“To Experience Africa”A Travel Log of Southern Africa Done the Intrepid Way

by Alexander Moir

Any proper travel account deserves to begin with a word or two about how the traveler came to settle upon that particular course. For me, as for many in this part of the world, a trip to Africa is a major milestone: a holy grail for the adventurous and a rite of passage for the itinerant wayfarer. When my career path began to settle down this past year and I finally realized I could probably afford some kind of African safari, I did what I usually do when I’m feeling the spirit of a new passion moving me: I went on Amazon and bought a book; a primary source to satisfy the academic in me: H.M. Stanley’s Throught the Dark Continent, both voluminous volumes, which I devoured on the Long Island Railroad in a week or two.

As fortune would have it, between Ebola, guerrilla uprisings and general turmoil, the Congo countries are less than advisable destinations in the middle of the second decade of the twenyfirst century. This time I settled on Google to help my passion, ultimately deciding on an Australian company called Intrepid Travel that specializes in what they term “Basix” travel: camping, only some meals included, group dynamics, the whole shoetring shmear. I booked a tour from Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe to Johannesburg, South Africa that was to last 10 days and travel overland to at least three countries in southern Africa.

I had a couple of months to get stoked and prepared, both in equal measure. I got malaria pills (Atavaquone, the no-side-effect variety), a typhus booster, a couple of country and animal guidebooks, a snake bite kit, a fancy new flashlight and a lot of extra underwear.

On Friday, June 12, 2015 I arrived at JFK Airport and settled in for the big flight: fifteen hours diagonally south by southeast across the pond, the equator, the season division, and a lifetime of imaginings and dreams.

For a person who suffers from self-diagnosed airplane insomnia, I generally am in the habit of making at least passingly friendly conversation with the people sitting near me. On this flight I didn’t have to make much effort. Before we began taxying, the man a couple of seats over (we had the whole middle row of five seats to ourselves) leaned over and asked where I was from.

Stefan is a middle aged German South African businessman who had been on a trip to California and was on his extended way home. When I described my own itinerary Stefan did a raised eyebrow and puffed out cheeck motion with a slow nod that I was to notice in southern Africa meant something positive. “That sounds like a good trip you’ve got yourself,” he stated.

Affirmation from a local. Mental victory fistpump.Stefan showed the easygoing and adventurous attitude that I had come to expect

from southern Africans from a lifetime of watching National Geographic and Shark Week programs. He told me stories of animals and of life in the Southern Hemisphere. When the time came for dinner service, it was Stefan who introduced me to the uniquely South African concept of unlimited free food and drinks on a flight. Here I am coming from the country whose cheapskate airlines used 9/11 as an excuse to charge us for headphones to watch one-star movies from two years ago, now finding that the

hospitality here is quite another thing. I asked the flight attendant how much a beer would cost and when she said it was free, I balked and asked how much a second drink would cost. She and Stefan both chuckled and the latter said with a smile, “This is South Africa, forget about that.”

And so it was that my flight, though patently sleepless, was marked by the relaxation induced by an innumerable quantity of African beers and wines and of course, at Stefan’s insistence, a small bottle of South Africa’s signature liqueur, Amarula. Fifteen hours later I found myself sitting at Tambo International in Jo-burg for the short layover to Victoria Falls.

So let’s talk about the idea of a white American going to Zimbabwe.Just about the only thing we know here in the US about Zimbabwe is that it is

held under the yoke of a man internationally recognized as a brutal despot, Comrade President Robert Mugabe, the lion of Zimbabwe who has sat on his personal golden throne since 1980. Mugabe, who keeps a suspiciously small mustache, has likened himself to a modern Hitler, denounced gays as inhuman, compared himself to Jesus Christ and, perhaps most ominously for me, averred that the only good white man is a dead one. Famously, Mugabe spent much of the 1990s forcibly removing white farmers from their land and often killing them, and basically screwing with the agriculture of a country that used to be the breadbasket of southern Africa. And here I was going to visit his country. To think, last year at this time I was going to Iceland…

It was with these trepidations that I alit from the plane onto the tarmac of Victoria Falls, making physical and sensory contact with the African continent for the first time in my life.

This is the essence of the excitement of world travel for me. The planning and the wait are an adrenaline rush and the whole experience is bound to be great, but it’s this kind of moment that sends me into the stratosphere. What would Africa feel like on my skin, in my lungs, under my feet, in my ears? I felt like Columbus, Stanley, Livingstone and Neil Armstrong must have at similar points in their journeys.

As I stepped off the plane and headed toward the “Welcome to Victoria Falls” sign I looked at the ground and watched how the sun reflected on the blacktop. I turned upward and squinted at that sun itself and thought about how that gigantic ball of gas gives life and warmth both to my half of the world and to this one, each in its season. I smelled the air, the freshness that I knew I’d find in Africa even at an airport. I looked at the palms and how the breeze moved their branches.

With excitement in my heart I entered the terminal- the only one, I think- at the Victoria Falls International Airport. The first two things that greeted me inside were to represent Zimbabwe in my mind from that point on: the genuinely radiant smile of the locals (even just a simple customs guard) and the shadow of the stern frown of Mugabe whose ubiquitous portrait hangs in every public space, each of which is sun-faded: after 35 years in power with these things hanging there they ought to be.

I filled in the short questionnaire card and handed it to the guard. I was first in line, which is typical me for anyone who knows me well. I held my breath. Would I get a hard time for being American? Would they be suspicious of one thing or another?

The officer looked down quickly- too quickly to have really scrutinized the paper- and looked back up. That Zimbabwean smile again.

“Teacher?!” he asked with glee? (You’re required to declare your profession.)

I smiled back and told him that was correct. He wrote some paperwork out and casually said “It will be a few moments, the system is down.”

Now this I had been prepared for. I was on the famous African time now. Be patient, don’t get frustrated. I’m on vacation, I have nowhere I have to be and nowhen I have to be there.

It didn’t actually take long, and I stepped outside to wait for my transport to the rest camp. Outside, a group of lithe young men in traditional costume began to sing and dance for the tourists. I sat on my luggage and pulled on my Aussie style bent brim hat with a flap for the back of my neck. A man walked over to me from nowhere. What could he want?

The smile. “How do you like Africa?” I explained this was my first hour on his continent. He reeled and showed genuine

excitement for what he must have known lay ahead for me. I commented offhand that the costumes of the dancers looked more Zulu than Zimbabwean, to which he laughed heartily and agreed. It was all a show. Ah, but what a show for this first timer to Africa. The men’s flawless harmonies struck me as reminiscent of our old doo wop a cappella music; of course, as we all know, so much of American music has deep roots in African tradition.

As my taxi van pulled out onto the man road, I noticed how sere and arid the landscape really was in winter. What I thought was some kind of cattle up ahead turned out to be baboons looking for water in a drainage area. Not my first time seeing primates in the wild, but it really hasn’t gotten old for me. I watched their hauntingly familiar expressions as we passed and made eye contact. This was Africa. What was next?

After checking in to my chalet (a small room with a bed and a table, but just fine with me) I packed my pockets with the essentials and walked out of the compound gates to get my bearings. A young man came up and pestered me to give him $20 for a few dirty old banknotes. Zimbabwe’s inflation had reached such epic proportions that, by 2008, they had abandoned their currency and adopted the US dollar. This made things easy for me: a few days at least without having to do the old “What’s that in dollars? Like $3.50 or something I think? Ok close enough.”

I walked across the street and approached a young guy who was just hanging out against a post. As it turned out, Mark1 was to become my guide, protector, and friend for the next two days.

Mark could easily be mistaken for an American city guy. Twenty-five years old (though showing some extra ageing as people from hardscrabble areas tend to) and about average height, he wears a Chicago Bulls ball cap, a jersey, shorts and sneakers.

Mark is an effusive, affable, outgoing guy with a penchant for laughing hysterically at life’s small pleasures; he displays a singular pride at apparently being some kind of big man around town: a quick glance or word from him stopped the kitsch hawkers in their tracks and almost everyone we met from one end of the town to the other came up to fist-bump Mark. I never really figured out if he was the cool cat because he had his own foreign dude or if I was the lucky one for having my own local friend; probably both.

Mark never missed an opportunity to observe repeatedly that he loved the fact that I was there “to experience Africa”, a term that I loved and adopted as the title of this

1 I’ve omitted surnames of locals to protect their identity.

account. Mark would say, “Alex, you have come to Africa to experience it! To meet people, to see how Africans live!” That, as opposed to the insular rich tourists who go there to stay in luxurious hotels, never meeting a local person and seeing their Big Five quickly in helicopter rides, after which they speed back to the comfort of the airport and their wifi. Mark was right: even if I could afford that, I didn’t want it.

I spent my first evening in Africa (at that giddy third wind point after about 36 straight hours awake) in a very local bar with Mark and his friend William, surrounded by working class and poor locals who were enraptured by soccer scores and their boisterous conversations in Shona or Ndebele, the two main indigenous languages of Zimbabwe. I never really let my general traveler’s guard down completely, but in this bar, which abutted my campsite, I felt safe. Mark and William and I spent hours talking about music, movies, funny life stories, animals, and life in our respective countries. I purchased some nice souvenirs that they had in bags; whether or not I got the absolute best prices, I decided that Mark’s company was worth something too. We treated each other to rounds of Zambezi and Castle beer and shots of some kind of brandy that cost $2 each. I told them a shot where I live could cost between $6 and $10 and they fell into each other’s laps laughing. The joke is definitely on us here in the US in certain matters.

I knew I was not hammered, just happy, buzzed and on a fourth wind, but when William laughingly commented that I had “walked like a snake” on the way back from the bathroom, I knew it was time to go relax and get ready for my next activity: the Boma.

The Boma is a Zimbabwean tradition related to the South African concept of the braai: a huge outdoor cookout buffet affair. Upon arrival they wrap you in the traditional shawl and you proceed to the dining area. I struck up a conversation with a Scottish family who invited me to sit at their table for the evening. We were given a taste of the local sorghum beer (think ammonia and glue) and then got in line to load up our first plate.

I heaped piles of game- mostly types of antelope, warthog and fowl- onto my plate and relished the smells of the grilling olio of African goodness. I found it enjoyable talking with the 9 year old daughter of the family, who was being raised with a spirit of adventure and global awareness. I convinced her to try the mopane worm, a chargrilled caterpillar that lives in a certain tree’s wood. They eat it as a snack and it tastes like bacon (not chicken). The house gave out silly certificates to anyone who ate the worm. The little girl exclaimed after getting two certificates that she wanted yet another. Her mom said two was enough.

On a walk around the grounds I met a white Zimbabwean family of mother and daughter who owned an adventure lodge in the nearby Zambezi gorge. They were both full of life and fairly close in age (young mom and early-twenties daughter). I had to stop and think about something: why didn’t they leave when Mugabe began purging Europeans from the country and murdering them? Only later did it occur to me that this was their home and it would apparently not have been even an inkling of an option to leave. Apparently Uncle Bob was past the active point of his mini ethnocide anyway.

***After a good night’s sleep I headed off for what the camp concierge had

recommended when I said I wanted to go bird watching: the “canopy tour”. I put on my safari gear and hat and grabbed my binoculars.

I was surprised when the car picked up two French guys in athletic gear and dropped us off at the gorge, where a host asked us to sign indemnity forms and get ready to put our harnesses on.

Come again?Right, so the “canopy tour” is a tour of the canopy of the gorge forest via zip line.

Yeah, I was not ready for this. But then, I wasn’t going to back down. I suited up and got hooked up to the first line. What the hell had I gotten myself into? I was first in line and I had to zip down across a gorge to a guy waiting on the other end. Oh, and when I asked how they would slow me down the guide explained that I would do that myself by squeezing my heavily gloved hand on the wire in front of the crampon thingie.

I didn’t see birds but I did see the canopy for sure: more above it than inside it as I had expected. But by the third of nine zips I had gotten the knack. I began to enjoy the sounds of the flowing river far below and the company of the vervet moneys eating fruit and berries next to me in the treetops. I also got to see a surly alpha male baboon defend his harem of red-rumped females from a smaller rival with laughably human growls.

I spent that second afternoon with Mark again. He insisted that I see the local Chinotimba township, the village outside the tourist area where the locals actually live and go about life. As it was a Sunday it was quiet (Christianity is serious in Zimbabwe), but the little streets were still full of people, everyone from dandy guys in mix-matched hand-me-down pimp suits from the West to smiling groups of kids and the obligatory ladies with jars balanced on their heads that we’ve all seen on television. Mark took me to the grounds of the primary school, where small barracks-style buildings were demarcated with squad names like rhino, lion and elephant for each grade. Mark was proud to say he had graduated from there, and was slowly working on secondary education, which most young people in Zimbabwe can’t afford to do full time as teenagers as they need to go to work at a young age to help the family.

Chinotimba is not the kind of African village that has straw huts or people in traditional tribal outfits; it’s simply a slice of modern working-class Zimbabwean life. People looked content and every kid we passed called out “uziwa!” as I passed. The returned smile, greeting and nod would invariably send them running to tell of their exciting encounter with the outsider.

Mark got us into a local football/soccer game in which the town’s high school team was playing a team from another area. The stands (tiers of rock) were packed and people were as excited as at an NBA game. There was a rhythm section of fans with drums and other instruments who played a beat the entire time and upped the tempo when the home team got close to scoring. People were coming over to meet me and offer me local drinks (I was disappointed to have to decline because I feared the water from the local ice) but Mark and I did share a six pack and went suitably wild whenever home scored or turned the tides. I was so happy!

I tried to imagine a suburban town all turning out for a high school game here in the States, but all I could conjure up was the image of restrained soccer moms sipping cucumber water wearing Snuggies and clapping reservedly. These African villagers are poor by any world standards, but hell if they don’t live their lives like every day is the last.

That evening it was time for me to meet up with the Intrepid group I would be spending the next ten days with. I said a difficult and heartfelt goodbye to Mark and

headed back to the rest camp and walked over to the tent area. There I saw the unloading of the truck beginning and it was then that I met Colin and Collen, the lead guide and driver, respectively. They invited me to make myself at home in the campsite.

This is another key moment for a traveler, particularly the group traveler. I began to meet the others who would form the tour group that was to become a new family for me. I made small talk and we formed one of those slightly awkward ever-expanding circles that happen at high school dances or anywhere that people who don’t know each other yet but wish to get together. I chatted with Michael and Tue, two young Australian medical students just in from Malawi on a summer holiday. (I was to ultimately feel very honored that these two seemed to look up to my advice.) I said hello to Bonnie and Bobbie, tent-mates from Australia and Scotland, respectively. Bonnie is studying languages at university, which was a small but automatic bond for us. I met Greg, an avid birdwatcher who was traveling with his wife and we discussed the avian fauna we had experiences thus far.

Enter Angus, a fun-loving Aussie meteorologist with a shock of curly blond hair and a beard to match it who was interested in checking out a local bar, and along came his lovely girlfriend, Felicity or “Flick,” an exotic beauty of an Aussie with a sagacity beyond her years and a knack for the practical. The group was rounded out by Victoria, a cop from Australia who, being closer to my age, was a strong organizer for the group and who provided a levelheaded and grounded perspective. I spent some more time walking around the grounds with Ava, an English grad student traveling and doing fieldwork across Africa, and Ian, a big burly Aussie who can knock anyone dead with either his incredible stories of safaris in the “good old days” or his snoring.

At our group dinner that night we said goodbye to the people who had been on a earlier part of the tour but would not be continuing onward with us. I got to meet more new friends: Marco, a quiet but friendly professional photographer from Italian Switzerland who carried around a trillion dollar camera dubbed the bazooka by Guide Colin; Marc, a German Swiss engineer who is also quiet but tends to be up for any challenge and will stay up to the wee hours with his friends; and Marty and Madeline, a couple from the American Midwest, and my only fellow Americans on the trip.

Ava was the first to remind me to look up at night. It had completely slipped my mind that I was in a hemisphere in which there were constellations I had never seen before. I immediately set my eyes on the Southern Cross and began a love affair with that star formation that would last the whole trip.

After yet another restful night with no mosquitos (there really aren’t many in the dry season) I headed off to the actual Victoria Falls with a bunch of the members of the group. Even if you’ve seen Niagara Falls, there’s no way to explain the majesty of this place. It radiates an electricity that pervades you and makes you, as Bobbie said echoing my own feelings, completely happy. The Falls seem to go on forever: there are parts where the spray and mist are so dense that it feels like it’s evening; around a bend the sun is shining brilliantly and you encounter rainbows you thought could only exist in a kindergartener’s water paintings. I was reminded of that Stanley book that sparked all this interest and I imagined what it would have been like to be Dr. Livingstone seeing this enchanted and holy site for the first time. How can there be any better feeling in life than the precise moments of exploration where you know you are on a true adventure into new ground?

Victoria Falls straddles the border between Zimbabwe and Zambia. We decided to see what it would entail to cross into Zambia for an hour or two. I wanted to get another check in the box in Africa. At the border post, I asked the officer how that could be done and she was very friendly and honest with me: “You can pay for the visa into Zambia but then you need another one back into Zimbabwe. That all costs $50.”

The group decided to skip it and walked out but the lady continued by explaining that she could give me a bridge pass which would allow us to cross through the checkpoint and just go out across the long bridge over the Zambezi. We’d technically be in Zambia but not have to go as far as to reach Zambian customs. The bridge pass was free and we had time to kill, so we took the opportunity.

On the long walk out to the bridge in no-man’s land the group shared more stories and had a chance to bond over shared and desired experiences. We watched old jalopy cars sputter past with numbers Magic-Markered into their fronts and backs to serve as license plates. Ladies in colorful wraps walked past with head-borne loads and it seemed like everyone stared at us.

At the midpoint of the bridge we watched bungee jumpers drop off into nothing and bounce through the Zambezi gorge far below. I stopped to talk to a Zambian curio salesman who told me about life in a Toka-Leya village and about his tribe’s language and customs. He seems pleased that I was interested in him and his culture, not just in finding a good beer (though that’s never far from my mind). He produced wood carvings of busts of a tribal man and woman from the Toka-Leya tribe, which I gladly purchased as a souvenir of my hour in Zambia. We didn’t get passport stamps but we did get another afternoon full of events and great company from both locals and each other.

***The next day it was time to leave Victoria Falls and head to Hwange National

Park. I watched the countryside pass by as we sped past little villages and humble roadhouses interspersed with the constant dry vegetation of this part of Africa. At Hwange’s rest camp I paid $50 for an upgrade that turned out to be more like a honeymoon cottage than a camp chalet. High on stilts to protect against the larger wildlife, the cottage looked out over a watering hole and featured a grand bed with mosquito net and heated blanket: the southern African winter is about 40 degrees F at night but reaches about 80 by noon. There was a tree right outside and the windows had no glass, just flaps. I asked the concierge about leopards. He raised his eyebrows, looked off into the middle distance, and said: “These are usually shy cats, but if it comes in, lie still.”

I gulped. I noticed with some relief that there was an air horn next to the bed for such an eventuality.

That afternoon we took our first game drive as a group. We packed into open cars with canvas roofs. The exhilaration of a game drive comes from the fact that you can’t drop your guard or you might miss something. You have to constantly peer off into the bush. We saw the rare ground hornbill, a cross between a toucan and a turkey, and at a large watering hole I got my first taste of real safari. Herds of elephants basked and bathed, crocodiles glided ominously toward loud belching hippos, and zebras mingled with antelopes on the periphery.

As Intrepid promised, this was to be a whirlwind tour. The next morning we were off early toward Matobo National Park further south in Zimbabwe. Our truck broke down

for an hour or two, which I considered a rite of passage in an African overland excursion, but several mechanics who were passing by actually helped us get going again and then patiently follows us to Bulawayo, which was no small favor. You’d have to imagine breaking down on the Long Island Expressway and a random civilian spending an hour helping you fix your car and then tailing you to Manhattan to make sure you were ok. Do we do that kind of thing in America? I just don’t think so. Whether white or black, I found Africans to be utterly genuine in their concern for others.

It was in Zimbabwe’s second largest city of Bulawayo on a rest and repair stop en route to the park that we met one of this trip’s most vivid and larger than life figures. Ian Harmer is a white Zimbabwean native who runs a safari outfit called African Wanderer. He specializes in rhinos. Actually he doesn’t just specialize in them, he lives and breathes them.

Tall and lean, Ian wears short safari shorts with a jacket, sandals, ball cap and binoculars. His face is both sun-worn and care-worn on behalf of his beloved rhinos. Ian has the eye of an eagle, notably being able to actually spot and identify said bird from a mile off (as well as seeing a chameleon and a stuck bug in the road before it was too late). It’s a skill one must develop during a life lived as a guide in the bush.

Ian’s speech comes across as almost rehearsed, but I think it’s simply a combination of erudition, passion and experience. At the rest stop, Ian’s safari vehicle pulled up and he jumped out. Standing in front of the group he lit one of his ubiquitous Zim cigarettes and explained:

“Folks, this is not going to be a game drive. A game drive is a drive to spot animals. I will take you right up to the rhinos. They’ll be closer than that truck.” He gestured toward a truck about three meters away. “The white rhino, there are only 21 left in Matobo now because of poachers.” Ian clenched his cigarette in his lips and squinted like Clint Eastwood facing off to an enemy in a spaghetti western. He released a puff of smoke and continued: “This is the one of the Big Five that people miss, but you won’t miss them with me. We’ll leave early- not too early- we’ll have a nice lunch and drinks, we’ll see ancient cave paintings, and you’ll get up close to rhinos.”

We were all sold.***

The next day a bunch of us met Ian at the Matobo campsite and headed off for the park proper. At the gate he told us more about poaching. As we had all heard before, the barbaric Chinese obsession with the idea that rhino horns are an aphrodisiac and a natural Viagra is fueling the wholesale slaughter of these magnificent beasts. When the wealthy agents of the black market arm of the Chinese medicine industry offer upwards of a million dollars to a destitute native bold enough to track a rhino at night and shoot it dead, how could he turn that down? One dead animal and you’re set for life.

Ian’s hatred of poaching is palpable and infectious. He mentions that he lost “one of his boys” a few months ago to poaching. He doesn’t mean one of his assistant guides; he means a rhino. To Ian, they’re my boys. He states that Zimbabwe has a shoot-on-site policy on poachers. As an ex-military guy myself, I don’t ask Ian if he has taken advantage of that law, but one gets the feeling he either has or at the very least wouldn’t hesitate to.

As a sticker on a trash can at Victoria Falls advertised, Africa is not for sissies.

Inside the park, Ian stopped the car on a hill and we got out for a frigid soda from his cooler. A rustle in the bushes beyond us startled us all. It was a native game warden, complete with green fatigues and a well-worn AK-47. Ian lit a cigarette and spoke a local language with the warden, who explained that he had tracked the rhinos all morning to another part of the camp. We followed Ian’s lead and trekked off into the brush in search of our quarry.

Matobo lies in an area that consists of ancient volcanic rock formations that look like some immense giant had stacked rounded boulders one on top of another. Ian explained that it was actually natural: the result of wind erosion as opposed to the scarred and pitted rocks of glacial places like New York. After passing a dammed lake in which a fish-eagle dived like a cruise missile into the water to catch a fish as a croc sunned nearby, we got to a spot where we began to climb.

We climbed.We climbed some more.At one top (not the top yet) I was huffing and puffing despite my fairly good

physical condition. Ian took out a different pack of cigarettes and explained that he likes to change up his routine. He is convinced Africa will kill him before tobacco does.

We sat down and looked back at a vista that takes the breath away. The valleys and mountains go on for miles everywhere. “Imagine the ancient bushmen sitting here looking out at massive herds of animals,” Ian mused. ”They must have said what’ll we have for dinner?”

He puffed his cigarette and grinned wistfully. “I sometimes think I was born 150 years too late.”

I feel the same way about myself.At the summit we were treated to another magical vista; this time because of its

enclosed nature as opposed to its expansiveness: a cave formed by the meeting of two colossal boulders that must have crashed together and stymied each other’s progress back in deep time.

On the walls of the cave are paintings. They date back to about 36,000 years ago. Ian leaned against the cave wall and lit up. He explained professorially that these astounding etchings of animals that still look ready to jump off the rock face may have actually been a sort of explanation of the local threats and food offerings for wanderers.

Imagine it: you and your band wander into the cave for the night from another region and in relief on the walls of that very cave you have a menu of antelope, buffalo, rhino and giraffe, complete with the predators to be looked out for. I’ve never heard that perspective on cave paintings, but, as with much else, Ian has me sold.

Just as the last light of our day in Matobo began to fade, Ian met another guide and after speaking the local language he turned to us and got serious. “Let’s go see some rhinos.”

We were as giddy as school children.As promised, Ian got us within a few meters of the white rhinoceros. Like a sort

of rhino whisperer, Ian emulated a cooing sound to the baby rhino, which got closer and stared at us. The mother and babywere clearly not threatened by us at all. And we’d gotten more than our money’s worth on this optional day trip.

After another simple but delicious dinner prepared by Guide Colin and with more than a little help from Angus in appreciation for the guide’s hard work on our behalf, we

settled in next to the campfire to have drinks and enjoy the evening. Angus, Ian (the Aussie on the tour, not the rhino guide) and I decided to stay up late to listen for animals, particularly the elusive leopard. We only saw a small herd of klipspringer antelope, but we shared war stories and jokes. It was amazing to see the ease with which the group could poke silly fun at each other’s cultures while still learning a lot about one another. Bonds of friendship are inexorably strengthened by shared adventure.

As we stared up at the brilliant stars we marveled at the ability in zero light areas to see the sky as a magical galactic tapestry. Where in the city one can see a few major constellations, in the dark wilderness the stars appear in several dimensions, surrounded by the Milky Way, nebulas and shooting stars. I stared up at the Southern Cross and found myself humming the Crosby, Stills and Nash song named for that constellation. The song tells of a guy who leaves his frustrations with life and love behind and sails off alone to the Southern Ocean to find answers and look within himself for new inspiration. One stanza goes,

When you see the Southern Cross for the first timeYou understand now why you came this way,

‘Cause though the truth you might be running from is so small,It’s as big as the promise, the promise of a coming day.

I saw something of that in my own journey. I can’t speak for everyone, but I think that many world travelers are not simply pursuing exciting new territory; I think there’s always something that we’re trying to figure out or even leave behind. It would take more than a story of the present scope to really go into that, but there it is.

The following day we said farewell to Zimbabwe and headed to Botswana. At the overland customs checkpoint I told the lady who was checking my passport as we left that I was really going to miss Zimbabwe. She didn’t miss a beat. She just said, “Then why leave?”

Indeed.***

In Botswana the group stopped in the city of Francistown for lunch and a break. It was immediately apparent that this was a different country. The buildings were more modern and in better shape, the people looked a tad more well off. We only had one day in country, but I was determined to experience as much of the place as I could. At a gas station I skipped the Wimpy’s fast food option and had a tray of the local fare: curried beef with pap, a cornmeal mash that serves as Subsaharan Africa’s staple starch. It’s a bit like white polenta and is a great accompaniment to a main dish.

We spent that night in a rest camp that didn’t have electricity. There were no hut upgrades so I spent my first night in a tent. It was a bit too small for me and the travel pillow I had brought was inadequate for my neck but I slept moderately well. Before bed we sat around the fire telling ghost stories. We got to hear some supernatural African tales from our guides Colin and Collen (“The Collins” in popular verbal vernacular). I told my story of the hotel ghost in Ireland and a story of the Wendigo, the Native American evil spirit of the north that goes howling through the darkness. The guides seemed scared, which was my goal, I suppose!

After another border crossing we were in South Africa, bound for the rural town of Blouberg. The town lies in the foothills of the Drakensberg Mountains, huge granite

monoliths that shred the country from coast to coast. Our rest camp was in a valley in which huge bats made strange electronic klaxon noises during the night and where the upgrade cottages had oil lamps and bucket showers. I found it a rustic and fun experience, except for the wasp that took up residence in my shoe and gave me a bit of a sting when I woke him up too early with my foot.

In Blouberg we stopped at a bar at which hundreds of people were making merry, dancing their hearts out to loud music and getting sloshed on beer and more of the gluey sorghum/maize potage. We sat in a semicircle outside and people came past shaking our hands, speaking Xhosa, and dancing with us. The kids in particular were thrilled to be in our phone selfies and they chittered and chattered around as we mingled. They vied for rides on blond Bonnie’s back. I went inside to buy a beer and a big fellow in a suit who was piss drunk but still affable extolled his happiness at meeting a New Yorker and he assured me that I was welcome in his country. Once again, this attitude seemed to prevail in this part of the world.

I never did really figure out if the whole thing was staged for us or if any part of it was serendipitous or spontaneous, but it was a good time.

The group then shared a home-cooked dinner at the house of a moderately well off businessman, who was out of town, but his wife and her sister and mother had whipped up a feast. We stuffed ourselves and then The Collins told us about local life: how marriage works there, how different generations communicate with each other, how the mother is the most revered figure in the family unit.

For the final days of our time together, the Intrepid group traveled to Kruger National Park, possibly the most famous game reserve in southern Africa. This is the one you see on the nature specials all the time, the one where you could see anything from a lion hunt to a black mamba hanging in a tree overhead. In the rest camp Marco and I spotted a bush baby, a proto-primate that has to bee seen and heard to be believed. If you have any hint of a heart you will want to hug and squeeze it. It looks like a cross between a Furby toy, a koala, and Yoda. It cries in the night like a baby and has lamp-like red eyes. Herds of impala antelopes roamed the grounds of the camp and creatures scurried through the thick foliage and fruit of the huge palms.

On a night game drive that evening we began the trip with an auspicious start: an immense eagle owl was sitting on the side of the road. He did the famous owl head turn back about 180 degrees to look at us with his eagle-like face and then took off with a silent swish of his giant wings, the span of which is bigger than any American owl I’ve seen.

We used handheld spotlights to seek out eye shines, which we would call out for and the driver would stop and back up. I was amused at the cute springhare, a cross between a fox, a rabbit and a kangaroo that hops about and at one point even hopped toward the truck, causing someone to call out (to my amusement considering the dimensions and cuteness of the thing), “It’s coming right at us!”

We saw hippo and croc eyes in the distance in a river, a pair of monstrous spotted hyenas, jackals, and antelope, but it was the wandering leopard that made everyone’s night. The camera flashes lit up the sky like lightning for minutes straight as a large male leopard appeared in the road ahead of us and walked silently along next to the truck for a good while. His sinewy movements and utter silence combined with his total lack of care

about us and our machines were a reminder of the grandeur of the life we share this planet with.

***The next day we took a morning game drive to our next rest camp inside the

sprawling park. Colin acted as expert lookout, spotting animals we never would have noticed, and helping me with my quest to find as many different birds as possible.

See, I had developed a reputation as something of a “bird guy” in the group, which is ironic considering that I only have a dilettante’s experience in the hobby. But thanks to the loan of my mom’s binoculars I thoroughly got into the pastime more, and was able to share my enthusiasm with others. Colin in particular said I had rekindled his old interest in birds- all certified African guides have to be able to identify every species of bird from their region!

On an eventful game drive we saw giraffes, wildebeest, antelope, hyenas, jackals, a rhino in the distance, and of course many elephants. But we were will without the last of the famed Big Five: panthera leo, the African lion. You can’t very well go to Africa and come back without seeing a lion.

The night drive that night was mostly a bust, with the star being one more leopard (who peed on a tree) and a host of civets, a very curious nocturnal predator that looks like a raccoon crossed with a cat and a wolverine. But still no lion.

We awoke on the final morning of our trip together with a final game drive to the gate of the park, and our hopes were high for the king of the jungle. I kept my binoculars out and scanned both sides of the truck as Colin and the others kept their own hopeful vigils. Finally I could see a large, open watering hole materializing from the brush on the right and Marty exclaimed, “Lions!!!”

I don’t know how the truck didn’t tip over with the combined weight of 18 people pressing in on one side all of a sudden. Walking around the water was a pair of young male lions, likely hunting brothers. They both looked back at us at once in what became a photo opportunity of a lifetime. My good camera only had minimal battery life and I had saved it for this occasion. The elder lion mounted the younger in a show of dominance and then we saw them hide in a bush and peer out.

To the left, a herd of four immense cape buffalo bulls emerged from the forest and began to drink. Anyone who has ever played with a cat toy at home knows the look of those lions at that moment: the heads went down, the ears perked, the legs were tucked into the bodies. Ultimately though, two immature lions were no match for four titanic male buffalo, as the one attacked would have likely been defended by the others, so discretion proved the better part of valor for the felines that day. Our Big Five photo hunt was complete.

“Ndima ndapedza,” I said to Colin the guide. Mission accomplished.***

Thus began the journey to our final destination as a group in Johannesburg, one of South Africa’s capitals and a city known for its contrast between abject poverty and fabulous excess. This part felt like a countdown for me and I wept silently behind my sunglasses as I thought of all the days behind and all the friends who would be dispersing to other corners of the globe soon. We stopped in Blyde River Canyon to see the grand vista of the third largest canyon in the world. It was truly spectacular, but sentimentalist that I am and not being very good at farewells, there was a weight on my heart.

When we reached the Holiday Inn, a fairly lavish oasis in the suburb of Sandton, we disembarked from the truck (Colin had nicknamed it the Antichrist but it had gotten us to the end) and began the goodbyes. Fortunately, a majority of the group was staying there another night to take flights the next day, so we had one more evening together.

As I entered in my dusty safari jacket and with my tanned face and grizzled salt and pepper beard and filthy khaki pants and sneakers, two suited businessmen actually stopped and turned to look back at me. It was awkward but it reminded me that I really had been an explorer these past two weeks. A concierge laughed and said, “No matter, you had the real adventure. What do they know?”

I love the sagacity of the common African man.***

Up in my hotel room I was stunned at the luxury compared to the past accommodations. I turned on the TV and watched disease, atrocity and corruption spread across Africa on the news like a pandemic.

But that was not my Africa. The Africa I experienced for twelve days is a place of effusive generosity of spirit in the face of despotism; of determination to dance in spite of not knowing if you’ll have breakfast the next day; of reverence for the power of the flora, fauna and colossal natural resources that surround you day in and day out.

That song “Southern Cross” by CSN was in my head for most of the trip, and as I left Africa I reflected on the lyrics. While we may seek grand adventures and great escapes from the woes of the Western world, what we find on the other side is often a smack in the face in more ways than one. It’s not to say that I was shocked by Africa, at least not in a negative way. No, the slap in the face came more from me turning my hand on myself and asking what was the truth I was really running from and how big was it really? I may not be thrilled in my current job but doesn’t it afford me the time and the funds to live the way I did on this trip to the Dark Continent?

Did I come home healed and cured of my first world woes? Far from it. But ask me if I came home enriched, relaxed, and emboldened to take on the next challenge whether abroad in the wilds of this wide world or right here at home and I will give you a resounding hell yes.