Saint Lucia

Clint and Sandile
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Please note, pictures will come once I find a computer which will upload them, chances are it will be in Cape Town, around Nov.11. But we have got some amazing shots!

After our sad departure from Swaziland, Wendy and I (Tovah) boarded the Baz Bus again for St. Lucia. Swaziland was beautiful, and so welcoming, but after being so far from any shops it was nice to get to St. Lucia.  It's a touristy, resort town, looks like it could be in the Keys, lots of people go here for fishing.  We were more interested in using this as our hippo hunting site, as well as the kick off point for Hluhluwe-Umfolozi Game Park (pronounced "Sha-shlu-i Um-philozi"). Hluhluwe-Umfolozi is South Africa's 2nd best Game viewing park with more than 900,000 Hectars (what ever that is) of protected land.

as Wendy turned to save her life, the guide said "wait take a picture first."

Sadile and Wendy at the beer fest
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What came to be one of the best things about this little community was the two guys Clint and Sandile, who "managed" the hostel.  Bib's international backpacker's is at the center of town, a block away from the supermarket, gas station, bait shops, restaurants... whatever you need.  We threw our bags down and Sandile took us on the official town tour for new comers. The hostel was a 30 minute walk to the beach (no swimming- unless you want to get eaten by a shark, croc, or stepped on by a hippo).  We opted for a 2 hour sunset (more like early evening sprinkle) cruise down the river for some hippo viewing.  There are 900 hippos in the river, we saw a good deal of them, in their pods (1 bull and 10-14 females, hi-o).  They are so cute, little babies on their mother's backs riding along in the water, mother's turing over for feeding time, lots of big yawns, and we even saw 2 bulls play fighting.  Plus the area it full of lots of birds, but Wendy and I have resorted to giving the ones we see fake names, like "the black billed egret."

Zebra
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After the cruise we hit up the market for some meat (Wendy has been doing great at eating meat), to through on the braii (bbq) they get one going at the hostel every night at 7, and the guest all eat together. Clint and Sandile's job descriptions include management and guest entertainment, (ie. keeping you up to all hours of the night laughing and drinking).  It's best to stay in the hostel though, because the hippos wonder the streets at night.

We also discovered that it's not always safe to use the ATM, even in a safe sleepy town.  Wendy and I had to pay for one of the tours in cash, so we walked down the block and a half to the first ATM (passing a seemingly harmless guy on his phone), which was out of order.  A man in a white min-bus pulled up to tell us about the ATM around the corner "in the alley,"  and offered us a lift.  We said no thanks, and that we would head to the gas station.  To our supprise the same guy had beaten us there and was at the ATM, which was also out of order, but he said he had gotten money out of it and to go ahead.  The screen wasn't even on, but the guy persisted that it worked and grabbed Wendy's card from her, saying it had to be wiped off- which he did by swiping it in his wallet.  We were shocked and wanted out of there, but he persisted that Wendy type in her pin.  Wendy grabbed her card back, as we got out of there, first asking the attendant where another atm was, and headed in that direction.  We got to the last ATM- which was in a strip mall parking lot, where all the stores are closed and it was getting dark- to find a another guy at the machine, but it didn't look as though he even made a transaction.  That's when the first guy we passed on the street shows up at the ATM, claiming he was there to shut it down for the night and insisted that I use it with "miss, it's ok now, you can use the machine." I went to use it, when he began to tell me it needed to be wiped off first and tried to help me.  I 'refused his help and proceeded with the transaction, when Wendy noticed the guys trying to look over my shoulder, she gave the "Tovah let's go!", I pushed cancel and we walked very quickly back to the hostel.  Frustrated by the whole situation we finally got the tour people to agree to let us put it on our credit cards (which we were charged an extra 7% for), and told Clint and Sandile what happened.  They immediately sprung into action, concerned that these guys were in the town and were treathening any tourist.  The hostel owner came down and took Wendy for a spin around town to see if she could identify them, but it seemed they had already left town.  It was comforting to know that the hostel and whole town were so concerned to keep the place safe for tourist and backpackers alike.

Elephant charging us
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We got our first peak of the Indian Ocean and it's vastness, however, the 3' wide board walk there gives the impression that your toes are vunerable to a croc at any moment.    We booked a "Safari" to Hluhluwe-Umfolozi, which left at 5 am, this fit in really well since Clint and Sandila had us up til 1:30 playing jenga.  But the park was unreal.  We thought we saw alot of animals close up in Swaziland, we had seen nothing.  It was 365 R (7R = $1) for the tour, which was half day and cover's the park's admission (70R).  We saw Blue Wilderbeast, Water Buffalo, White Rhino and a little baby white Rhino, Kudu, Inala, Impala, Warthogs (which are rather endouring) Zebras scratching there backs on trees, elephants and the best of all Giraffes. The Giraffe is SO enourmous, and I feel it's pain with the long legs.  It just towers over everything else, plus it's orange and easy to spot.  Though there are lions and leopards in the park, we did not see any.  We did however get charged by a lone elephant bull who fared his ears at us taking picture, the guide yelled for us to run back to the truck, and as Wendy turned to save her life, the guide said "wait take a picture first."  We got back into the truck, and got some more shots.  After 5 hours riding around on the truck we were glad to head back to St. Lucia, where it happened to be an all day beer fest.  In South Aftrica, this just means you drink all day, no microbeers here.

Baby White Rhino
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We had another crazy night with the Bib's guys and all their lady drama.  If ever in St. Lucia, keep an eye out for the Vervet Monkey, it travels in herd of 10 females and one small grey male, who had bright blue balls.  Some of the adrenaline hungry locals follow them around to rub their balls for the blue color, so at night they can sneek up on feeding hippos and smack it on ass, and then run like hell.  The next day they try to find the hippos they hit. Keep in mind it's a small town and they run out of backpacker's to entertain.

Clint messing with Wendy
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Next stop, one night in Durban (due to baz bus scheduling, then Port St. John's.

by the way, short hair was a great call for this trip.