip so we were in the midst of the park. The leopard was in perfect view on a dead tree looking with aggravation at a nearby herd of impala. I say aggravation because he, too, had a giant belly and had no need to hunt.

Perhaps the impala knew!

We had a single encounter with truly wild elephant that are mostly transitory south of the Kuro airstrip. It was hilarious. We rather surprised a single family, and one female who was nibbling on a smaller acacia tree was so startled that she ripped the entire tree out of the ground and ran off!

The hundreds if not thousands of elephant we saw were mostly the sedentary group north of Kuro. They tend not to move in and out of the park, content with the space and habitat. More docile than very wild elephant, it allowed us numerous wonderful encounters.

I think everyone was particularly pleased as we watched three very young elephant rough house for nearly 15 minutes.

They “jumped” on one another, rolled each other, butted each other … I put quotes around jump because that’s virtually impossible for an elephant to do, but I really believe I saw that youngster fully airborn if for only a nano second.

I’ve noticed that most of the southern European and western Asian bird migrants haven’t yet left (like the Eurasian Roller and Steppe Eagle [buzzard]), whereas most of the central and northern European migrants have (Adim Stork, Eurasian bee-eater). Don’t know if that means anything – please leave a comment if you think you understand this.

We left Tarangire hurriedly so that we’d have enough time to see Manyara from top to bottom, entering from the remote southern gate. It’s a spectacular drive through rural Tanzanian countryside, including intense small farming of rice and corn.

Manyara, too, was dry but it was wonderful as we left late in the day to see the thunderstorms forming.

Now, onto the Crater!

OnSafari: Kilimanjaro’s Foothills

March 25, 2015March 26, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Debbie Weingarden with the camp's bushbaby. — Debbie Weingarden with the camp’s bushbaby.

A large private ranch on West Kilimanjaro was the perfect place for my group to shake some jetlag and ease into safari.

Ndarakwai Ranch is one of many private concessions in the foothills of Mt. Kilimanjaro. Its 11,000 acres of beautiful undisturbed veld where wild animals and Maasai herds have coexisted for years.

We spent the morning walking, after I determined that there were no elephants in the area, and because it was so cloudy.

Lyle and Jane Krug hiking in the Kili foothills.

We walked past several dozen giraffe, dozens of zebra and wildebeest, impala, and an amazing number of eland. There was also warthog, Grant’s gazelle and lots of baboon.

From the earliest traditional days with the Maasai herders and continuing uninterrupted today with safari guests the animals are unmolested and have become pretty tame. Most of these animals are spillovers from nearby Amboseli National Park, but their behavior and acceptance of us walking near them suggested they were more sedentary than transitory.

West Kili is pimpled with old ash cones that over the eons have formed into beautiful hills with considerable vegetation. We climbed one, following an animal path, until we were about 400 feet above the slopes on which the ranch was located.

The views were superb, of course. To the west was towering Mt. Meru, over 13,000′ high. To the northwest was the great pan of Amboseli and we watched dust devils twist across it.

To the east, of course, was the granddaddy of them all, Kilimanjaro. Throughout this cloudy day it cleared by for a few minutes, but most of the day quite a lot of the mountain was available with the clouds forming gorgeous wraps around its peak.

Hope Koncal, Mark Weingarden and Dave Koncal.

We had good birding, too, including lammergeier, fully feathered breeding steel blue whydah, several types of rollers, waxbills and finches, plus a wonderful array of raptors including augur buzzards, black-crested hawks and tawny eagles.

When we descended the hill I called for our rovers to drive us home and in the afternoon we took a more extensive game drive, seeing a considerable number of wildebeest and zebra. These are not a part of the great migration, although they probably move between Amboseli and possibly Tarangire via Meru.

Our day ended at the ranch’s tree house, which overlooks a beautiful vlei that had zebra, warthog and baboon, and incredible views of the Kilimanjaro landscapes.

“Can we say that we climbed in the Kilimanjaro foothills?” Hope Koncal asked anxiously.

Absolutely, and it was wonderful exercise and a wonderful way to slip into the magic that Africa holds you in.

We took a rather creative way here from Arusha, traveling through Arusha National Park from its southern to northern gate. It was a great game drive itself, with waterbuck, buffalo, giraffe, zebra and impala.

But there were three really great bonuses!

The first was when we saw a red duiker in the deep forest. This animal is growing increasingly endangered because of the erosion of forests. I hadn’t seen it for several years, and I was surprised how literally red it seemed. About the size of a small pig, it moves stealthily and quickly when noticed, so we had but a few minutes to enjoy it.

We also saw the prized colobus monkey that the park is so famous for. These are probably East Africa’s most beautiful monkey, with their long white tails and flowing black-and-white manes.

And we lucked out big time when the Momela Lakes gave us probably 30-35,000 flamingoes! We sometimes see them here, often not at all, but rarely have I seen so many.

And now, on to Tarangire!

Thousands of flamingoes in the Momela Lakes.

OnSafari: Moremi

March 19, 2015March 13, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Jim is out of touch and on safari in Moremi in Botswana. The picture is of wild dogs seen on his last three consecutive trips to Botswana. Come back next week for a full account of this year’s trip.

OnSafari: A “Real” Village Experience

March 17, 2015March 17, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 5 Comments

The Naru Bushman experience was the highlight of our two days in the Kalahari.

I’m continually upset when clients ask me to “visit a village.” There are no traditional villages left in most of Africa, and certainly not in the areas that tourists can visit.

Braame Bodenhorst explains to Marty Fisher re-enactment''. — Braame Bodenhorst explains to Marty Fisher ‘re-enactment’.

Yet someone will insist that their friends just came back and that they “visited a real village.”

What their friends saw and what they ask me to see are horrible remnants of traditional life. As Africa progresses rapidly, traditional life styles are understandably being lost as Africans seek better education and a better life.

In many countries in sub-Saharan Africa, however, the development cannot meet the demand, and so many traditional peoples get caught between the old ways and the new ways.

Binding arrowheads & making shafts from acacia.

The so-called “villages” that people claim to have experienced are impoverished groups of people who wish they were better off and in most cases are stuck in the worst of two worlds.

It is the identical situation to many impoverished communities in America — distressed villages in Appalachia or southwest Wisconsin. I’m infuriated that travelers will actually return from these visits, claiming to have experienced “the real Africa.”

No longer nomadic, many of these so-called villages become unclean and their children get sick. That was not the case when nomadic peoples moved regularly. Unable to get the jobs that their schooling prepared them for, they down poorly maintained traditional garb for tourists and “interpret” the old ways in the near perfect English they would prefer was being used in a business in town.

Demonstrating water harvesting/staroage. — Demonstrating water harvesting/storage.

In the end traditional life is not conveyed at all. What is conveyed is the disgusting failures of modern development. The glorious and successes of traditional Africa life ways are completely obscured.

Braame Badenhorst, owner/manager of Deception Valley Lodge, has mastered a display of early Bushmen life without denigrating the people who portray it.

Our two Naru Bushmen trackers, both 31-year olds and fine staff additions to our successful game drives, traveled with us into the bush, then hopped off the vehicle as our other guide, Jacob, explained they were going to change costumes.

Bramme wants people to understand what real traditional Bushmen life was like, especially the younger generation of Naru. But he makes no bones about it: “There aren’t any traditional Bushmen, anymore,” he flatly tells his guests.

What his two staff members are going to do, to both our and their benefit, is reenact what it was like 30 years ago.

So they stripped off their khakis, pulled out their earplugs from their iPhones, and gave us the best example of “traditional peoples” I’ve ever had the privilege to see.

It was fabulous. The kids, who I’m ashamed to say I can’t transliterate their names, had mastered their grandparents’ techniques in water and food gathering, hunting, and tool building. They conveyed to us a life style that may no longer exist, but demonstrated how creative and clever their ancestors’ – our species – can be.

In so doing, they preserved for themselves, us and generations to come, mechanisms and solutions for survival that may be valuable even in the modern age, and will preserve in ways no written account can, the history of these magnificent people.

This was a true visit into the past: an unpretentious reenactment of something that no longer exists and risks being lost forever.

If a traveler wants to see poverty, disease and human distress, it’s much closer to his home than Africa, I’m sure. If a traveler wants to understand what traditional African life ways were all about, they will not “visit a village,” because traditional villages do not exist where 99.9% of travellers go.

Whether it is innate racism or a weak intellect, travelers are plagued by a desire to see “bad.”

Put a Naru Bushman’s day opposite one of John Boehner’s, and there’s no contest. That’s the truthful message waiting for travelers with a real desire to understand what traditional Africa is all about.

OnSafari: Kalahari

March 16, 2015March 15, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

We found a Kalahari lion our first day on safari!

Unlike the more traditional lions roaming the great savannahs of Africa, the Kalahari lion has a lot more work cut out for him. Lions have to flood themselves with water after gorging on a kill or their insides close down.

Carol, Michelle & David at Deception Valley Lodge. — Carol Winikoff, Michelle Fisher & David Winikoff at Deception Valley Lodge.

In the best of years, which last year was with regards to rain, the Kalahari gets a few months of tumultuous thunderstorms then dries up. In the long dry part of the year Kalahari lions are restricted to water from the bodily fluids of their kills.

This normally results in a much shorter life span and many fewer lions. The owner/guide of the camp where we’re staying, Deception Valley Lodge, told us that traditionally a Kalahari male lion’s territory could extend into the hundreds of square kilometers.

It’s one of the reasons that throughout so much of southern Africa, national parks and private reserves have constructed borehills (water wells) for the animals, particularly the larger ones and the carnivores.

Deception Valley Lodge drilled its first bore hole in 1997. The reserve has since continually had a healthy pride of lion that today is dominated by a single male, and three females with nearly a dozen cubs among them.

The male acted like the males I’ve seen throughout East Africa and had a beautiful extensive black mane, but as our guide pointed out, fewer scars because he’s had fewer scraps with other lions … since there are so few lions.

He’s now nearly ten years old, extraordinary for a Kalahari lion. When I watched him walk it was apparent he had hip or spinal problems, but otherwise looked quite regal.

This northwestern section of the Kalahari is thick scrubland with many more low lying trees including a variety of acacias. In several regards it reminds me of the drier parts of East Africa.

During our two days we saw a great variety of animals, including lots of kudu, giraffe, warthog, zebra, lots of steinbok, and good birds including the spectacular crimson-breasted shrike.

On to the Delta!

It rains only briefly, although sometimes torrentially (as last year) so the pools of water necessary for lions are frequent during the rains.

OnSafari: Cradle of Humankind

March 13, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

On our last day in South Africa we toured mankind’s first.

Or some of his first, anyway.

The Lanzerac was kind enough to give us an early breakfast so that we could leave at 7 a.m. It’s always such a crapshoot in South Africa when traveling around the cities during the week, because of traffic. Their highways are modern, but far too small for the concentrated traffic of rush hour.

We were fortunate. Sometimes from Stellenbosch it can take 90 minutes. We made it in 45, checked in to Mango Airlines and were on our way to Lanseira, the smaller municipal airport on the far northwestern side of Joburg.

That meant we were only 30 minutes from Maropeng, translated: Origins. This World Heritage Site includes the Maropeng center and early man museum, and ten minutes away by car, the Sterkfontein caves.

It shot to prominence 15 years ago when the American, Ron Clark, found “Little Foot,” only the third nearly complete skeleton of an early man, in this case, an Australopithecus Africanus.

So the South Africans sprang for something akin to a mini theme park.

After a brief introduction and circular time line that you walk through, depicting the stages of Planet Earth’s long trajectory to life, there is a short video about the early geological forces that formed the planet.

Then it’s to the “boat ride,” a simulation through time that somewhat parallels the deep river caves in which so many precious early fossils have been found in the region.

And this emerges into a decent museum about early man, and contemporary man.

The several-hour visit cave some meaning to what would otherwise have been just a travel day, something when combining South Africa with Botswana is unavoidable.

And so we end our last day in South Africa back at the lovely Michelangelo in Sandton. Tomorrow, to Botswana!

OnSafari: In The Cape

March 12, 2015March 12, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

After a day at Cape Point we ended our Cape experience in the wine country near Stellenbosch.

Dogged by unprecedented fires, our touring was only slightly interrupted as part of Table Mountain Park at Cape Point was closed. But the Cape of Good Hope, the Flying Dutchman to the Cape Point and our choice picnic spot at Buffelsfontein were unaffected.

Art & Marj Newman, Scott & Terry McKenzie, Joan & Alan Gross

Yet the damage was visible everywhere, from the sometimes heavy haze of distant hillsides still smouldering to the distinctive smell of ash.

An entire mountainside at Hout Bay was scorched.

I love our specially prepared South African picnics, which overflow with enormous varieties of foods and sweets, and I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say most of my clients think the South African brownie is better!

The African penguin was toddling around in full force at Boulders, on our way from the Cape into wine country. Considered pests by many of the local residents, SANI Parks has created a marvelous sanctuary for them virtually in Simon’s Town, taking the pressure off many private residences.

Alan Gross with something that doesn't fly. — Alan Gross with something that doesn’t fly.

There is so much more to the wine country than wine. We began the day at Eagle Encounters, a private rescue and rehabilitation center principally for birds, but Alan also discovered some things they take care of that don’t fly!

We’re staying for two nights at the Lanzerac, one of my favorite wine estates for accommodation. The grand rooms are furnished with Boer-style furniture, including some priceless antiques.

Lanzerac wines are excellent, and everyone enjoyed tastings and a cellar tour. We also visited the Tokara vineyard, currently famous for its brash blend of Spanish and traditional French grapes. The day ended perfectly with a chocolate and wine paring at the Waterford estate.

The heart is Stellenbosch, the heart of Boer culture and history. We toured the Stellenbosch museum and its four beautifully restored old homes. There was time to browse the city’s many shops.

Now, one day in Joburg before our venture into Botswana!

OnSafari: District Six

March 10, 2015March 10, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Dave & Carol Winikoff, Michelle Fisher, Alan Gross, Sue Lebby, Marj Newman and our guide, Linda Fortune, at the District Six Museum in Cape Town.

We spent the day in Cape Town’s District Six, learning of some very heavy history, eating some fine local food and applauding the country’s transformation.

Around 60,000 people were relocated out of District Six under apartheid’s gruesome Group Areas Act, from 1966 – 1974. One of those persons was our guide, Linda Fortune, author and advocate for the District Six Museum.

Altogether more than 3½ million people were forcibly removed from their homes throughout the country during that period, but what makes District Six so important historically is that it was probably the most multi-cultural, multi-ethnic area in the country.

Begun by the Batavian slaves brought to the colony in the 17th Century, District Six had grown into an “old part” of Cape Town with a rich, rainbow heritage. In an area hardly more than 2 sq. miles, virtually every religion on earth had a house of worship, and virtually all of the 11 race classes proscribed by apartheid had been living an integrated life for generations.

So the breakup of District Six is one of the best examples of apartheid’s sinister mechanisms.

Linda’s story, like all the varied guides I’ve enjoyed having from the museum, was an incredibly melancholy one. Today the residents have reclaimed their land, but it will be a long time before the promised reconstruction of what had been bulldozed down will be completed by the government.

Today the district which has just begun rebuilding is vibrant and … colorful. BoKaap merges with District Six and the primary color architecture of BoKaap brings a smile to every face!

Owner Joey of BoKaap Kombuis explains our special Cape Malay meal. — Owner Joey of BoKaap Kombuis explains the history of Cape Malay cuisine.

And smiles galore to our tummies, too! We had a special Cape Malay meal prepared by Joey and Nazli of BoKaap Kumbuis. Joey gave us a history of Cape cuisine, which he calls a cuisine franca.

Curry lamb, dall, rice, wonderfully spiced chicken, yellow tail, and of course, Bobotie were just part of the fare.

We also had time to visit Streetwires! This is one of my favorite artisan coops in Cape Town, where 55 young artists are trained to create the most imaginative objects from near full-size Volkswagon beatles to every animal on the African veld … all from wire and beads!

Tomorrow we head to Cape Point. Fortunately the fires are out, the park is completely open and even today the spectacular Chapman’s Peak opened as well!

OnSafari: Joburg & Cape Town

March 9, 2015March 10, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Rob Lebby and Joan Gross at afternoon tea. — Rob Lebby and Joan Gross served afternoon tea at the Mt. Nelson.

Outstanding local guides complemented my own very personal commentary as we began city touring in Joburg and Cape Town.

An increasing number of black Americans are traveling to South Africa specifically to visit Joburg and its surroundings. But many white Americans continue to see Joburg as unsafe. They’re very wrong.

Alan Gross & Scott McKenzie on more difficult Table Mtn hike. — Alan Gross & Scott McKenzie tackle one of the more difficult Table Mtn trails.

Safety is an issue I discuss frequently with clients and write about in this blog, and it’s an issue which unfortunately is often different from the more important factor, which is the perception of safety.

Joburg definitely earned a bum rap shortly after the end of apartheid as local officials really neglected the city. This was compounded by an incredible influx of African immigrants from around the continent, who with the end of apartheid saw enormous opportunities in black Africa’s most prosperous country.

Crime surged, although by the numbers it never exceeded several American cities in all sorts of important categories like burglaries and homicides. But the point was that Joburg had been a very safe and peaceful city, because the police had been so brutal under apartheid.

When the cap was snapped off, compounded by a new republic’s struggle to allocate precious resources and a huge influx of African immigrants, Joburg sank into a veritable mess.

It’s emerged. Our outstanding local guide, Peter Mashaba, took us Saturday into the center of the city. It’s bustling and active although I would be remiss if I didn’t confirm that it isn’t as sparkling and inviting as when I had a shared office in downtown Joburg for several years in the 90s.

But it’s much better than it was only a decade ago, and it’s infinitely better than the perception that many of my clients have.

Our touring took us to Mandela’s posh home in Joburg where the faithful have stacked small stones with inscriptions on two cairns just outside his wall. We also drove by the international headquarters of Anglo-American which has been relocated into the center of the city.

Other large corporations are following suit, including SAB Miller and Rennies. We saw in the deep center of the city where two new hotels were being built.

Although my tour scheduled three nights in Cape Town most of my guests this time have booked five, and I’m filling every moment.

Dave Winikoff, Joan Gross, Sue Lebby, Dot Malan & Marj Newman.

Sunday was with one of my favorite guides in the world, the lovely Dot Malan, who I think knows more about Kirstenbosch Gardens than any person alive. We got an intense tour of several important parts of the gardens.

Today we went up Table Mountain. It was a spectacularly beautiful day and about a third of the group undertook the whole hiking route at the top! In the afternoon I took them on my historic walk through the Company’s Garden stopping to visit an outstanding exhibit by South African artist Penny Siopsis and for a short time touring Slave Lodge.

I have some avid shoppers in this group. They warned me! But the time in gardens and museums they felt so valuable, they canceled the Green Market Square flea market!

Finally, several of us ended a fantastic day – where else? – but at afternoon tea at the iconic Mt. Nelson Hotel.

Any big city can provide attractions to easily fill a week of touring, and I always feel that we’ve never done enough. I worry, too, that I might be pushing my folks too hard. But so far, anyway, the feedback from this group is … fabulous! What’s next?

Cape of Good Hope Not Enough

March 5, 2015March 5, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 1 Comment

Global warming disrupts my landmark Cape/Botswana safari, but compared to what may happen a decade from now, I don’t think anyone will complain.

A 12,000-acre wildfire has closed one of the Cape’s most spectacular coastal highways and today threatens Table Mountain National Park.

These areas are not simply major tourist attractions, but arguably the most precious of the world’s six floristic kingdoms.

The Cape is about 35 degrees south longitude. So is much of Australia and South America. California is about the same, but north. All these coastal areas in their summers are experiencing record-breaking hot temperatures, high dry winds and … unprecedented fire.

“Unless there are rapid …reductions of greenhouse gas emissions …Australia will experience more heat waves and bush fires,” a climatology professor at the University of Melbourne has warned. 2014 and 2015 were the worst years for wildfires in Australia’s history.

The 2014 Chilean wildfires nearly destroyed the port city of Valparaiso.

The Brazilian government has warned of a 160% increase in wild fires as endless lines of flames destroy huge portions of the Amazon.

We all know what’s happening in California.

Light rain yesterday slowed the fire’s advance in The Cape and there’s hope that “heroic” (many volunteer) fire fighters will get control, today.

But the spectacular Chapman’s Peak drive into The Cape Peninsula from the city is closed, and it’s likely to remain closed long after the fires subside.

The destruction of the foliage on the steep cliffs that rise from Chapman’s is now compromised, and rock slides are more likely.

Chapman’s Peak is one of the main tourist attractions and in a very personal way it displays how global warming is lasting and destructive. Everyone remembers catastrophes in personal ways: Saturday 35,000 bicyclists convene at The Cape for the world’s largest timed marathon race. The route has been slashed to less than half its original 70 miles.

We pay attention to the catastrophe of an event, but then we move onto the heroes who ended it never paying enough attention to the long term trends and destruction.

I remember the 1996 Yosemite Ackerson Fire which burned 60,000 acres and may actually now stand as one of the markers of global warming. But at the time it was rationalized as a necessary ecological event, just today as many in The Cape are viewing today’s fire.

The Cape is arguably the most precious of the six floristic kingdoms on earth for little more reason than how small it is. The Ackerson fire was 60,000 acres large. This Cape fire is currently 12,000 acres, a fifth the size of the Yosemite catastrophe.

But Yosemite sits in the world’s largest floristic kingdom, the boreal. The fire was infinitesimal over that immense area.

The Cape’s precious floristic kingdom is less than 800,000 acres large and this fire could destroy almost two percent of that kingdom, an area with a remarkable 8,700 species of plants of which two-thirds are endemic. This rivals the Amazon’s biodiversity and dwarfs the boreal biomes in which Yosemite is found.

A good friend here told me yesterday that “we’re just going to have to learn to live with this” as she repeated the mantra of the importance of fire in rejuvenating plant species.

It’s true that the fynbos biome requires fires more often to remain healthy than the great pines of Yosemite. Most scientists think the optimum for any fynbos plant is 7 years.

But I disagree substantially with my friend’s shrugging off this occurrence. When understood globally we begin to see how sinister global warming has become.

This Cape fire is not a singular event. It’s part of the longitudinal band we can now clearly call the planet’s “Ring of Fire.”

Caused by global warming, increasing fires reduce the plants that produce our oxygen while the actual combustion contributes to increased greenhouse gases. This is precisely the exponential advance that scientist have been warning us about for years.

Yes, heroes should be applauded and firefighters are among the most laudable. But it’s time, folks, to start focusing on the villains.

And among the most notorious of today’s villains are the climate change deniers like our own Senator Inhofe who now chairs the American Senate’s most important environmental committee.

Can you believe that? But I doubt Senator Inhofe even knows what a floristic kingdom is. His cronies in Kansas and Texas have been doing everything in their power to eradicate such nonsense from the public school textbooks.

OnSafari: South Africa’s Cars

March 3, 2015March 3, 2015 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

I transferred to my hotel in Sandton last night in a brand new Mercedes Benz, but the driver/owner kept turning the engine off at stoplights to save gas.

That’s South Africa in a nutshell: a veneer of luxury … but a base still struggling to become middle class.

In incredible contrast to the rest of the entire continent, including relative power houses like Nigeria and Egypt and Morocco, there is nothing in South Africa you as a visitor can’t get. Everything from organic kosher milk to a heart transplant, from the newest model Mercedes to the highest tech call center in the world.

Diamonds are a luxury that no one needs, and gold too was nothing but a luxury when first discovered. South Africa has been the world’s primary provider for more than a century. I believe this dependency on the world’s lust for luxury has bored itself into the local South African’s psyche.

If there was ever a top-down economic model, the intractable belief that prosperity trickles down, it’s here.

We’re rapidly coming to the conclusion in the U.S. that trickle-down economics doesn’t work. We – America – the bastion of capitalism is admitting our economic success was not from the flash-in-the-pan headlining Rockefellers, but from the mom-and-pop entrepreneurs who never really make it big, except in the aggregate numbers of them.

Cars reflects that. Long before a little business needs a Madison Avenue PR consultant or Washington lobbyist, it needs a car.

The old adage in the States that as goes GM so goes the economy might be lately displaced by “so goes Apple,” but that’s stepping a bit too far into the future when discussing economies like South Africa that are still trying to develop a sustainable middle class.

That isn’t to deny that every peasant needs a mobile phone. But even Ubuntu – which will long outsell Apple in Africa – is too expensive for many South Africans, today. The sheer number of mobile phone sales in South Africa is an undeniably important and hopeful part of its economy.

But ‘cars’ is driving it this minute.

The automotive industry contributes nearly 6% of South Africa’s GDP and is the third largest sector in the South African economy after mining and banking, accounting for 29% of the country’s manufacturing output.

Mining and banking are not driven by South Africa’s minions, but by global forces associated to the lust for luxury.

Cars are driven by the South Africa’s minions and it’s substantial.

All the major car manufacturers have plants or shared plants in South Africa. Between a half million and three-quarters million cars are sold annually here. (Ford is the top manufacturer and seller in the country.)

Of the roughly 190 countries reporting in 2010, South Africa was 68th in the world for the number of vehicles sold per thousand persons.

The U.S. was 32nd. Seychelles was actually the African country with the most sales, but the Seychelles has so few people and is such an anomalously rich place for Africa, I don’t think it really counts.

South Africa is the king in Africa, and actually among most countries just below the level of development reflected in the United States.

(Brazil did not report in 2010. Based on a range of years around that, though, Brazil would be the leader in South America and would rival South Africa’s world ranking.)

South Africa stands out as well for an exporter of cars. Toyota’s Hilux truck or pickup, Mercedes Benz’ C220, and Volkswagon’s Polo are the top exporters, respectively. They represent a huge range of car types, from super luxury, to work vehicles to economic vehicles.

So what does this all mean? South Africa is a major consumer and producer of cars globally, from all styles and needs. But many of the owners, like the guy who transferred me to the hotel last night, really pinch their pennies.

Luxury drives visitors to South Africa, and it’s a reasonable presumption that they will appreciate being transferred in a luxury vehicle to the nearest diamond seller.

But the man driving them still lives hand-to-mouth. Though South Africans might cherish thinking otherwise, it’s not going to trickle down.

Africa Answerman

Sharing the beauty of African life today. Adventurer. Conservationist. Owner of Explorers World Travel.

Category: OnSafari