Spring Break!

We had our spring break here at UCT about 2 weeks ago, and I feel like I could write a book about all the amazing experiences I had on my 10 day trip, but I’ll just have to give you a glimpse on here and I’ll be full of cool stories to tell once I get back home as well. I decided to kind of break the bank for my spring break trip, but looking back it was definitely worth it. I traveled to three new countries I had never been to; Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe, so my passport is getting lots of use and has some sweet stamps in it. I got a souvenir 100,000,000,000,000 dollar bill from Zimbabwe, which sadly is worth less than one cent because of inflation... But it is a pretty cool souvenir in my mind.

We left in the wee hours of the morning on Saturday the 4th with high expectations of seeing ‘cool’ wild animals, but otherwise no idea of what lay ahead. I put the word ‘cool’ in quotations because what I’ve realized is that for people who live in the wilderness where we visited, elephants, zebras, giraffes and the like are no longer a sight to see. Even for our group leader Jess who has been on this specific trip 5 times, the idea of seeing these wild animals is similar to the mindset I have towards squirrels or rabbits back in the states. When at first you see them it might be a big deal or exciting or whatever, but when you see them day in and day out it isn’t as spectacular. For me though seeing these animals was amazing and something I will never forget for the rest of my life.

Traveling all day on Saturday was grueling but the route was scenic and the destination was even better. We crossed into Botswana that evening where we spent the next 6 days or so. We stayed at a handful of different campsites in the country as well as in the Okavango Delta for 2 nights. Taking a flight in a small 7-seat plane over the Delta turned out to be a great idea because we were able to get our first glimpse of wild animals (elephants and giraffes!) as well as a greater picture of where we were going to stay for the next 2 nights. We got into the delta by means of macuro’s, which are hand crafted boats kind of like gondola’s, which were pushed by our guides who grew up in the area.

Living in the Delta for 2 nights we slept outside by the fire, went on walking safari’s (to witness elephants, zebras, giraffes, wildebeest, water buffalo, warthogs, and black mambas),
sunset ‘cruise’ to see hippo’s and crocs, tried to push the macuro’s (which was definitely harder than it looked), swam in the delta and obviously song and dance by the fireside. Seeing all the African wildlife up close and personal was definitely one of my favorite parts of the whole trip.

On the last two nights of the trip we stayed in Zambia at a campsite near Victoria Falls. Being one of the 7 natural wonders of the world I knew Vic Falls had to be spectacular, but it exceeded all expectations by far! The falls take a curve around the border of Zambia and Zimbabwe and the first night we went to the Zambia side which was absolutely stunning. But what we didn’t realize was that about 80% of the falls are only able to be seen from the Zimbabwe side. Once we realized this that was a perfect excuse to get another couple stamps in our passports and also to hit up a market we had heard about where you can trade socks and pens and such for hand crafted goods.

Victoria Falls is part of the Zambezi River and just downstream from the falls there are some of the biggest rapids that you can raft in the world, without certification. Over time the falls have shifted farther and farther upstream, leaving a beautiful gorge in its wake. The rapids go for about 15km snaking their way down the river. Quite obviously since I was in the area I had to conquer this challenge. I conquered every wave except #13: The Mother. She got the best of our whole raft as you can tell. I feel like I have said this before since I came to Africa, but this was definitely the sweetest thing I have ever done!


All in all, spring break was amazing! I visited 3 new countries, traded sunglasses for trinkets, saw sweet wild animals, rafted the Zambezi, and SO much more! I could not have asked for a better trip!

FREE WILLIE

It’s been a while since I’ve blogged and I apologize, I simply have been too busy to sit down and document all my adventures! I will write three blogs today about the things that have happened in the past month, so hopefully this will make up for my prolonged hiatus from the blogosphere.

As I talked about in one of my previous blogs, interStudy, the program that I am studying abroad through organized a fun filled weekend for all the students to get away and do some sweet stuff. The whole interstudy crew was split in half because there’s just too many of us. The group that I went with had our getaway weekend Oct.27-29th.

We got picked up on that Friday afternoon after classes were finished and trekked along the coast for a couple hours to the coastal town Hermanus. This town is a destination for whale watching as well as shark cage diving. Both of which were activities on the agenda for the weekend. (I had already gone shark cage diving so don’t worry I didn’t go again mom!)

The weather was kind of spotty for the whole weekend so some of our activities ended up getting delayed, but the cool part about that was that we got to just hang out by the ocean all morning on Saturday. Nick and I hopped a couple barriers and went climbing on the cliffs by the ocean, and climbed around on the rocks for a good couple hours. It was SO much fun, and we got some sweet pictures of course.

After hanging out in the town all day we went whale watching on Saturday afternoon, which everyone was excited about, but not quite sure what it would be like at the same time. I kind of picture whales as boring animals which are only cool because they are so gigantic and ominous out there in the ocean. But never the less I was excited to possibly see one jump out of the water Free Willie style or something!

About 25% of the people ended up staying below deck puking their guts out, but the rest of us got to see quite a show! The guide who was on the boat with us said in 15 years he had never seen anything like this before, which was pretty amazing. We saw 3 whales all feeding next to each other, which is odd because typically the whales migrate away from SA to feed because there isn’t much food. And not only that, but one of the whales was albino. For those of us who aren’t whale enthusiasts it didn’t seem like anything special, but in the eyes of a professional it was a very rare occurrence so I was glad I could be there to witness.

After docking back in the bay the next activity was sea kayaking which lots of people weren’t feeling up to after having spent the whole boat ride bent over the toilet. Our group was split into two, and the group I was in wasn’t scheduled to sea kayak until the morning, but since so many people felt sick I took the opportunity to kayak with the other group as well! In hindsight I was very glad I chose to do so.

10 of us headed out into the open ocean in 5 separate 2-man kayaks. Peter and I were kayak partners and obviously were the best ones out on the waves. We took a scenic tour of one of the bays, bearing witness to the beautiful cliffs that I had climbed all over earlier that day, and a great view of the coastal town. Some of us took a swim in the ocean, some on purpose, and other’s not so much. Which was cold, but very refreshing. On our way back there was a playful ‘little’ whale that started to follow us back, getting so close one of the kayaks said they could’ve touched him if they weren’t drenched in fear. At first I was extremely excited at the thought of a whale being directly underneath us and hanging out with us. This feeling of excitement was instantly wiped away when our guide told us that the whale putting its tail above water meant he was likely to breach (jump out of the water) which is extremely dangerous for obvious reasons. Whales are thousands of pounds and we were in flimsy little kayaks! Needless to say we raced to shore as quickly as possible in order to avoid the possible flying massive whale. As it turned out, the curious young whale was following us around because he was just that: a curious young whale. He did not jump on top of us, thankfully, but it was quite an adrenaline rush none the less.

My second trip out on the ocean kayaking was less eventful, but this time around, just like last time, Becca and I dominated the waves as expected. We saw a whale again this time, but there was no threat of breaching so we didn’t see our lives flash before our eyes, quite a relief actually. I’m just going to say this right now, water sports are all SO much fun. I had a great time obviously.

After a quick stop at KFC, which is literally on every corner in this country, we got to go paint balling and quad biking (ATVing) on Sunday afternoon. For those of you who know me, I love playing shooter video games. Now this may be because I am a sick human being or whatever, but I love those types of things, so paintball is the same sort of experience.. But I actually get to shoot people so that makes it even better! We were pitted against these guys whose jobs it is to beat up on people who never play and so quite obviously we got our butts kicked, but it was tons of fun! One of the rounds there were 12 of us trying to protect these two huts that were connected by a walkway. Meanwhile all the professional guys who were all in the armed forces at some point in their lives were trying to storm the houses and pelt us with paint balls, which hurt quite a bit at short range! Towards the end of the round the were all on our doorstep and we were fighting for our lives. We tried everything, opening the door to pelt them, only to be shot probably 15 times within a couple seconds. Failed attempt #1. Tried to shoot around the corner at them, only to be shot right in the fingers. Failed attempt #2. Finally I had a great idea, to sneak around the front corner where they didn’t expect me. As I round the corner the owner of the place was just reaching above his head to shoot in the window at my teammates, so I pelted his belly about 10 times! Seems like a successful attempt right? Well he has 2 teammates right behind him who immediately shot me up pretty badly. Failed attempt #3. We were overrun eventually, but it was so much fun!

Bruised and battered we headed out on quad bikes, which are the same as ATV’s back in the states. We took a scenic route through some vineyards and some sort of orchards which were beautiful. We ended our ride at the top of a cliff that overlooked Hermanus which was stunning. On the way back we ditched the single file rule and passed each other at any opportunity! It was tons of fun, and a perfect ending to a great weekend!