Days 6-7 (no-man's land)

Looking at any map, you'll see a bunch of solid lines marking the boundaries between countries.  But that single, solid line isn't reality.  On the ground (at least in Southern and East Africa), you first go through an emmigration office to leave the country you're in, and then you either walk or drive a ways to a separate immigration office to enter the country to which you're heading.  Leaving you with a period of time and space in a literal no-man's land.  Really, the maps should show two parallel lines at all boarders, with a vacant, unaffiliated space between.

And while the very easy way to view this process is as a hassle (double the paperwork, double the lines, and twice the immigration officers scrutinizing your movements) there's also the chance that maybe they're right.  Maybe it's good to spend some time in no-man's land.  To completely finish with one thing before you start the next.  Perhaps this just the bureaucratic equivalent to asking: Why the rush?  Why such a hurry to take two separate things (an end and a beginning) and smush them into one?  Just wait.  Take a minute.  Breath the unaffiliated air, unencumbered.

Which is all just to say that we crossed our first boarder today, from South Africa to Namibia.

Namibia

Driving into and through Namibia felt like driving into a Calvin and Hobbes moonscape.  Which, let's be honest, is exactly what I was hoping it would feel like.  (Who doesn't want to be Spaceman Spiff?)  We drove by craggy rocks and funky looking trees, alternating with vast stretches of shrubbery in warm afternoon sun.

Spiff coming in for crash landing!

Dry, cracked earth

Scenic shrubbery

Warmth

The first evening brought us to sunset at Fish River Canyon, the second-largest canyon in the world, after the Grand one.  

Technically, it's two canyons.  The first caused by tectonic shifting, and the second caused by river water erosion.  As this was being explained to me in the fading light, I kept squinting, trying to identify the second canyon.  Where is it?  Is it beyond those hills?  I only see one...

And then I realized- it's not two separate canyons, but rather a canyon twice over.  The second carved into the belly of the first.  

Our second night in Namibia was spent camping in the Helmeringhausen Area, just outside of the Namib Dessert, where we watched the sky turn from pink to dusk, and then whiled away the night with drinks around the campfire.

Our guide found a scorpion and put him in a halved soda bottle.  Scorpions have the unique quality of fluorescing under black-lights, with no apparent or known evolutionary cause.  

As if the opportunity to impress at a roller-rink 80s night weren't evolutionary reason enough?

Days 4-5 (auspicious beginnings)

"Sick, no money, rain, rainbow, rain, wet, hail, cold, still very very sick," is how my journal reads from these first few days on the road.  After a few days in winterish Cape Town, our overlanding trip finally departed, amidst torrential downpour, on the morning of June 2, 2013.  

Within the first hour, there was the distinctive pop of one of our massive truck tires.  Our guide called it, "auspicious beginnings," as we delayed an hour on the side of the road.  He also said it was good luck when we passed a goat giving birth several days later.  Clearly a person whose glass isn't just half-full, but spills over with unrelenting optimism.  

Our truck, on sunnier days

The trip itinerary for this first day had said: 

"Leaving Cape Town, we head north through the wine growing regions. We cross the Piketberg Pass into the rich fruit growing area of Citrusdal. Our first night is spent in a picturesque campsite surrounded by local wine farms. This afternoon we have the opportunity to sample some of the nectar of the gods or to explore the surrounding beautiful Cederberg Mountains"

Which really sounds like the most lovely of days, and was true in at least some ways, like driving north through the wine growing regions.  

That happened

Although the scenery was more often this

And I'm sure the campsite would have been "picturesque" if it hadn't started hailing when we were setting up our tents.  After running back to the truck to shelter from pelting ice-bombs, I finally emerged to find that the inside of my tent had become a lake that no mopping could fully drain.  To attack the last remaining puddles, I had to resort to sopping them up with socks.  (Which I then carried around damp for the next week, never having enough warmth or sun to fully dry them, until I had to shamefully hand them over to a laundromat in Swakopmund, reeking of sour something.)

And too sick for any "nectar of the gods."  

The following was another of day-long driving, with only one short stop in Springbok to buy blankets.  Others grumbled, but, being sick, I couldn't have asked for more.  All I want to do is sit on the bus and nap all day until this cold is resolved; I don't want everyone else enjoying activities that I'd have to miss out on.  Because, clearly, I'm just that selfish.  

And just like that, with 2 full days of driving, we were at the boarder of South Africa, looking out at Namibia across Orange River.  

Camping with a view of Namibia across the water

Which is about when things started looking up.  Because that placid river?  It ignites by evening.  As though Namibia were a phoenix, smoldering through the night to rise again come morning.

Orange River

Namibia in flames

And I thought, despite the cold (chilly rains) and the cold (sniffling and sneezing), there's something special happening here.  

Day 2 (the fog misbehaving)

Walking around Cape Town this morning felt like I had been dropped into that GeoGuessr game, where you're placed at a random spot on GoogleMaps Street View of the earth, and you have to look around to figure out where you are.  Wide, nicely paved roads, an embarcadero along the waterfront, delectable bakeries.  

Beach Rd.

Fog sneaking...

Everything familiar, but... just a little bit wrong.  Cars on the wrong side of the street, and the fog misbehaving.  In San Francisco, fog rolls in like a wave that you can spot from a distance.  In Cape Town, it sneaks up on you like steam in the bathroom, where one minute you can see yourself in the mirror and the next you're lost amid the molecules.  

Fog snuck

I putzed around the V&A Waterfront, which (like nearly every waterfront in the world these days) is comprised of shops and a large Ferris wheel.  Then after finding out that Table Mountain was open for a day between the sequential weeks of gloom and rain, I headed up.  

Indian Meets Pacific Ocean

And it's nice to know, again and again, that you can still be blown away.  I'd seen Table Mountain in pictures and movies, but to actually be there (as they say) is something else.  And I remember that the Earth is a very very beautiful place, and that I am a very very lucky person to see as much of it as I have.  And that, really, this is just the beginning.  Day 2. 

Above the world

Table Mountain

The sun sets over SeaPoint

The sun sets over the world

Postscript

As I've noted, these blog entries are retrospective, drawn from my memory and journal entries.  My journal entry from this day describes my trip to Table Mountain, but also includes a section that I labeled "Other Items of Note," under which the following notes appear:

1.) Benevolent strangers vs. charming serial killers-- How do you know?
2.) What comprises narcissism?
3.) Love Bill Murray.

That's right.  Love Bill Murray.  A shorthand note or a command?

Day 1 (to leave Kenya)

It was difficult to leave Kenya.  

Not exactly in the emotional, heart-wrenching way of packing all your stuff into a backpack and realizing just how transient your life really is, but because the Nairobi airport almost didn't let me.  

Everything I packed for 6 weeks

Sure, I knew I'd face challenges when I decided to embark on a 6-week overland camping trip from Cape Town to Nairobi, but I never expected them to start as soon as the check-in counter when the agent asked for my Yellow Fever vaccination booklet.  Somewhere along the lines of packing my Seattle life into a Honda Civic and driving it down to California before re-packing to move to Kenya, my vaccination booklet became misplaced.  Luckily, I have impeccably preserved color-copies of the booklet (just as is recommended in case you lose the original) which I presented to the agent.

He was nonplussed.  And then said I couldn't board the flight because I didn't have my Yellow Fever vaccination.  "But," I said, "I do have the vaccination... See, it's right here."  After a few rounds of that conversation, interspersed with some faffing about of paperwork, he agreed to take me to the Port Health authorities (to relieve himself of the problem).     

Flying over Lake Victoria (Spoiler alert- I was able to leave the country)   

The Port Health authority looked at my paperwork and said, "What's the problem?  This is valid."  I liked him immediately.  But our bureaucratic Catch-22 consisted of three pillars:

1.  South Africa would not accept a photocopy and would not allow me in the country without the original.

2.  I couldn't get another original booklet without receiving a new Yellow Fever vaccination.

3.  I couldn't get a new vaccination because my current one was still valid for another 8 years.  

A few more conversational laps around that track, greasing some wheels, and finally I was granted passage onto the plane, with just a small window before departure.  

Flying over Rwanda

As I was leaving, the authority asked what I do for work, and I told him that I'm in Public Health, which broke the ice about an hour after it would have been helpful.  He just laughed and laughed and laughed and said, "Just like us!"

And then I was on my way.

Departing Johannesburg for Cape Town

The answer, always

It's Monday night of my last real week at work, which is really just a half-week.  Come Thursday I'll be landing in Cape Town to start a 6-week overland camping trip from South Africa back up to Nairobi.  As such, this is probably my last post from Kenya for a bit (unless I get ambitious tomorrow), though I'll be doing my best to keep you all (Hi, Mom and Dad) updated along this next journey.

So, gosh, what to write about for the quasi-last post?

I could show you a picture I finally took of that monkey on my sidewalk.  Talk about why Lamu town is more charming than people give it credit for.  Post images of my legs and let you all vote on whether they're riddled with mosquito or bedbug bites.  But I think the best way to go is with turtles.

Because we all know that the answer, always, is Turtles- all the way down.

I just returned from a lovely long-weekend in Lamu, where (as is apparently my custom) I didn't plan a single detail of the trip.  But luckily one of my companions knew that it was turtle-hatching season.  So, hurrah!

Along with the other 10 muzungu tourists on the island that weekend, we started with a pleasant boat trip through the mangroves, out to Manda Island.

Mangroves

The Lamu archipelago is made up of several islands- Lamu, Manda, Pate, and perhaps another.  Manda is the one from which the disabled French lady was kidnapped by Somali pirates in 2011, and subsequently the reason I was never able to visit on my last trip.  But please don't let that color your impressions.  Manda really is quite lovely.  

Manda

Goat tracked beach

 The turtle NGO (I left the brochure back at the hotel and forgot the name), employs ex-poachers to identify nests that are ripe for hatching (mounds of sand that are marked with two sticks).  In the wild, turtles hatch from their eggs under the sand mound and then take about a day to crawl their way to the surface.  It NGO world, the turtles hatch like usual, and then the handlers help dig them out so they can walk a red-carpet runway to the ocean with tourist paparazzi. 

The turtles most definitely did not stay within the prescribed runway

And thus I pronounce you FREE!

They leave the nest in a pretty uniform fashion.

AaaaaaaAway they go!

Herloo!

But it becomes chaos pretty swiftly, in an each-turtle-for-himself dash for the ocean.  Turtles racing each other, flipping over, getting stuck in beached seaweed, going in the wrong direction... Having seen all this, it's not surprising that most of them die when they get in the water.  Not the best instincts.  

Almost there...

Oh no... that's not the ocean!

Not the most flattering picture (hello, new bangs), but provided for scale.  Baby sea turtles are TINY.

Finally, with a few redirections and heroic rescues by the handlers, all of the 60 babies in this nest reached the water.  Probably about 10 will survive the first week.  

 

Turtles beyond turtles, all the way down to the foam

 And on that bittersweet note, I'll say "Kwaheri Kenya."  At least for the next 6 weeks.

You know, superlatives

A little while ago I was walking home from work when I came across a colobus monkey sitting on the sidewalk a few blocks from my apartment.  And the first thought to cross my mind was not: Wow, a monkey!, as you might expect, but rather: Wow, what nice sidewalks!  

You see, well-paved, pothole-free sidewalks that don't have cars driving on them are more rare than monkeys.  Especially around my house, where the roads had almost necessitated 4-wheel-drive when I first moved here in 2011.  I never really knew how exciting fresh asphalt could be.  

Sure, I'd probably point out a monkey on the sidewalk to a friend, but no tears would be shed if it ran away before she got to see it.  Kind of like a brightly plumaged blue-jay in the back yard.  You might say, hey, come look at this nice bird, but there wouldn't be any urgency to the suggestion.  

But it's still not every day that you see a senior scaling the columns of her house to hand-feed them bananas.  That's still special.   

And that's what we saw when we drove out to Limuru to spend an afternoon at the Kiambethu Tea Farm.  Tea, like flowers, is one of Kenya's biggest exports.  Whenever my boss visits Kenya, he's conscripted to return home to Vietnam with bundles of tea for his family and Kenyan friends.  Wikipedia even says that Kenya is "the leading producer of the best black tea in the word," and that "Kenyan tea [is] the most sought after beverage in the world."  So, you know, superlatives.  And internet.  

Kiambethu apparently used to be one of the largest tea farms in Kenya, but has been pared down and sold away through the course of generations.  It's still operational, but only in small quantities.  They generate additional revenue by hosting tours and luncheons on their grounds.  

Kiambethu house

Tree tomatoes growing in the gardens

The afternoon begins with tea and biscuits (naturally), served with fine silver.  Then everyone sits around a warm living room, passing around fresh tea leaves and examining different sizes and textures of dried tea and and tea dust.  

Good tea, mediocre biscuits

Six shades of tea dust

After that, everyone goes outside to look at the monkeys for a while.  Then they look at the lady (granddaughter of the original farm owner) breaking bread (bananas) with said monkeys.  

Babies!

Then there's some walking around the tea farm, lookin at geese, and exploring a swath of indigenous forest before returning back to the house for a home-cooked lunch in the garden.   

Tea grows in Kenya

Twisty trees

Garden lunch

So what's the final verdict?  If you're interested in tea and looking for an easy day-trip outside of Nairobi, Kiambethu Tea Farm is a solid option.  However, not recommended quite as highly as an afternoon at Brown's Cheese Farm, also in Limuru.  While tea and cheese are both delicious, the house and grounds at Brown's are a bit more lovely, and they're a bit less stingy with their wine.  

Perhaps it's time

The city of Nairobi (and by extension I think I can safely assume the entire country of Kenya) has run out of Nutella.  

That's right.  It's a country completely dry of delicious chocolate-hazelnut spread.  

Perhaps it's time to start thinking about leaving.

Off to more chocolately pastures! 

(Incidentally, I think that's the Ngong Hills we're flying over)