Good-bye Emdoneni

I don't think I could ever get enough of walking by baby Servals, crossing paths with impala and Zebra.  Emdoneni is a magical place.  I wish we could have had at least 1 week there.  Time to rest, enjoy, and explore the great land of the Zulu.  While in Durban we learned some basic Zulu, but it was within the park, in the bush, that I could really feel the Zulus.  The spirit of Kwa-Zulu Natal.  Unjani, jeelapela. Sowabonga, sowborna.  The words of the black people of the area.  The clicks in the language.  It was music to my ears, I could listen to isizulu all day long.

We went on our last cat tour with so many more visitors this time.  However, being the pushy American that i am, I got to the front of the line.  Partly it was because Casey and I were not scared of the animals like many of the other visitors.  It was great to be with the cats again,but I am thankful we had the first day we did with them, as they were getting annoyed and overstimulated with the amount of attention, and some didn't even come out to visit.  But it was still great to watch them and pet the baby servals.

We said goodbye to the zebra, impala, nyala and cats.  We headed out on our 2.5 hour drive back to Durban.  I wanted to explain what the drive was like.  We were driving in the rural part of south Africa, but the highway is well paved.  It is surrounded for miles and miles and miles with blue gum trees, a type of eucalyptus, that is farmed for poles.  It made me sad to find out that these trees suck up 300 liters a day of water.  In a country spare of water,these trees used for poles are sucking the country dry.  The amazing thing was the lush land around, and the villages on the sides of the road.  There were black south Africans, Zulus, walking along the road,waiting for taxi pick ups, or catching rides on passing Mack trucks. The rondavels and huts are sparce with a nicely paved ( much better than california) roads throughout.  It was an interesting experience.  The custom is to allow people to pass,and drive in the broken down lane, when you can.  When you pass a car, it is polite to blink your hazards as thank you and acknowledgement. Casey did a great job driving on the wrong side of the road,  it was actually a quite peaceful drive.  As we thought we were tight on time we ended up stopping for gas, a pee, and some McDonald's on the way,  it was easy and fast,  tasted almost the same as McDonald's at home ;) we successfully returned our car at Avis, and got our bags wrapped, and checked. We were unable to check our departure and when we arrive at the airport we had a few hours to kill as our flight was delayed.  However, we just got some ridiculous pancakes at mug and bean, got some coffee and enjoyed the time. I am now on the plane, just about to land for our adventure in cape town.  I'll keep you posted! 

Full day at Emdoneni, with animals galore!

Our first day consisted of a 9am semi-private cat tour.  The lodge is full of a tour group, and there fore there are only a few of us not within the group.  Us and 2 other couples did the cat tour. We all got to snuggle and cuddle with the Cheetah, Moya.

One of the greatest experiences of my life.  Absolutely nothing better than hearing the purr,feeling the fur and warmth of a gigantic, magnetic cat.  The most incredible thing to me is to watch the behavior of the large wild cats.  A cat is a cat.  They lick, purr, hiss, rub and head butt.  We got to spend time with the Cheetah, Caracal, African Wild cat, and Serval.

The Serval is by far the softest coat.  In my interaction with the sweet Serval, he was rubbing and head butting me, then a hard fast stream of pee came fit out of his butt.  I luckily dodged it, but he was trying to claim me as his territory.  it was awesome!

I had little fear facing these cats and I felt I got a great interaction with them.  Casey also had a fun time playing with the big cats.  It really is taking all my will power to come home from here, as this was absolutely my dream,and I could do this all day every day.  If I could lead the cat tours, what a dream job! This will be something I remember for my entire life time.  During our visit with the Cheetah we saw the Zebra begin to gather by our cottage.  It was the beginning to an amazing couple of days.

After the cat tour we walked around the grounds finding Zebra and Impala.  It was awesome to walk around with them.  

Then we came back to rest, take showers in our outdoor shower and head out on our first game drive. We were so lucky to have a private tour of Hluhluwe game reserve.  Our guide was Vernon, and he has been a guide 16 years, at many reserves.  It was clear by his save the white rhino bracelet, his love and knowledge of the white rhino, this is a passion of his.  He taught us all about the white Rhino, as we first came upon 4 right on the road, as we entered the park.  W watched them graze calmly, watched some of the pecking order happen,and admire the long horn on one of the females.  You would think when I say white rhino, it is white in color, but this isn't so.  They look exactly the same as the black rhino, they just are docile grazing creatures.  Where as the black rhino is aggressive and eats from trees and bushes. There are so few white rhinos left in the world, they will be extinct in 12 years at the rate they are poached.  So sad.  We got our fill of rhinos for sure as we saw them many times throughout our drive.  We also came upon warthogs, monkey, a zebra group where one had clearly been recently attacked by a lion, as the scars on his rump were fresh. As we were leaving we saw a whole family of baboons, probably over 30 of them playing, grooming, eating, and walking to their fig tree where they spend the night.  It was awesome to see the babies playing, wrestling, and chewing paper and rubbish they found on the road.  It was quite a site I will never forget.  We saw giraffes in the distance, and a gigantic herd of buffalo.  It was fantastic.  The views were tremendous, it he park of rolling hills, and trees.

We arrived back home in time for dinner, which was great, with roasted chicken, veg, dessert.  It was very high quality food.  We headed back to our room soon after to get some sleep before our next game drive at 530am the next day.  

The drive to Emdoneni

Today we checked out of the Elangeni hotel, in the midst of utter chaos. Almost all of the transplant games participants all were checking out at once. During which everyones card keys deactivated at once. There was a line for check out, and panicked people all trying to get their room keys working agin for the 11am check out. After a little chaos, we said good-bye to my parents and took a cab to pick up our rental car. We packed our car with all our many bags and began our 3 hour journey to the game reserve and Emdoneni lodge. It was Casey and my first time driving on the wrong side of the road and with a 6 speed manual car. At least it was a Toyota Corolla so there was some similarity, except everything, including the steering wheel were on the wrong side.  We had a beautiful drive for the first 2.5 hours, and the last 30minutes was utter hell for me, as my bladder got to the point of pain, and I was close to going in a bottle, or stopping on the side of the road in an African villiage. I have never been in such dire need for the bathroom. It was the worst time, in rural Africa, to need a bathroom. Good job Anna. We finally reached the lodge, and we had to drive slowly 1km, on a bumpy road. Once we reached the lodge, I ran out of the car. The best and biggest pee of all time.

After the epic piss monsoon, we were taken to our room, the windfall cottage.  To get there we all jumped in our car, drove by the Serval, and came upon our luxurious room. 

Our room is the windfall cottage, and it is off the beaten path from the rest of the rondavels. It is luxiourious with a leather couch, bar, 2 rooms, large "princess bed" as Casey calls it, with a mosquito net canopy, a claw foot tub, and out side shower, within our enclosed patio. I'm not so sure about the shower, as we have already seen an African wild cat, frog, and plenty of bugs out there... The exciting thing, was when I looked outside the first time, we already had a large and cute African wild cat out there grooming himself for us to see. We couldn't get a picture as the night time pic was too hard without prior set up. They set up a green light on our bathroom patio, which works as night vision. I think we figured showers will be taken in the middle of the day, between activities :) The rooms are decorated with traditional African hats, and beautiful black and white shots of the cats. It for sure is Anna and Casey's paradise. The one problem is the bathroom has no noise control between the bedroom, so we will be taking turns in here... The one problem. As we say, it is the honey moon suite where all was lost ;) 

Right out in front of our room are the cat enclosures, and when we walk to reception, we will pass by the cute cats every day! We already saw the caracal, and the cheetahs off in the distance. There are all kinds of antelope, zebra, and a variety of animals that live on the property. We already saw some antelope and an unknown large animal on the drive in. There is plenty of Scat around and I am sure the animals will be spotted today or tomorrow.

Our itinerary today is to have breakfast then head on over for a private cat tour at 9am. Then at 2pm we will be heading out for our first game drive. It is very exciting to be here. 

We are literally living in the bush. To go to reception it is about a 5 minute walk, and we walk by the cats, and through the bush. Last night it was pitch dark. We take a flash light to lead the way. It is quite the experience. I can't wait to see what happens on this adventure! 

Bringing The Gold Home!

I am so sorry, but emerging from 1 12 hour swim meet and another 10hour swim meet, I have been completely dead, and right now we are heading out on a tour. But I am happy to report, I received a gold medal in fly and backstroke, a silver in free, and 2 bronze in our relays. Happy overall. I did good times for myself, so that is all I can ask for. I must say, relays are the most fun! I will try to post more details tomorrow...

Later,

Anna

Ok, so it is later... Let me think about where to start... The swim meet organization was a night mare, we had people swimming for the wrong age group, for the wrong country, and the wrong events. It was totally chaos. Luckily the only thing they screwed up with me was that they listed me as 33 instead of 32. I can deal with that. So I didn't swim until the second half due to preliminaries in other age groups. I was so thankful that I didn't have to do prelims, or I would have been so exhausted for the real competition. My fly was against another USA team mate, Hillary. It was fun swimming together as we knew we would place gold and silver. I wanted to do my absolute best, to see what I could do. I got gold in the race and came in with a time of 39.33 seconds. The important thing to note here is we were swimming long course, which means 1 length across is 50meters. This is very different than how the majority of my swim practices are. In the US we have 25 yard pools, not even meters. So a 50 meter pool is so long! I was told adding the meters makes the length we swim 10% longer, so what ever your time in the 25 yard pool is you need to add 10% to figure out what time you would swim in meters, so hopefully ou can understand as I explain my times. In practice at home, my fly time was 37.00 seconds. So you would expect it to be 40.70 in a 50 meter swim, so getting a 39.33 was incredible. Very very happy with it, and I know the things I need to work on for next time... 

The backstroke race was not much of a race as everyone else scratched out. But I gave it my best (when you are racing someone else, it makes it much easier to swim faster and push yourself.) but I managed to do well for myself with a 44.61. My time back home was 41.37, again faster than the 10% time addition. So I cant ask for much more. 

Then we get to the freestyle. I was racing 6 ladies, 1 French national swimmer and then, the British tank. This girl was a beast, who ate the pool for breakfast. She dominated all her races, and despite her large rugby player like appearance, she was killing it in the pool. I was scared, but it also motivated me to want to try to beat her. I sure did my best. She just out touched me by 0.30 seconds. So close. My mom told me I was gaining on her, and if I had just a little bit more length I would have beaten her. Ugh. This one will drive me crazy. If I only.... My time was 33.53, and my last time at home was a 32.33, also faster than the 10% time difference. I was happy with my time, but if I was placed in the lane next to her, and could have seen her swimming, I know it would have helped me a little. But that will always be the gold that got away.... I am just so happy to have beaten the French girl. So that is that.

Our relays were awesome. It was me, Holly, Agnes, and Dianne. 3 young'ns and the gammy ( as Dianne said). We did awesome. I was the last swimmer, or anchor, in the free style relay. We were in about 4 or 5th place when I went off the blocks, and just kicked it into turbo mode, and pulled ahead and got us the bronze. I was told it was an exciting race to watch. When you are in it, you have no idea what is really happening, you just go and swim your best. It was awesome. 

The medley relay was comprised of the same people, and I swam backstroke, so I started first. I did my best, but compared to thos skittle Brits we just couldn't come out ahead. We got bronze again, and everyone did a great job swimming. I was really proud to swim with everyone. Collecting a medal with team mates is much more fun than on your own.