Morocco Pictures

Casablanca! This is the famous Hassan II Mosque. I never went in though..just drove by it

Our view after walking out of the Marrakech train station when we arrived

Photo stop for my roommate Yesenia & I as we traveled through the Atlas Mountains! Yes, that's SNOW in the back. In Morocco!!

Me with our tour guide in the beautiful city of Ksar Ait Ben Haddou where many movies and TV shows have been filmed

Soup on the left and my beloved tagine on the right

Before the camel actually started walking. Back when I was excited to be on a camel...

Getting a little too close to a snarling camel

The Game of Thrones-y tent I slept in in the middle of the desert! So cozy!

A blurry (and the only) picture I have of the drum circle with random people and nomads

LOOK AT DEM EYES. Pretty camel

The entrance of the movie studio we went to

Just chillin on a...what even is that? Something Egyptian I guess?

The exploded marketplace created for a scene being shot the following day in a movie

Yes, I am holding a locust. Yes, I was freaking out on the inside. No, it did not bite me.

Just a little glimpse of the market in Marrakech

Lorely, Laura, one of the riad workers and I in our beautiful riad after our Hammam spa adventures and right before leaving Marrakech :(

Keep on Mo'roccan me Baby

Oh Morocco. What a beautiful country. When people ask me what my favorite country I went to was, I usually answer with Morocco. I loved every country I went to, but there’s something about the culture of Morocco that is so authentic and I had the best experience there! In one of my first blog posts, I talked about how they took Morocco off the itinerary for a bit but later decided to put it back on after finding out about the Ebola situation in Senegal & Ghana. I literally cried because I was so happy. I didn’t know why, but I just knew I would love Morocco and have always wanted to go there. And it did not disappoint.

RANDOM OBSERVATIONS

-Everyone trying to sell you stuff at markets were men, compared to Vietnam where it was only women

-There are so many stray cats here, but not dogs

-Hookah, or shisha, is literally everywhere

-Mint tea is literally everywhere and is the Moroccan specialty. Tea with hookah is a great combo, as I realized at my riad

-It’s hard to explain, but Morocco to me felt like a combination of India and Vietnam

-French is very widely spoken and so is Spanish since it’s so close to both countries

-I’m probably allergic to something in the air in Morocco. I had the sniffles the majority of the time 

L

DAY 1

In most countries, I chilled for the first day in the port city and set out for another destination the following day. But we didn’t spare any time in Morocco. We docked in Casablanca and Yesenia, Jack, Lorely and I immediately set out with our backpacking backpacks and caught the shuttle that took us to the port terminal gate. We got off and found a building with a Starbucks, wifi and an ATM, and we figured out where the train station was located where we could catch the train to Marrakech. We went back outside with the intent to catch a taxi, but we got bombarded by multiple taxi drivers who were trying to get us to go with them. It was extremely overwhelming and a few of them started pushing each other and getting into a fight, so we quickly walked away from them with the help of a security guard. We decided against taxis after that and realized the train station was within walkable distance, so we started walking.

Casablanca was not at all how I had imagined Morocco. It just looked like a normal city, but there weren’t too many people out and about. We made it to the train station after a solid walk and bought our tickets. We had some time to pass until our train arrived, so we found a café across the street and ordered the first cup of many mint tea’s we had during our time in Morocco. And it was heavenly. After finishing, we waited a bit more then caught our train. So many SAS’ers were on the same train as us! I think it was about a 3 hour train ride to Marrakech and when we arrived, I finally felt like I was actually in Morocco; gorgeous brown buildings, beautiful elaborate tiles, and tall palm trees. We found a taxi and got dropped off in front of an alley. It was really busy and reminded me of India because of how many people were on the road carrying a lot of their stuff. We got out of the taxi and started walking to where we thought our riad (pretty much the Moroccan version of a hostel) was. A guy suddenly asked us what we were looking for and we told him the name of the riad. He led us there and it was only about a minute away, then he asked us for money. After lots of arguing, we just went in the hostel because he was being ridiculous. After that happened, I made sure not to let anyone “help” me because I knew they’d ask for money.

So we made it into the riad and it turns out it was the wrong one. It was the “sister riad” to the one we had booked to stay at. A nice guy who worked for both riads said he would walk us over to the other one, and so we walked for about 10 minutes through many alleys and markets with many twists and turns. We finally made it to “Hostel Waka Waka” which was a part of “Marrakech Rouge Hostels” (we still called it a riad) and got welcomed by two awesome guys who sat us down in the common area and served us mint tea, brought out shisha, and blasted “I’m in Love with the Coco” over and over again. One of the guys spoke English well, but the other one spoke more Spanish than he did English. So we somehow managed to communicate in Spanish, which was neither of our native languages. I found that so funny and cool!

We put our stuff in our rooms and looked around the riad. It was a small place but so vibrant with beautiful tiles along the walls and rugs with crazy elaborate patterns. We were starving by then so we embraced the huge Jemaa el-Fnaa market after meeting a nice Slovenian guy who was also staying in our riad who tagged along with us. The narrow alleyways slowly became more and more populated as we approached the big square where all the action and food was. We found a place and went up some stairs to get to the rooftop. A very popular dish in Morocco is “tagine” which is named after the earthenware pot in which it is cooked. There are many different types of tagine offered and the vast majority of them I found out are gluten free. So I tried a potato and chicken tagine and it was delicious. I was really sad I couldn’t eat any couscous since that was one of my favorite things to eat before I found out I had Celiac, but at least I had tagine to fill me up! By the time we were done eating, the majority of people had closed up and there wasn’t much going on in the square. We managed to find our way back to our riad in the dark and went to bed since we had an early start the next day.

DAY 2

The rest of our group had arrived sometime in the middle of the night. Dylan put together a group and organized a camel trek for us! We got picked up early in the morning and all of us fit into a huge van. I think there were about 13 of us plus some other random guy who tagged along to be dropped off at his village or something. The drive took HOURS with a few stops along the way. I don’t remember the exact time but I’d say we left at about 9am and didn’t actually get to the Sahara desert until sunset-ish. Boy was I not prepared for the car ride. The majority of the ride involved going through the Atlas Mountains along the craziest roads I’ve ever seen, comparable to the Road to Hana in Hawaii. There were twists and turns everywhere and constant climbing and descending for hours. It was crazy. Surprisingly I did not get car sick and neither did any of the girls. But every single guy did. The random guy had us pull over so he could puke and all the other guys were having problems and had to move to the very front of the car to feel better. I don’t know how it only affected the guys, but I am so glad I didn’t get sick!

Along the way to the Sahara, we stopped at an old city called “Ksar Ait Ben Haddou” which has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1987. This is a fortified city, or ksar, and most people living in the area now live in more modern homes around the area, although 4 families still live in the city. Several films have been shot in this city including Prince of Persia, Gladiator, The Mummy, Kingdom of Heaven, and last but definitely not least, GAME OF THRONES! (For those who watch GOT, it is the city of Yunkai where Daenerys goes to.) We got to wander around the city and take stunning pictures. It was exactly how I imagined Morocco to look. After we crossed over a river and back again (after a little boy helped me without asking and then begged for money after), we went to a restaurant. I had my beloved tagine, this time with eggs and meatballs which was my favorite!

We eventually crossed all the way through the mountains and drove even more and finally made it to the last place we would stop at before the desert. We got some snacks and water then drove for a little while longer. We finally made it to the desert and saw camels already waiting for us. We chose the 2 day 1 night excursion so we didn’t go as far into the desert as the 3 day 2 night one. I kind of wish I did that one because the desert that that one goes to I heard is beautiful with golden brown sand and dunes everywhere like you’d expect the desert to look like. We were at a part of the desert that didn’t have such deep sand and had many shrubs everywhere. It was still amazing but it wasn’t really how I’d imagined it would be.

We got our stuff out of the car and we each got escorted to a camel. I never realized how terrifying camels are. They are the closest thing to monsters that this world has. They were roaring and making crazy grunting noises and some were being really stubborn too. I walked to my camel and hopped onto him. It was terrifying when he stood up! To stand up, the camel leans really far forward and you feel like you’re going to fall off it, then he finally is up. I was holding on for dear life! We finally started walking and it hurt SO BAD. I’d always heard about how much riding a camel hurts and really didn’t think it would hurt THAT bad! My camel’s hump might have been a little bigger than normal camels? We walked for about 20 minutes into the desert and I was so happy when we stopped and I could get down. I already felt the soreness coming on!

The camels had taken us to this nomad camp in the desert. There were many big tents set up that each fit about 10 people comfortably. The tents looked like they were straight out of Game of Thrones; it was so cool! Our group had 2 different tents so we split up and claimed our tents and mattress. Once we got settled, a guy came in and served us dinner. It was dark by the time we finished dinner and the majority of us decided to climb up a small hill and lay down and look up at the stars. I laid there for what felt like hours and it is one of my most cherished memories. Staring up at the night sky in the middle of the Sahara Desert was just so beautiful. I’ve never seen the sky look like that and I felt like such a small person in this huge universe we live in. After laying down for a while, I heard drums close by. I got up and walked to the fire that people were sitting around, and there were a few nomads hanging out. One was playing the drums and 2 got up and started to dance. Their dancing was so entertaining! It involved lots of wiggling and butt shaking so I was just cracking up. After their little performance, the drum got passed around to everyone and we all got to play for a bit and make our own beat. Of course I did it too and I was having so much fun that I didn’t even want to pass it. After sitting in the circle for a bit, I went back up to look at the stars once more to soak in that moment, then I went to bed since I was absolutely exhausted from that long day.

DAY 3

I surprisingly got a really good night’s sleep. We got woken up quite early and left soon after. I felt pretty sore from the camel from the day before and I had to get back on it because we were riding them back to the truck. It was awful. Honestly one of the most uncomfortable 20 minutes in my entire life! After taking some camel pics, I eagerly got off and got in the car.

We set off and got some snacks at the same little shop as before. We then started heading back. I loved looking out the window on these car rides. Morocco is such a beautiful country that’s filled with desert oases, winding mountains, and beautiful buildings. The next stop was a place with pretty rugs, knives, and just about everything, but I was done with buying stuff. We drove for a while and then the driver asked us all if we wanted to stop at this movie studio called CLA Studios that was a part of our tour. The majority of people didn’t really care but me and this other girl wanted to stop. I was NOT going to pass up an opportunity to see a film studio in another country! So we got out and went on about an hour long tour with a funny tour guide. There was a Dutch couple on the tour with us and they were so rude. When the tour guide would spend a little longer than they liked talking to us they would look so impatient and spoke up asking if we could hurry up. Why even go on the tour if you wanted to race through it? We went through and saw things from many movie sets like The Mummy, Gladiator, Game of Thrones (we saw Astaphor!), and other movies I hadn’t really heard of.  We also walked through an “exploded marketplace” that was being used for a movie being filmed there the next day. It was really cool and looked so legit. Towards the end of the tour we saw a huge insect on the ground. It was like a gigantic grasshopper, I think it was a locust or something, but damn are there weird critters other places in the world.

We got back to the car after the tour and everyone was so ready to head back to Marrakech. After driving for a while longer, we finally made it back to the riad. Some of us were hungry so we went out to the main market square again to eat. There’s a street food section in the main market, so we decided to sit around and soak in the crazy environment. What do you think I ate? More tagine! This time there was kiwi in it and it was delicious. After a great meal, we got up and looked around. There was a guy holding a monkey and we knew he’d try to get money from us in any way possible so we stared at the monkey but didn’t go towards it. Well the guy saw us eying the monkey and came over and placed it on Laura even though we were backing away and told him not to. It was already on her so we just decided to take some pics and he wouldn’t leave us until we paid him. I hate getting into those situations…

After walking around for a bit, we decided we would look around the market more the next day and actually buy stuff. We walked back to our riad and everyone was out in the common room talking. We joined and smoked some hookah and eventually ended up on the roof talking to cool people along with one of the hostel workers. Now, we weren’t planning on staying the night at that riad after our camel trek. I was going to take a train to Fez, but we all were sick of traveling so much so we stayed. The riad was fully booked but they had couches upstairs outside under a tent/fort we were allowed to sleep under. It was so comfortable! I definitely did my fair share of sleeping under the stars in Morocco!

DAY 4

Shopping day! There are such cool things in the Moroccan market. I bought many t-shirts, candles that said “Marrakech” with the hamsa peace sign on it, hamsa earrings, puzzle boxes that take a long pattern to open it, and more. I loved the whole vibe of the market and we were there for hours walking around and looking at just about everything. Later, we decided to go to a traditional Moroccan bathhouse called a Hammam. Yesenia and Lorely decided to get their nails painted and eyebrows threaded I think, and Laura and I decided to get a body scrub and massage. Boy was that an interesting experience…the women had us sit in I’d say about a 12x6 foot room where we each were on one side of it on a bench-like surface we laid down on. They told us to take all of our clothes off and gave us this underwear-like stuff to wear. Laura and I kind of just looked at each other and shrugged then started undressing. The women came back in and told us to lay down. Let’s just say, I had no idea I’d have to be naked for this, especially with another person getting the same treatment in the room! But I was relaxed. They started pouring buckets of HOT water on us and the material we were laying on made the hot water burn even more. It was pretty uncomfortable. It was legit a full-on shower like how it was in the olden days. She even shampooed my hair and scrubbed my face and everything! After this, we got towels to dry off and got escorted to the massage room.

The massage was so nice after that hot bath or whatever you want to call that. After the massage, I felt pretty relaxed and my skin was glowing! These body scrubs work! But I honestly don’t know if I would do it again if I had the chance. We went back to the riad after this and grabbed our stuff. We took a few pictures with the workers and of the beautiful riad itself, then set out to catch the train back to Casablanca. After catching a trolley back to the terminal and walking a bit in the dark, we finally made it back to the ship. Oh how nice it feels to come back to the ship, my temporary home, after a long adventure in a new country.

DAY 5

On our last day in Morocco, I went off to the Morocco Mall with Yesenia. She had to get computer stuff, I was looking for a dress for the Alumni Ball coming up, and we just looked around the huge mall. There was a huge aquarium/tank from the ground to the ceiling filled with crazy fish. I’ve never seen anything like it, especially in a mall. After a few hours, we headed back to the ship to make it back for on-ship time. It was such a bittersweet feeling knowing that it was the last port! The voyage was practically over, besides finals. The next site of land (besides refueling in the Canary Islands) would be Southampton, England where we would dock and never return to the ship. I tried to push that thought aside and try to soak in the last moments I had on the ship which was just 6 days. 

Namibia Pictures

The township we went to on my field lab

We stopped by a daycare while we were at it

And played with some kids

Click lessons! Each of those symbols represents a different type of click

The first of many funny signs on saw in Namibia

Still can't believe I ate a worm...

Amazing cider I got to drink on my field lab

Dani, Heather, my professor and I on the field lab

Feeling successful that we made it up Dune 7 without dying of a heart attack

I promise, this is not Germany!

Meat on meat on meat on...potato?

Taking a breather from sandboarding. The letter "I" was part of a message for my parents you can see at the end of my voyage video!

Just casually hopping around the desert after sandboarding

Our beautiful hotel that saved us from having to sleep on the ship

Such an awkward little critter

Just chillin in the desert...just like I am in like half of these pictures

Insurgent time!

The beloved Sprinbok Shot

'Swalkin around Swakopmund, Namibia

I had no idea what to expect in Namibia. I just thought there would be a ton of tribes and they would all live in huts. Shows just how ignorant I, and pretty much everyone else, was.

RANDOM OBSERVATIONS

-Namibia is a beautiful country where sand dunes meet the sea. It’s so cool and I’ve never seen anything like it before

-Swakopmund, the city I spent my whole time in Namibia in, is surprisingly a small German town! Many people spoke German there and there were quite a lot of Caucasians

-It may have just been in Swakopmund, but Easter is a very important holiday there. All 4 days I was there from Friday-Monday, the majority of shops were closed due to the 4-day Easter Holiday

-People like to decorate their restaurants with funny puns, jokes and quotes

-Meat is extremely popular in their diet in Namibia

-There are only 2 movie theatres in all of Namibia!

-Many people here I personally noticed were openly gay and there is wide gay acceptance

-There are Pizzerias everywhere!

DAY 1

I had my last field lab on the first day we arrived in Namibia with my Evolutionary Psychology class. It was an absolute blast (and of course a good learning experience as well). We hopped on our bus and set off for a center called “COSDEF” about an hour away from Walvis Bay in Swakopmund. It was a beautiful drive and I instantly realized how beautiful this country was. We arrived at COSDEF which stands for “Community skills development foundation” and there were many little shops around that had all handmade stuff in them. One of the ladies that worked there told us a bit about it and we got a few minutes to look around in the shop where I got a few cool bracelets. We then followed her to another building and went upstairs to a fashion design room. There were a few women in the room in class and they were sewing designs they came up with. They were all so talented! We went next door to the music room and we each grabbed 1 of about 6 instruments and we each learned a part from the teacher and put it all together; it sounded awesome! Then my 70 year old teacher showed off his drumming skills and damn, he can drum!

After all of this, we went down to the restaurant there and had an amazing meal of Oryx (a type of antelope). That was definitely a first and I was a bit weirded out at first about eating an antelope, but it was really good! After getting nice and full, we left and went to go to a township where we got to visit some children who were in a childcare program. We then sat down and a guy gave us a “click” lesson where we learned how to say different words with different clicks from our tongue which was really cool! After learning a few words, we actually then went to a bar a few minutes away! They first served us some food in some other room behind the bar and I ate a worm! It was fried and tasted salty honestly kind of like seaweed…the texture was so nasty but I’m glad I did it since when abroad, I try to say “yes” to most things. After eating the worm with a few friends and of course filming ourselves doing it, we all went inside the bar and got a free beer (well I got delicious Savanna Dry Premium Cider because I’m special like that) and then an amazing acapella group came in and sang a few songs for us. They were SO good and even sang “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” and it made me so happy and at that moment, I realized that I was actually in Africa.

It was already such a great field lab, but what we did last was a perfect way to end it. We got driven to a sand dune called “Dune 7” and climbed to the top! There was a way on the side that was way easier, but some of us more daring people decided to go straight up it. We were straight up crawling and I had to rest multiple times. It probably took about 15 minutes to get up the whole thing, I was dying! But finally when we made it up, Heather, Dani, and I took some amazing pictures and we were just on top of the world. It was a great field lab and I had to write a paper how all our activities related to topics studied in our Evolutionary Psychology class which was difficult to come up with at first, but I later realized pretty much everything can relate to evolution.

DAY 2

I took a taxi to Swakopmund with Scout and another guy who decided to share the taxi with us because it was about an hour long ride. Scout stayed the previous night in Swakopmund and found a really nice and cheap condo at a place called “Lifestyle Apartment”, but she only had it for one more night because someone had already reserved the room for Easter weekend. So after dropping my stuff off at the condo, we walked around the cute town and tried to find a hotel for the next couple of nights. After going to a few and finding out they were all fully booked, we doubted we would find one and thought we would have to sleep on the ship for the remaining days. But then we walked towards the ocean and found a nice hotel by the pier called “Hotel a la mer” and snagged a nice ocean-view room for a very reasonable price too.  

When we were reserving the room, we met a nice German girl who actually ended up being one of our sandboard instructors the following day! We then found an excursion place called Desert Explorers where we ran into other SAS friends who were booking fun stuff like sky-diving and camel riding. Scout and I wanted to do some excursion that day but everything was booked up. We decided to have an action-packed day the following day so we booked both sandboarding and quad bikes! So Scout and I found a nice little restaurant to eat at that had really funny puns all over the bar stools and walls. I was starving so I got some special meat platter they had but it was so much, I couldn’t finish it. Mind you, Scout is a vegetarian. Oh well. So at the restaurant, Scout ran into a guy from the US who she met the day before. She got his number and he later came back to our condo to hang out. We somehow got a complimentary bottle of wine at the condo so we drank some of that and went to this pizza place that turns into a bar/club at night called Napolitana. There were a ton of people around our age there but also some adults and even kids. It was so weird but we had so much fun.

DAY 3

A van picked us up in the morning to take us sandboarding! It was actually kind of chilly out and there had been light rain that morning, and we got in the car and there were a few SAS’ers already in there. We drove for 30 or so minutes and parked at the bottom of a dune we would be sandboarding down. We all got our boards and helmets and trekked up a big dune and we were all panting when we got to the top. I can’t imagine how much more awful that would have been if it was a hotter day! After a few instructions and separating into our “stand-up” and “lay-down” groups, we were ready to go down the dune. I was one of the only ones who had actually snowboarded before so they encouraged me to go first and so I did. It’s definitely harder to get moving than snowboarding and harder to turn as well but I got a good halfway down until I decided to slow down then fell. I later discovered my GoPro had fallen out of my pocket when I fell and I got so lucky that the German instructor found it. I thought it would’ve been lost in the sand forever!

I went down about 3 times because I was dead tired from trekking up the dune every time. But I tried lay-down sandboarding one time down the other side of the dune and I went way faster than I thought! They documented my speed but I don’t remember how fast it was! I just remember it was one of the fastest. And that came with consequence. I tried to slow down at the end after a little dip which made me go faster, and I brushed my elbow against the sand then crashed face first into the sand. It was all over my face, in my eyes, mouth, hair, everywhere. I started laughing but it was really annoying especially since I went down once more after that. I got back to the stand-up side and a SAS guy, Michael, convinced me to try the jump. Watching people go off it and wiping out really freaked me out, but it was my last time going down so I decided to give it a shot after Michael talked me into it/forced me to. But I’m glad I did it! I went off the jump and even almost landed it but had a pretty smooth landing that turned into a fall. Not a single person actually landed the jump. This was all caught on video and I definitely feel like a badass when I watch it!

We then went back to our condo and moved our stuff over to our new hotel. After we took a little breather, we walked to Desert Explorers to set out on our second excursion of the day. Swakopmund really is that small of a town, most things are walkable. We got to the place and got our helmets on and got seated on our quads. We were out riding for 2 hours which felt like forever but it was so amazing. It was terrifying at first because I was scared I would fall off of it when I turned (I AM a total clutz) but I got the hang of it. At some points we had to go almost full speed to make it up a dune and it was pretty scary but I felt so free. We stopped in the middle of the desert about halfway through our excursion and just chilled, took pictures, and soaked up the environment. It felt like we were the only people in the world. Namibia is so beautiful! We headed back, but every time we went by little plants our guide would look at them to see if any creatures were in them. We saw a snake and the cutest chameleon! Such strange creatures.

We were pretty tired after our full day but we cleaned up and decided to go out for dinner (well, we didn’t have any food so of course we had to go out). We walked parallel to the beach in the dark and made our way to a restaurant that was either right under a lighthouse or part of an old lighthouse. There was a wait and the hostess offered to seat us at a table outside that’s generally used for people waiting to get seated. So we sat there and I ordered steak (so much meat!) and then we ran into a few other SAS’ers who decided to join us. We then got told that there was a table in the restaurant we could all share with a few other people already eating and we said that’d be great! They were a group of Namibian natives in their late 20s/early 30s who were drinking and were so funny! They were all so friendly and they were fun to listen to. I would’ve talked to them more but Scout and I were dead tired from our busy day. They told us about some bonfire/party in the desert that sounded amazing and invited us to come along, but I didn’t even know how I could get enough energy to make it back to our hotel. I think the other SAS’ers ended up going and I hope they had fun! That would have been an amazing experience for sure.

DAY 4

We wandered around the town after a good night’s sleep. Still not many places were open due to Easter, but it was Easter Sunday so we weren’t expecting much. We wandered around and found 2 different churches and thought it would be cool to attend an Easter service, but we had slept past all of them. We kept wandering around and found a nice restaurant to eat at. There was gluten free pizza on the menu and I was so excited, but someone had just ordered the last one like 30 minutes before me! Of course that would happen. I got nachos instead, which were so good, and we decided to also split a Dom Pedro which is this amazing South African drink that is a smoothie mixed with alcohol (we got yummy amarula in ours). After dinner, we walked close by to this area that had a nice hotel, a few restaurants, a casino and a movie theatre. Mind you, this was one of TWO movie theatres in ALL of Namibia! I couldn’t believe it. And the new Divergent movie (Insurgent) had just come out and we happened to be there just in time for a show time. The movie theatre was a part of Swakopmund Hotel & Entertainment Centre and was called Atlanta Cinema and when you buy your ticket, you reserve your exact seat (I was C1). The movie was good but they had the volume pretty low! It was definitely a unique experience though and I’m glad I got to do something normal and compare it to home.

After the amazing movie, we walked right next door to the casino. We sat at the bar debating a drink and I decided to get a “Sprinbok shot” which as I said in my South Africa blog post, is amarula mixed with a peppermint liqueur. It was green on the bottom and brown on top, perfectly divided, and looked so cool! After that I spent the tiniest amount of money on slots while Scout watched and we decided that we were still tired from yesterday and walked back to our hotel.

DAY 5

We checked out of our beautiful ocean-view hotel room. We walked along the pier and took some pictures, trying to document the environment in Namibia. We also went in a few shops since finally the long Easter holiday was coming to an end. I bought a carved out Big 5 dangling bell that I am looking at right now that’s hanging from my blinds. It’s one of my favorite souvenirs I got abroad since it reminds me of both Namibia and seeing the Big 5 in South Africa! We went for one last bite to eat and I ordered a burger. I made sure to make the waitress understand my gluten allergy, and after biting into the burger, I noticed there were onion rings that I assumed were not gluten free. I was so hungry so I decided to take a few more bites away from the rings before I asked. Turns out, the onion rings were fine but the actual hamburger patty somehow had flour in it. I was so mad and the woman said she would get me something else, and when I waited a while and they brought it out, she was going to charge me for both the first burger and the next thing I got! She was ridiculous and I think I just waited until I got back to the ship to eat.

Of course, the stomach ache came on and lasted for days. I’m lucky to say that that was my only big gluten contamination story in all of my travels and I’m okay with that. It could’ve been way worse, but I’m proud to say I got by in every country!

I loved my time in Namibia and the country was so different than I had imagined. I was not expecting to find a cute German town where the desert meets the sea in some African country I hadn’t heard much about before the voyage. I had a really relaxed yet adventurous time in Namibia!

South Africa Pictures!

The beautiful Table Mountain that I never got to climb :(

Me smiling on the outside but freaking out on the inside while shark cage diving

Circus shark! He jumped out of the water to entertain us

The whole shark cage diving crew <3 plus Lance, Mr. Sarcastic

Wine tasting with friends & taxi driver!

It's just a large cat...

The entrance to Kruger!

I made a friend

This buffalo was definitely a popular one with the birds

I made another friend!

I was always the one to spot the Zebras...

Gotta take a safari selfie

Mr. Robbie Williams with an iguana on his arm. He cool.

The adorable cheetah I fell in love with

Simba, is that you?!

I told you the dogs look like normal dogs...but evil..

Us with the Swedes holding up "The Magnificent 7"

The colorful block of houses on my field lab that probably has a name but I don't remember it

About to watch a live radio broadcast with my Social Media class at Bush radio station

This time South Africa. Zamina mina ay ay

After being off of Semester at Sea for over 3 months now, I randomly got determined to finish my blog. SO, here’s South Africa!

I fell in love here. Cape Town is one of the most beautiful cities I have ever been to.  The nice sunny weather with a subtle breeze, the beautiful coastline, and the majestic Table Mountain makes this place look like a painting. South Africa was everything I was hoping for, and more.

RANDOM OBSERVATIONS

-There’s no Starbucks in South Africa! Mugg & Bean is an EXTREMELY popular place that is comparable to Starbucks, and local competition is too high for good ole' Starbs to thrive in the South African market

-Uber is extremely popular here, with many men sitting at the airport waiting to drive people

-Domino's Pizza just recently entered into the South African market. I sat by a guy on the plane who was working on opening various restaurants across the country, but Pizza Hut beat them to it by a few weeks. And now there's a pizza war

-Pretty much every car I saw was white!

-Amarula is this delicious cream liqueur comparable to Bailey's Irish Creme that I saw everywhere. "Springbok Shots" are really good, with half amarula and half peppermint liqueur

-Safari means to “travel through a journey with luck” and boy did I sure get lucky on my safari

-The "simba" brand is quite popular (I got so many of their peanuts) and is owned by PepsiCo. I wonder why the name appealed to me so much? THE LION KING!

-The Big 5 (the traditionally 5 hardest animals to hunt) are: elephant, lion, leopard, rhino, and buffalo. The “Magnificent 7” are all of those plus wild dog and cheetah. I saw the Magnificent 7!

DAY 1

Right when I got off the ship, I waited with a group of friends for our car to pick us up. We got in and headed on our 2 hour journey to go to Gansbaii where shark cage diving is! There were 10 people including Emily’s mom who was on the parent’s trip in South Africa. After a beautiful drive parallel to the coast, we got to a small building called “SharkLady Adventures”. We went inside and met our awesomely sarcastic guide named Lance. I honestly thought he was Australian when I first heard him talk, but South African’s just have a certain accent that to me sounds similar to an Aussie’s. He was offended. In a sarcastic way. We had a snack then another group of 10 walked in and the workers there said they were joining us on the boat. They were all SAS’ers and the majority of them pretty good friends of mine too. It was a great shark cage diving group! Lance then went through the safety precautions, and we were on our way out.

We then went on a 15 minute boat ride out into the ocean, and it was very rocky. When we stopped the boat and started throwing the shark bait in the water, it started rocking even more. I went up to the top deck of the small boat and freaked out when I saw the first fin. Mitchi and I are both insanely scared of sharks and we started getting really nervous about what we were about to do. The first group put their wet suits and goggles on, then got in the cage. The cage was right against the boat and there was about 2 feet of air so that you could go down to see the shark when it comes, but come back up whenever you want even though the cage was closed. It definitely is not as scary as other shark cage diving could be where the cage is far away from the boat and way under water so that you would have to scuba dive. 

After watching the first group for about 15-20 minutes, I felt ready to go. I put my wetsuit on, sat on top of the cage, and slowly sunk into the cold water. There were 5 people total in the cage and they made me go on the end and it was terrifying. They closed the cage above us and I hung out in the cage waiting for sharks, filming a GoPro video, and trying not to think about the fact that I was in the water with sharks surrounding me. Lance yelled to us that a shark was coming and said to go under, so I went under and didn’t see anything. The water was quite murky and the whole 20ish minutes I was in the cage I saw nothing but fish and ONE shark body/fin (but I didn’t see the face) swim by. There were a lot around the cage, but they had to come up close for us to really see. We got out and slowly dried off, then the third group went in and had better luck with many sharks going close to the cage, jumping out of the water, and even bumping into the cage. That was fun to watch from OUTSIDE the cage.

After the third group went and we were all freezing from the water, we headed back to shore. They served us coffee and lentils and had us watch the video they quickly put together of us shark cage diving. I had to buy one. We left after that and didn’t get back to the ship until 7pm. I quickly ate and showered, then met up with a group of people to head out to the Cape Town Jazz Festival.

The jazz festival was on a big stage in a park by a street, and there were a ton of people there enjoying the music. Heather, Oswaldo and I pushed through some people and ran into other SAS friends by the front, and it was so much fun with great music! Very very upbeat jazz. It ended around 11pm and we headed to Long Street where we found a restaurant/club. I wasn’t there for long and went to a place called Mitchells on the V&A Waterfront close to our ship. Basically everyone from SAS was there and there were at least 100 of us. Like I’ve said before, SAS sure takes over when in port.

DAY 2

I didn’t get much sleep, but managed to wake up for our day to start bright and early around 8am. Mitchi and I met a taxi driver the day before that said he would drive us places the next day, so he was there waiting for Mitchi, Jordan, Cindy, Lynn, and I at 8am. Our first stop was Stellenbosch which is wine country and has many wine farms, and we went to one called “Spier”. We walked around and saw a mini farm that had the most adorable things like bunnies and BABY PIGS. They were so cute! After admiring the animals for a while, we finally made it to the wine and went into a restaurant building place where we sat down. Wine tasting is this whole interesting science that I didn’t really know about beforehand, but it was really cool. There were different options we could order where we would get 4-6 glasses of different wine. There was a wine & chocolate option that Mitchi and Jordan went for, and I would have done that too if the chocolate did not contain gluten! When the wine came, they went through this whole process of biting into a specific chocolate and drinking a specific wine to make it taste the best possible. I just picked 5 different wines randomly and they were all amazing!

This was just on one farm. The majority of people in South Africa go on full day wine tours where they get taken to different farms and drink many glasses at each, so they are just completely drunk by the time the day is over. One farm was definitely good enough for me. After we drank our wine, we got driven by our amazing taxi driver to a place where we could pet cheetahs. I thought it would be a cheetah walk, but it was instead petting a sleepy cheetah. It was still great though!

We then got driven through a township where we made a surprise stop of what turned out to be our taxi drivers’ mom’s house. We only stopped for a few minutes and stayed in the car, but his mom was so nice and just had such a joyful spirit. After driving through the township and hearing about how our taxi driver used to be the head of a gang but reformed when he had a daughter (that sure was interesting to hear), he took us to a buffet-style restaurant to grab a quick bite, then we made our way back to the ship. I had a flight to Johannesburg that night and our taxi driver offered to wait for me to pack then take me to the airport.

After about an hour or two, I came out and got into his taxi, where there was already a woman in there sitting in the back. Turns out the woman was his wife and he was giving her a ride home from her work that was close by. The entire car ride to the airport, the driver was talking about how much he loves his wife and kept saying that true love is really out there. I was just amazed; I have never seen a couple so in love before and they’d been together for what…like 30 years?! So sweet. So we got to the airport and it all went way faster than I thought it would, so I had over a solid hour to kill before boarding even started. I went to go sit at a long table with high chairs, and a couple of men sat across from me. I asked them if they knew the wifi password, and that eventually got us talking. The two guys were uber drivers taking a break at the airport and waiting for people to request a ride. They told me the vast majority of people around were all uber drivers, and I looked around and saw many men around their age.  One of the guys then got up to get some coffee for him and his friend and he asked if I wanted one. Of course I couldn’t turn down free coffee! And it was some of the best coffee I’ve ever had. Such nice people in South Africa.

I eventually met up with Bryan, my safari buddy, and we got on our flight. We both have always dreamed of going on an African safari and we were so excited to experience it together. When we landed in Jo’burg it was dark and we needed to find a hotel. Jo’burg (that’s what South Africans call Johannesburg. Yeah yeah, I know I’m cool) has quite a high crime rate and we even got escorted to a shuttle area by a security guard because he said it was not safe to be out. Eventually after trying literally 4 hotels that all happened to be booked, we took a taxi to one a bit further away and crashed in a nice room.

DAY 3

We woke up quite early so we could grab a taxi to the airport where we would get picked up on a shuttle. We first had an absolutely delicious complimentary breakfast at our hotel, then went on our way. After waiting a bit and Bryan accidentally shattering a bottle of wine (sorry Bryan, it’s too funny and sad not to mention), our driver found us. She loaded our stuff in and there were about 6 or so other people in the car. We drove for a few hours and arrived at a gas station. I had no idea what was going on when we got there, but turns out that the gas station was a central meeting point for all the safari lodge shuttles around the area I guess. Bryan and I got into a safari jeep and met our guide, Robbie Williams! Other than his cool name, he was just an all-around cool person who was fun to talk to and had a great laugh. We drove for a few more hours and finally arrived at the place we were staying at, Nhongo Safaris at the Numbi Gate of Kruger National Park. Kruger is an extremely well-known (and one of the most popular) safari parks in South Africa and Africa in general, so I was so glad Bryan’s mom found us a great deal!

We only had a little less than an hour to get ourselves situated into our room which was our own personal cabin-like place a little ways down a path. We went back out and met up with our safari guide who was a guy around our age or a few years older (this was the only time we did not have Robbie as our guide). We hopped in our own personal safari jeep and headed out for our night safari about an hour or so before sunset. We picked a great place to stay at since our hotel was actually IN Kruger. Like on one of our safaris, we saw a huge elephant right by our hotel just casually eating from a tree. The majority of hotels are on the outskirts of Safari Parks! But we drove to the road to another main entrance then started driving around trying to find animals. We came across a nice area with a small pond close by. We stopped the jeep and our safari guide said he has some snacks and drinks for us. I didn’t realize this was included in the deal, but it was, and usually there are way bigger groups so he had a lot of drinks and snacks. We hopped out of the jeep after he surveyed the scene to make sure there were no animals around, then he brought out some trail mix, other snacks, and one bottle of Brandy and a bottle of Amarula, both half full. We stood for a bit and chatted, ate and drank (he didn’t drink of course) then got back in the jeep right before the sun was setting.

It was kind of a gray day sadly. There had been a heat wave and we came at the very end of it where it started to get pretty dreary out. But the colder weather also meant that we had a better chance at seeing animals, and that was definitely proven. As it started getting dark, our guide brought out these big flashlight things to scan the area with. He said the eyes of any animal we shine our flashlight across will glow so we can easily tell when we found an animal. It was so much fun! We were non-stop waving the flashlights around for an hour or two and got so excited whenever we thought we saw something glowing. Many of the times we actually found the animal, like the basic Impala antelope and even some random birds. It was a blast!

DAY 4

We woke up very early to go out on a morning safari. We had an amazing buffet breakfast and good ole’ Robbie Williams came in and joined us too! We then left for our morning safari and were gone for HOURS. At first we didn’t see too many animals, but it kept getting better and better. Robbie made sure to keep his radio on to hear other safari guides mention sightings, so he was determined to find us tons of animals. By the end of the safari, we had seen 3 of the big 5 (elephant, buffalo, and rhino but not lion or leopard) plus so many other animals. Some include warthogs, hippos, tons of zebras (I always spotted them), monkeys, whatever breed of bird Zazu from The Lion King is, a chameleon, and many others I can’t remember off the top of my head. Such a great safari! The best part was when we found a cheetah sitting about 50 feet away on a rock. He then started moving and as we kept following him, he came closer and closer to the road. He then was just a few feet away from us on the road for a while, then crossed to the other side. He then proceeded to CLIMB A TREE. A large cat just casually climbed a tree and started stretching on it. It was like he was putting on a show for us. Now of course, with my luck, my camera died RIGHT before we spotted the cheetah, so all pics and videos I got of this amazing encounter were crappy phone pics or on my GoPro. But that cheetah was awesome, cute and playful and it was one of the highlights of my safari.

We then I guess went back to our hotel/lodge for lunch I guess? This is why I try to type up my blogs right after going to a country…I don’t remember some details! But where and when I had lunch ain’t no biggie. Then it came time for our afternoon safari. We were told that a random Swedish couple would be joining us. They were a really cute couple in their mid-20s/early 30s who were really sweet! It was interesting seeing the difference between us though. Like when on our safari when an animal was spotted, Bryan and I would instantly move to the side of the jeep the animal was on and start taking pictures. The Swedish couple just kind of sat and looked without taking pics, then just looked uninterested after like 30 seconds. They made me feel like such a tourist, in a place where you’re supposed to be a tourist!

It was a great afternoon safari and we finally found the 2 remaining big 5 animals: lion and leopard! We found the leopard taking a nap in a tree (what’s up with cats and trees?!) and the lions were all taking a nap in tall grass (what’s up with cats and naps?!). After another awesome safari, we got back to our place and had a nice buffet dinner with the Swedes (is that what you call them?) and Robbie Williams. After dinner, we grabbed Bryan’s bottle of wine, the one that he didn’t drop, and casually drank it in the beautiful, open, lobby by the bar. It was a chill night and we talked to the Swedes for some time.

DAY 5

We went on another early morning safari with the Swedish couple and it was the perfect way to end the trip. We were happy with seeing the Big 5, but Robbie was determined to find us wild dogs so we could say we saw the Magnificent 7. Well, we had the best wild dog encounter that lasted for at least 30 minutes. There was a huge pack eyeing a herd of buffalo and they began following them. None ever tried to attack the buffalo, but the dogs were running along on the road a few feet away from our jeep. They looked like dogs…but…evil. Strange creatures!

We left Kruger National Park completely satisfied and drove the long way to the gas station and then the airport. I was so happy I got to live one of my childhood dreams and was glad I still had another day in South Africa. My only regret is that I did not get to climb Table Mountain which gives an amazing view of Cape Town because I was constantly busy in South Africa. The last and final day I would have, but I had a field lab for my “social media and global change” class.

DAY 6

I left for my field lab with my class and we went straight to the District Six Museum in downtown-ish Cape Town where we learned about the forced removal of entire neighborhoods during apartheid. We then drove to a very colorful row of houses and got out for lunch. We were separated into two groups: one for people with food allergies/restrictions and one for “normal” people. One woman welcomed us into her home where she made us absolutely delicious food targeted towards our various allergies and restrictions. Well, she definitely thought more of us were gluten free (I was the only one) and made baskets full of traditional South African gluten free food. I was in a food coma and it was so worth it. #noragrets (We’re the Millers reference. Hilarious movie.)

After lunch, we got to tour a radio station called Bush Radio and even got to be in the room for a live radio broadcast/interview. This community radio station was firmly anti-apartheid and broadcast without a license for years in opposition to the apartheid government. We learned about how the radio station was a form of alternative media and used many participatory communication tactics such as doing radio shows about topics people stated they were interested in, and dedicated a few hours a week to letting children on the air to talk about whatever they want. It was a really cool experience, a great field lab, and good ending to being in South Africa!

South Africa is one of the countries I have always wanted to go to and it exceeded my expectations. It’s such a beautiful country and I would love to go back there someday (and finally climb Table Mountain).  

Semester at Sea voyage video!

Hey everyone! So as you see, I got really lazy about halfway through the voyage and haven't caught up on blogging. I will really try to catch up, but for now, I just finished a video I put together documenting some moments in each country. Check it out!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RG8tGHkc7Jg