Alright, so I know that it’s been 6 weeks since my last post. But I have a one word explanation for you… School. Turns out that taking a 300 level anatomy-and-physiology class, along with 3 other classes, is a bit of a time suck. But, better late than never, right?
So continuing on with my African adventures! Next we passed the border from South Africa into Swaziland! One of the highlights of Swaziland was a visit we did with a local orphanage. ISV provided us with some money to purchase food so that we could donate food to the kids at the orphanage. We also had the option of buying additional items with our own money if we wished to donate more, so I found a cute elephant puzzle that I threw into the mix. We were told that the kids are always happy to get new toys or things to play with so I’m hoping that my puzzle will make one of them, or some of them, very happy! Most of these kids have some pretty harsh backgrounds but it was so sweet to see how happy they were just from receiving an apple and a banana from us. A lot of the volunteers donated things like footballs and hula hoops so we hung out with the kids and played with them for an hour or so after handing out all of our food donations. The little kid in this picture was about 3 years old, he was pretty shy and didn’t talk much so I never caught his name, but he glued himself to my side for the majority of the hour and I carried him around with me as I visited with the other kids. He hadn’t been around cameras much so when I pulled out my phone and put it on selfie mode he got super excited and kept a smile on his face for the camera for a solid 10 minutes.
While in Swaziland, we also went to Milwane Wildlife Sanctuary. We had the option of paying extra money to either mountain bike through the sanctuary or horseback ride through the sanctuary. So, naturally, I signed up for both. I mean, when else will I get the opportunity to bike or horseback ride through herds of zebra? So that is pretty much literally what we did – we rode right by a bunch of different animals on both the bikes and the horses, including zebra, wildebeest, and even a few crocs by a few different bodies of water. My favorite moment though was riding right through a herd of wildebeest on the horses. We were able to get closer to the animals on the horses than on the bikes because the wildlife was more calm about it if we were on some type of animal. I guess us humans are scarier on our own than we are when we are on horseback. Anyway, this isn’t the greatest picture ever but here is a picture of one of the wildebeests that I got while on my horse – even though it isn’t the best picture in the world, I still love it because it reminds me how cool it was to see them so up close.
The owner of the lodge that we stayed at in Swaziland had an albino python that had been rehabilitated at one point in time and got so used to living in captivity that that is how he lives now. I don’t know the full story behind this guy, but I know that he is a rescue of some sort. Although he isn’t really considered “wild” anymore, I still think this picture is worth sharing. The owner took him out of his cage one night and told us about what type of snake he was and allowed us to hold him, which was really awesome. This type of snake constricts around other animals when it wants to make a kill, which means that it’s got killer muscles (literally). It was insane how I could feel its strength just when it was chilling out on my shoulder – I can’t even imagine how much force he has when he wants to constrict around something. This is a picture of another ISV volunteer and I holding this magnificent albino python.
The final Swaziland adventure that I feel worth mentioning is “adventure caving”. Now, adventure caving is much more… well, adventurous, than normal caving. You don’t simply walk through a cave, you literally crawl through tiny little holes and scale walls to get through. We even went adventure caving with Swazi Trails, which is the original company that kind of invented the term “adventure caving”. We hiked to the cave, went down in the cave, made our way back up, and then hiked back to camp. This was another fear I conquered because I can get claustrophobic at times, another point for Laney! I did pretty well with it though, I got a little claustrophobic towards the end of the caving adventure but I controlled it well and had a lot of fun overall. I also liked seeing the bats in the cave – we had to be quiet around them to avoid waking them up, but they were so tiny and adorable! We were told that waking them up could be a crucial mistake because if they woke from their slumber they would begin looking for food, which wouldn’t be around at this time of the year. These particular bats were horseshoe bats, which means that they have cute little faces that look like horseshoes. Here is a picture of the little cuties (along with some other ISV volunteers), followed by a picture that our cave guide got of me as I made my way through one of the tiny cave holes.
Our final stop of the tour was Mozambique – which is literally a sandy paradise. As soon as we crossed the border into Mozambique all paved roads disappeared and all of the roads were simply sandy paths. Our accommodation was in Ponta Do Ouro and it was basically a bunch of cabins right on the beach. Shoes were optional and I’m pretty sure our tour guide literally left his shoes on the bus the entire 3 days we were there. Mozambique was a lot of fun but also felt a lot different than the other places we had been because the scenery was so different, it almost felt like a completely different trip. One of the first things we did in Mozambique was a dolphin encounter. We basically met with a dolphin expert that has been studying the dolphins of the area for 10 years and she told us all about dolphins. Once we knew more about them and had a bit of a safety talk, we hopped on a boat and road out into the ocean. We cruised around looking for dolphins and eventually found 3 of them about 30 minutes in to the trip. The guide looked around the area to make sure it was safe for us to get in the water and decided that it was, so we all put on our snorkels and fins and jumped in the water. We basically floated around on the surface and got to watch the dolphins swim around right under us, it was pretty amazing. We only got to be in the water for about 10 minutes before the dolphins swam away, but what happened next was so awesome that it was worth it. We hopped back in the boat and wandered around for a bit hoping to find more dolphins. We didn’t find any more, but we saw something else that was equally as cool if not more – the humpback whales are currently migrating and a group of them swam RIGHT by our boat! We saw them come up to the surface and go back under, slamming their tales against the water as they went back down. It was so cool to see! Unfortunately I don’t have any good pictures of the whales since I didn’t bring my camera on the boat, but here’s a good shot that the dolphin company got of the dolphins!
We were also given one hour of surf lessons later that day, which was something I had never had any prior experience with! I stood up twice for about a millisecond each time, and there were a number of times that I didn’t quite stand up all the way but I got into a crouching position and held it for a few seconds. So I was pretty bad at it, but I had a LOT of fun anyway! Here is me being a beach babe with my lovely surfboard.
This next picture doesn’t have that much of a story to it, but it’s one of my favorites so I have to share it anyway. The drinking age in Africa is 18, so I got to have my first official drink of my life in Africa. How cool is that? They have a super popular drink called a “Savanna”, which is basically an apple cider. I think I only drank two times the entire four weeks that I was in Africa, but here is a picture of me enjoying my Savanna on the beach. Best first-drink story ever.
The last big thing we did was one of my absolute favorite things that I did the entire trip, so I was very excited that I got to end my trip with something so great. We had the option of paying some extra money to go scuba diving. I debated it for a while because I wasn’t sure if it was something I would absolutely love or if it would just freak me out and make me feel claustrophobic. I thought about it for a while but eventually decided to go for it, and I am so glad that I did! It was a two-day program, so the first day we were got in a pool with a scuba instructor and learned some basic skills to get comfortable with the gear, and then the second day we actually went out into the ocean to dive in a reef called Doodles Reef (if you say that you’ve ever heard of a reef with a more whimsical name I won’t believe you). When we went out I did have a slight bump along the way, but I was very proud of myself for getting through it and having a great time anyway. About halfway to the bottom of the reef, which was 14-18 meters deep overall, I couldn’t get my ears to pressurize and they were starting to hurt. I started to freak out a bit so I swam back to the top and gave myself a little pep talk on the surface. I headed back down and went super slow and steady, and then once I reached the bottom I was just fine. Success! We swam around for a total of 42 minutes, and we saw so many things! We saw some potato fish, which are huge! They were longer than me! We also saw a few lyon fish and some awesome jelly fish as well. At one point I swam right over a manta ray that was buried under some sand on the ocean floor – I didn’t realize he was there and when I swam over him he quickly scurried away, but it was really cool to see him! He was literally within touching distance. We also swam through some schools of small sized fish, which was really cool. Though I think that one of my favorite things about the entire dive was that we could hear the humpback whales as they were migrating. They were too far out for us to see them, but we could hear them very clearly – and yes, they did sound like Dory in Finding Nemo when she mimics a whale. It was super cool to hear, it took me a minute to realize what it was but once I did I was so excited! The company we swam with was called Back to Basics, and their slogan was “There is no adventure within your comfort zone”, which I really loved since this was another one of my conquered fears! One of the divers that went with us recorded the whole thing and got some great shots, so here are a few of my favorite pictures. The first one is me in the pool when we were learning how to use the gear. The others show one of the jelly fish and one of the potato fish that we saw in the reef!
Our final night in Africa we hiked up to a nearby lighthouse and watched our final African sunset with a beautiful view. It was truly a great way to end the trip. This was truly the trip of a lifetime and I am so thankful for the opportunity. I stepped out of my comfort zone a number of times and every single time, I was so glad that I did. I may be back again someday, but until then…. Stay beautiful, Africa. And thanks for listening, bugs.
Until next time… (which hopefully will be sooner than 6 weeks from now),
Love,
Laney-Bug ❤
lovelaneybug 