Durban Welcome

Posted on January 26, 2011December 25, 2013 by Marcia Mayne

Almost everyone we spoke to before we left the U.S. said we’d love Durban, although they didn’t say why exactly. The largest city in KwaZulu Natal, Durban is also an important manufacturing hub and port. It boasts a sub-tropical climate and some of South Africa’s best beaches.

I didn’t know much about the city when I decided to plan that leg of our trip. And apart from a visit to Shakaland, a Zulu homestead near Durban, the only things we wanted to do was watch the whales, get some good Indian food and enjoy the city.

Durban Welcome — Alison, Marcia, Sandra, Tanya and Judith (stooping)

Then I received an email out of the blue from an author in Durban who suggested his book for my book club. When I told him of our plans to visit Durban, he suggested quite strongly that we had to visit ‘Drakensberg.’ When I asked what that was, he said he had no idea (he had just moved to Durban from the UK), that I should search online. Once I did, it added a whole new dimension to our trip.

Through a friend, we found a travel agency, Compassline Africa, that took care of the details and Tanya, Alison and Don from Compassline met us on arrival at Durban’s Shaka Zulu International Airport.

Don would be our driver for our three days in Durban and not too long after we arrived, we had loaded up the car and were on our way to our first stop, Shakaland.

Don Botterill was a combination tour guide, driver, loveable uncle and a proud South African who was enthusiastic about showing and sharing his beautiful country with us.

We were driving along to Shakaland when he received a phone call. Instead of saying, hello, he asked, How’s your granny? We looked at each other and burst into a fit of laughter.

Once we heard that, we knew we were in for a treat with Don. And boy, did he deliver!

Cape Town Winelands: Everywhere a Vineyard

Posted on January 25, 2011April 25, 2013 by Marcia Mayne

We saved our last full day in Cape Town for our trip to the winelands.

Our first stop was at KWV Wines, a 90 year old brandy and wine emporium located in Paarl, one of the three popular wine regions – Stellenbosch and Franschhoek being the other two. We did a tour of the cellars followed by a wine tasting, then a brandy and chocolate tasting. I don’t like chocolate so that pairing was lost on me but Sandra and Judith enjoyed it. Overall, we had a blast at KWV (I’m sure Manfred is still talking about us.) and came away with several bottles of wines and brandies.

Lunch was a relaxing affair at the Seidelberg Wine Estate, a winery, restaurant, glass studio also in the Paarl region.

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Three Black Girlz on Safari: Hippo!

Posted on January 8, 2011December 25, 2013 by Marcia Mayne

The day before we left Makalolo Plains was bittersweet. The team had made us feel very welcome and we knew we had made friends. On top of that, we had spent many hours watching animals at close range, and that was better than the best episode of a nature program.

Towards the end of our morning drive, Godfrey spotted this hippo that appeared to sleeping at the edge of a watering hole. We were fortunate as hippos tend to spend most of their time in water to keep their skin from drying out.

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Three Black Girlz on Safari: Besides animals, what else is there to see?

Posted on January 7, 2011December 25, 2013 by Marcia Mayne

If we didn’t know it before, we discovered pretty quickly that no two game drives are the same. While Makalolo Plains keeps a log of the types of animals that guests could probably see, they cannot offer a guarantee.

During September, the time we in Hwange National Park, there was a high probability of seeing elephants (100%), zebras (100%), waterbucks (100%), widebeests (93%) and steenbucks (90%). But because of the size of the park, the animals have many places to escape the sun so sometimes, we’d drive for long stretches before we’d see anything.

However, the guides are very knowledgeable of the animals’ habits and hideouts and would use every method – from communicating with other guides to following animal tracks in the sand – so that we’d have a good experience. We were very lucky to see four of the Big Five – elephant, lion (60%), leopard (17%) and buffalo (57%) – and witness some pretty interesting animal behavior.

Game drives were never boring. While we jaunted along, different things caught our attention. Take our first day out, for example. We spotted vultures sitting high atop several trees. Others were circling and a few more were flying in – a sure sign that they knew a meal was waiting.

Godfrey told us that an elephant had died the previous day – probably from old age. As guides, they’re not allowed to interfere in animal activities. However, since the elephant had died close to the path, they had moved it out of sight so as not to upset us. We saw part of the carcass – and we could definitely smell it.

Since Hwange is a natural habitat, life and death exist side by side. Seeing the carcass was a reminder but if we hadn’t seen it, there would be other reminders as the bones of dead animals were everywhere.

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Three Black Girlz on Safari: Elephants at the Watering Hole, I

Posted on January 4, 2011December 25, 2013 by Marcia Mayne

With 30,000 elephants in Hwange National Park, it wasn’t whether we would see any, but when and how many.

As the sun came down on our first game drive, cold and blackness overtook us immediately. Dixon pulled out his infrared flashlight to make it easier to spot the animals that had become invisible to us.

We were following the flashlight as it darted from side to side, and complaining, through chattering teeth about how cold it had become when we saw what looked like small beads floating on dusty brown mounds directly ahead. Dixon stopped abruptly. I was shocked when the jeep’s headlights illuminated two elephants — they seemed to have just come out of nowhere. Dixon shone the flashlight at them but before they backed away, one shook its head as if were annoyed at being disturbed.

I was a little unnerved at how close we came. It was our first day and our first time being that close and it brought home the fact that in this world, we were the intruders.

Elephants at the Watering Hole — Elephants at sunset

After that first night, we’d see elephants every time we went on a drive. And as days passed, we got better at spotting them even when they appeared to be hiding among the grass or seemed to blend into the foliage. Since it was difficult to see them at night, I’m absolutely certain that we missed many more than we saw.

Despite their size — African elephants can weigh between 5,000 and 14,000 pounds and are about 8 feet tall — they’re gentle animals. A herd could be approaching and you wouldn’t hear their footsteps. It surprised me to discover that.

They’re also very playful. It’s a treat watching them with their babies, or playing with others in the herd. It was always fun watching them at the watering hole.

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Three Black Girlz on Safari in Zimbabwe: Stalking Big Cats

Posted on January 3, 2011July 10, 2018 by Marcia Mayne

On the afternoon of our second day, we raced to the spot where Godfrey, our guide, had heard that a cheetah was seen. When we arrived, two jeeps of game watchers sat waiting patiently, eyes trained on a spot in the tall grass where the cheetah was supposed to be.

We were looking at the same place for so long, I no longer trusted what I was seeing. Was that a log or the cheetah? The grass was so tall, the color so similar to the cheetah’s skin, I couldn’t be sure. My eyes could play tricks on me but my camera wouldn’t lie, so I pointed it in the general direction, ready to shoot when the cheetah appeared.

We continued to sit and wait, whispering among ourselves from time to time; the radios silenced, so as not to startle the animal. After a while, the other jeeps gave up and left but Godfrey didn’t move. The cheetah, he said, had eaten the previous night and was resting, so we stayed put.

I’m not sure how long we waited, excitement bubbling in my stomach. Then Godfrey, binoculars covering his eyes, whispered urgently and pointed.

Where was it? There it is! Where? Where? We were all whispering loudly at the same time.

The cheetah had gotten up and was walking along. But by the time we spotted it, it dropped unexpectedly into the grass, as if its legs had failed him.

I couldn’t see much through my digital camera so I just snapped several times, hoping I’d get something. This is the best of the lot. If you look closely at the middle of the photo just before the log, you’ll see it.

Caroline did much better.

I’m glad Godfrey decided to wait as this was the only cheetah we would see.

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Three Black Girlz on Safari in Zimbabwe: Sunsets that take your breath away

Posted on January 1, 2011July 10, 2018 by Marcia Mayne

I’ve seen some spectacular sunsets but the ones I saw in Zimbabwe’s Hwange National Park took my breath away.

Each evening, I looked forward to seeing a dazzling display of color as the sun stained the clouds pinky blue, gold, burnt orange, purple-red before settling into an inky-black.

In all, it took about two minutes for the sun to drop completely behind the horizon and when it did, it dragged all the warmth with it. Talk about a sunset!

Let me know what you think.

Hwange - More elephants in the sunset — Elephants at sunset

Can you see the elephants in this photo? They’re almost indistinguishable from the trees that look like they’re right on the horizon…but if you look closely, you’ll see them – two of them actually – just to the left of the photo.

Hwange Sunset — Wildebeests and zebras at sunset

At about 5,700 square miles, Hwange is an enormous park. We left Makalolo and drove for about 30-45 minutes into a part of the park we’d not been to before. We stopped a few times along the way, including to take this photo of wildebeests and zebras together.

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Sawubona! Finding Family in Johannesburg

Posted on December 6, 2010December 25, 2013 by Marcia Mayne

During our meetings in the months leading up to our departure, Sandra, Judith and I decided to identify our three ‘must-see’ places in South Africa. Soweto was on each of our lists.

An abbreviation of South Western Townships, Soweto, is home to about 2 million people. It is recognized internationally as the seat of the Apartheid resistance, and for us, women of African descent, it holds a strong emotional charge. No visit to Johannesburg would have been complete without a trip to Soweto. In fact, if all we got to see was Soweto, we would have been happy. Anything more would be, as we say in Jamaican parlance, brawta, a treat.

We arrived in Johannesburg, South Africa’s largest city, on the last Thursday night in August after a lovely flight via Amsterdam on KLM. KLM’s flight attendants were extremely friendly and attentive, the meals delicious and so attractively presented, I almost didn’t want to damage the package by opening it. (Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, where we had a 2-hour layover and KLM’s service deserve separate posts.)

Thope and Hope, our new friends, were waiting to meet us at Johannesburg’s Oliver R. Tambo International Airport. Thope‘s a friend of my new friend, Montrealer and South African jazz singer, Lorraine Klaasen, and Hope is Thope’s friend and co-owner of Shepherds Court,the guest house where we were booked to stay.

We had met Lorraine earlier in the year, told her about our trip and asked her to recommend places for us to see. When I told her that we didn’t know a soul in South Africa, without hesitation, she whipped out her Blackberry and gave us the contact information of several of her friends and relatives in Johannesburg. We were deeply touched by her generosity.