Miles Headbob's my name. Whew... Talk about a drive and a half. We never considered that to see all these amazing places it takes hundreds of kilometers to get there. Cows and more cows, followed by donkeys and the odd elephant crossing the highway without any concern for the oncoming cars. The reality is that this land is more theirs than ours and so we slowly and respectfully wait until they decide to carry on. Our long tiring journey takes us to Mankwe Lodge. Has all of our previous temporary residences been simply building us up for this experience? First the tree top open lodge with electric fencing but made of wood and on stilts. Next a canvas walled place surrounded by electric fencing. Now as we pull in we notice no cattle guards, we're deep DEEP into the bush and yup, you guessed it, no electric fencing, and a canvas tented room. All that separates us is mesh, and the wild animals are right there. As we approach, Blessed gives us a quick run down. "Ok, so in this place- you cannot walk by yourself at night. You must always walk in twos and at night either myself or the resident manager will escort you to your room." Mmmm, ok" we all reluctantly agree. And so we pour our tired and stiff bodies out of the land cruiser and make our way to be introduced to the manager and guzzle down our welcome drinks (a concentrated fruit juice that you add water to- not the type we were necessarily looking for after that drive but fortunately just behind us is a fully stocked bar). The manager sits us down and gives us the run down on this place. Much the same as what Blessed told us. We basically understood by the end of the speech don't leave your tent at night. If you need to for some reason then yell out for Blessed as he is in the tent beside us. We thought back to some of the other locations that contained fog horns in case you had an emergency. Having been witness to Eric when he's seen a snake, I'm quite confident that we could get someone's attention should we need it. His scream could be heard by a neighbouring camp I'm sure.
After settling in we opted to go for our night drive. We met Costa, who was our safari guide for this particular excursion. We loaded into the truck and off we went searching for the wild as the sun slowly sets. We saw some elephants, impalla's and drove for a bit but it wasn't terribly successful for new wild life. Birds. There were a number of large, very large cranes who had to basically take a running start and skip before they got air bound. It made me think of the time of dinosaurs as these creatures were so large and reminiscent of terradactles. Ok - obviously not that big but you get the point. We stopped by some paw prints and some little birds. How do I politely tell our guide I'm not really interested in stopping the truck for 5 minutes to stare at little birds and paw prints?! Being stereotypically polite Canadians we held our breath and listened to the guide and snapped the odd picture or two.
Our two hour drive soon came to an end and we went to our rooms to freshen up and get ready for dinner. We entered our very large tent structure for dinner. We were greeted by the manager, Tear, and the " waitress" who was a very timid and shy young lady that giggled a lot.. The manager queued her to make her presentation. "Excuse me everybody". She was so shy and she swung her hips as she looked at the ground and I'm sure she would have been blushing if I could tell in the very dark room with her equally dark skin. She continued to tell us about tonight's menu and then politely welcomed the lady to be first to help herself to dinner. Eric smirked and after 30 seconds or so also got up to help himself and so the rest of us followed.
After dinner we decided to retire for the night. As directed we were escorted to our rooms, sorry- tents. The path contained fired up lamp oil torches, it was very dark out and besides the torches, the only other light was the odd star that poked out from behind the mostly cloudy sky. African nights are very noisy with all the active wildlife. Especially the beetles and bugs. Sometimes they are so loud that it sounds like an alarm going off with a constant loud hum coming from the grasses. Someone told us once on this trip that there is a beetle here that if you took him and split him in two that you would actually see little drums in his back with a thin film over them and what the beetle does is push air through his back to effectively make his drums beat. I'm not about to run out and buy an album but a cool fact nonetheless. Sorry, I digress. We got to our tent and said our good nights to everyone and they went off into the darkness to their tents as well. As quickly as we entered we realized that the front of our tent was all mesh and it had canvas covers on the outside that were pulled up and and away from the entry to allow for easy access. We stirred about our tent that was lit by an oil lantern and both of us were too nervous to go back outside on our own to close the canvas. What a conundrum - do we risk going back out to close the canvas? Or do we not and just stare out into the open and have the animals stare back? We opted to not go out and instead take our end tables in our tent and a chair and pile it up in front of the zipper entry. We also realized that you can see between the floorboards and behind the ensuite ( a toilet in your tent that had gaping 1 inch wide gap) that there was many easy access points for critters to get in. All part of the adventure. Hopefully scorpions don't like cotton sheets and my extra warm body heat. Eric took a sleeping pill and I opted for a non medically assisted sleep tonight and brave the African darkness.
So, the morning sun slowly rises and the dark shadows of the night soon became bushes and trees again. Eric had a good sleep and Mine was less than rejuvenating. Every rustle I thought was an animal and I raised my head to see If could see anything through the mesh of which of course, I didn't. We got ready after our wake up call "CAM, ERIC! Time to wake up- the yell from Blessed from outside the tent. An early 530 am. We scoffed down breakie after our intro from shy girl. A non generous egg, maybe two and one slice of bacon and off we went.
We drove down the very large dirt road which we soon realized was basically like a highway with speed limit signs at certain points. Very bumpy, lots of pot holes and after a fresh rain. Rain and sand are great for showing paw prints and we did. Large prints of some lions. We drove on the same road for a number of kilometres on the same road and every once in a while we'd look down and still see the paw prints. What are the chances that they are going to still be on the road? Not likely but let's follow anyways....
Costa yells out as we are all getting a bit bored of the lack of anything interesting, " lions ahead!" And on the right side of the road was a big boy lion confidently sauntering into the bush. Then another emerges from the left side and crosses the road. And yet another and another. Four big boy male lions. Both Costa and Blessed said that its pretty rare to see four male lions together. The most Blessed has seen is 3. Very cool. Ok our day has been made. If we see nothing else than we've at least crossed these guys off our list.
It was a long day of little birds, impalla's, the odd zebra, some monkeys way off the distance. We're getting tired and bored. It's hot" the road is bumpy. It has rained recently and the tracks of many a jeep and land cruisers have worn deep holes in the road that make for watery obstacles. We approach what looks to be a somewhat bigger muddy water filled area. Nervously we rush through it. I thought that was it but each time the water obstacles got bigger and bigger to a point that it was basically crossing a pond or small river. All of us are thinking - are we actually going to cross this? What if we get stuck? Ahh, your just sitting in front of this pond for dramatic effect. Nope off we rush as the water quickly rises us the side of the land cruiser to the bottom of the windows. Oh please don't get stuck, I think to myself as I worry about the various hippos we've seen today and there has to be crocodiles here. We push on through as the water fans off the side off the side of the truck and we slide through like butter. Nothing to be worried about but we all silently feel a bit of relief that we made it to the other side.
We continued trucking through the bush and watery paths, stopped for lunch which was cold cut meats, rice cakes and veggies and were ready to end the the day. We were tired. As we made our way back we noticed in the distance a large body in the water ahead. Another hippo? Nope, an elephant. He was so deep that he was able to dip himself under the water. In front of us on land was a hippo making his way back to the water. The first for all of us to see a hippo out of water. Normally we just see the tops of their head and the occasional yawn. Very cool. The elephant sprayed himself and frolicked in the water for a bit while a separate couple of hippos to the right looked like they were French kissing as they open their mouths and touched.
We were scheduled for a another game drive the next day. Unfortunately the "African massage" got the best of us and when we heard that it was an hour and a half commute to the next place, we opted out. Eric's back had enough and knowing that we would be up at 530 and not returning till 5pm, we were ready to take a relax day and hand by the "pool". Pool is in quotations because they fill the pool with some local water" treat it with salt but from what Shelley tells us, you get in, you walk out and you feel coated with nasty.
Morning comes and so we did exactly as we had planned. A day at the pool, some wine, some good reading of Wilbur smith - the leopard hunts in darkness. Eric read from his iPad (not sure of the name) . We loved our day. It got hot part way through, we had lunch with the shy waitress and the manager ( beans, pasta salad which we can't eat, sliced of meat, cheese and iceberg lettuce). And so we relaxed!
Shelley and John returned at about 3:30 with the crew and stories ofpainted dogs and hippos that charged toward the truck. No worries we enjoyed our day. John and Shelley ordered their drinks at the bar and then left for their evening shower. We gathered around a new spot for dinner - around the fir pit. Sweet! We were doing Boma! Dinner around a fire. We sat in the chairs around the fire pit and Tear ( the manager) told us that they were going to do a song for us. In behind the grass hut we heard the soft hum of the staff and as they appeared they broke out into African song. So very cool. Again it was a moment of, are we actually here? I love it when they sing! 3 songs around the fire and I look to my left and Eric is in tears. A cultural moment. This base camp seemed like it was going be a quick pass by moment and yet. ... Another amazing memory. Can we top African experiences now? Yes... Keep reading
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