Random facts about being on Safari

• Patience, patience and again patience. Getting around in Africa needs a lot of patience. Roads are bad or sometimes worse…so it takes much longer to reach your destination. Going trough border post needs a LOT of patience because either the customs guy don’t know what the newest procedure is or he leaves the office and let you wait….sometimes for 45 minutes before coming back. Up to now we were lucky. All and all we only spent about 8 hours at 3 border posts without having too much trouble.
• One also becomes very close to your partner and vehicle. We are totally tuned into every move, mood etc. of each other as well as the bakkie. Sometimes this also needs patience Like when we were driving down the mountain from Livingstonia. It sounded like this: Elize: EEK!! This is VERY close to the edge! I can’t even see the bottom of the gorge from my window!  Arno: Yes, I saw that when we came up 2 days ago. Elize: Can’t you drive closer to the cliff? Arno: If I drive nearer to the cliff I will break the mirror. Elize: Better leaving the mirror behind than losing the bakkie and our lives rolling down the mountain. Arno silently concentrating on driving. Elize; EEK! That was VERY VERY close to the edge!! Arno silently concentrating on driving.
• Campsites are not always what you expect. They are mostly more expensive than what you wrote down, downloaded or read up in Lonely Planet. The “hot shower” they promised are about 1% hot and for the rest cold. We also find that campsite owners are in general not in tune with campers and the facilities are not up to standard or even practical. Surely they never camped themselves.
• We saw more travellers from the Western Cape than local people. It seems that the whole Cape Colony decided to come to the Serengeti in a wild crazy rush…..3 weeks from Cape Town, Calitzdorp, Worcester, Malmesbury, Darling, Paarl, Wolseley, Ceres, Caledon etc. chasing up and down in the most extravagant over equipped expensive outfits under the sun. Some extend the trip up to 4 or 6 weeks. They misjudge the distances, condition of roads and shorter daylight and we hear them arrive between 10:00 to 2:00 at night in the campsites just to start their crazy journey at sunset the next morning. When we speak to them they can’t tell you where they saw what or when! They spent thousands of DOLLARS in the National Parks but all in a hectic rush.
• We learnt to do our washing once a week. To drive around with smelly dirty washing is not nice and it can become a huge work if you wait to long. Up to now we washed every Sunday all our dirty clothes and changes our bed linen and wash that as well. 2 Pair of hands, lots of chatting and laughing makes it an easy going job. Normally the bakkie also gets a wash at the same time. Once a month our whole outfit get washed when we get a campsite with grass and available water.
• Up to now Petrol and drinking water were filled up when necessary and without any problem.
• We eat lots of fresh veggies, fruits and bake our own bread from time to time.

HEALTH

• 1 Left big toe injured because of letting the black pot lid fall onto it (Arno)
• 1 Right big toe injured because of stumbling over a hidden brick (Arno)
• Light attack of Malaria (Arno)
• Numerous small finger cuts because of cutting biltong (Elize)
• Numerous different type of insect bites that itch and burn like hell especially at night! (Elize)
• Otherwise fitter, slimmer and browner than at the start of the trip (Arno & Elize)

FIGURES

We are still on schedule with the budget.

• Petrol stays the most expensive commodity
• Fresh food is very cheap and we buy it in small villages
• We are still stocked with meat but buy chicken and mince where possible and affordable
• Dry provisions not necessary to buy yet…still have lots. Only bought Longlife milk twice that costs R15 per liter.

This cost about R50 at Mbaya’s fresh veggies market

• We got 39 tomatoes for 1000 TS or about R6
• 2M Beer in Mozambique – R10
• Carlsberg in Malawi = R10
• 500ml Kilimanjaro, Castle or Safari in Tanzania – R13
• 5L Overberg Red Wine – R230 – R300  (This comes on the wish list for when back at home)
• Petrol – Mozambique – R17 per liter
• Petrol – Malawi – R20 per liter
• Petrol  – Tanzania – R13.50
• Kilometers travelled – 8 500  used 1168 liter petrol. Average of 7.3km per liter
• Average speed – 46.8km h
• Distances between overnight camps – not more than 300km because of the road conditions and crazy traffic.
• Got lost – twice and both times because of the GPS
• Lost things – 1 brand new bottle of body lotion left in bathroom – Goody Villas, Mozambique and 1 brand new tube of toothpaste left in bathroom – Coffee Estate, Tanzania (Elize)