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still in Athens
Yesterday I made my way to the Acropolis, the most important ancient architecture in the western world. Acropolis is really the name of one of eight hills within Athens, and is dominated by the Parthenon, a massive structure made of marble hauled from great distances. Below it are ruins of a city from 300 years BC (the designation BC has changed recently to not reflect the birth of Christ but Im not sure what the new name is). The Parthenon in particular is impressive only for its size and placing on high, many of the carvings and statues from it have been placed in the nearby Acropolis Museum. I also…
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Athens
Travelling through Toronto and Frankfurt, I arrived in Athens this afternoon. Rather than brave the legendary taxi drivers from the airport (if you get a nice one he will very likely rip you off) I instead took the Metro train, which takes about the same amount of time and saves about 40 Euro or more than $50. The hard part was keeping my wits about me to gather my bags and leave at the right exit after an hour on the train, since I couldn’t help but nod off a few times (it’s 9 hours ahead of the time at home). Leaving the metro station whose exit was lined with…
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Greece
I leave for Athens in less than a week. Some parts of Greece right now are 40 degrees, but should be starting to cool down in September. Here at home we have had hot weather for only the last week or two, but summer is winding down. Mornings are cool and days are getting shorter. This week I was advised by my tour company that the activity level of my trip had been upgraded, mainly due to the day long trek into the biggest gorge in Europe, on the island of Crete. That day we will leave our packs behind and carry only a small pack, so I decided I…
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Hwange NP and Vic Falls
We packed up camp and left for a conservation area for the rare painted hunting dogs, and got to see a couple of the dogs who reside at the centre. They are skinny and of course dog-like, and are so ugly theyre cute. They can take down antelope in the wild, and are endangered due to being easily snared in poachers wire meant for other game. The centre sells stuff made from the poachers wire that is gathered from the park. We entered Hwange National Park, home to 40,000 elephants, for that nights camp, but got to stay in basic cabins. This means toilets and showers outside in a block,…
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Tracking rhinos in Matopos
In Matopos National Park, set off in open 4x4s to go rhino tracking. The rare white rhino is still killed by poachers for its horn, sold to the Chinese as an aphrodisiac. This doesn’t make much sense since their horns are made of keratin, like our fingernails, and can be cut off without having to kill the animal, they grow back quite quickly. This is different than the elephant, whose ivory tusks are attached to the skull and don’t grow back. Rhinos in this part have had their horns trimmed off to deter poaching and save their lives. We followed some signs, like big piles of poop and scratching, but…
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into Zimbabwe
We got to the Zimbabwean border around opening time, again taking well over an hour to get cleared through. Canadians pay $75, the most of any nationality (other than a Chinese girl who had to pay $500), apparently because our PM was the head of a committee that determined Zim should be expelled from the Commonwealth due to human rights abuses, in 2003. There are almost human-sized naughty baboons running around in the parking lot of the border agency looking for food. Carried on to Harare, capital of Zim, modern city of 2 million, looks great until you look at the ground to see garbage and crumbling sidewalks. We passed…
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The warm heart of Africa – Malawi and Zambia
We returned to our past campsite and everyone upgraded to basic bungalows on the beach so we didnt have to put up and take down tents in the rain. We have to leave at 5 am so its worth the $14 to not have to tear down in the dark. I had a great sleep with the sounds of the ocean in my ears. This was fortunate since the next day I noticed the bottom of my day bag was ripped, I thought maybe just worn out until I pulled out my snack bag at the bottom that was chewed to pieces. By rats. I am missing a melted chocolate…
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Zanzibar
Day 8 of the trip – we are headed to the fabled land of Zanzibar! Tanzania turns out to be the name of the mainland, Tanganyika, combined with the islands of Zanzibar, and initials of Independent Association tacked on the end. They seem to operate separately – to get in to Zanzibar we had to show our passports and yellow fever certificates. We had to take a crowded very early morning ferry across a channel, trying to get out of the way of vehicles also on board, then a van to a big modern ferry. I sat outside at the front watching another ferry unload with people carrying off random…
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The Road to Zanzibar
We went for a tour of the village the next morning where they do woodworking and painting, and visited a kindergarten which was really cute, they all wanted to high five and show their drawings to us. Back on the truck, the lady who had washed our clothes last night had hung them all over the seats and overhead shelves in the truck, so we all got to know each others’ knickers. We drove up into highlands at the base of snow-topped Mount Kilimanjaro, largest free-standing mountain in the world – it’s not part of a range. Along the way we passed the village of a Maasai man who has…
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Serengeti and Ngorongoro
We set off for the Serengeti , stopping in Arusha, the safari capital of Tanzania, for supplies, then on to a small town named Mto Wa Mbu which means Mosquito River, where we set up camp. Its hot and humid here, and to no surprise malaria is an issue, so we have to cover up. The next morning we went in 4 x 4s (with a roof that lifts off so you can stand up for game viewing) through the Ngorongoro conservation area to reach the Serengeti National Park. In this conservation area the Maasai are seen everywhere in their striking red and purple blankets, which were adopted from the…