amanby

[amanby]

Stay Well, Africa FINAL BLOG POST CLAXON! I like the fact that people from England who move to Africa stay here. The gaggle of friends I have in Australia seem to love it, but all admit they'll be back in a few years when the lustre of sunny Bondi wears off and the reality of living surrounded by Australians kicks in. The people I've met from the UK living out here in Africa have no intention of ever returning. It's addictive, it's all-encompassing and it's so full of possibility and adventure that I can completely understand their resolution. I like the sturdiness of people here. They're like the hardy, unconquerable elephants which roam the continent. They get it from childhood, I think. I like the way babies are raised not just by their parents but by the whole community (or whoever is to hand; I've had dozens of infants thrust into my arms on various forms of transport), and wander around their village unsupervised from as soon as they can toddle. I doubt they have a translation for 'child snatching' in Africa. I like the openness, the welcome, the generosity, and the lack of cynicism here. I don't think we're necessarily selfish back home, but the thought of giving someone we've never met a free bed or meal would strike most people as strange. Here, it's almost the norm. I realise, by the way, that I'm clumping all Africans into one generalised bunch here, which is completely unfair and inaccurate (and I've loved discovering the national idiosyncrasies), but there are some common characteristics. I like the respect they have, although I wish they would be bolder here. Less in awe of the white man. I sound like Steve Biko! When the average African - as opposed to the calculating politician - realises that he's just as capable of making a sound decision as anyone else, this continent will make huge strides. It would be great if they start to feel secure enough to admit when they don't know something, too. And to that end, I also wouldn't mind it if governments would start helping their young citizens out with decent access to education. I like lots of other things out here. And get frustrated by many other things too. But I won't write them all down; I don't have the words or the time to do this place justice. I like that you've read my blog while I've been out here! My boss at Aqueduct, Rob, used to say that liking something on Facebook or Instagram is "the lowest form of social commitment" and I agree. It takes no effort and means next to nothing. You visiting this blog is several steps up that social commitment ladder, and even if you're small in number, each visit means a lot to me. So - gushing teary Oscars moment - I mean it when I say thank you for following my escapades as I ambled through Africa, sometimes aimlessly, often unpredictably, but always trying to keep a spirit of adventure. And finally, writing this from Joburg airport about to board my flight out of this mighty continent, stay well, Africa, until the next time...

[amanby]

Don’t give up the day job

Not that I have one to give up, but it’s safe to say that no-one’s about to offer me a career in construction…

This is a strange little place, and probably quite an odd way to end my time in Africa. I’ve got no idea how Ferg spent three months here. But then I suppose he was looking for hard work, tranquility and, most of all, the great outdoors, and Mukolo Camp has all of these in abundance.

The camp is still under construction (which is why I’m here, of course), but opened its doors a few months ago anyway, with campsites, cabins, a modest swimming pool and offerings of boat tours, game drives and other activities. The problem: no-one’s coming. Clearly, no-one’s even heard of it yet. And this is making the owners, Afrikaners Hennie and Veronica, rather twitchy. They’ve given up their lives in Windhoek and put all their savings into this place, you see.

They’re milder and more softly spoken than most Afrikaners, and less overtly racist, even if they’re still pretty dismissive of the trustworthiness and quality of workmanship of the blacks. They’re nice enough, although remarkably uninterested in anything outside of their lives which, right now, consist entirely in this camp. I’ve been here nearly a week, and they haven’t shown any curiosity in me. They know I’m Fergus’ friend, and that’s all; they have no idea whether I have a job, siblings, parents, interests, my nationality, what I’m doing in Africa, nothing.

Meal times are a bit of a slog until I learn that Hennie used to train long distance runners and took two to the Barcelona Olympics, where good old Frankie Fredericks bagged Namibia’s first ever medal in their first ever Games, so we can now safely talk about that at length.

But I’m not here for the conversation. The deal is I work hard and in return they give me a bed, three square meals and the freedom to explore the surrounding area. I’m sort of treating it as a training course, an overdue attempt to learn all those things a man should know how to do.

Training is not going well.

I drive the pick up truck (“bakkie”) with trailer attached and four local workers armed with shovels aboard. They think I’m weird for several reasons: 1) I’m doing this work unpaid, 2) I help with the shovelling, which isn’t a white man’s job, and 3) despite MANY attempts, I can’t for the life of me reverse the bakkie with the trailer! It’s BLOODY HARD.

I cut a steel sheet with a grinder but apparently I press too hard so I wear through three saws. Oops. Hennie tells me to weld the sheet to the oven and I have a good long think about this but eventually decide that as I don’t even know where to start, I’d better confess that in welding he’s discovered my one manual labour weak spot.

I drill some holes and lay some decking. I’m a genius! Although I do take hours and break two drill bits so I suppose it’s not an entirely flawless performance.

I cut down bushes and dig out roots and scoop and carry cow manure in 25kg sacks. Immaculately. I’ve found my calling!

Hovering omnipresently is the memory of golden boy Fergus. Hennie: “are you good at carpentry, Alex? No? Oh right, Fergus was an excellent carpenter.” Veronica: “do you have artistic skills Alex? Why are you laughing? Ah I see, Fergus had a real skill for art.” And so on and so on. I nearly tell them Fergus was never captain of fives at school, ALRIGHT?!

I’m better at marketing than labouring, however, and at least I can add some value in trying to spread the Mukolo word. Hennie and Veronica seem to have ignored the fact that you need to make people aware of a place before they’ll come to it.

There are some lovely moments. I sip cold beers after work, listening to the wildlife chattering. I reflect on a hard day’s work while watching absurdly spectacular sunsets. I negotiate a deal with one of the workers for my sister’s hand in marriage (sorry Pip, but on the plus side now you know you’re worth 150 cattle. And Kisko will make an excellent husband). We go on a boat cruise and see two dozen hippos lounging around slothfully. I’m not sure I get the fuss about hippos though. They’re just big-mouthed fat pigs 95% submerged in water, no?

A word for Aboriginee Brita, a professional chef who, like Ferg, finds Mukolo Camp on Workaway. She turns up, cooks some delicious meals, complains about the quiet and remoteness, drinks 75cl of vodka on Day 1, the same again on Day 2, a whole litre of whisky on Day 3, breaks down in tears, sings Adele (badly) at the top of her voice through the night, and then gets up, packs her things and leaves the next morning without saying goodbye. Quite some performance.

The top picture shows me and the lads, doing the Namibia sign - the shape of the country! My favourite is Kisko, the guy in the hat (Pippa take note), and he’s immediately likeable and funny. The others take some persuading, which may be because they’re shy, or alternatively they’re wondering why the hell a white man who is quite so incompetent at reversing a trailer and handling power tools is now in charge; something I admittedly find myself wondering too.

So it’s been a funny old week. But I’ve actually really enjoyed myself. And now I have to head the 1,200km back to Windhoek to catch my flight out of Africa on Thursday, so this is my penultimate blog post. I’ll do a wrap before I leave; there will be tears.

[amanby]

Mukolo Camp

Following on from my last blog post, I’m sorely tempted to go searching for the San, but conclude there’s too much possibility I won’t find them, or that they’ll decide they don’t want me voyeuristically hanging around, so I chose option 2, and after a 15 hour bus ride to the Caprivi Strip, I’m now happily installed at Mukolo Camp. I could walk to any one of four different countries in a day from here, which I have to admit is food for thought…

This place is as tranquil as its location would suggest, and I’ll spend the week here ‘helping’ with building the camp and enjoying the wildlife; we’ve got crocs and hippos in the water just in front of camp (pictured) and I heard lions growling nearby last night.

[amanby]

One last decision to make 

In an unexpected but happy coincidence, my first full day in Namibia is also the country's Independence Day, now 27 years since gaining autonomy from South Africa's apartheid government. Celebrations are, perhaps surprisingly, quite understated in Windhoek; apparently there's only enough money to stage a public event in one town, so it's a moving feast each year in terms of location. 

I stroll around Windhoek, which is clean and orderly but doesn't have a great deal to say for itself really. It's striking how many German tourists are here, and I try inconclusively to establish whether it's for linguistic, historical, or cultural reasons. Actually, as much as anything I think it's just habit, and it's a location on their radar much as Kenya is for the Brits. Either way, it's a novelty to have locals approach me and ask questions in German. 

A bit of digging into the colonial history isn't pretty, however. Even by the shocking standards of European colonialists, Germans in the early 20th Century were brutal. In the west of Namibia can be found one of the world's first concentration camps, where thousands of Nama were interred and killed. Nama women were forced to remove the eyeballs, hair and skin from the skulls of their husbands, brothers and sons before cleaning the skulls so that they could be sent to Germany to be used in eugenics studies. 

I receive these and many more graphic anecdotes from a lovely local guy called Kennedy, who shows me around. At one point it feels like we're playing 'worst occupying force' Top Trumps. Kennedy also tips me off about a great spot to eat Namibian food, so I head along to Kapana in the Single Quarters township, which is heaving with people buying barbecued meat from dozens of stalls. Not for the squeamish, there's blood everywhere and even an entire furry cow's head just lying on the floor, with legs scattered nearby. 

Some of my fellow carnivorous diners there invite me for beers in a bar round the corner, which turns into a boozy session. Namibians, like many Africans, seem to be great linguists; all of my new friends here speak at least three or four languages, including English, German and Afrikaans. They're also more mild-mannered than the South Africans, exhibiting the same nervousness around me as I had noted in many East Africans. And of course, like all Africans, they see England as a flawless utopia in which they want to live.

And now for my last big decision: what to do with my final ten days left in Africa. I've got three options: 

1) sightseeing option. Visit the iconic Sossusvlei sand dune and see pelicans, flamingos and seals at Swakopmund, potentially as well as waterfalls and other safari 

2) project option. Ferg has put me in touch with the place where he spent a month or so building a lodge in the Caprivi Strip, in the north of the country, incorporating some good old fashioned manual labour and some driving around looking at animals up close 

3) detective option. The San, or Bushmen, come from this country! Possibly the world's oldest civilisation still around today, they number only 20,000 in Namibia, and still retain their hunter-gatherer lifestyle, constantly on the move, digging in the sand to find their water and eating mostly shrubs and insects. I'm quite keen to try to find them and live with them for a week but no-one seems to know where they'll be!

[amanby]

Namanbya 

Even without Rambo, there are distractions galore in Cape Town, especially when I meet up with Mike and his mates for drinks one evening and they nearly entice me to stay for longer with talk of upcoming barbecues and beach parties. 

But I limit myself to two more nights, now staying with my second cousin once removed, Nicola, having fondly bade farewell to Angela with lots of mutual thanks and good luck wishes. I work out that, when I leave Nicola's, I've only paid for accommodation six nights out of the past 30 (and five of those six were cheap nights in a tent - in fact the only time I've paid for a bed since northern Mozambique was when our car broke down in no man's land). 

The final days in Cape Town provide a few memorable highlights: finally managing to redeem the Aqueduct helicopter ride above the city, providing yet more evidence of what a rare beauty she is; the fun and games of Carnival already detailed in a previous post; District Six Museum, commemorating the apartheid government's inhumane eviction of blacks and coloureds from the centre of Cape Town in order to subjugate the residents and clear space for the whites. A plaque outside the museum reads: "All those who pass by remember with shame the many thousands of people who lived for generations in District Six and other parts of this city, and who were forced by law to leave their homes because of the colour of their skin" 

And on that uncharacteristically sombre note, it's goodbye Cape Town, goodbye South Africa, and hello 24 hour bus ride to Windhoek, complete with the most thorough border crossing I've come across - apparently there's a lot of drugs and gun smuggling into Namibia - and a farcical two hour wait in a petrol station as the bus turns round to take a couple of passengers who failed to get their passports stamped back to the border to do so. 

It strikes me as I get into Windhoek that I know absolutely nothing about this country. I can only name one Namibian who has ever lived: Frankie Fredericks! But, ever the eager student, I set about learning about the final stop of my African trip. Did you know, for example: 

* Namibia is four times the size of Great Britain but has a population of just 1.7 million 

* It has the oldest desert in the world, the Namib, which has held sand for over a million years and some of the tallest and most impressive sand dunes 

* It has the world's largest population of free roaming cheetahs 

* It meets Botswana, Zimbabwe and Zambia and one point; the only place in the world where four countries meet

[amanby]

Capes and Peaks

Rambo and I are down to our final days together, and as such take drastic measures like even planning in advance what we’re going to do. Our selection criteria is to cross off things for which the reason to visit is ‘you just have to do if you’re there’, or anything only achievable as part of a tour: bye-bye Robben Island and Stellenbosch wine tour.

After checking out Cape Town’s bars, beaches and seas, we’re now more interested in the natural beauty above land. And there’s plenty to go around…

We climb Lion’s Head. Rambo regales me with a suspiciously dramatic story of him saving a lady from falling off the mountain on his previous visit up the craggy path and then, as we toast each other with a bottle of rose, complains about the intrusiveness of someone flying a drone over our heads at the summit, with just a hint of hypocrisy.

We drive along Chapman’s Peak. Rated as one of the most beautiful stretches of road in the world by whoever puts these lists together, it’ll surely be in a Bond movie car chase soon.

We visit the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point. We feel the historical significance but hate the contemporary crowds. We quite like the fearless baboons though (and we even flout the signs by feeding them some bananas).

We check out the penguins. There are thousands of them, just standing around staring at rocks. Their brainlessness seems to be compensated only by their impressive libido (and charmingly affectionate post-coital nature). We hike Table Mountain. After abandoning plans to depart darling Angela’s at dawn when we see the drizzle, we then proceed to miss the path up and walk an additional two hours before finally getting back on track. This necessitates a breakneck charge up the mountain, followed by a slightly hurried drone session in which Rambo still grabs some outstanding eye-of-the-needle shots. The calmness at the top of the mountain provides an amazing juxtaposition with the 24 hour city life below. We even talk about our hopes and fears for the future, entailing probably our first serious chat of the trip!

We enjoy our final night together with a bar crawl down Kloof Street and final feast in McDonald’s - the first I’ve actually seen in Africa, as they’re considered too expensive for other countries I’ve visited.

We recite poems we’ve written to each other. Except sadly we don’t actually do this because, despite having discussed it on several occasions during the past few days, we’ve been too busy having fun to put pen to paper, plus Rambo wakes up dangerously close to missing yet another flight and has to dash to the airport.

So Rambo, my man, farewell and thanks for being such an incredible travelling companion for the past three and a bit weeks. I’ll leave the really gooey soppiness for the poem to be recited when we next see each other, but suffice to say that in amongst the extraordinarily offbeat philosolosophising, it’s been a smorgasboard of endless foolishness and fun, gasps and games, laughs and life lessons, walks and waterfalls, animals and Africans and activities and adventures. I like to think we brightened a few people’s days along the way too. And maybe even learnt one or two things about this wonderful, complicated country. And let’s keep that rambling, nonsensical video diary under lock and key until we’re both 100 years old, hey?

[amanby]

Carnival!

It's carnival! But not quite as I know it. Having done Notting Hill Carnival many times, having rampaged around Cologne in fancy dress looking for Lukas Podolski, and having experienced the inimitable real deal in Antigua in 2010, carnival for me has always been associated with music, dance, street performances, goat curry, Red Stripe, Cap'n Morgan and the smell of sweet Mary Jane (and also, of course, Julesy's ruthless efficiency, people getting lost, girls queueing for hours to pee and no-one having any phone signal or battery). 

It's an African version of more or less the same here, but without the booze and marijuana. Throughout proceedings, I don't see more than a handful of people with a beer in hand. I wonder if Notting Hill's Sunday 'Family Day' started like this before being cannibalised by dem yout? 

Here, it's a truly family and multi-cultural event. Originally created by the coloureds (I still feel uncomfortable using that term even though it's inoffensive and even part of legal language here), Cape Town's mixed race community still dominates Carnival, but I also see large numbers of blacks, Indians and Chinese, and a smattering of whites sitting in the VIP stands which have been erected by the parade. Having said that, not one white person who I've met here in Cape Town has ever attended, so it's clearly not a prominent part of their social scene. 

The theme for this year is Under the Water, which is pertinent given the worrying drought the Cape is currently suffering, so there's a brilliant array of people dressed as penguins, lobsters, barracudas etc, and even a scantily dressed mythical mermaid or two.

[amanby]

Jaws!

Sadly, Rambo has the GoPro video footage so I can't upload it here. When I get hold of it I'll add it to the blog, but for the time being let me describe what you'll see... [camera opens centimetres above the sparkling Atlantic Ocean, sunshine dazzling the viewer as it bounces off the surprisingly calm water. All is silent. There's an air of trepidation in the air, of nervousness about what's to come or, more pertinently, what might not come. Camera pans around. Five men are wearing wetsuits and masks, with just their heads bobbing above the water line. They're in a cage which is attached to a 40ft motor boat. On board the boat are another ten expectant passengers, and five crew. But the camera isn't bothered about them. It's focused on the five men... The men are cold. They've been in the water for a long time, and the temperature is barely above freezing (perhaps). Two of them, our brave heroes in this tale, are now on their second stint in the water. Lesser men would have given up by now. But not these two; they've come for one reason, and won't quit until they accomplish their goal. And then the shout comes...] Captain Hansie: DOWN! [the five men, as one, duck below the surface, and the camera ducks with them. There, coming quickly and dramatically into view, is a great white shark, a huge beast, the biggest ever seen in these waters (possibly). The shark flies towards the camera, towards the men, towards our two brave heroes, before at the last millisecond, just as it gets to the cage, it turns. It's close enough for our valiant warriors to poke its eye through the bars, but they decide not to. On this occasion. The shouting starts even before the men's heads emerge from the water. But it's not a cry of fear, this is a guttural howl of celebration. Their heads burst dramatically above the surface...] Valiant Warrior Rambo and Brave Hero Mambo: YEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! [the two brave heroes hug and continue to shout at each other for some minutes. It's like their football team has scored a last minute winner. Other passengers seem bemused. Captain Hansie thinks they're very strange. But the brave heroes don't notice. They're blissfully happy. The two heroes go on to see the shark up close several more times. And then they live happily ever after.]

[amanby]

This Addictive City

There’s something in the air in Cape Town. Or maybe it’s in the chilly Atlantic water crashing against endless beaches. Or is it the craggy mountains hiding their heads up in cloudy blankets? Either way, it’s got an addictive sort of pulse to it, immediately tangible and instantly compelling; the pace of our trip just stepped up a notch and I’m sure it’ll take a couple of blog posts to cover everything…

Kiff has put us in touch with his mate Mike Russell, who I happen to already know from his days as Lou Troen’s beau, and Mike invites us to his typically African Saturday afternoon activity: a charity lawn bowls tournament in Camps Bay. I seem to have missed these events in the likes of Rwanda and Mozambique! The drinks are flowing and rands racking up for the charity, but right now (cynics might say always) Rambo and I are a little too bedraggled and scruffy for this Cape Town royalty, and we need to confirm our lodgings so off we scuttle.

Topologically, it’s an incredible city. I’d forgotten just how central Table Mountain is, a peaceful roundabout encircled by a hive of activity. We head anti-clockwise to Constantia, where we’ve got a lead but are slightly nervous about what we’ll find…

My friend Rambo has a friend, who has a colleague, who has a mother. That mother, Angela, happens to live in a mansion in Cape Town with a wonderful swimming pool, the biggest TV I’ve ever seen and, most importantly, an entire wing which is currently unused, and where we’ll apparently be sleeping for the next week.

Now neither Rambo nor I have ever actually met Angela’s son, and decide to keep this fact to ourselves in case she starts questioning what exactly we’re doing in her house. But she’s delightful, has a wonderful tendency to ply us with steaks and red wine, and seems genuinely happy to have us staying, given that her husband’s living in Mauritius and children have moved abroad. Yeah, this’ll do for home for a week!

We tear ourselves away from Angela’s wine cellar and catch an Uber into town, where Mike has recommended the Village Idiot bar. It’s obviously a hotspot, as Jonny Knoxville’s there, and can I just say to all those who claim that being a celebrity would be terrible: erm well it’s got its perks. Knoxville is surrounded by Cape Town’s most beautiful girls (and that’s saying something), and after kissing at least three, he soon heads off with his pick of the bunch, who is by the look of her giraffe-like legs and faultless facial bone structure presumably a Victoria’s Secret model.

Mike never makes it to join us, but Rambo and I happily rampage around and blow a month’s African travelling budget on tequila shots, an undoubtedly excellent investment given how much fun it is. Rambo’s subsequent negotiating tactics with the taxi driver border on the infantile but we make it safely back to Angela’s, and the Egyptian cotton king size bed brings welcome relief from our recent nights in tents and car seats.

The next day is a slow-burner. I head across town to redeem the second voucher my Aqueduct friends so kindly bought me: a helicopter flight above the city. But it’s too windy to fly today and I’m too hungover to argue, so I book for a few days’ time and retreat to Angela’s to lie by the pool and learn to fly the drone.

So that’s our first two days in Cape Town! Next up, we’re off cage shark diving…

[amanby]

Ajax Cape Town official website, informing fans that last night’s relegation six-pointer was taking place at Cape Town Stadium.

Turned up at stadium…

No-one there…

Walked around stadium…

Still no-one…

Random guy shouts at me: “you in the wrong place! It’s at Athlone Stadium!”

TIA, bru, TIA…

[amanby]

When I emailed my South African friend Kiff asking for recommendations in his beautiful country, he was full of useful tips. But the place he reserved his most effusive praise for surprised me a little:

“One thing you must do is stop at the Peregrine Cafe in Elgin which is before Somerset West and on the N2 (the Garden Route road). Elgin is the apple growing country and they have the best fresh apple juice, biltong and pies - you won’t be disappointed I promise”

After tearing around the nearby hills on a souped-up quad bike - a present from my old colleagues at Aqueduct - we duly drop in on the Peregrine and Kiff, you weren’t wrong. What a place!

[amanby]

Ostriches!

On our first visit to the Sun and Bass festival in Sardinia, in 2009, the villa we stayed in was next door to a restaurant breeding and serving ostriches, and a night out was incomplete without running the gauntlet of the ostrich enclosure during a game of shoe golf on the way home, thus giving the animal something of a legendary status amongst our Bristol crew.

So when Rambo and I find out that there’s a town in South Africa which is famous for its ostriches, the logical conclusion is that we’ll pay it a visit.

Outshoorn, which seems to be pronounced a different way each time we hear it (most extreme version: ooots-wirren), was founded on the strength of the feather industry in the first half of the last century, but since that collapsed the town has had to innovate, so it now attracts visitors for winery tours, hiking, the vast cango caves and, naturally, ostrich riding.

There are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of ostriches here. You can stop on the side of the road and feed them, like a New Forest pony but more aggressive and menacing. And with longer necks and bigger beaks. So actually very little like a New Forest pony.

In 24 hours in Outshoorn we eat ostrich steaks, carpaccio, biltong and chunks on a pizza. We also eat some kudu and springbok just for good measure.

There’s still time for another game of 421 by a waterfall (this country has absolutely nailed the art of the waterfall), before a through-the-night drive to Grabouw…

[amanby]

Beachin’

We’ve covered the serious miles and so we’re now spending less time in the car and more on the beach.

First up is Stormsriver, which sounds like it should be in Australia, where they actually have a city called Surfers Paradise. That’s not a nickname, it’s what the city is actually called… good old Aussie culture! Here in SA, Stormsriver is beautiful but a bit disappointing, as we come across tourist crowds for the first time in our trip, and have to share beach space with some Russians with hilariously Russian haircuts and tight trunks, and a fat Englishman intent on making everyone aware that he’s drinking the beach bar dry of champagne.

Rambo also does some work! Yes that’s right, all you doubters who thought he was just here for a holiday need to pay attention: he spends a whole morning on the phone to clients back home reassuring them that he will make them some videos just as soon as he’s allowed his one more week of fun. For him this also means taking on the highest bungee jump in the world, at 236m, recreating the jumping style of Rob Shipster’s Mum Jackie when she completed the feat ten years ago.

From Stormsriver, we head to the legendary Plett Bay, scene of much misbehaving and unrepeatable antics from my school mates on their gap year. Hopes are high as we roll into town, but despite the stunning, endless beach, it’s pretty much empty, apparently because college kids aren’t on holiday right now.

We manage to get an invite to a house party, but the numbers are low and the highlight (for me and Rambo anyway) is when we get into a competitive game of balancing on your hands with your feet in the air and knees resting against your elbows. I’m pretty sure this is a yoga move but I forget the name. Either way, the owners don't seem to enjoy it as much as we do, and so as soon as the idea of watching South Park in Rambo’s tent is mooted, there’s only one outcome to the night.

[amanby]

Lovely to stop in on my 95 year-old great aunt Nonie in Port Alfred. She’s currently reading The Catcher in the Rye but, not being a sex-crazed 17 year-old American high school dropout, she isn’t sure if she can identify with it enough to really enjoy it.

We then hop down the coast to Kasouga to stay with my dad’s cousin Peter and his wife Elisabeth, who together founded St Mark’s, the school I taught in for five months on my gap year. It’s another free night for the lads, with a walk on the sand dunes of the wild and empty beach followed by a braii and characteristic intellectual interrogation by Peter!

[amanby]

My thanks to guest blogger Rambo for an excellent post detailing our short separation and his Afrikaans experience with Barry the bigot. It's amazingly confusing how those people tend to be simultaneously so generous to us and hate-filled to the blacks. Our drive from Durban to Hogsback is an arduous slog, with time on the road punctuated only by a pit stop and cliff jump in Coffee Bay and an aborted quest for the holy grail of Bulungula, a tiny community we had heard about which supposedly offers the chance to live amongst the Xhosa with their colourful round huts, at the mouth of a river with dreamy tubing opportunities. Sadly it proves unfindable, which is another way of saying that my navigation skills aren't up to scratch. The dunce award for the day clearly goes to Rambo, however, when he discovers he's left his pride and joy, his drone, at Barry's racist hell hole home and will have to pay to get it shipped to Plettenberg Bay. Nevertheless, Hogsback blows us away. We're in Tolkien territory here, and while stories of local influences on the author may verge on the apocraphyl, it's impossible to wander amongst the endless hills, with the backdrop of the imposing Hogsback mountains, without recollecting hobbity images of the Shire and its surroundings. Rambo and I go for a long walk along winding forested paths, with overgrown bushes and trees frequently blocking our route, and stop occasionally to swim in rock pools above or underneath crashing waterfalls and pose for epic photos, although the snap of the day is undoubtedly taken back at our hostel, with both of us having a (swimming trunked) bath in an old tub which the manager has installed a on the edge of a cliff with breathtaking views. We climb to the top of the tallest waterfall to roll back the years and play our favourite uni game of 421 before inventing poohpuffs, which is essentially like poohsticks except you drop cheesey puffs into rock pools rather than sticks into a river, and hope your intrepid puff navigates its way through treacherous overhanging branches, microscopic eddies, countless wrong turns, and over the raging fall itself. There's some poignancy for me in this admittedly ridiculous game, given that we're playing it just 100km from the city of Grahamstown, where my gran grew up, and it was she who taught me and my siblings to play poohsticks by her house in Shropshire when I was growing up. Back in town, stopping in at the local pub brings much hilarity as we accidentally crash a local birthday party and benefit from a case of mistaken identity when someone identifies me as "that Canadian legend who drank 19 pints yesterday." I can't see any reason to refute the claim, and suddenly we're the talk of the town (and no-one seems able to recognise we dooont sooooond like Canadians).

[amanby]

Guest post: Rambo...

Hello all you avid Ambling through Africa subscribers! I’m sorry to deprive you of your habitual splurge on high quality travel journalism from your most favourite of early mid-life crisis, go find yourself, super-intrepid bloggers.

I am sure to be a dissapointment in terms of content, grammar, syntax and general making-senseness. But I’ll do my best to give a fresh perspective on Manbo the traveller, as well as getting him back for that “Rambo locked himself in the room” slight in the last post, utter codswallop!

Talking about codswallop, we have seen a lot of incredible place names out here - generally a mixture of Zulu, Afrikaans and Hxosa, but this one has to take the biscuit! Collywobbles!

So my story takes you from Fugitives Drift onwards, where - as you heard - the freeloader Manby rode my coat tails into luxury, alongside more middle class white British people than he’d seen in the past 5 months.

From there we were to have our first - but not last - break up. Time for Alex to have a long hard look in the mirror. I was off to MtumbaTumba to chance my luck with a notoriously racist Afrikaana named Barry, while Manbo shot off to St Lucia (not the one Ratman Ferguson frequents each Christmas) to see the sea and try to avoid getting attacked by the town’s most aggressive inhabitant - a huge and irritable hippo that roams the streets at night.

I met Barry, dubbed “The Steve Irwin of the Eastern Cape”, and went to his local game reserve that afternoon. There weren’t any preditors but there were a huge amount of zebra, giraffes and buffalo grazing at a watering hole. Baz immediately asked to see my flying machine in action, and assured me it would not spook the animals. Fast forward 5 minutes and a stampede of 50 large animals careers just past the car…

That night I am confronted by the strongest experience of the notorious racial bigotry I have had to stomach so far on the trip, and I’m embarrassed to say when you’re spending so much time with just one person, you water down your views, give wet answers and generally feel guilty about it afterwards.

Luckily Barry tires himself out, falls asleep with a half smoked cigarette and a beer in hand, and I slip of to bed ready for a 5am wake up call (after extinguishing the fag of course).

The next day we go to iMfolozi game reserve, and despite having to “um” and “ur” awkwardly when hit with another barrage of “don’t you agree” racial slurs and analogies, my overpowering memory of the day will be of the sheer power and magnificence of the elephant. For someone who’s never been to Africa or seen wild game up close, you can’t exaggerate the feeling of a huge old bull walking slowly but powerfully straight towards your car. I was lucky enough to get a rare video of him drinking at a watering hole from all of 10 metres away. Other highlights include Rhinos with little babies, Pumba-esque warthogs, buffalo, baboons and some little bird that Barry got extremely excited about.

After saying my goodbyes to Barry, Manbo and I meet as planned at the Nandos (it’s either Nando’s or KFC in this country, they love their chicken more than I could have imagined) and the repatriation feels good, the bad blood has been washed away and a new beginning is embarked upon.

We make a B line for Durban where we have a bunny chow - a curry in a whole loaf of bread with extra potatoes - and the light meal propels us on to Coffee Bay, two hours in a city is enough.

Little did we know as we head out of Durban that the next 24 hours would bring us 20 hours and 1200 kilometres in the car.

Would Hogsback be worth it? Totally…

[amanby]

He controls the waves!