I'm in Africa (Part 2)

Tue 29/06 cont'd... I made it back to the hostel just in time for the pre departure meeting. It's really cool to be able to go "ok, you do all the thinking now". It's amazing , you really don't realise the pressure quite so much when you're in the middle of everything but as soon as you relinquish it the weight just flies off your shoulders. I had a really early night, think I was in bed by 8pm. I was so tired. To many late nights in Lisbon & not enough sleep on the plane. Three continents in 5 days.

Day 1 on Safari, Wed 1/07 - After handing over our money & filling in the insurance details we set off about 9am, it was pretty much just a full day of driving. We were heading to wards Kruger National Park & stayed at Gekos Bushpackers just outside of a town called Hazy View. We were about 15kms form the park. We slept our first night in tents, they're a decent size which is good & there are only 2 people to a tent which isn't bad. I slept really well :)

Day 2 on Safari, Thur 2/07 - Up at 5am (that's always fun) in order to leave for Kruger by 6am. We got there as the gates opened & stayed there all day, don't think we left till after 5pm. It was really cool & we saw so many animals. First thing we saw were Giraffes & Zebras then Elephants, it was soo cool & everyone was really excited. We saw so many different things, no lions though :( One of the ladies, Karen, managed to find a tick off list of all the animals at the park at one of the guests shops. SO here's a list of the animals we saw (not in any order) Vervet Monkey, banded mongoose, spotted hyaena, African elephant, white rhino (although it was been eaten by the hyaenas & vaulters at the time & I didn't see it that well), Burchell's zebras, Hippos, Blue wilderbeast, lots of Impala (McDonald's of the bush), Kudu, Vultures plus heaps of other birds & I briefly saw a warthog that no one else saw.
It was a pretty long day & you'd go 30min or longer with out seeing anything but constantly been on the look out. Oh & btw who goes to Africa to go on safari & doesn't take binoculars with them? Ummm, that would be me, good one huh! I didn't really prepare for this trip quite so well but its all good. I have malaria tablets, insect repellent & sunglasses. FANTASTIC! Plus I just steel everyone else's :o)

Day 3, Fri 3/07 - It's only 7.20am so nothing as yet.

Oh & the moon here seems huge! Hope I get to take a photo of it, it's amazing! Oops, didn't even write about the people on the tour. Our tour leader Toska is awesome & I can't believe ho many hours our truck driver ford spends behind the wheel. There are 4 couples & 4 of us girls traveling by ourselves. One of the couples, Jason & Megan are form Oz & Lilly is form Adelaide, everyone else is form the UK. Jason & Megan, Alex & Jason, Lee & Louise, Thomas & Lilly, Niki, Claire, Karen & Me. 12 in total. It's going to take us about a week in total to get to vic falls then most of the group is going to cape town & Tom, Lilly, Karen, Claire & I are going to Nairobi, another 16 more people are joining us at Vic Falls. So far it's a bit different than the tour I did in OZ, we all just seemed to click instantly on that tour & we all keep in touch but this tour seems a little different. Spose it's cause there's so many couples...

Ok, that's as far as I've written today's the 7th so I've still got 4 days to catch up on... but need to get going...

Today everyone's doing activities & I decided that nothing really appealed & that I could really use some time to myself. So I'm spending the day chilling out & loving it. I so got used to doing my own thing in South America & just the last day or so I've felt a bit locked in. In a minute I'm going to go in search of a massage then spend the afternoon lying in the sun in a hammock reading a book :)

Oh & mum, (emails so slow!) When is Karen going to be in Morocco? I'm thinking of changing plan's & cutting out Spain & France & going there at the end of August instead. Have talked to heaps of people & I think its safe enough even if I were to go by myself. Europe is way to expensive & I think it'd be better to travel there once I'm earning the pound. I've just emailed my travel agent to find out if it's do able.

Ok, gotta go, Love & kisses!

Wednesday, 7th July 2004, Vic Falls, Zimbabwe, Africa, 12.08pm