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Safari in Southern AfricaSafari in Southern Africa
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We're going on a photo-safari with friends! Overseas Adventure Travel will take us to South Africa, Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe to visit national parks and meet the locals. Read more
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  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 2

    Around Johannesburg

    August 5, 2022 in South Africa ⋅ ☀️ 70 °F

    We’re finally starting our Southern African journey (after two overnight flights) with our good friends, Nance and Sande, and their friend, Dottie. Upon arrival in Johannesburg mid-morning, we had enough energy to check out a small anthropology/archaeology museum at the Wit University.

    For our second day in Johannesburg, we arranged a day tour around Johannesburg to learn about the legacy of Nelson Mandela. A lot was packed into this day.

    A tour of Constitutional Hill showed us the site of the prison where both Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi were incarcerated (at different times) for human rights activism. The prison has mostly been dismantled now, leaving a few remains as reminders of the atrocities visited upon the prisoners—beginning long before, but becoming especially dire under the apartheid regime, from the late 1940s until the early 1990s. Once South Africa became a democracy, the Constitutional Court was built on the site—a beautiful building with lots of symbolism built into it. Notably, the concept of justice “under the trees,” meaning full transparency of the legal process (e.g., the carpet resembles the dappled shade of trees overhead).

    Another highlight was a visit to the Apartheid Museum. They had an extensive chronology of Nelson Mandela’s life and a special exhibition on Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who recently died in December 2021.

    We also drove by the stadium built for the 2010 soccer World Cup. Again, symbolism abounds— its design is inspired by the African pot, or 'calabash', with terracotta cladding representing fire underneath the pot and a roofline that resembles the bubbling foam on top of a stew.    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 3

    Karongwe Private Game Reserve

    August 6, 2022 in South Africa ⋅ ☀️ 86 °F

    We’ve begun our Overseas Adventure Travel pre-trip and arrived at our first safari location! We are now traveling with three others from Washington state.

    The Chisomo Safari Camp in the Karongwe Private Game Reserve is a beautiful collection of tented cabins with very luxurious amenities. Full baths in each tent and beautiful lounges and dining spaces. The staff are so warm and friendly, too.

    The lodge manager offers a little insight into local customs each day, and today she previewed some of the dinner preparations—impala stew cooked for several hours over a wood fire in a traditional cast iron pot. She also explained some precautions—(a) don’t go out at night without the night watchman because there are several nasty hyenas in the camp; (b) don’t leave food in your tent cabin because the baboons will get in and wreak havoc during the day while we’re out!

    We’ll be here for 3 nights, and every day we’ll have two 3-hour game drives—early morning and late afternoon. For our arrival day, we went out until dark, riding in a comfortable jeep with our guide, Sondy, and tracker, Ludwik.

    Dottie loves giraffes and no sooner had she mentioned to Sondy that she hoped to see one, than one came along to order! It was a pregnant female. This game reserve is known for sightings of the Big Five (elephants, leopards, lions, rhinoceros and Cape Buffalo). At one point, Sondy heard leopards calling to each other, so we set off to find them. We only got a brief glimpse of one, and we were all so surprised that no one got a good photo!

    But then there were more and more animals—a herd of elephants (with some young ones), several types antelopes (nyala, kudu and impala), and lions mating, up close and personal!

    What a great first day for all of us!    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 4

    Zebras & Cheetahs; Elephants at Dinner

    August 7, 2022 in South Africa ⋅ ☀️ 86 °F

    At Chisomo camp here in Karowange preserve, the day begins with a wake-up call at 5:30am to make a 6am getaway to find animals on the reserve. There’s only time for a quick coffee or tea and to say ‘hi’ to some of the other (non-OAT) travelers staying before we go. So far we’ve met an extended family group from Cape Town, an interpreter for a group of Italians and a solo traveler from Zurich.

    Our OAT (Overseas Adventure Travel) group has decided to rotate through the tiered jeep seating, so this morning we sit at the back with the highest vantage point. Ludwick, as our tracker, sits on a kind of jump seat out over the front of the jeep.

    It was mostly dark when we left the lodge, but very soon the sky glowed a vivid orange. First up, a group of male Burchell’s Zebras, also called Plains Zebras. Their stripe pattern includes a shadowy stripe between the black stripes on their rump. Followed by: three cheetah brothers sunning on a rock, giraffes, rhinoceros, birds (owls, ibis, vultures and more) — and warthogs in our camp. And there are countless impala, along with the occasional nyala and kudu—different types of antelope. We encountered the cheetahs later in the day after a good feed, because they were quite docile and were licking each other after the meal. They have a cute meowing voice, quite like a pet cat—check out our video.

    After lunch, we had a talk by a conservation and enforcement ranger. Precious is 26 years old and studied conservation in college. Her main job is to protect the animals at Karowange private preserve from poachers. She trains dogs to track humans and when she catches a poacher she will turn them over to government law enforcement. Sadly, there is a lot of corruption and she may catch that poacher again the next week due to lax enforcement. She knows full well that she is as much a target as the animals she is protecting—she is standing in the way of a lucrative, well-organized (think mafia) business. We were quite taken aback when she said she is ready to lay down her life to protect the wildlife here.

    We were very happy with our first full day on safari, having had two game drives, and then came dinner time. A herd of elephants broke through the electric fence around the camp and wandered around the camp, right past our cabin. We were already in the open-air dining tent, but watched them all through dinner as they crashed around in the trees to feed on tree branches and leaves.    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 5

    Elephants and Hippos; Bushwalk

    August 8, 2022 in South Africa ⋅ ☀️ 88 °F

    Another day here at Karongwe private reserve.

    Today we found our fifth of the Big Five, the African buffalo aka Cape Buffalo. The four others are lions, leopard (saw just one), rhinos and elephants. That’s in addition to the many other species we’ve seen here on the reserve.

    Between the early morning drive and the late afternoon drive, we did a bush walk. Our guides showed us tracks and talked about the uses of plants and even dung. Elephant dung has several uses. It contains a lot of twigs and grass in it because ellies (South African nickname) have such poor digestion. African people will burn it and inhale the smoke to cure a headache. For a stomachache, they will soak it in water and drink the ‘tea.’

    Another thing about elephants is that they are smart enough to know that when they want to eat the leaves of certain trees, they need to break the trunk before the tree can send tannins into its leaves as a defense mechanism. We also watched an elephant break off small tree branches and strip the bark off to get at the inner cambium layer which contains water and nutrients.

    One of today’s highlights was not even connected to our ‘formal’ program of game drives. We walked out on our own to a large pond on the reserve where hippos, birds and other species were known to hang out. For nearly an hour we watched a group of hippos sunbathing on the sandy shore and not moving a muscle—not great entertainment. But we got to see a crocodile, many turtles, some birds and an African Fish eagle. And there was one elephant nearby, playing around in the water and mud. Suddenly, the hippos all got up and hustled into the water — the rest of the elephant herd had come to occupy the beach. It was great entertainment and we’re glad we didn’t give up!    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 6

    Farewell Karongwe; Monkey Tales

    August 9, 2022 in South Africa ⋅ ☀️ 79 °F

    (We have a short window of wi-if and are catching up on some of our stories.)

    For our last day at camp, we got in one more early morning game drive. We hoped to find another leopard, but it didn’t want to be found. Still, we had several good animal and bird sightings: giraffes, waterbuck, a small antelope called the Common Duiker, owls, hornbill and more. Heading back to camp for breakfast-time, we had an elephant roadblock. It gave us an excellent opportunity to observe their tree-grazing behavior—stripping off the bark of small branches to get to the softer, moist layer beneath (it is the dry season after all).

    After breakfast, we had time for a quick visit to the hippo pond. They were sunbathing again, but no ellies driving them away this time. A very large crocodile made his way across the pond, and a smaller bird was dive-bombing the eagle, who was probably too close to its nest. Along the way, we found lots of Vervet monkeys hanging around the camp.

    Soon it was time to fly back to Johannesburg in preparation for our departure for Zimbabwe tomorrow. Along the drive to the airport, baboons were hanging out eating oranges left behind from the recently harvested groves that lined the road.

    A story from yesterday: while we were out on our afternoon game drive, the troop of baboons living near the camp ripped the canvas of six of the 24 tents — including ours. They got inside, opened the mini-fridge, which was behind a cabinet door, but since we didn’t have anything in it they left. But first they investigated our Yahtzee game box. It needed a lot of taping to put back together, but all the pieces were there, and no dice were lost.    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 8

    Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe

    August 11, 2022 in Zimbabwe ⋅ ☀️ 86 °F

    Yesterday was a big travel day, flying from Johannesburg to Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, then going by bus and jeep to Hwange National Park. Seven other OAT travelers joined our group of eight—two friends of the Washingtonians, one friend of Dottie and Nance and Sande, and a couple from Philadelphia and a couple from San Diego. Our group of eight on the pre-trip had been so cohesive, but the newcomers are fitting in well, whew!

    As we drove for 2 hours, our OAT trip leader, Tinashe (Nash) oriented us to the country (about the size of California), and its politics (rampant corruption) and to the park and its wildlife (park is about the size of Belgium and is the largest national park in Zimbabwe; known as the elephant capital of the country).

    We are staying at Kashawange Safari Camp in Hwange National Park, another tented camp. Each tent has its own bathroom and we have a view to the east over a river valley (mostly dry now). There really are only two seasons—wet (summer) and dry (winter). The rains will begin in November here.

    It is a bit warmer here, now that we are farther north, although still chilly for the morning game drives. Our last camp gave us blankets and hot water bottles for our laps in the morning. The large animals are much more elusive here, compared to the game reserve in South Africa. Our guide for the drives has been Victor, and he is great about teaching us about the plants and birds. For example:

    • With the crocodile bark tree, you can make a tea from the roots to cure snake bite; if you chew the leaves and put them on a wound it helps the blood to clot; and its good for making roof beams and cooking utensils.

    • Dried wild basil, which smells like eucalyptus or menthol, has been found to be a COVID treatment (inhaling steam from an infusion)

    • White-browed sparrow weaver birds build basket-like nests on the lee side of trees, out of the wind. They build several decoy nests to confuse their predators. The male builds the nest and the female inspects it. If she doesn’t like it, she tears it up!

    • Names for groups of animals: Rank of impala, Sounder of warthogs, Dazzle of zebra; Business of mongoose; Parade of elephants    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 9

    Life in a Hwange Village

    August 12, 2022 in Zimbabwe ⋅ ☀️ 86 °F

    Part of the OAT experience is to learn about the people in the places we are visiting. We set off on the 45-minute jeep ride from our camp, then the hour-long bus ride to a ‘shopping center’ (series of very small buildings) to pick up some groceries for the family homestead we would be visiting. This is one homestead of many that make up the 2,000-person Dick village.

    The head family has hosted OAT groups before and seems to welcome visitors. The matriarch, Francesca, showed us around the camp—the living quarters, the goat pen (baby goats!), chicken coop, and how they build their houses. We helped them fix some traditional foods—polenta (sadsa); a spinach and other vegetable dish with peanut butter; and Mopane worms (caterpillars), which are washed, dried in the sun and then sautéed with onions and other vegetables. They were a little chewy, but quite tasty.

    Most of the family members were away at a meeting (we didn’t find out what), and the children were over at another homestead. But Francesca and her husband Phillip invited about 8 other neighbors (all women, of varying ages) to welcome us and help with the demonstrations. After our meal, we were able to ask them questions about their life, and the women asked us questions. They wanted to know about marriage arrangements (does the man pay a dowry, etc.). Also, why do American women only have two kids—don’t their husbands love them? It was great to have a two-way exchange of information and didn’t feel awkward or voyeristic. They seemed proud to share their lifestyle with us.

    Before leaving, we brought over all the staple foods we’d bought (OAT paid), and the women sang and danced.

    On the jeep drive later, we saw more elephants (there are 45,000 in the National park), and our guide, Albert, stopped for interesting demonstrations—many based on his childhood activities, and augmented by his studies to be a licensed guide. For example: the spear grass can be pulled apart to make darts. So when the boys would be out with the grazing cows and goats, the loser of the dart game would be the one who had to go fetch the herd when they got too far away. A fascinating phenomenon of the spear grass is that by moistening the seed end of a strand of it in your mouth, it will curl and spiral like it has a little motor in it. This is how the seed is planted into the ground when the rains start.

    We’ll catch you up at the next wi-fi opportunity!    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 10

    Zimbabwean Coal Miner; Onward to Zambia

    August 13, 2022 in Zambia ⋅ ☀️ 84 °F

    Before we left Zimbabwe, we met with a coal miner who told us some sobering stories about the exploitation of the local workers. For a number of years, the workers weren’t receiving cash salaries—just housing and food parcels that weren’t enough for a large family. Now that Chinese investors have taken over the mines, meager salaries have returned, but safety and living conditions are no better. The miners do not have the financial means to access adequate food, medical care, and education (which is not free) for their families. The miners fear reprisal or loss of employment if they try to fight for better wages. With unemployment in the country in excess of 80%, they can’t just find other work; plus they’d have to find and pay for new housing.

    The Zimbabwean government does nothing to help—with such rampant corruption, the ministers and regulators are in lockstep with the new Chinese mine owners and benefiting financially. These talks are what OAT calls “controversial topics,’ meant to take visitors out of their comfort zone and teach us about things the government (or the world) may not want to talk about.

    On a more upbeat note, we got a quick drive-by visit to one of the primary schools the OAT foundation is supporting. A portion of our trip fees, along with private donations, provides books, computer and technical equipment, some teacher salaries and one free meal a day for needy students. On a less upbeat note, OAT has had to find a workaround to deal with the corrupt Zimbabwean government. For a while, the government was pocketing the donations of school funds. Now donations of school supplies go through Rotary International.

    Two 8-seater planes took our group to Kafue National Park in Zambia. Already, we could see that the land was a bit less dry. Our new camp, Lufupa River Camp, is located on the Kafue River. All of our tent cabins and the open-air dining room face the river. We can see hippos and the occasional croc in the river, and vervet monkeys live in the trees. We had a nice, musical greeting from all of the staff (see video).    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 11

    Leopards and Warthogs

    August 14, 2022 in Zambia ⋅ ⛅ 73 °F

    Well, if the last park was all about elephants, this one (for us) will be all about leopards. It can be very rare to find leopards in the national park. The previous OAT group visiting Kafue didn’t see any for their three-day visit — so we know we are lucky.

    The grasslands were covered in mist as the sunrise glowed on the horizon for our morning game drive. The Puku, another type of antelope, were out grazing. We suspected a predator may be nearby since they were all looking one direction, and not at us. Sure enough, as we drove around some more, we found a leopard tracking a lone puku. But we were told that since the puku had its eyes on the leopard the whole time, the leopard was unlikely to attack. The puku can usually outrun a leopard, and are only caught if surprised. We were able to follow the leopard for awhile, going off-road in our jeep. That was exciting!

    More driving took us past several different kinds of birds, more puku and impalas, and several interesting trees. The Ilala palm was originally planted by the Portuguese to guide them along a route to water, but now the palms are scattered all over. The fruit can be used to make wine, and the inner leaves are like cabbage (hearts of palm?). We saw a Giant Kingfisher catch a fish.

    We had just rounded a large termite mound when we heard squealing and saw a warthog running in circles at the base of a tree, clearly agitated. Up in the tree was a different leopard that had just caught it’s morning meal—a baby warthog. The mom walked away and the leopard stayed in the tree staring at us, all the while with the dead warthog in its jaws. Eventually it must have wanted to eat in peace, so it climbed down and walked into the bushes with its prey. The circle of life in action.

    Back at camp, we went on a little walk around camp, and were taught about more of the native plants and their medicinal and culinary uses.

    The evening game drive was relatively uneventful, except for nearly being charged by an elephant! Apparently, the mom didn’t like us getting close to her baby. We were sitting in our jeep on the road, but mom seemed to be getting agitated—swinging her trunk around. Then suddenly, she flared out her ears, took some running steps toward us and trumpeted loudly. We cleared out in a hurry!

    Every evening at sundown, we have a little happy hour called a Sundowner. Tonight we stopped near the river and watched saddle-billed stork and hippos in the water as the sun glowed orange on the horizon.    Read more

  • Diane and DarrylSafari in Southern Africa
    Day 12

    A Day on the Rivers

    August 15, 2022 in Zambia ⋅ ☀️ 88 °F

    Today was a dust-free, bounce-free day spent in shaded pontoon boats on the Kafue and Lufupa Rivers. Rafts of hippos were semi-submerged in the water, keeping their skin moist from the sun. If they ducked under the water completely, they’d come up spraying water like a whale. We were told that hippos don’t swim, they walk along the river bottom, sometimes munching on water plants—but they like land grasses better.

    Nile crocodiles lined the banks, and we were introduced to many native birds, including three varieties of kingfisher. The African fish eagle is the national bird of Zambia. Everyone knows its call because it is always played before the national news. The news is broadcast in the seven most dominant of the 72 different languages in Zambia (one for each tribe). English is the official language, making 73 languages in Zambia.

    In the middle of the day, between our river safaris, we had free time to play dice Catan in the lounge by the river. Later, Helen, the camp manager, gave a presentation on some of the traditions of Zambia, and showed us how they make peanut butter—which is used in everything from their morning porridge to their dinner vegetables (delicious!).

    With the cooler temperatures on our sunset cruise, some of the hippos had moved up to the banks and the crocs were a bit more active. Back in camp, our dinner featured fresh-caught tilapia, thanks to a couple of our fellow travelers and our guides.    Read more

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