Ted's Tours: No Cheetah-ing

Our story left off (as I am sure you, avid reader, remember) when we were saying goodbye to the beautiful and strange Matopos park. We all climbed back into Betsy the Polar Bear for our third day of adventuring and started our long drive to Hwange National Park. Our first stop was Zimbabwe’s second biggest city: Bulawayo. We wanted to get a few things because we wouldn't have any access to supplies for a couple of days in Hwange. My biggest surprise was that Bulawayo was empty. EMPTY. There were hardly any people around. It was eerie - the beginning of a bad zombie movie eerie. In the supermarkets, the shelves in the shops were almost empty. We went into one of the three electronics shops along the main road and the shelves weren't stocked. This is what happens to a beautiful country when its leader is stealing all of its resources – its second biggest city is a graveyard midmorning on a weekday.

After acquiring a few of our purchases, we made our way north to Hwange.

Hwange of Cecil the Lion fame. This is indeed the park that Cecil the Lion was poached from. Although ironically (SPOILERS!!!!) we did not see any lions here. BUT we did spot other really awesome animals and were very lucky on our first day, so I can't really complain. We drove up to our campsite in the late afternoon (that and dawn = prime time) and within five minutes had seen sable, roan, and zebra.

The real bit of excitement came just before we reached our campsite – Mike called out for the car to stop and we reversed a few metres to see a cheetah lying next to the road.

He was thoroughly unphased by our presence, as demonstrated in the above photo. Cheetahs are really rare to spot so we were patting ourselves on the back when we saw another one! (well, if you really wanted to know, I spotted the second one – that doesn’t make me special or anything). From the mammal behavioural book we had with us, James concluded that they were two males travelling together and leaving their scent around the place.

Our campsite was so cool. Definitely “in nature” and more what I expected of our safari than the other two. We set up our tents and the rest of our camp properly for the first time – I was definitely feeling many bush vibes. The one thing that was slightly off putting were the many animal skulls around the campsite. I couldn’t decide if they were deterrents for animals or for decoration. Either way, a little creepy. We went to bed with a beautiful clear sky; more stars than you could possibly imagine lit up the sky. So Ted and Mike left the rain sheets off their tents, what a mistake that was. Around 2 o’clock there was a huge thunderstorm. James and I were up for most of it. It was so close and being in just a tent is not much protection. Awesome – in the true sense of the word – to see though. In the morning (around 4:30am ish – which is the average waking time on the trip*), we were woken up by baboons rushing by our campsite – a new alarm clock noise for me.

This was a fairly relaxed day as we were just moving to a different campsite within the same nature reserve. Every morning, MIke, James, and I pack up the tents and get them ready for Ted to put on top of the car - this is the hardest part of packing up. While Ted is doing that, we clean and put away all the foodstuff and pack the back of the car. Not that it was a race or anything (it definitely was), but we beat Ted every time. Although in his defence, he did have the hardest job.

Our drive was about 7 hours up through the nature reserve and on this day I got to drive! This was very exciting as I don’t have a license but I can drive but obviously don’t get to do it often because that would be illegal**. I was definitely a better driver than James – and he doesn’t read this blog so I can say that. I shall include a picture of James driving, because I couldn't take any of myself WHILE I was driving - that would be irresponsible.

We saw more zebra and sable as well as giraffes with their really cute babies.Look how cheeky this giraffei is - so cheeky! Giraffes are cool animals.

Fun fact: trees have a defence mechanism against giraffe browsing. About five minutes after a giraffe starts snacking on a tree, that tree will send foul tasting juice into its leaves and the giraffe promptly stops eating and moves onto the next tree.

Then, for the firs time on this trip, hippos! I love hippos. We went up into a viewing tower and got to watch the hippos play in the water and cool themselves off in the late afternoon sun.

We also discovered that the noise hippos make is officially called “wheeze-honking” which may have been the highlight of the trip for me. This long car ride through the park was also the perfect time for James and I to have a lively, intellectual discussion about what it means to be an artist. We were arguing (sorry, I mean discussing) self expression versus an artist’s responsibility and contribution to their society. The car ride was about 7 hours – we covered a lot of ground (heehee puns).

Excitement of the day: we got to our campsite before dark! So we got to set up while it was light which was also a first for the trip. We slept in a hut/view point thing that overlooked a pan filled with hippos and crocodiles. Crocodiles are evil looking – more on that later.

Our morning was fairly easy: we were woken by the hippos, packed up the camp, and set off to leave the park. Sadly, there weren’t many animals because there had been so much rain so instead of congregating round pans/watering holes – all the animals were drinking from the little puddles that were everywhere. Both James and I did get to drive more and through deep sand as well.

It was Ted’s idea of fun to test my nerves by making me drive through terrain where I could’ve potentially gotten the car very stuck. Chalk it up to good experience.

We left Hwange feeling refreshed, definitely having enjoyed two days away from civilisation.

Find the next part of the story here! Xx

LINKS: Part one

Part two

*I think if you had told James a month ago that he would be getting up every day between 4:30 and 5:30am, he would have laughed in your face. Now, he is a regularly early morning riser. Along with the rest of my family, I am still reeling from the shock of seeing James before 11am.

**It’s a long story. Basically, I’ve moved too much for any country to give me a license currently.

#Zimbabwe #TedsTours #Safari #Hwange