Real World Gaborone Episode 3 - House Silliness!

This is the true story of five strangers, picked to live in a house, work together and have their lives taped, to find out what happens when people stop being polite... and start getting real. This is The Real World, Gaborone.

I know. I get it. I can get really really silly sometimes. And how did I not think about all the potential critters in Africa before getting here? They are totally a part of life here…and this episode of Real World Gaborone is all about it.

A loud shriek is heard from the upstairs grey bedroom (my bedroom).

Paw Prints in the sidewalk

“HELP!” I scream as I run out of my room and head in search of Trevor. “Uh, Trevor?”

“Yeah? I heard you LuckyCdnGirl, what’s up?”

“A HUGE SPIDER is in my room!”

“Really? A huge spider?”

“YES!” I say, directing him to my room. “Can you PLEASE help me? PLEASE?”

“Okay, show me where it is.”

Pointing, I show Trevor palm-sized, flat, black spider…

“Get out of here if you don’t want to watch,“ he says.

I run to the other side of the house and wait.

Trevor finds me in the office.

“It’s gone.”

“You killed it?” I ask.

“No, I chased him out of your room, using the door to the balcony.”

I breathe a big sigh of relief…thank you.

And that was just night number one at Casa Maria.

Somehow my housemates from the Caribbean hate flies. I don’t know what it is, or where it comes from, but they hate them. Last weekend, Tina, Trevor, Jenny and I were all in the Prado just after having a leisurely breakfast out at Delis in Broadhurst. This is what happens when a fly is found in our vehicle…

Termite Hill on the golf course
(they are found ALL over town)

Trevor is driving. Jenny is in the front passenger seat.

I am behind Trevor and Tina is behind Jenny.

(Note to my North American readers: When you imagine our seating arrangements, don’t forget they drive on the other side of the road here!)

Trevor is telling us a story about his strange encounter at the bathroom where we just had breakfast with this guy who was either trying to pick him up for himself, or his girl friend, or perhaps both?

“…He said ‘We saw you last night.’” Trevor continues.

“What? Who?” I ask.

“Yeah, who? What? Was it the girl…” Jenny asks.

When suddenly!

“AHHH!!! A fly is in the car!”

“What?!” shouts Trevor.

And before we know it, Trevor pulls the car over.

Jenny and I are very confused.

(Wouldn’t you just open the windows? Why are we stopping?)

Tina is screaming little a tiny baby girl.

Trevor has pulled the Prado aside and opened all our windows.

Both Tina and Trevor are trying to shoe the teeny tiny little fly out the window.

Success.

We all die of laughter.

What on earth just happened???

Moral of the story -  Caribbean peeps can handle spiders but not flies.

Okay one more story for good measure –

And just because it JUST happened.

So we get to work this morning at our usual time, around 830am.

We’re just settling in and the power goes out.

Doesn’t come back til about 11:15am-ish.

We’re working away, have lunch, all is good when…

It’s about 2pm and boom. Power goes out.

Sigh…

Big sigh…

No power again.

In fact, the power doesn’t come back before we leave the office at 5:00pm

And it’s a huge power outage.

No traffic lights ALL THE WAY HOME…

You can only imagine the traffic…

The girls (Jenny, Tina) and I had pre-planned dinner out tonight.

We go to our favourite Indian restaurant called Saffron in the Sebele Centre.

Deelish…

But that’s not the story –

It’s back at the house, after dinner –

Where, surprise surprise, no power.

It’s totally dark.

We find candles and head upstairs.

The girls are in my room while I pack for the Delta safari adventure that I’m leaving for in the morning.

“How many pairs of panties for 3 days guys?” I ask just wanting to see what they’d say.

“8,” Tina says.

(Not surprised, we call her Actuary Tina because of her rather risk averse look at life)

“Really Actuary Tina? You’re hilarious!” Jenny laughs.

“Uh yeah, 2 per day, plus 2 extra, just in case,” Tina explains.

“Hey, LuckyCdnGirl, you’ve been taking your malaria pills right?” Jenny asks.

“OH crap!” I say… “Oops!”

“Don’t worry – you can start now.”

I go into the drawer where I’ve stored my miscellaneous medication and find them. After wrestling a little with the packaging I pop one in my mouth. It’s rather minty I think to myself, when I take the package over to a candle so I can see…

“OH man!” I laugh, “That wasn’t for malaria.”

“What did you take?!” Actuary Tina asks.

“Quick dissolve Immodium!” I laugh!

After more laughter, I do find my malaria pills and  finish my packing and the girls head to bed.

It’s only 9pm…after brushing my teeth and using a wash cloth dampened with the last of my water bottle, I think about heading to bed when miraculously the power returns!

AHHH!!!! Just in time to write this and go to bed. Tomorrow I head to the Okavango Delta! 

***************

Jr. – a mid-20’s Toronto boy, born and bred. Accountant by trade. On this project to travel and try something different. Nurse/student girlfriend at home.

Trevor – an early 30’s guy from the Caribbean. Completed a number of these types of projects before in different countries. Single

Tina – a late 30’s/early 40’s Caribbean woman who has lived and worked with Trevor on projects in different countries. Single

Jenny – an early 30’s woman from Vancouver. Common-law Life partner at home.

And me. LuckyCdnGirl. Accustomed to travel but never been to Africa

My Botswana Family...

“I just miss the noise of tv, you know what I mean?”

Enjoyed the African sun this afternoon from the pool.

“Yeah…” I respond to my housemate, “I totally get it.”

It’s Sunday morning. The morning of the big day.

If you are Canadian, you know what I mean.

We are dying here at “Casa Maria”.

The big game is on in 3 hours and the tv’s in our house are NOT working.

Why?

Because, although we were told the cable bill has been paid until the 14 of March, it is not.

We have found a solution.

But unfortunately the solution includes using a vehicle to get to the furthest mall in Gaborone, to pay the bill directly at DSTV so we will immediately be able to watch Team Canada win Gold.

And therein lies the situation.

Our one housemate TOLD us (rather than ask us), that he was taking the car to climb a hill.

The other house, Mecca (named because they have a newer home with working everything AND two lemon trees and an avocado tree), where they are not using the car, has asked that we walk 30 minutes to their house if we want to borrow “their” car. I say “their” because truly, it’s a company vehicle…

WHAT is going on here?

We are supposed to be one team.

We are certainly not feeling like it.

These are daily little frustrations that make living and working a bajillion miles away from the people you care about, difficult.

Because, at least in Casa Maria, everything else is awesome. I mean, just this morning I woke to my housemate sending me a text message that said, “Come downstairs, I will feed you.” How much more lucky can I get?

Yesterday we said goodbye to one of our housemates. He is only going home for 3 weeks, but right now it feels like eons. After only having lived together for 4 weeks, we have become a family in a way. We fell into a routine almost immediately. And while the details of our routine are not sexy, they make us feel good. And even though it sometimes feels like we’re “complaining” about little things here and there, we remember that we have each other. And it feels good to talk to people who know what we are going through.

This in no way means we do not miss our IMPORTANT people at home.

We miss them greatly. And we talk about you ALL THE TIME!

We do share some of our frustrations with you, but you need to know, we censor them a bit.

We don’t want you to be worried about us or become frustrated that you can’t help.

We want you to know that, while there are daily frustrations, we are loving our time in Africa.

And we understand that you too may be censoring things at home.

This is ok, we’ll catch up when we get home.

And all the little things that seemed SO BIG at one point, in fact are not at all.

And all that will matter, is that we are together again.

If you’ve been following along, you know that there are amazing, amazing things we are seeing and experiencing in southern Africa. (In fact, later this week I am venturing out to the Okavango Delta!)

But it wouldn’t be true or real or honest of me, not to say, that life isn’t perfect.

But what I’m getting to do here is truly amazing and as always, I am truly a very lucky lucky girl.

And in case you were wondering…

We DID get the tv working and we watched the GOLD medal game!

And WE ARE SUCH PROUD CANADIANS!

was kinda weird watching the gold medal hockey game
in 30 degree weather but hey! we were victorious!
GO CANADA GO!
WE ARE WINTER!

The Real World Gaborone Episode 2

This is the true story of five strangers, picked to live in a house, work together and have their lives taped, to find out what happens when people stop being polite... and start getting real. This is the Real World, Gaborone.

We’ve got all the right characters (names have been changed to protect their privacy).

Jr. – a mid-20’s Toronto boy, born and bred. Accountant by trade. On this project to travel and try something different. Nurse/student girlfriend at home.

Trevor – an early 30’s guy from the Caribbean. Completed a number of these types of projects before in different countries. Single

Tina – a late 30’s/early 40’s Caribbean woman who has lived and worked with Trevor on projects in different countries. Single

Jenny – an early 30’s woman from Vancouver. Common-law Life partner at home.

And me. LuckyCdnGirl – From the TDot. Sweet dog and loveable fam at home. Accustomed to travel but never been to Africa!

Since episode one: not much has changed. We continue to work long days and play hard when we can… Jr’s girlfriend arrived for a one week visit earlier this week, so Trevor, Tina, Jenny and I have been holding down the fort at Casa Maria.

Walkin' around the neighbourhood

 Thursday night at Casa Maria...

Jenny and I sprawled out on the leather lazy boys in our tv room and watch the rest of the Internship…Jenny sipping on her favourite South African red, me, my new fave, gin and tonic… Finally, a peaceful night at Casa Maria.

We laugh at the easiness of the movie and wonder what Tina is going on about as she walks through the house mumbling things. The ease of our evening suddenly turns when we hear a knock at the door. We look at our phones. It’s just past 9pm. Who on earth is at the door?

An early morning meeting

Jenny heads to the front door and asks, “Hello? Who’s there?”

“It’s me Jeff.”

Our BOSS! WHAT?! WHAT is he doing at our house in the middle of the night…In the middle of OUR peaceful night?!

Tina hears us and heads down to help us out.

“Where’s the key,” Jenny asks.

(Casa Maria has about 5 billion doors, each with keys that unlock them from the INSIDE and out. We have six…YES, six keys to the front door and yet none of them are nearby.)

Tina runs back up to grab her key.

I go upstairs to find Trevor, “Get downstairs with us! It’s Jeff!”

“What the…” Jeff shakes his head and heads downstairs with me…

Finally we get the door open, and Jeff, his wife Cindy and their buddy, Johnny (who is doing creative work on the project) stroll in.

“We brought leftovers!” smiles Cindy…

We are all wondering what on earth is going on…when we realize, it truly isn’t as bad as we thought.

Trevor leaves for his 3 week trip home on Saturday (the girls in the house are devastated as we have NO idea how we’ll cope without our personal chef, driver, bodyguard, and big brother) and Jeff, Cindy and Johnny leave for a weekend trip tomorrow morning. They had just returned from dinner out thought they’d drop in to say their farewells to Trev (and apparently leave us with their butter chicken and naan leftovers).

Cut to later in the evening…

We’re hanging out in our upper lounge area at Casa Maria. There are crazy oversized chairs and a piano. The chairs are referred to as thrones and somehow there is GREAT wifi reception there…If I’m quiet and in the house, you will usually find me on “my throne”.

Tina, Trevor and I are discussing the next morning’s timing. We were pleased we had no 730am meetings and since the boss was going to be away…we were thinking we could have a little more time to sleep in… :)

Celebrating 100 days until the African Youth Games

“Ok Trevor, if we’re not leaving for the gym til 6am, I’ll wake you at 5” Tina says with a smile.

“WHAT? You need an hour before you go to the gym?” I ask.

“No! Tina, you’re nuts!” Trevor replies.

“Ok, 525am, that’s my last offer. Besides you need time to make my smoothie after you shower, “Tina smiles.

“What? You shower before you go the gym?!” I ask.

“Yeah, I do too,” says Tina.

At this point, Jenny, who was in her room, comes to join us, “Let me get this straight Tina. You shower before you go to the gym, when you get home from the gym…”

“Yes,” says Tina, “and when we get home from work and before I go to bed.”

“Four times!” Jenny exclaims… “Full disclosure time. At home I shower every other day!”

My mouth drops.

Trevor laughs and points at me, “Look at LuckyCdnGirl, she cannot believe you!”

Oh what you learn when people stop being nice…and start telling the truth! Haha!

Return to Tau

Panoramic View from the back deck of my hut

Early last week we were looking for a little getaway. Just some place to enjoy the outdoors and maybe see something new. After some consultation with (our new best friend, travel agent) Mandy, we decided we’d return to Madikwe in South Africa and stay again at Tau Lodge. Little did we know just how good a decision that was…

Chocolate lava cake (dessert on last day lunch)

As we pulled up to the Lodge midday on Saturday, our Game Driver Patrick (from two weeks ago) was there to greet us along with cold homemade lemonade and a great big smile. I think we actually “squealed” with delight knowing Patrick would once again be our game driver and take us on our safari adventures! Our room assignments are given to us and we headed to lunch.

Lunch at Tau is bountiful. The buffet greets us with numerous salads and hot dishes. I head for my favourites: chicken pie, spinach and beef salad and a smattering of fruit. Dessert, which must be noted, consisted of a chocolate caramel tarte, passionfruit panacotta and tiramisu. Every bite was heavenly.

Part of what is so incredible about Tau is their spa. Jackie and Evelyn are the sweetest and most talented aestheticians. As I did on our last visit, I opt for a hot stone massage. Evelyn whispers quietly to met\ to ensure I am comfortable. How could I not be? The hot stones are warm and so calming,  I fall into a short  nap…

Afternoon game drive immediately provides one lone and majestic elephant. I have to say, even though I’ve been on four game drives now, it is a new experience every time – even in the same reserve. I will never tire of seeing elephants or the baby lion cubs. Patrick never disappoints. He combines the intel provided by other game drivers (by radio) and tracks animal prints and poops on the roads. I love seeing Patrick slow the truck down, stare at the ground, reverse the vehicle and switch direction – when he does this, you know you’re about to be in for a treat!

For example, we spent a good twenty minutes Saturday afternoon, ohhh-ing and ahhhh-ing at two lion cubs. They were hidden under a cluster of tall bushes; adorable little cubs, probably only four weeks old. One looked at us curiously, while the other slept without notice of us. It was incredible to see…and from time to time, we realized that mama lion, might not be so far away, and that we should watch our backs!

Later that afternoon we came upon 9 female lions of different ages and sizes. Around the same

9 Female Lions

spot, we also spied two large ostriches in the distance…We followed for a while, watching the lions notice the ostriches and start to walk slowly in their direction. We thought, for a moment, that we might get to see a “kill”! Not this time… instead we continued to follow the lions, watching them walk, stop, lie in the tall grass and play with one another.

We had an amazing elephant encounter with the very large grey beast, who came right up beside our truck…we all held our breaths…some caught it on video, almost missing the event in “real life”. Saying it was amazing, does not seem to do the experience justice. But what more can I say? It was amazing…

My Outdoor Shower

While at the lodge, you worry for nothing. Nothing. This time my hut was closer to the watering hole and I spent some time sitting outside, listening to the sounds of birds, the soft trampling of the antelope and the splashes of the alligators. Each hut has a little soaker tub, complete with bath salts and an outdoor shower. Showering bathed in the light of a full moon and a sky full of stars is absolutely unreal. Similarly, showering in the sunshine, with a view of the watering hole is something I will not soon forget.

The lodge’s servers (David), staff (Tumi), front desk staff (Poppy & Rebone), bar man (“President”), spa staff (Evelyn & Jackie) and pastry chef (didn’t catch her name) are all amazing. Everyone remembered us from our previous visit (albeit it was only two weeks ago), and made us feel special.

One absolutely special treat. Rebone, who works at the front, told me she had a special gift for

Patrick gives us a lesson on animal tracks

me. I was told not to open it until we were out of the park. I didn’t open the package until back home in Gabs. It wasn’t from Tau Lodge. The present was from Patrick, our ranger (who is actually sub-contracted, we requested him on our bookings for this trip because we loved him so much two weeks ago). Patrick had given me a wood carving of a giraffe.

He remembered they were my favourite.

Absolute sweetness.

Every meal with a view of the Watering Hole

Relaxing on my deck...

a stop for coffee and rusks (kinda like biscottti)
on morning game drive

The Real World Gaborone...installment one.

This is the true story of five strangers, picked to live in a house, work together and have their lives taped, to find out what happens when people stop being polite... and start getting real. This is the Real World, Gaborone.

Any MTV Real World Fans out there? Cause sometimes I feel like I’m living the tv show in real life, minus the tv cameras…although if MTV is reading, you really should consider us…

We’ve got all the right characters (names have been changed to protect their privacy).

Jr. – a mid-20’s Toronto boy, born and bred. Accountant by trade. On this project to travel and try something different. Nurse/student girlfriend at home.

Trevor – an early 30’s guy from the Caribbean. Completed a number of these types of projects before in different countries. Single

Tina – a late 30’s/early 40’s Caribbean woman who has lived and worked with Trevor on projects in different countries. Single

Jenny – a late 30’s/early 40’s woman from Vancouver. Common-law Life partner at home.

And me. LuckyCdnGirl. Accustomed to travel but never been to Africa.

For those of you who don’t know The Real World series, what basically happens is 7 strangers get thrown into an amazing location and are given a job. They live together for approximately 4 months. In our situation, none of us knew each other except for Trevor and Tina who worked together previously, we are all on the project for various lengths of time. We also have two other houses of people but “Real world Gaborone” will focus only on “Casa Maria” as we call our house (named after the owner of the house we’re renting).

This morning at Casa Maria…

After a run and yoga or a morning swim and shower, I come down the stairs and into the kitchen. I am met by Trevor and Tina who have just arrived from the gym.

“Hey LuckyCdnGirl!”, Trevor says, “I’ve got photographic evidence!”

I lean in and take a look at Trevor’s phone.

He’s got a photo of Tina being chatted up by the cute Chinese restaurant owner guy that she’s been interested in but will do nothing about.

Teasing of Tina ensues!

This only to be stopped by Jr’s arrival in the kitchen.

“My milk smells bad,” he says as he takes his cereal into the dining room.

Trevor and I continue teasing Tina, asking her if she’ll invite him to join us for the Valentine’s dinner we are having at Chinese guy’s family restaurant.

Jr. returns to the kitchen.

“Expletive! Expletive! Expletive! My milk is bad. There goes breakfast!”, he says as he throws the cereal in the trash and asks, “Why doesn’t milk last long in this country?”

Trevor pipes up something about the lack of preservatives while Jr. mentions how he keeps milk in his fridge at home for a month…(a month??? Where is he buying his milk?)

Cut to the arrival of Winnie. Our maid. She tidies our home on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. She cleans our rooms on a rotation and while she does have a salary, we give her extra money to do our laundry. Today is my day and Tina’s day to get our rooms cleaned and laundry done.

“So, really Jenny, you really let Winnie wash your delicate unmentionables?”, I ask, (til now I’ve been taking them to a local laundry mat).

“Yes. There is no problem. Winnie does a good job on them.”

“Okay…thanks…” I respond.

“…but, you never know, maybe she let’s Curtis play with them!”

“What?!”

Curtis is our “house boy.” He comes on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays to deal with the outside of the house, the plants, the grass, the pool. He is the cutest Motswana (singular for a person from Botswana) you’ve ever seen.

Just yesterday after work, I was considering jumping in the pool for a cool down.

Jr. was laying out by the pool reading (as usual) and sipping on a g&t (our regular drink – gin & tonic, mostly because someone said the quinine in the tonic fights malaria…not that Gaborone is a malaria area…). I went back in the house and chatted with Jenny…when Jr. came in saying it was a good I hadn’t yet jumped in the pool because Curtis had shocked it this afternoon and it wasn’t going to be ready for 5 days…5 days?! No way! I ran out to find Curtis…

“Curtis! Curtis!” I called.

Curtis appeared in only his shorts, arms crossed, covering his bare chest.

“Hi Miss LuckyCdnGirl.”

“Curtis, can we really NOT use the pool for 5 days?!”

“Not 5 days mma (how you address women in Setswana, kind of like saying miss). I put chemicals in the pool today.”

“So can I swim tomorrow morning?”

“…maybe no…”

“So tomorrow after work?”

“…I think maybe Friday.”

“Okay Curtis. Thank you! Have a good night.”

I think the best part of that interaction was Curtis standing there, with his arms crossed in front of him. Poor guy. I shoulda just let him dress and go home in peace…

And so ends this installment of the Real World Gaborone. Stay tuned for more.

I would definitely appreciate comments!

Thanks friends!

Peculiarities of Living in Botswana

A perfect Sunday evening sunset...

Random Blackouts

We lost power at some point last night, which, has been a rather usual situation. (In the time I’ve been here, we’ve experienced about half a dozen to a dozen blackouts). The house we live in does not have central air, it has a water cooling system, which kind of cools the house a bit, but is in no way like having air conditioning! I purchased a fan to keep my bedroom cool, so that was my only indication that we had lost power in the middle of the night. I think what woke me was a little bird outside my window who was trying to get in!

Anyway- by 6am, the power was still out. Luckily on my “workout” schedule, I had already planned to go for a swim this morning, which was nice, because when there’s no power in the house, there’s no water (pump doesn’t run!). My housemates went to the gym as usual, probably thinking that they could get showers there – no such luck, the power was out at the gym also! Luckily, power came back on just in time for breakfast!

You know how this story ends right? We get to work at our regular time and – sure enough, the power goes out! I have less than an hour of time left on my laptop battery. And as I write this, there is no internet connectivity (hope it comes back soon!).

"Oh you know, just taking the family out for a
Sunday afternoon shop at the grocery store"

Road Traffic Accidents

So before you start to worry – I am fine. My colleagues are all fine. We are ok!

On Monday this week, we were involved in an RTA as they are referred to here in Gaborone. We were literally moments away from the office when we heard a big crash behind us, followed by us being hit.It was quite a hard impact, but luckily we are fine and there was only minimal damage to the car. The entire experience was more a shock to our system than anything. And the follow up process in dealing with the local authorities was something that is still on-going two days later.

You know how at home you ensure everyone is ok, then start taking down information for everyone involved, then go on your way to file the paperwork? Not here. Here the police arrive, talk to everyone, take notes and try and understand what happened. Then you go to the police station, wait for everyone involved to get there, then you all take your vehicles to another location to get a thorough check. (The accident happened at about 830am, by the time the vehicle inspection was complete it was about 1230pm). Next you go back to the police station to “hash out” with everyone involved what exactly happened. Then the police officers take time to deliberate and finally, return to read the verdict to everyone. By the time all the paperwork was signed it was about 3:30pm.

We were not at fault. We were hit by a car who was hit by a car who was trying to change lanes…That made a truck, who was trying to evade colliding with the lane changing car, to hit another car and end up in oncoming traffic! We were very lucky no one was hurt!

We are the white car in front of the blue Ford. The red car is the one that caused the RTA by trying to change lanes.

Safari Time! (Madikwe Reserve, South Africa)

Super Excited to be on Safari!!!

The LION KING! :)

Approaching Madikwe Game Reserve

UPDATE: Want to see more pix? Check out my Flipagram at Cherrie's Safari pix in 30 seconds! 

Have you ever been lucky enough to go on safari?

It is the most incredible experience!

Being upclose and personal with the animals – Totally indescribable…but I will try.

We stayed at Tau Lodge in the Madikwe Reserve in South Africa.

Madikwe is 75000 hectares big!

It's one of the largest game reserves in South Africa and they have both the "Big 5" and the "Magnificient 7".

The Big 5 are: the lion, rhino, leopard, elephant and buffalo... 

And the wild dog and cheetah and you've got the magnificent 7.

(We got to see the magnificent 7 minus the leopard...which apparently is the hardest to find.)

While at the lodge, our stay included two game drives daily. One early in the morning and one in the evening.

Each day worked like this:

5am - wake up call

5am-530am - tea/coffee/muffins

530- 9am - game drive

9am - breakfast

1pm - lunch

430pm - afternoon tea

5 - 8pm - game drive

8pm - dinner

They look like busy days - but you have the FULL day between game drives to go back to sleep, go to the spa, go to the pool...etc. 

Tau had amazing huts/chalets that we stayed in.

All of the "huts" backed a watering hole where animals come by to drink.

There were tons of waterbuck antelope and zebras that went by - but one of the afternoons I also saw three wort hogs! That was so cool!

I was eye to eye with these animals, probably about 20 ft apart…

The only thing that separates us is an electrified fence.

My amazing room...those steps lead to a hot tub!

While we were on game drive we had the same ranger every time. Ours was named Patrick and he was amazing. He was able to look in the road for paw/hoof marks and figure out where to go - he'd also look at the different "poop" in the road to see if it was 'fresh' and if we should follow it! Then when we found animals - Patrick would make sure we had optimal viewing. If there was another truck, he'd circle around the animals to get a better vantage point!

Some of my animal highlights...

 - The first time we saw lions - lying lazily under a tree...they totally didn't care we were there. Turns out, we found out later, that had just feasted on a kill earlier in the day.

•  The first and second time we saw giraffes. They were so tall and beautiful and elegant. The next time we saw giraffes, zebras came by and they all just "hung out" together.
•  Seeing the white rhinos! They were adolescent boys and literally walked in front of us while they were playing... it was crazy! 
•  The first time we saw mane lions! The lion king! There were two big guys... Again, they totally didn't care we were around. It was so strange!
•  The first time we saw elephants. They are so huge but so quiet. And one night we even came upon like 20 of them! They literally stood between us and the gate to our lodge.

 

One of five white Rhino's that walked past our truck

And in every case we also saw babies! We are in summer now so the baby animals we saw were all just born this past spring! I'd never seen soooo many cute baby elephants! It was pretty amazing.

The food…OMG the food was incredible at the lodge – and plentiful. I am certain that I gained 7 lbs over the weekend.

We also got to experience some local game – like ostrich carpaccio, grilled eland, impala pie! It was all delicious!

On each game drive we also stopped for refreshments, hard liquor, pop, juice and water along with dried nuts, fruit, jerky, meat pies and cookies. So as you can see, we were well nourished.

I dream of returning to this spa...

One other thing! Did I tell you about the spa??? Yup – Tau also had a full spa. On one occasion I enjoyed a hot stone massage and on the second a moisturizing and revitalizing facial.

So – Safari life…if you get the opportunity – do it!

It is incredible! :)

…Now…back to work! 

Patrick, our Game Driver, setting up our coffee and tea on a morning drive.

Me, thinking, "This is ABSOLUTELY insane! Those are zebras!"

Our Game Drive Truck

Sunset at Madikwe