Ok, we have made it back safe and sound from our overnight to Kasungu.. I will write today, add photos of the trip to the park and the add more photos tomorrow from our trip. The kids took most of the photos so I have alot to sift from. I just wanted to update the blog and keep you in suspense until tomorrow.
A quick thing before i talk about our mini trip.
The night before we left for our trip, we went to the swimming pool .. It has a great bar, restaurant, etc. I purchased a few beers and soft drinks and gave the gentleman a tip (probably 2$)… As mentioned before, tipping here is not necessarily expected.. I think coming from the US it is engrained in our head to tip, so I usually tip.. Anyway, I gave the gentleman the tip and he said.. “thank you sir, this will be used for transport.” which means he will be using it to catch a ride home on a minibus.. I thought to myself…..i can’t imagine going to work each day, uncertain as to how I am going get home. I get upset if there’s a problem with my car, or there is too much traffic, or god forbid, there’s no gas in my vehicle and I have to stop to refill.” But to go to work each day resigned to either hope that I get some money for a ride home, or that I’ll just walk home, is beyond my way of thinking..
The kids and I left Lilongwe about 9 am on Tuesday… Before we took off, I stopped at the ATM to withdraw about 300USD, which takes about 5 transactions … it’s kind of embarrassing, and you leave the machine with a giant wad of cash.. thank god each ATM has a 13 year old guard dressed in uniform, sometimes sporting a billy stick..
We stopped at the 7 eleven to pick up 2 bags of ice.. I realized I only needed a bag and a half and had some leftover ice.. Now at home, I would have dumped in the parking lot and been on my way.. Here, I had several workers around me in the parking lot, sitting in 90 degree heat with nothing.. I couldn’t possibly throw this ice on the ground in front of them.. .. So, I walked up to two of them, asked them if they wanted it , and the excitedly took the bag out of my hand.. As I was pulling away, I thought the two young men would use all of the ice for themselves, and I felt horrible that I left a few of the other workers out of the mix… But as I was pulling out of the lot, I saw the two young men running over to their co-workers with some ice and a few recycled bottles they found trying to divvy up the ice for everyone.. moral of story…. don’t waste your ice.
On the road to Kasungu the kids and I had a great time… we played music off of my “cheese” playllist, then listened to Kate belt out her tunes, which includes One Direction and more One Direction.. Around 2 1/2 hours into the drive, we found the turnoff for the National Park .. After a mile or so on pavement roads, everything turns to dirt.. and for the next hour and a half , we were driving on unmarked dirt roads that traveled through very remote small villages… It is incredible to see these places.. Families living in these beautiful handmade homes with grass roofs, children running around yelling “White man!” at you as you dart through their neighborhood.. I stopped to ask a few elder women if I was on the right road to the National Park, but before I could get a chichewa phrase out of my mouth they pointed down the road and nodded.. Why else would a white guy be out in the middle of nowhere but to go check out a bunch of animals that they live with every day?? side note. in one of the photos are the dreaded Gule Wamkulus(see earlier post)... they freak my kids out..
We arrived at the entrance to the park(photo below) and met by this man who’s name escapes me but in Chichewa it means “Whip” or “to whip”.. after he told me that, he said.. “but I only get whipped when I’m bad”.. The kids were laughing at me as I got out of the car to meet him because apparently my back was soaked in sweat.. he greeted the kids and opened the gate and we were on our way..
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| Road to Kasungu |
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| Road to Kasungu... firewood |
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| Entrance to the park.. just like Kings Island |
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| Kids taking in a game drive |
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| Gule Wamkulus... scare the hell out of Maura |
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| Our destination.. perched right next to a hippo infested lake. It is difficult to describe the experience of being out in the African bush. As someone who has only done it a handful of times in my life, it is always an amazing experience.. Otherworldly I think may be the best way to describe it.. the dark , the quiet, the sheer feeling of being in the middle of nowhere is really surreal. I think the kids are now old enough to really understand that as well.. We took a hike, did a drive through the bush, camped out on the edge of the lake, stargazed and were treated like royalty by the staff.. While the wildlife was scarce due to how dense the area was around the lake, the experience was still really incredible.. Ill post more about our trip tomorrow as a man has just had a seizure outside our gate.. Ill explain more tomorrow... that's a great way to end a blog post! Don't worry , he is ok. |
