Monday, March 9, 2009
Thursday, March 5, 2009
C-C-C-Cape Town
Yesterday we went cross country in a rented car, driving on the wrong side of the road. We had some misshaps, and destroyed a hubcap, but we finally made it to the Cape of Good Hope without killing anybody. The first problem happened when dad hugged the curb a bit to closely, and kinda destroyed the hubcap and dented the rim against it. the second was slightly less costly, but a lot more terrifying. He went on the right side of the road and nearly rand into another car head on coming from the other direction. He swerved away just in time, and we continued our journey with echoes of profanities following us.
our first stop was in Simon's Town, where we wen't to The Boulders to sea the african penguins. They're not cute like other penguins, but they're pretty funny when they waddle around. The Boulders were also home to some high winds, which whipped the glistening white sand into a furious storm for the enjoyment of the tourists. I'm still picking it out of my hair and ears.
Our other destination was the Cape of Good Hope, which is actually not the southern most point of Africa, though it's commonly percieved to be. There we were subject to wind speeds upwards of 50 miles an hour when you lean over the blockade to see the precarious cliff below, along with unpredictable gusts that pushed me into the bushes. We found these winds to be exilerating, probably because they didn't have sand in them (they might have had some sand after going through us though). We saw some interesting plants, and took a ton of pictures of the landscape. there were so many extreme and fantastic views, my dad actually complained about it.
"There are to many pictures to take..."
Man, what a dork.
Dad has also confided in me that he's about ready to kill me after spending a month of time with me continuously. I sent the message right back.
Today we went shopping by the harbor and enjoyed the fantastic aquarium they have here. There we enjoyed a closer look at rock hopper penguins, which are considerably more cute and funny that african penguins, and learned about the local ocean and river fauna. We learned about the plight of frogs, the plight of whales, the plight of sharks, the plight of albatrosses, and the plights of just about every other animal in water or around it that humans have managed to touch negatively. Did you know that there are over 100 extinct species of frogs? fun stuff!
our first stop was in Simon's Town, where we wen't to The Boulders to sea the african penguins. They're not cute like other penguins, but they're pretty funny when they waddle around. The Boulders were also home to some high winds, which whipped the glistening white sand into a furious storm for the enjoyment of the tourists. I'm still picking it out of my hair and ears.
Our other destination was the Cape of Good Hope, which is actually not the southern most point of Africa, though it's commonly percieved to be. There we were subject to wind speeds upwards of 50 miles an hour when you lean over the blockade to see the precarious cliff below, along with unpredictable gusts that pushed me into the bushes. We found these winds to be exilerating, probably because they didn't have sand in them (they might have had some sand after going through us though). We saw some interesting plants, and took a ton of pictures of the landscape. there were so many extreme and fantastic views, my dad actually complained about it.
"There are to many pictures to take..."
Man, what a dork.
Dad has also confided in me that he's about ready to kill me after spending a month of time with me continuously. I sent the message right back.
Today we went shopping by the harbor and enjoyed the fantastic aquarium they have here. There we enjoyed a closer look at rock hopper penguins, which are considerably more cute and funny that african penguins, and learned about the local ocean and river fauna. We learned about the plight of frogs, the plight of whales, the plight of sharks, the plight of albatrosses, and the plights of just about every other animal in water or around it that humans have managed to touch negatively. Did you know that there are over 100 extinct species of frogs? fun stuff!
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Table Mountain and more pictures.
Today we got up early (again) and went up to Table Mountain by Cape Town. Table Mountain is a flat mountain at three thousand feet that towers over Cape Town and resides right above the sea. It actually doesn't look to high from underneath, but once you get up there by a fast moving cable car, man is it high. For those of you living in Ketchikan, Table Mountain is about the same height as Deer Mountain, but it feels much higher. The view from the top changes as you face different directions, from an above view of beautiful Cape Town, to a fantastic view of the expansive Atlantic and Indian Oceans, to a cloudy look of the surrounding countryside. We went on a short, brisk walk around the perimeter of the top (part of it, at least) and took some funny and silly videos of us singing "The Sound of Music" and making fun of Cory. Sorry Cory, but it wasn't my idea.
We also saw the City Hall, which is known as The Castle. We learned about the process of justice in the 1600's, which includes forcing people to confess through tortures such as lashings, being hung from the ceiling, being dropped from said ceiling, and being left without treatment for a day after these punishments in a dark, dank dungeon. We took a video here as well, but I'll show you that at home.
Our guide next brought us to a diamond shop that showed us the process of creating diamonds and polishing them. Sorry everybody, but we didn't get any souvenirs there. We also took a look at a very pretty and rare jewel called Tanzinite, which is only found in one mine near Mt. Kilamajaro in Tanzania. It's incredibly rare and very neat looking, in colors varying from blue to violet, and all shades of these colors. We've been told that the darker the stone, the better the quality. I'm not a huge fan of shiny rocks, but I thought that that stone was quite nice to look at.
Well, It's time for dinner. I'll write about tomorrow tomorrow.
Monday, March 2, 2009
Victoria Falls
I must say, Victoria Falls the sight of a lifetime. We only managed to see about a third of the whole falls, but the view was awe inspiring. And wet. VERY wet. The mist created by all that water continuously pouring into the gorge becomes torrents of rain coming from every direction for the enjoyment of the people viewing the natural wonder. We did enjoy it, the rain poured so continuously and with such power that all of the paths were creeks, and the steps were mini sets of Victoria Falls. The downpour is tropically warm and quite enjoyable, and we didn't even attempt to stay dry(unlike some people, who rented raincoats from locals). Anyway, We've decided that going through hell in various airports was worth the experience.
We also went white water rafting yesterday, over class five rapids (dad thinks they were 4, but whatever). I think that dad likes to take every opportunity to scare the crap out of me, because he is continuously doing things that I think are insanely scary or dangerous. For example, part of the white water rafting tour was a cliff jump from various heights. you could do the easy one, at eight feet or the medium one (which I did) at fifteen feet. However, there was another cliff at more than 35 feet that dad climbed up to, while the guides warned him against it. He jumped of first. He also walked out on a rock that hangs out over the Zambezi river about 25 feet from the falls, and posed for a picture. On the flight over as well, he kept threatening that the propeller would break off and saw the plane in half. Ah, good times.
Anyways, now we're in Cape Town, on the final leg of our journey. I'll be home in about a week!
We also went white water rafting yesterday, over class five rapids (dad thinks they were 4, but whatever). I think that dad likes to take every opportunity to scare the crap out of me, because he is continuously doing things that I think are insanely scary or dangerous. For example, part of the white water rafting tour was a cliff jump from various heights. you could do the easy one, at eight feet or the medium one (which I did) at fifteen feet. However, there was another cliff at more than 35 feet that dad climbed up to, while the guides warned him against it. He jumped of first. He also walked out on a rock that hangs out over the Zambezi river about 25 feet from the falls, and posed for a picture. On the flight over as well, he kept threatening that the propeller would break off and saw the plane in half. Ah, good times.
Anyways, now we're in Cape Town, on the final leg of our journey. I'll be home in about a week!
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Tanzania
to finish off my bit about Kenya, I'll tell you about our guide, Dominique. he's been a safari guide for 25 years and I have to say he is very good at his job. In fact, we like him so much we decided to prank him. Now, Chloe has this stuffed animal, a rat, named Pinky. Dominique has told us a few grisly stories about animals in cars, so we decided to have Pinky attack someone while on safari. The perfect moment came when Kirsten was in the front seat. We were driving slowly to avoid speed bumps, there was a bush nearby that an animal could jump out of, and we no one was expecting it. Kirsten stuck her hand out the window.
"Hey, what's that thing? oh my god! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!! WAAAAAH!"
Dominique screamed as Kirsten shoved a flailing animal that was attached to her arm in his face. he tried to jump out of the car, but not before hitting the brakes with enough force to propel my face into the seat in front of me and shoot 8 year old Chloe onto the floor. Ouch.
Once we all started laughing, Dominique told Kirsten to get out of the car. She didn't, but it made us laugh even harder. I don't think he ever thought it was funny, but we're still laughing at it.
Now we have a new guide named Daniel, and he took a wild animal it the face a lot better than Dominique. If any of you know my stuffed monkey Pedro, you can imagine what happened. same thing, but with baboons surrounding us, Pedro on the attack, and Chris as the lead actor. it was also quite entertaining. Daniel's nick name is Mamba, which means Crocodile in Swahili. The first place we visited with him was the fabulous Ngorongoro crater, which has a self contained ecosystem. We went on an early morning safari to see the twilight hours through the eyes of a wildebeest. The view was fantastic, because the clouds were pouring over the rim of the crater and into the center like an overflowing vanilla latte. The clouds were tinged pink from the rising sun, and the zebras and wildebeest were enjoying the peace that comes when the lions get a fresh kill. We also saw the lions with that fresh kill, and watched as one cub stole a hunk of bloody meat from another.that was pretty fantastic.
After this whole ordeal, we went to the expansive Serengeti National Park, which was named after the Masai word (seringet) that means "Endless Place." For good reason too! The place is over 14,000 square miles of plains, forest and water, based roughly on the annual wildebeest migration, which was what we came here for. The migration is when almost 2 million wildebeest and almost as many zebras migrate around Tanzania and Kenya and face dangers such as crocodiles, hyenas, lions, raging rivers, and their own stupidity. Zebras are significantly smarter than wildebeests, they let the fools take most of their falls for them.
we also have seen several different species having a bit of fun, if you know what I mean. We've seen gazelles, lions, vultures and baboons, all fornicating. Actually, I saw two different sets of baboons going at it, and one couple with a bit of disgusting evidence. Must be mating season.
Now we're at a hotel in Arusha waiting for our various cars to take us to our various flights to various places. We have some slow Internet, which is allowing me to type this right now. I'll take some time to answer some questions here, because I just went through all the comments. Sorry, no one has asked to buy my dad yet. I guess I'm just more beautiful than him. Camel tastes musty,but you have to take about an hour to chew one bite of it. Sorry for the responsibility Leo, but I think you can handle it ;0. I'll try to get you all some souvenirs, but IT'S SO HARD TO GET EVERYBODY STUFF! I got Katy some sugar packets though. and I got Methi a hat from Egypt. and about a million post cards.
Well, I have to go. Meanwhile, the baboons and lions are smoking their cigarettes.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Maasai
Sorry for the delay in postings, but we've been lacking in the internet department as of late. We just finished our safari in Kenya, and now we're in a hotel for lunch in Tanzania. I'll just talk about Kenya here, because we've only been in Tanzania for a few hours. Kenya is surprisingly green for the dry season, but it's also ridiculously dusty. We all enjoyed the roads (by "we" I mean the eight of us, Kirsten Steketee, her husband Chris Morscheck, their kids Chloe and Sarah, and Kirsten's cousin Kim, plus her husband, Chris. Yeah. Two Chris's) with all the potholes and speedbumps, and dad and I got a taste of Montezuma's african cousin, coloblo. Dad came up with the name, he made it sound like a Swahili word. I've learned about thirty words in Swahili, and I'm trying to learn a song called Kenya Best in Swahili.
The people here are very different from what I'm used to. There are 54 different tribes in Kenya, and more than a hundred in Tanzania. If you ask someone what tribe they are from, you do't get a short answer, you get the name of the tribe, an idea of the language, and what the tribe is famous for. Our guide, Dominique, is from a tribe famous for carving. fdon't remember the name though.
the most interesting of the people though, based solely on looks, is the Maasai. there are a lot of Maasai, and they do wierd things to their bodies. They get their ears pierced, then weigh down the earrings to turn the peaircing into a big hole. Sometimes the earlobes touch the shoulders! We went to a Maasai village and watched them dance and sing. We leaerned two Maasai words (Ashay is thank you and sopa is hello) and danced with them. Most of them had shaved heads, but some had long, braided hair. While they were dancing one of the ones with hair hit me with it. The Maasai live in little huts made out of cow crap. the wives build the houses and the termites eat it. The Maasai are poligamist and a man can buy a wife for 6 to 7 cows. I'm kinda curious as to how that works. Does the man haggle for a price with the father of the girl? It's all quite wierd.
On the topic of the actual safari, we saw a TON of animals. We saw lions, leopards, vervet monkeys, baboons, cheetahs, hyenas, girraffes, elephants, zebras, all sorts of songbirds, a bat eared fox, warthogs, jackals, hippos, thompsons gezzelle, impalas cape buffalo and ostriches. There was a big swamp where hippos and elephants stayed all day, and a road running through it. A bunch of elephants were on the road, and a little baby one got mad at us when we tried to pass it. It bellowed more loudly than I imagined possible, then ran into the water. It also ran into papa, who bellowed and threw the kid into the water, both of the protesting loudly. We were also chased by two different Cape buffalo and we were threatened by a baboon. We frightened warthogs on multiple occasions, and I have to tell you, they're hilarious. When they run their tails go up like radio antennae and they book it. I gotta go. more later.
The people here are very different from what I'm used to. There are 54 different tribes in Kenya, and more than a hundred in Tanzania. If you ask someone what tribe they are from, you do't get a short answer, you get the name of the tribe, an idea of the language, and what the tribe is famous for. Our guide, Dominique, is from a tribe famous for carving. fdon't remember the name though.
the most interesting of the people though, based solely on looks, is the Maasai. there are a lot of Maasai, and they do wierd things to their bodies. They get their ears pierced, then weigh down the earrings to turn the peaircing into a big hole. Sometimes the earlobes touch the shoulders! We went to a Maasai village and watched them dance and sing. We leaerned two Maasai words (Ashay is thank you and sopa is hello) and danced with them. Most of them had shaved heads, but some had long, braided hair. While they were dancing one of the ones with hair hit me with it. The Maasai live in little huts made out of cow crap. the wives build the houses and the termites eat it. The Maasai are poligamist and a man can buy a wife for 6 to 7 cows. I'm kinda curious as to how that works. Does the man haggle for a price with the father of the girl? It's all quite wierd.
On the topic of the actual safari, we saw a TON of animals. We saw lions, leopards, vervet monkeys, baboons, cheetahs, hyenas, girraffes, elephants, zebras, all sorts of songbirds, a bat eared fox, warthogs, jackals, hippos, thompsons gezzelle, impalas cape buffalo and ostriches. There was a big swamp where hippos and elephants stayed all day, and a road running through it. A bunch of elephants were on the road, and a little baby one got mad at us when we tried to pass it. It bellowed more loudly than I imagined possible, then ran into the water. It also ran into papa, who bellowed and threw the kid into the water, both of the protesting loudly. We were also chased by two different Cape buffalo and we were threatened by a baboon. We frightened warthogs on multiple occasions, and I have to tell you, they're hilarious. When they run their tails go up like radio antennae and they book it. I gotta go. more later.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Kenya
I am typing this from our room in my favorite hotel in all of Africa. We’re in Kenya now, and this hotel is home to the biggest swimming pool in the country of Kenya. It really is a cool pool, it looks like part of the landscape and it’s surrounded by plants of all kinds. I’m glad to see some green after being in Cairo! We’ve learned some politics (they just had a regime change here last year, it was messy for a while with riots, but things have calmed down a bit and now Kenya has a more democratic check and balance system between two political parties. We are learning some Swahili words (jambo is hello), and we’re starting to get used to the currency. One American dollar is worth about 75 Kenyan shillings. Leo! Thanks for the comment. Tell everyone else that if they don’t say anything then I won’t bring them any souvenirs.
At the airport today (at 4 am) we met two guys from America. One of them was actually from Oregon: he lived in Salem on Battle Creek, only around 10 miles away from us. The guy and his friend were studying in Cairo to learn Arabic, and they talked to us for an hour or so. There were a total of 3 major and bizarre coincidences with this guy: he was from Oregon, He was in the same flight as us, and he’d spent three months at my dad’s hometown Ketchikan, Alaska. They were really interesting ad we discussed all sorts of things with him.
/
We started taking preventative malaria medication yesterday; hopefully it won’t have any bad side effects. Dad brought a different type of medication in case we react badly to this stuff. I haven’t seen any elephants yet, but I’ll tell you guys when I do. I have seen some cool art though. I think I’ll have to bring something of that sort home just because it’s so different. The plants here are very different too; I’ve taken about thirty pictures of flowers alone. The weather is perfect and this place is like a bird sanctuary with all the calls I’m hearing right now. The sky is a ridiculously dark and pure shade of blue, it’s like there’s no air pollution at all. Needless to say, I like it here. I guess that’s just my green hippie child side showing itself. More later.
~Kelly
P.S. We just finished dinner. I had beef, pork, chicken, turkey, lamb, goat, camel and crocodile. Crocodile is salty.
At the airport today (at 4 am) we met two guys from America. One of them was actually from Oregon: he lived in Salem on Battle Creek, only around 10 miles away from us. The guy and his friend were studying in Cairo to learn Arabic, and they talked to us for an hour or so. There were a total of 3 major and bizarre coincidences with this guy: he was from Oregon, He was in the same flight as us, and he’d spent three months at my dad’s hometown Ketchikan, Alaska. They were really interesting ad we discussed all sorts of things with him.
/
We started taking preventative malaria medication yesterday; hopefully it won’t have any bad side effects. Dad brought a different type of medication in case we react badly to this stuff. I haven’t seen any elephants yet, but I’ll tell you guys when I do. I have seen some cool art though. I think I’ll have to bring something of that sort home just because it’s so different. The plants here are very different too; I’ve taken about thirty pictures of flowers alone. The weather is perfect and this place is like a bird sanctuary with all the calls I’m hearing right now. The sky is a ridiculously dark and pure shade of blue, it’s like there’s no air pollution at all. Needless to say, I like it here. I guess that’s just my green hippie child side showing itself. More later.
~Kelly
P.S. We just finished dinner. I had beef, pork, chicken, turkey, lamb, goat, camel and crocodile. Crocodile is salty.
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