The wilds of Africa

We were awake early with the birds singing in the milkwood tree outside our room and so decided to go for a run. From our accommodation it is about 200m to the beach promenade. On our previous visit we noticed someone rather entrepreneurial who was selling coffees from under a gazebo on the street corner near the beach. Now, years later, he has a thriving business going, he works from a trailer and has a power point for his coffee machines. At 6.20am when we ran past there were already about 25 people enjoying coffees after their morning walk on the promenade. There were many walkers and a few runners on the promenade, school and work starts early here so people are up and about very early. 

Another consequence of the floods earlier this year in April is that the pump facilities to pump the sewage up to the filtration plants were damaged, so currently raw sewage is being pumped into the rivers and consequently there is now E.coli in the water. You cannot drink the tap water and swimming at all beaches is banned. We did notice a few (ignorant ?) people swimming but mainly the beaches are empty. It has had a knock on effect on the travel industry and we noticed that we were the only people staying in our lovely accommodation, Teremok Lodge. The owners of our accommodation said they have been struggling with firstly the effects of  Covid, then the riots and looting, then the floods and now this E.coli outbreak. I really hope they survive as they offer excellent accommodation and many famous people have even stayed there (movie stars who were here filming in the area) 

After breakfast we packed up and set off north along the coastal route to the game reserve Phinda. It was just under 3 hours to get there. The national motorway was broken in some areas with collapsed bridges under repair but generally it was in good condition. There were cows grazing right on the edge of the unfenced motorway but in most cases there was a herdsman to prevent them from walking onto the road. We stopped to refuel and I had forgotten the pleasure of driving into a garage to be greeted by a smiling, friendly person who fills up the tank and washes the windscreen while you just sit in the car. There were vendors along the road selling pineapples and also African wooden carved bowls and also miles and miles of forestry plantation.

We received a warm welcome at Phinda, got shown to our room at Rock Lodge, unpacked and then went to have lunch. While we were eating lunch on the outside terrace there was an enormous thunderstorm with lightning, and when the rain started blowing in sideways we had to move indoors to finish our lunch. By the time tea and cake was served at 3.30pm the rain had stopped and we could go on our game drive.

The sightings were rather poor, I don't think they have the number of wild animals here that we saw when we were in Kenya, but that may have been due to the rain as the animals tend to hide in poor weather. We saw one bull elephant, a few species of antelope, some giraffes, zebra and many hippos in a pool. The extra is of a beautiful Nyala. When it got dark the tracker used the light to search for the nocturnal animals, and we saw many genets. 

We got back for another delicious meal and now it is bed time. We will be up early again, a 5am wake up to meet for our morning game drive. It has been busy with no down time but tomorrow should be easier. The lodge is very luxurious and as it only has 12 guests we have met all of them, and they all very nice.

I am delighted we have a new PM, the person who should have been voted for in the first place.