Back in Cape Town

After a couple of nights in Windhoek, I said goodbye to Namibia and flew back to South Africa. I stay here in Cape Town tonight and tomorrow it's back to the US. As I mentioned last time, it will be very hard to leave Africa. This trip has been amazing in so many ways, from the landscape to the wildlife to the adventure activities, but especially from the people I've met along the way.

In all, we had 18 people on my tour and 2 phenomenal guides. Three of us ended our tours in Windhoek and three new people replaced us and continued into Botswana with the others. The original 20 of us only knew each other for 13 days, but there were quite a few tears shed yesterday morning as the bus pulled away and left us behind in Windhoek. I wasn't among the ones tearing up, but I easily could have. It was really hard to see everyone go, but on the plus side I've got a ton of new friends and a lot of couches to crash on around the world.

I don't really know why it was that hard, maybe it was because we all shared so many amazing memories, or maybe it was because we just became that close over that short of time. The one thing I do know is, I have never laughed more in such a short period of time. All of you will be hearing a lot about my traveling companions, so be warned. Actually, you Atlanta folks will get to meet one of them. A guy named Judson lives near Winder and teaches in the Gwinnett County school system. And yes, for those interested, he is a Dawg. (And single...ladies)

As for the last part of the actual trip, it was simply amazing. I mentioned we were in Etosha, but I didn't get much of a chance to talk about it. If any of you are looking for a park to visit in Africa, Etosha is a good one. The wildlife is abundant and the opportunities to see them, plentiful. My only regret is that I didn't get to see a rhino.

Overall though, we saw a ton of wildlife and honestly, got a little bored seeing some of them as they were so numerous. Among those I count giraffe, zebra, and the many antelope species in the park. At night we camped at one of the watering holes. The campsites here have been amazingly nice. They're nothing like the dirty, unkempt ones that abound in the US. They are all clean, they don't smell, and best of all, most of them have a bar!

The ones in Etosha were probably the best we had. The big plus was that they were next to the watering holes, so we could sit and watch animals as they came by to drink. They were even lit at night to enable viewing in the dark. That was a nice feature, but I found it a little too touristy.

After two days in Etosha, we headed to Windhoek. Along the way, we stopped a huge craft market to shop for souvenirs. It's interesting to shop in the markets here and the prices are extremely negotiable. A carving could be labeled 250 Namibian Dollars (about US$35), but the seller would walk up and say something like, "Hello my friend. I give you special Saturday price on that." He would then pull out a calculator type in a price roughly 2/3 that and more or less invite you to counter. I made it kind of a rule to pay close to half what they originally asked and that came true on the few things I bought. It was interesting.

After arriving back in Windhoek, we rested up and hit the town for our final night out. Our group went to one of the most popular restaurants in town, one that specialized in wild game. I've tried a lot of game over the past couple of weeks and this place was good. Among the meats I tried were three antelope species; Kudu, Oryx, and Springbok, and at an earlier dinner, Crocodile. Springbok was probably the best and the worst was easily Crocodile, it's like chicken, but extremely tough.

The restaurant was huge and had a bonfire going in the outside section we sat in, so everyone just mingled around and drank the night away. It was a wild night, but a fitting note to end our tour on. I couldn't help but feel sorry for the three new people. I don't think they had any idea what they were getting in to.

As mentioned, yesterday was spent saying goodbye and then checking out Windhoek, which to be honest, isn't really worth the time. One of the others, a Canadian girl named Joanne, was spending most of the day in Windhoek so we walked around together. Her company was the only thing that I enjoyed about the day.

So, that's about all. As I said, tomorrow it's back to the US. I fly from Cape Town to Johannesburg and then take an overnight flight to Paris. I get in early Wednesday morning, and then it's off to Atlanta a few hours after that. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone after nearly three weeks away, but I have to admit, I really don't want to leave.