Advice and things to know about Johannesburg

Playing with the cubs in the Lion Park

Want to know a bit more about Jo'burg and it's people? Well here's some stuff I found out while I was there. The video is choc-full of info and tips if you plan to visit, so give it a watch.

Johannesburg facts:

• Population: 750,000 + 
• Currency: South African Rand (ZAR), which is equivelent to 0.056 GBP
• Official languages: 11 including English, Afrikaans and Zulu
• Johannesbug is named after two founding officials named Johann Friedrich Bernard and Christiaan Johannes Joubert. However this is widely contested as there were many officials involved with founding the city who had names including Johann/Johannes
• As with the rest of South Africa, Johannesburg was under apartheid until 1994. To put that in perspective, man landed on the moon in in 1969, 25 years prior!

Johannesburg tips: 

Go on a group safari, much better than going it alone

• Do a group safari in Kruger National Park, you'll meet some great people (I know I did) and having more sets of eyes will pay off - our guide spotted less than a third of the animals we did. 
• Group safaris also allow you to share pictures and photos if you create a shared DropBox, GDrive, etc
• You can book to go to a Lion Park with a day's notice, so if your safari is rainy (as mine was), you can still see the big cats and even play with them, which is worth it in itself
• Don't be afraid - although the homes are quite intimidating with their high walls, barbed wire, etc it's not too bad. That doesn't mean you should be wrekless though!
• Take public transport, I took the Gautrain and it was brilliant, plus they have special carriages for people going to the airport. The Gautrain busses are also great. For both you'll need to pick up a Gold Card at the station which works much like any other transport charge card
• When booking a lion park, do your research. I heard a lot of horror stories about places that raise lions for 'canned hunting, especially in other African countries

World trip: Johannesburg, Kruger National Park, Lion Park and Apartheid Museum

Cheetah at Lion Park

Johannesburg is a great destination and starting point for a trip across the country to Cape Town. Having arrived a day late from Cameroon, I had two weeks to enjoy the city and all it had to offer including Kruger National Park, the Lion Park and the Apartheid Museum. I split my time between Boksburg on the outskirts and Rosebank in the middle of things.

I'm going to try a different format with this blog to see if it's more helpful and easier to digest. I'm going to break it down into accomodation and different activities. Hopefully this will help me to marshall my thoughts a bit too.


So...

Accomodation

The Mbizi Lodge http://www.mbizi.com/home.html

Christmas mug poolside

I got to Johannesburg airport and imediately arranged for a pick up to get me to my first hostel the Mbizi backpackers. I have to say that I loved it here. It was cheap and Patrick the owner looks after you like you're family. It's out of town, but Patrick is more than happy to arrange activities for you and can suggest better alternatives, though he's not pushy if you want to do your own thing. I went to Kruger National Park from here and was the last pick up, so no driving from hostel to hotel for hours pick up and dropping off other people.

There's also a bar (I was offered a free beer on arrival) and a pool, which I used inbetween intense blogging sessions to catch up after Cameroon. I must admit hanging poolside was a new one for me and didn't feel as Christmassy as any other December I've had, but I did find a mug to remind me of the season.

I'd suggest that if you want a base to arrange activities such as safaris, visitin the Lion Park, etc, that this would be a good place to go.

Rosebank Lodge

It's cheap, not neccesarily cheerful, but cheap. Also the paid for internet was sketchy at best, but you can log onto another network that is unsecured if you like. The main thing with the Rosebank is that it's in a good location. It's by the Gautrain making it easy to get to Pretoria and the O.R. Tambo airport. It's also a few minutes walk from Rosebank mall which has a local market - perfect for picking up gifts, plus there are bars in walking distance/a short bus ride away.

Safari in Kruger National Park http://www.marcstreehouselodge.com/feedback.php
I did a four day (three night) safari, with one day in the park itself. The First day I was picked up and met the seven other people I would be doing the safari with. We were then taken to a lodge in the area surrounding the park. The accomodation was really nice and more importantly there were a ton of monkeys around the lodges which were very cheeky (who'd have guessed). Once we had settled in we went on a sunset drive which saw the landscape transform as the sun set before we had dinner in the wild. We saw a few animals, including a mongoose trying to break an egg, lots of Impala (they are EVERYWHERE), male and female kudu, some birds, etc, etc. What was really great was coming across a  breeding herd of elephants, including two tiny babies which were impossibly cute.

Sun setting on day 1 of our safari

The next day we took a daytime walk and learned more about tracking animals from our guides and got a
glimpse of hippos in the lakes, which we didn't go too near. It's easy to see why these animals are so dangerous they are HUGE! We also saw an active termite nest, not exactly what you go on safari for, but interesting non the less. The walk was followed by a drive around the park before we headed off to the camp where we were shown to our rooms/tents and had dinner. We also bumped into a group who had come back from Kruger National Park and told us that they had seen pretty much everything the park had to offer as it was such a sunny day. I assume that the animals are too hot and lazy to move from the plains.

So, this is where I got lucky. I had booked a tent (I think) and found myself in a tree house for four with a balcony and what's more it was all mine. I have to say that while the camping sounded fun, I really didn't mind having a private lodge (check out the video to see how awesome it was).

Cheeky monkey at lodge

The next day was the big one, our visit to Kruger National Park and that's when my luck changed. It POURED, which while it makes for cute videos of baboons looking sorry for themselves, also meant that a lot of animals has sought shelter in the trees and bushes. That being said, we saw some bull elephants, more giraffe, hippos, zebra, Impala, Kudu, etc. What really made it was seeing a croc eating a catfish which went on for a while, a hyena and three white rhino.This is where doing a group safari really came into its own. If I'd been on my own with a guide we wouldn't have spotted half the animals we did and more over I wouldn't have enjoyed it half as much, as it was the people I was with that made it a good trip, we all sort of kept each others' spirits up and after a few purchases at the shop (yes they have a shop and some restaurants, which shatters the illusion a little) we played a animal spotting drinking game.

On the way back from the safari we stopped off at Blood River Canyon on the Limpopo river to take photos. It's really breathtaking and I was able to buy a few souveniers from the local people selling items on the roadside.

Two young warthogs with their mother and father

Zebra in Kruger National Park

Giraffe in Kruger National Park

The Lion Park http://www.lion-park.com/

Playing with lion cub in Lion Park

Having not seen any big cats during the rather wet safari, I decided to go to the Lion Park. A couple from the safari had been and said it was good fun. I was picked up at 8am as I had decided to go as early as possible to avoid the crowds. I started off by playing with the lion cubs, it's only two minutes as they don't want to stress out the cubs, but it was still a fun experience. It would have been better if a certain girl and her daughter hadn't disregarded everyone else and kept running around the place. It was so agrivating, I hate these parents who think just because they've had kids they can go charging around ruining everyone else's time. It's bad manners and they should be teaching their children a bit of decorum (how English was that?!).

With a Cheetah in the Lion Park

I then went onto walk with a cheetah. I was with a French group of three people, so my plan of getting there early really worked. It was a fun experience and as with the lions, the cheetah was very domesticated so I didn't feel unsafe at all. I got to pet the cheetah too and again as with the lions, the hair was quite course and felt like it had sand in it, even though it didn't.

We finally went on a drive around the park proper and saw black buffalo, more impala, springbok, giraffe and other prey animals, before going onto the lion enlosures. There are four prides of lions, one regular and three white. We also got to see some cubs with their families. Seeing the white lions was quite strange as they aren't albino, they just have lighter fur, which in my ignorance I wasn't expecting. It was later explained that the white lions were much like ginger people in that they were perfectly normal they just had recessive pigmentation genes.

The Apartheid Museum and Mandella House

A young Nelson Mandella

These are a definite must see in the town, the museum in particular. Mandella House is also very much worth seeing to find out more about the man and his years before incarceration. However it was the museum that captured my heart and imagination, it was so eye opening to get a better understanding of the struggle and scale of the issue. I knew the theory of apartheid before, but the museum brings it into its terrible detail and tells the story of the two opposing factions. It's laid out in a chronological fashion so you get a sense of the story, the steps forward and back and the number of people who lived and died for equality. I must admit I felt quite emotional at the end, especially reading about individual stories of people who had been involved. However you end feeling amazingly in awe of what was achieved in the fight against prejudice and how they didn't just stop at race but secured freedom for all ending discrimination on the grounds of race, gender disability, sexual orientation, religious belief and so on. I can't say I can remember everything I learned and would suggest if you go that you leave yourself a good amount of time to see and absorb it all.

Tribute to the end of the Apartheid

So that's the main bits. I also went to the Magnum store to make my own ice cream, having missed out on the one in London. It was good fun, but the video covers all that.


Hope you enjoyed it all. I've put more videos of cute animals on the YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/user/TWINETraveller please do subscribe it will help boost my ego, plus you can follow me on Twitter and Instagram on @The_end_is_Ni or on tumblr on the-end-is-ni which will inflate my ego even further (though be warned you may be creating a monster haha/not joking)
Cheers,

Ni

Cameroon: interesting facts and tips

Putting my feet up on Ethiopian Airlines

While putting my feet up on my flight out of Cameroon, I took some inspiration from an Ethiopian Airlines destination guide video and have changed the format of my own tips videos. I hope you like the new format.

Facts about Cameroon:

Population: 22.25m (2013)
Languages: French and English (though a lot of people speak pidgin English)
Currency: Central African Franc. £1 GBP = 825.59 Francs
Cost of a 1.5l bottle of water is 400 Francs (under 50p GBP)
Capital city: Yaounde
Largest city: Douala

Some of the children of Cameroon

The name Cameroon comes from the Portuguese Rio dos  camarões which means river of prawns
Cameroon became independent of France and England in 1960
The colours of the Cameroon represent vegetation (green), independence (red) and sunshine (yellow)

Tips for traveling in Cameroon

1) you only pay airport tax (10,000 francs) on the way out of the country. Don't be fooled by anyone in the airport on your way in claiming to be a security guard
2) don't exchange money with the touts at the airport, do it before hand
3) this isn't a luxury holiday so be prepared to rough it. On my trip I had limited access to running water and electricity (though this wasn't necessarily a bad thing)
4) if carrying your passport in your luggage , make sure that once your bag is unlocked it's easy to get to. I had to leave my passport in my bag when my bike broke down as the whole backpack was strapped to the bike meaning I couldn't access it
5) keep your passport on you when traveling as there are a lot of roadside police checks
6) in the rainforest always have water purification tablets and a timer (smart phone) on you, refilling mid hike is a life saver

One taxi I took had 10 people in (7 adults & 3 babies)

7) try public transport a couple of times, but make sure you know the details of a private driver - your hotel should be able to help
8) insect repellant is a must for the rainforest
9) if you have tattoos cover them up, people will stare - I was also told that it was against the word of God
10) Church is very... let's say, old school (you're all sinners unless you stay in the church, God caused 40 days and nights of floods to kill sinners like homosexuals). Only go if you're completely ready for this

Well that's it. Hope you liked it and please do watch the vid, subscribe, like, comment, etc : )

Peace out,

Ni

Life in the Cameroon rainforest - Gorillas and Chimpanzee conservation

My shower for the trip

Life in the rainforest is exhausting in the best possible way. You trek for hours under the shade of the trees recording the signs of animal movement, feeding, etc and the effect of the human population, in challenging terrain - sometimes I thought the forest was actively trying to trip me up. However you know that you are helping an endangered species and feel like you've achieved something, that you've pushed yourself further than expected each day.

Every morning I would get up, have coffee and cornflakes (in the same cup. That's a thing here), trek for hours and come back to the camp exhausted and head to the stream for a wash in the cool, but not cold, crystal clear water. You feel that you are really challenging yourself and getting the best out of your abilities.

Capturing data about the animals was fascinating as I learned, amongst other things, how to identify a Gorilla nest, which is large, well constructed and no higher up than 15m, from a chimpanzee nest. I also learned how

Gorilla nest about 10 meters above ground on one side

to judge the age of signs through looking at any broken vegetation, degradation of footsteps, etc. I could also identify primary forest and the type of plant growth from secondary forest. I got really good at it an by the end was able to do it without help. 

The data collection showed just how varied the wildlife is. Alongside the Gorilla and Chimpanzee signs, we see tiger feeding signs, a bush baby, a Bannermans Koraco (an endangered bird), a tree snake a huge millipede and a praying mantis, not to mention countless types of beautiful butterflies and dragonflies of every colour under the sun. The only thing that creeped me out were the ants, a few were fine, but when you see thousands of huge ants in one massive weaving line, it makes the skin crawl. I was glad I had my trousers tucked into my socks, though some even got through that! 

Sadly hunting is still rife

We also sadly saw signs of human activity, this included cocoa, plantain, banana and other farms that were dotted here and there cutting up the rainforest into tiny uninhabitable sections. There were also a lot of fun shells. While poaching Gorillas and Chimpanzees is illegal, hunters will come to the rainforest for other animals including porcupine, blue da at (a type of bird) and bush babies. The hunting activity obvious scares the Gorillas and Chimpanzees, with recent data showing that the loans Gorillas have been forced to leave their homes and venture further up into the rainforest.

I don't mind that I didn't see any Gorillas or Chimpanzees, as I knew it was unlikely, what with all the farms and hunting, plus I know that the data I collected will be used for ongoing work in protecting these amazing animals. I did however go to Limbe wildlife park which rescues Gorillas from the pet and bush meat trades, both of which are illegal. There I also saw chimpanzees, drills and other primates.

Being in the rainforest was everything I had hoped for and more. Completely cut off from technology, amongst the wild life, cooking on a fire, etc. It was an amazing and humbling experience. It has also reinforced my belief that we should do all we can to save the rainforest as well as its inhabitants and work with the local community to give them alternatives to farming and hunting in the rainforest. It's an important issue, with less than 300 Nigerian Cameroon Cross River Gorillas left in the wild, the species is classified as being critically endangered and could become extinct in the next five to ten years!

Fruits (and foods) of the forest

There are a lot of fruits and few foods that can be found in the rainforest. Here' I'll go through a few that we found.

Afromomo, this is a red pod that grows in bushes. The outer layer is a bit like the skin of an old onion, but bright red and thicker. Once you peel this off you are left with three segments that look like spotted cocoons. These are the fruit, which is very tart, a bit sour and have the consistency of dragon fruit, but with watermelon pips.

There's also plantain and banana, which are both farmed (boooo). The easiest way to tell the difference is the size and shape as plantain tends to be straighter. Also, where the leaves branch from the trunk is white in banana trees and yellow in plantain. 

Cocoa is also grown by farmers and pods are yellow or red. They are about the size of an adult male hand but rugby ball shaped. You just crack them open and eat the stuff (I don't know what it's called) around the bean. This again is sour but sweeter. Don't eat the beans, they need to be dried out, powdered and added to milk and sugar before they taste like chocolate!

We also found mushrooms. Tonnes of mushrooms, both small and large. We only picked them under advisement from our guide who said that if they are big or grow in large numbers they are OK to eat, though I would always check with an adult if you want to pick mushrooms!! These were tasty and had a really high water content. We had them with garlic, ginger , onion and peppers...

Scotch bonnet peppers were also plentiful in the forest. We picked some and having accidentally eaten a chunk, I can tell you they are HOT! However if you eat chocolate it really helps :)

So those are the fruits and foods of the forest I found. I had no idea the breadth of food that we could get from the forest, but having thought about it, if our closest relatives live there, there must be stuff we can eat. 

Getting around Cameroon

Yep, just remember 'no vomiting'. Even if you really want to!

So in Cameroon you are going to end up taking a lot of different types of transport from private cars (a complete luxury) to public busses (a complete nightmare).

OK let's start with the planes and airports. I flew in on Air Maroc and it's fast becoming my favourite airline. The staff are friendly and the flights smooth. However when I landed and got through immigration I was met by a man who claimed to be part of the security team and said that he needed to deal with me specifically as I was from the UK (lucky guess). The guy had no uniform or badge, but pushed himself upon me as I got my bag and said that he was going to show me where to pay airport tax (there isn't airport tax for arrivals). I tried to call the people who were collecting me but my international phone wouldn't get any reception (thanks eKit) and my iPhone had no credit. So this guy calls from his own phone, but I could see him putting in the wrong number. That's when I started freaking a bit. I passed a security guard who checked I had taken the correct bag. I tried to ask him if this guy was his colleague but he ignores me and starts talking to someone else. I get downstairs and the guy then tries to get me to the back of the airport and is really insistent, but I hold on and find the person who was collecting me and we get rid of this guy, who has the gall to ask if I will give him money for something to eat after it becomes apparent that he is not a security guard. This was not a good first impression! 

On the way out of the country I check in my bag and as I am heading to departures I am stopped by someone working for the luggage company. They take me down to the loading bay (I have to leave my passport with a police woman on the way) and they start demanding 2,000 francs for the bag to be wrapped. I explain that I don't have 2,000 francs (why would I, I'm leaving the country) and that no other airport had demanded this. I also point out that they are basically extorting the money out of me, blackmailing me with the threat of not taking my bag. I put my foot down and eventually another member of the team says they'll take it. Thankfully the bag did make it.

All in all I'm very unimpressed with Douala airport. I'd avoid it if you can, it's crawling with charlatans.

So onto public transport. I think I'll start with the taxis. These are OK. Not very safe, but OK. They run on the principle that 5 seats is not an indication of how many people can get into a car, but more of a suggested bare minimum. As such you go to a central pick up point and wait for a car to fill up, which normally means six - eight people and then more people may get picked up on the way. One trip was two hours with ten people (seven adults and three babies) in a normal five door car which was physically painful. The upshot is it's really cheap. 

The busses are cheap too and we took a night bus between Chsang and Beua. This was hideous as we had booked out the back row, but then told that this wasn't possible and instead got two seats between the three or us and not the four seats we had booked. I wrote a rant on my phone about 45mins in. I think it explains everything...

So my trip was again marred by public transport. This time by a night bus between chsang and baua. I had agreed to take the night bus so we could spend some time shopping in Chsang where I hoped to pick up Christmas presents for my family and as we were to have four seats at the back of the night bus, ensuring we had room and could all sleep.

The day did not start out well as we couldn't get a car to Chsang from Menji until after the shops had closed, but by this time the seats on the bus had already been reserved... or so we thought

The Having gotten to the bus station we found out that the person who was booking them had ordered the four seats but hadn't chosen which ones as they had been faced with the apparently monumental task of selecting them by letter. This for some reason meant that we were no longer eligible for our four seats, instead getting two between three of us. At some point after losing feeling in my lower back from sitting on a half seat, I finally got a seat of my own. I use the work seat ironically as it was more of a shelf that collapsed into the gangway of the bus that had no real support and only a half back. The woman next to me was carrying a small boy on her lap, or rather both our laps as he spent most of his time kicking, pushing or resting his head on my legs. The people behind me have also taken to leaning on the seats in front of them and spreading out to lean on me.

Despite being a night bus, the driver seems to think he's in charge of a one man human livestock carnival and is playing oppressively loud music. No one has asked him to turn it down...

Also I found out what it sounds like when three men carry a live pig onto the top of a bus (the one I was in) and lash it to a roof rack like a piece of luggage. FYI it's horrific. I then found out what it's like for a second pig to be strapped onto the first pig. To say this country's view of animal welfare is backward is an extreme understatement.

Oh the child is now trying to grab my necklace. Still only 4+ hours to go. 

So basically I would suggest getting a private car when possible. That is unless you get the chance to bike it. Biking is awkward to begin with, but once you're used to being pushed up against some random guy on the back of a bike, and you get used to leaning forward into said guy when you go up a hill, then it's a lot of fun. You go places that cars can't reach due to the state of the roads and the scenery is amazing. You also get to feel the country rush by and wave to the local children or say hello to the local people who all greet you, well they do in the rainforest adjacent communities an smaller towns. 

Transport is one of the weak areas of Cameroon. It's nice to give it a go and get an insight into life in Cameroon, but long term it would definitely be wearing. This is something the country is working on and the topic of a lot of the radio programmes I heard while in the country. 

I'd say that Cameroon is worth putting up with the poor travel, especially if you're only here for a few weeks. The scenery, food and majority of the people make up for it. Especially if you venture away from the cities and into the communities. 

A different way of life: Besali, Cameroon

A simple, peaceful life in Besali

Besali is one of the outlying communities around the Cameroon rainforest and was our final stop before the expedition began. We stayed with our tracker/guide Solomon, his two wives and their children.

Having lived in London before starting my trip, I've been used to having all mod cons. Besali soon showed me a completely different way of life, living without running water or electricity and I have to say that I really enjoyed it. Though I'm not sure I could do it on a permanent basis, I enjoyed the simplicity of it all and how trusting people are. You can leave your things anywhere and they would be safe, people say good morning to you on the street and everyone knows everyone, it's like a bygone era blessed with eternal sunshine.

Anna carrying provisions to base camp

Solomon's wives Anna and Constance looked after us really well and I got to try a host of new foods, which were delicious. Before heading into the forest we met with the chief of Besali who follows the towns traditional ways, part of which is the belief that the people's ancestors live in the forest. The chief was very welcoming and performed a ritual to let the ancestors know that we were coming, what we planned to do and asked for them to look after us while we were in the forest. 

With the ritual complete we then gathered our belongings. Solomon's wives, Joy, his eldest daughter and a local man took our tents and provisions up to the camp. I rather naïvely said I could take my own things, but Bedwin our biologist said it was best if they did it. After trekking two hours to base camp on tough terrain I was glad I wasn't carrying my things as I would have certainly injured myself. I am in complete awe of how Joy, Anna and Constance took all our stuff up in baskets which were strapped to their foreheads and rested on their backs.

I'll tell you all about life in the rainforest in another post as there's a lot to tell. However when we got back Bedwin and I did a tour of six local schools where I taught the children (often 100 at a time) about conservation. It was challenging for the most part as the kids didn't get my accent, but with some help from the teachers and Bedwin we got through. I also invented a game which was a variation on musical chairs in which the desks were rainforest and the children were gorillas. If we put books on the desks they became farms and the children could no longer sit at them. The game worked really well and the children got to see the effect of farming on the gorillas, however it did occur to me on day two that I was an ostensibly white man telling a bunch of black kids that they were gorillas... So that happened. Anyway the main thing is that it worked I suppose.

And on that note, I'll leave you with a video of my adventures