old travelogue

This is something written by someone very close to me, only a few months ago. I am posting it here, because I like it. And also to give myself (and my blog) a dose of pure good cheer.

June has been a hectic month. I've been doing a whole lot of stressful holidaying. I suppose the trip can be divided into two disjointed sections firstly, the Botswanian backwaters experience and secondly, pieces of South Africa. In Botswana, we lived in local rondavels, drank ditchwater from the famous okavango delta, went on mocoro rides (mocoros are 2 man shikara type things) in crocodile infested water. And I heard a hippo under my tent. South Africa was cleaner, safer, well organized and green. Spent two days doing the big city thing in Johannesburg, which for me was an excellent ending to a month-long road trip. But I'm not setting foot in that pajero for a month or so now.

To give you a general idea, we, ie, my folks, another couple their age(who were visiting us from delhi) and I, started from gabs on 27th June, in my dad's new old diesel Pajero that feels like a truck to drive. Went to sun city first. Stayed in a cottage in a cheeeeep resort called 'sundown ranch', where the loos had no locks. We used to keep our shoes outside the door to prevent mishaps. Sun city was usual and boring, with flashing lights, booze and some gambling. Dad won 200 Rand on the slot machines, which I then promptly lost. Next morning to the local Pilanesburg Game Reserve (here every tourist attraction has a game reserve next door) where Tini aunty saw her first giraffe, and the rest of us had our fill of the usual chhota mota animals – zebras,hippos, crocodiles, 2 horned rhinos and elephants. There's a 'lion park' where we were staying where they keep tame lions. Saddish, but we went along anyway and got to pat really smelly 3 month olds. Lions, I mean. Good thing we went too, because in spite of spending so much time chasing the king of the jungle, we never managed to catch a peek at a wild one.

Sun city done, we went on to Kruger national park, 500 km away. Lovely drive through hilly woodlands and the first of our supermarket breakfasts – one bun, one piece of cheese, a bite of polony and milk or tea. Kruger is a vast and wonderful place, more so because the country is completely different from Botswana. The grass is green for one, not browny yellowy like savannah grass. Wet broody trees and burnt landscapes, where you may see one wild buffalo or 200.The park has about 6 rest camps and a network of roads connecting good viewing points like watering holes and swamps, where animals would normally congregate. A rest camp is a cluster of habitable units, in different degrees of comfort. We lived in a safari tent, basically a biggish ready-pitched tent with an awning and a sit out. Each tent has a braai stand, while 3 or 4 share a communal kitchen. The loos were communal too, and 10 m away from the tent through the jungle. Made it a bit hard to pee after lights out. Evenings were devoted to cooking and barbecuing (braai = barbecue) and pigging out. Did a lot of stargazing through the leafy branches overhead. The stars remained faithful all the way home till we hit the city smokes again. Kruger was where we all became expert game spotters, coursing up and down the car tracks in search of a striped butt or a swishy tail inthe distance. I now can recognize all sorts of deer, impala, kudu, bushbuck, springbok, the works. A notable instance was when a herd of wild buffalos decided to cross the road just ahead of us. We were running late, had to get back to camp by 6 when the gates close, when it happened. They may look like Indian cows on Indian roads, but onepoke from those curly horns and you'll meet your maker, pajero and all. So we spent a half hour twiddling our thumbs, hoping an elephant wouldn't cross the road when we would race home afterwards breaking all speed limits. Thought I'd managed a few national geographic worthy shots at Kruger, but the prints disagree.

Anyway, after a very satisfying time at Kruger, we took a break from animals at Graskop, a tiny mountain hamlet with spectacular canyons and miniscule waterfalls. Stayed in a lovely place, can't describe it, except that the cliffs fell away from our front yard and there was a swimming pool perched on the brink. The town had a nice-ish pancakeplace too, but more on pancakes later.

The next day was a drag. We had a 700 km drive back to Botswana, past Gaborone and up to a biggish city called Francistown. That was where our only accommodation fiasco happened. Got into town at about 8 in the evening and found that our rest house was basically a couple of smelly small rooms in a local person's house, with huge half-naked men lounging around the lobby. The hostess seemed crazy and her eyes glinted with evil purpose. What if..! It was reminiscent of my Bangladesh experience. However the folks didn't feel up to taking it with good grace and humour, so we set off hunting for a decent place to spend the night. Found one at last, paid through our noses for cramped-ish rooms in a 4 star hotel and slept.

Kasane, our next destination, made up for it all. The long, 600 kmdrive was dotted with toilet stops and ostriches. When we finally got there, we found a homey 3 bedroom cottage and 4 dogs waiting for us. In the evening to Chobe river for a 'sunset cruise' with more animal spotting. I'd done this before, but it was fun playing guide to the Onjone unkals. More elephants, hippos lurking under the surface and ugly slimy crocodiles. The boat guy caused a minor accident and forfeited some of his tip on this one. It's rare to see water in Botswana and Chobe is one of the few places where a river runs deep and wide.

Made a foray into Zimbabwe the next day for Victoria Falls. I'd seen that too, but had a much longer visit this time, walked up and down the path along the cliff, drenched in spray. Zimbabwe has a very unstable government, and hasn't done much towards the upkeep of their one tourist hotspot and world heritage site. I suppose you could call it a raw experience, walking on slippery paths with no railings, in danger of plunging right into the spectacular falls. But boy, there's a shit load of water in the Zambezi! The local flea market at Victoria took up most of the afternoon. I hated it, with its stinky, desperate shopkeepers who sidle up to you and whisper "Sorry. Do you want a giraffe? What can I give you for that pen". Zim is really a very sad place, and once I escaped the clutches of the determined artifact sellers, I felt deeply sorry for them. Guess I won't make much of a jan-sudharak, LSE MSc or not.

Next destination was Maun, the gateway to the Okavango Delta, theworld's only inland delta. A huge river comes down from Angola and simply spends itself in the desert. No sea, no ocean, no lake. Just a huuuuge swamp. Naturally, this has been a boon to the people of the desert. The Kalahari turns into a tropical paradise here, with leafy trees, tall green grasses and swarms of un-paradisical insects. Maun is just a small town living off the tourist trade and some deltar esearch bodies based here. We had a short but pleasant stay in 2 Rondavels. These are round, mud huts with conical thatched roofs, about as much local flavour as you can get. Speaking of flavour, each rondavel had a loo within, open, but concealed behind a curving wall. Very architecty somehow. I spent most of the night trying to take a satisfying picture of the huts, stark against the treeless plain and the starry night sky. Unfortunately, the image is printed indelibly on my mind only. Took a 'scenic flight' in Maun, tiny 6 seater plane that flies you over the delta for an hour so you can see the geographical feature for what it is. Great views of green swamps and cracked earth in between, herds of zebras running and isolated tribal settlements, were wasted on us, because we had very poor air-legs. With the exception of my dad, we were all sick to the gills and as soon as we landed, mom and Tini aunty had to stagger to the airport loo. Quite a memorable experience.

Next and last stop was Guma Island lodge, inside the delta itself. Imagine a network of narrow wooden catwalks flitting about in the forest, turning into decks here and ramps there, standing a few metres above softly lapping water. Here and there you catch a glimpse of a small tent concealed within the brambles; there's a not-too-loud silence, occasionally you hear an animal-like grunt from underneath the deck. The trees form a tunnel overhead, which finally leads you to an expanse of blue water, twinkling innocently in the sunlight, waterlilies near the shore. This was guma lodge, very clean, very exotic and very white. We had sit down dinners each evening, where grace was said before we started, and I made a million faux-pas with knives and forks. We had an idyllic stay there; in fact, we extended the trip by a day and decided to drive straight back to gabs, all 1100 km in one day. My mum has agreed to fund my honeymoon in Guma, as long as I don't marry my X.

Well we then came back to Gabs and chilled out for 4 days before leaving for joburg where the other couple left us and flew back. We took in more, and better, pancakes at a small South African town on the way called Haartebeespoort dam. Yes yes, naam bhi mouthful aur pancake bhi. Our guests did their African art shopping there. Mum, dad and I hung around a couple extra days in josy for some pre-london shopping. Saw Parineeta in the process. Nice movie, completely rehashed version of the bong original, but still good. Definitely not a Devdas.

Well, trip's over, I'm back in drab gabs and have already been out drinking. Human beings adapt really fast. But I subconsciously look for deer in every patch of tree I drive past and often get mental flashes of long roads disappearing into purple gloom.Think I should include a map so you can figure what the hell I've been talking about. Better still, go find one yourself. This was really the trip of a lifetime. I had a surprisingly good time with the folks. Drove most days, complete with archetypal Indian tea flask and picnic basket, took plenty of pictures, squabbled with mum, grubbed well at night, and played ludo every evening. Wish you folks would decide to take an African safari. Although, if you want me to go along, don't plan on one anytime soon.Well, my next big thing is London. I can't believe I'm actually doing it yet. Magar die is cast, admission offer is accepted and visa is almost applied for.