1992 2 of 5
WEDNESDAY, JULY 7: 6 AM: LOTS of ANGRY noise, SOME very like human SHOUTS. Dream 1: I'm back at IBM looking over archives; my first letter is about the need for a certain project in 1974, the first work is 1978, and other progress reports. I sort through, arranging four different stacks of projects into date order. Dream 2: I've gotten a group of navy kids on a tour of Bloomingdales, and we enter at the 6th floor and I'm explaining how the atrium is surrounded by the shopping levels, and there's a central escalator that I think starts at 3, someone else thinks starts at 4, most think starts at 5, and ONE (like our hostess from Honeyguide) is triumphant in saying, "I said it ACTUALLY starts at 6 and it DOES!" As for noise, FIRST it sounded like JAWS pulling up GRASS and the fluttering WINGS or ALMOST the jawbreaker crunch of giraffe chewing. Then swishing hooves through grass, and slight knocks on the tent, like nuts from trees falling onto my roof. Then a very HUMAN-sounding "GA!" sharp and sudden, and I NOW paranoidly feel it might be NATIVES trying to scare all the TOURISTS away. In the middle of the night there's the loud voice of Delores saying, "Don't go out without (something?), Michael," the first and last words, only, distinct. Lots of low movement in river as I ENTERED my tent, but scene with flashlight showed nothing. At 6:11 check that drums went at 6:35 yesterday morning, and the "GA!" now has an ANIMAL guttural ending. Shit a copious shit to 6:25 (unlike the worrisome little bit yesterday) while listening to distinctively BABOON-like barks, and the widely-shifting close/distant "GA" that at least makes it impossible to be ONE throat. She said the white settling out in the water is CALCIUM, not the milk-drops I thought may have been left at the bottom of the thermos yesterday. AND I'll remember to DIP rusks in tea to SEE if they hold together and remain crunchy. Up to date at 6:28 (couplet!) average pages/day down to 7 1/2. Dream at 6:29. Even with a headstart it takes till 6:39 to put ALL clothes on! Off at 7:07. Elephants! Back at 9:40 AM and Delores makes noises of MISSING breakfast if the flight might be EARLY, so I dash back to pack everything into TWO bags, one for the plane, and dash for GREAT breakfast to 10:10, when PILOT arrives for breakfast. Use my AARP Visa for the 68R bar bill at 10:45. Leave at 11 and onto plane at 11:15, having FOUND Michael's black bag INVISIBLE in the back of the nose compartment (with their RETURN flight tickets!). Overjoyed! Flight 11:19-11:27, over HUGE Londolozi. Graham taller and leaner fellow, Kim is the hostess; Dorothy and Michael are in 3, to RIGHT of office, I'm in 2, to left of office, and the place is LUSH, LUSH, LUSH! Into reception at 11:50 and to room at 12. Shower, shove stuff into closet, and lunch at 1 with gin and tonic. Laze around pool with a seven-inch lizard, a vervet monkey around the next house, and I change to long johns for the cold evening and go to tea at 3:20. Cake and iced tea and talk with Jan and Dahlia(?) from Australia and meet Sandross, our black driver. Recall that DEBBIE was the blond hostess at Honeyguide. Delores and Michael late to tea, leave at 3:55 for car, and to the hippo pool for a HUGE old elephant, then cheetah for one HOUR, CRASHING through brush, and a pangolin, and LIONS (one blind) and HIPPOS BATTLING! SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 14 11/19/92
Extraordinary! Back at 8:10 PM, BOTH video batteries DRAINED! To dinner at 8:30, told that ONE of my outlets was no good, to switch to the other. Pork and prunes and port fabulous, beef and Bearnaise good, fried Camembert to start, good hazelnut chocolate mousse for dessert, and Michael tastes for wine. Finish at 9:55 and STAGGER to room to bed: to be up at 5:30 AM.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 8: 1:20 AM: Upchuck a bit and Dream: "Mr. Valentino" (was GROWN word from "Valentine" changed his reservation-end from 2/19 to 2/14. Valentine's Day! 3:40 AM, wake to pee, take two aspirin, Vicks nose and Chapstick lips. SOMETHING buzzes at 4:35 AM? Knock at 5:35. Dress and pee TWICE and to DARK dining room at 6. George and Ann SMOKING CONSTANTLY. Girls come in and I'm down to tell Delores and Michael they have BLANKETS out for our use in the truck. Others leave, Sandross says he LIVES 25 km from his home but STAYS two months in camp. Out at 6:35 and sun rises at 6:45. They find leopard marks ("from last night," can tell time in HOURS but not "5 minutes versus 2 hours ago"). Then go round a block and trackers find NO marks leading OUT so it must be still IN. They LEAVE (two trackers and two drivers with guns) at 7:30 to search for leopards. I look through bird book and take notes to 7:45. Gotta pee. At 7:55 the trackers return to drive trucks back to Sandross---leopard went across Sand River to Mala Mala, out of bounds. We get ostriches, steenbock, elephant VERY close and then back at 10 AM for breakfast, a DELICIOUS ham and cheese omelette with bacon on side. Then we're told about 11 AM "regular camp" walk to hippos, great. Back at 12:45, tired, and to lunch at 1, only pea soup and fruit. Then ELEPHANTS invade the lower trees below the balconies, and I'm photographing there till 2:30. Back to lay, exhausted, trim left big toenail that's looking INGROWN, and put cotton between toes. To tea at 3:35, taking only iced tea, NO cookies, and to car at 3:50 for elephants again, a warthog EXPLOSION from dust at my left elbow, four rhinos up VERY close at sunset, ANOTHER eating elephant, suckling wildebeest, and back at 8:05 to laundry in wicker box and notes to 8:16, DRUMS again announcing dinner. Nice talk with Jeff and Susan from Philadelphia (about Borobudur, Bali, Yap, and Ponape) and impala filet. Drink MY half-bottle of red and half MY treat of Michael's bottle, finishing early by 9:50, but we watch a Varty videotape of "Super Predators" that's GREAT, though everyone but me flakes out and leaves by 10:50 when it ends with ads for Dragonfly Helicopters, Cybele, and Londolozi. Back and fall into bed at 11 PM.
THURSDAY, JULY 9: Wake briefly at 2:45, then at 5:10 and door raps at 5:30. Sort out papers, get new Dolabid ready, sort pills I forgot to take last night, find Angel Seeds, dress, and get to breakfast at 6:05, dark ROOM but everyone but Delores and Michael there. Tea and risk and an orange to set a food-base for pills. Onto truck and out at 6:30, looking at leopard tracks from "late last night or early this morning" at 6:50. Sandross and the tracker leave, with guns, to look for tracks. At 7:05 I suggest, "They probably went over to have breakfast at the village," since we hear bulldozers and female laughter and talk from our right. Try to identify snorty breathing to our far left as sun comes up fully. Last full day here, tomorrow Sandton Sun! RADIO not working! He's back at 7:07, drives down to the Sand River, and at 7:27 leaves AGAIN to follow LION tracks. Activate and throw out Londolozi Angel Seed, first since Johannesburg's one for Laird. At least two helicopters make a steady drone in the sky, and at 7:45 Sandross isn't back YET. We chat about future camps on this trip. He's back at 7:57 (1/2 hour): LIONS have crossed to Mala Mala. WE cross to find and pursue two young elephants, then get warthogs close and running impalas. Back at 10 for ham and cheese omelette (no mushrooms!), and find we may have to DOUBLE UP and send a truck to Main Camp for a party of 27 being trucked an hour from Skukuza. See video of "Leopard: The Prince of Predators" and tell Kim I want to buy "Super Predators." Look through "The Gaia Atlas of Planet Management" before lunch at 1 PM, glorious SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 15 11/19/92
COLD impala cutlets (got from CULLING), and potatoes stuffed with ham and cheese, and fruit. Back to do teeth and video room and my NOSE is bleeding! To Changan village at 2 PM to 2:45, then back to take pictures and have Delores take my pictures, and back to photograph my room and finish Gaia and get to tea at 3:35. Delores and Michael want to go QUICKLY so we're out by 3:45, trying to find but losing leopard, find giraffe against sunset, (the elephant area is closed off for culling), FIVE rhinos at pond, and finally a PRIDE of three lionesses and ten cubs that Sandross was brilliant at finding after the first truck sighted and then LOST them. I can HEAR "The Pines of Rome" as background music for the buildup of lion and truck MOVEMENT on videotape! Back at 8 PM, VERY pleased! Prepare to video boma dinner. Do it, WITH everyone else, previously only Michael and Delores. Bed at 10, sleep immediately, my nose seemingly better and not bleeding again.
FRIDAY, JULY 10: Wake at 4:35 AM, knocked at 5:30. Dress quickly and out at 5:45. have juice and shortbreads and listen to morning sounds and watch start of sunrise VERY like end of sunset. Delores and Michael come out at 6:10 and we climb into truck and go off. Down to Sand River JUST as it's getting light and the tracker points and THERE'S a leopard walking across the bottom of a huge rock, and a SECOND one appears briefly at the far side of the rock. Look ahead and a CUB crosses the road, then hides in the grass at the right and then PARADES right across the rock, RIGHTLY FRAMED, and I get it PERFECTLY by 6:45. Then Sandross finds two lion males that we follow lying, walking, drinking, tumbling on back, and finally lying down at 8:10, finishing reel #2 for four hours of videotape. OVER an hour a day for the last two days. Elephants spotted, and there was a distant jackal, very shy. Elephants last, five mongooses found by 8:40. GREAT rhino shots by 9:45. To breakfast at 10:10 and pack to 11, Delores taking to 11:35! To pay bill of 165R for laundry and such and videotape. 50R to Sandross and 10R to Lison for omelettes. Nothing to Kim, just doing her job, or Gordon, saying "AIDS will kill off a lot of surplus population." To plane for photos and off at 11:57 with Green Rhino guy squeezed in across from me. I'm sleepy and anxious, wondering what the red "GEAR" light on the dashboard means. Fly east at 7500 feet, but west at 10,000, being told to hold nose and blow to equalize pressure when we descend. Hazy outside, but old "bridges" and some bluffs are arresting. Start to descend at 1:20, already overlong flight, and we PULL UP suddenly from landing pattern. What's wrong? Go around second time and pilot says "Nose wheel isn't down." Around SECOND time for control tower to verify it IS down, and third time we land, me oddly calm, figuring THIS isn't it. He later said we COULD land without nose wheel, but it would "damage the plane," though "we wouldn't be hurt." Off feeling EXHAUSTED and numb, not talking at ALL to Helen on truck back to city at 2:30, she saying "There WAS no news," during the past week. Into plush Sandton Sun, phone Laird and Wolf, happy to find out dinner is for 6:30, since we have to be up at 5:30 to be in lobby at 6 AM tomorrow. Down to Atrium for lunch of toasted ham and cheese sandwich and a Guinness that Delores pays for at 3:30. I repack, planning to leave heavy papers, old film, and some Johannesburg stuff at the hotel. At 5:30 Michael meets with Leora and Delores finds that we can only have 50 kilograms of luggage---ALL luggage including camera gear and carryon---AMONG us! THEY have 55 kilograms THEMSELVES and I have 18.5 when I weight on scale (myself at 86.5 kilograms = 190 pounds!). PANIC! I sort through and pack bag HEAVIER, leaving out tripod and snake for NEXT trip, and get down to around 15 kilograms. Laird phones from downstairs at 6:20 and Delores is on the phone with Leora, whom she paged to call her back. I go down to meet Laird and we go to Wolf's car and I say "They're in a panic and might not come with us." Wolf has people to visit in the Hifi show on the Mezzanine, so we agree at 6:30 to meet at 7 PM. Laird comes up and disgusts them by saying "They serve crocodile ragout" when Delores never eats reptiles, and "It only takes a half-hour to get there." SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 16 11/19/92
Delores says, "We can eat downstairs in an hour, which is just the TRAVEL time." It SEEMS to work out that it'll be OK as Abercrombie and Kent in Botswana is willing to say "Carry us and our luggage or we'll just get ANOTHER charter flight for $2000 and take the money away from YOU." But they're anxious and disorganized and Michael says he "doesn't have the energy" to go out, and Delores says they'll be repacking all night as it IS, and we leave at 7, Laird saying, "Delores sounded VERY organized to the person on the phone," and that "Michael seemed VERY unsure of himself." I described what I knew about their odd relationship as we passed the restaurant in only 18 minutes, getting in at 7:30 for CUTE train cars, smiling Leonard from Malawi and Samantha from Zimbabwe (which has a 300% black market for RAND, says Wolf, who DOES want dollars as a FUTURE US travel fund, and rands are liked in Botswana too, so I should SAVE dollars for HIM, though Greta confused messages from me, but I GUESS I have bus and train and hotel set up, and WOLF will pick me up at the airport on August 1 at 6 PM with note I gave him, and will take me and pick me up from Blue Train. 145 dishes are overwhelming at The Train, and two bottles of good Auslese wine go down three gullets, NONE of which should be drinking so much, and Laird and Wolf seem to be getting on FAMOUSLY, and I'm serving Laird by borrowing RANDS for my trip and putting DOLLARS into his US account, and doing Wolf a favor by giving him MY dollars for his rands for my travel plans, and THEY put up with me and drive me around and introduce me to people! Laird DID go to the concert in Pretoria and meet Natalie again, and will try to get a plant tour for me between August 6-11, which includes ANOTHER weekend during which we can play. Wolf agrees to store my bag and tripod with my black pants, and Natalie called LOUISE to say how nice the evening was! At 9:30 I plead to leave, full of zebra roast and elephant stew and kudu heart and liver and smoked ostrich and warthog salad and blueberry mousse (an unappetizing GRAY color) and two wines. Home through smoky night to Sandton Sun to throw things into closet that I really had to THINK how to lock: the LEFT door latches into TOP sill lock and the RIGHT door lock is propped BEHIND the left door; they HADN'T neglected to put in the "lock receptacle" on the left, as I'd thought---and I think NOW that wouldn't have worked ANYWAY! Bed at 10:10, thinking that 5:40 will be 7 1/2 hours, but keep adjusting "Warm/Cool" on room fan as it gets too cold or too hot during the day, and wake at 1:10 feeling DRY and overhot and put fan OFF and get Vicks for nose. Fullish moon shining through chinks in window drapes.
SATURDAY, JULY 11: Toss, and turn, maybe shaken by today's "nose wheel" failure---that NOSE really caused TROUBLE: hiding Michael's BAG inside and rubbing wheel on casing OUTSIDE); OR because of two flights today with possible luggage hangups. I'd taken lock OFF the bag I left with Wolf to put on the BACKPACK to leave HERE till we return on July 25. Leave myself a note to remind me to leave white pants behind, taking only two jeans for trousers, and think to sort through PILLS and leave most to pick up later. Think SO much that I can't sleep, so I tell myself "If it's at LEAST 3:30 (having been in bed only 5 1/4 hours) I'll get up and repack." It's 3:35, so I turn on lights and piss and feel reasonably ALERT and start repacking, happy that little lock will WORK on backpack to lock things up. Decide to leave dirty laundry HERE to cut down on clothing I REALLY don't need through next two "less-weight" weeks, though after dinner I'm up to 88 kilograms or 193.6 pounds! Start taking notes and decide I can even leave THIS notebook behind, FILLED in 16 days, only 1/3 the trip, and I might need ANOTHER book in two weeks from the mall here. Write about yesterday and today until EXACTLY 4:30, when I put on socks for cold feet with NEW worry: cotton balls between two big toes on left foot to keep toe away from left side of large-toenail that looks ingrown SIDEWAYS, rather than against the upper clipped-too-short overhang, and I have ANOTHER worry to add to the scabs that are STARTING to come off my left shin from the woodpile scratches way back in the Drakensburg. My porcupine prick from last Sunday SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 17 11/19/92
EITHER has a hard scab or I DID leave a tip-end inside the hole, and the SMALLER "break twig OUCH it won't break" hold in my left thumb-base is almost gone, but the layer causes twinges even NOW. Finish up to date by 4:35 AM, counting that I have only 3 1/2 more sides to fill in this book before 6 AM and I can TRULY leave it behind, filled. Sorting PILLS takes til 4:50 AM, of SUCH is my trip-time filled! BUT I'm starting to feel HUNGER already, not having planned to eat until Johannesburg airport! Keeping some stuff---HEAVY stuff like BATTERIES, to put in pockets! Repacking is ENDLESS: sort out MORE clothes, MORE papers, MORE stuff; COMBINE underwear and socks, have ALL shirts/pants in one sack, down to TWO sacks of "stuff and medications," wash face, comb hair, eat chocolate, fill out laundry list, partially dress, and it's 5:15 AM ALREADY. Fill out WOLF'S cards for ALL my bags in case they get misplaced, get .38R bill under door for PHONE I must check out with before I leave. Pack spare BOOK (clearly I'm NOT reading) and wear BOOTS to save bag weight. have a rather SOFT shit (from chocolate and anxiety?) that reminds me to stuff toilet paper into my back jeans pocket. Earplugs into shirt pocket and it's 5:25 AM and I can hear breakfast dishes being rattled next door. Films into SHOULDER bag (with passport and plane tickets) for international-border x-raying. Decide to safe-deposit ONLY $500 US dollars and take ALL rands along! Get WAKEUP call at 5:32! Thanks! Finally, at 5:35, I weight 86 kilograms = 189 pounds and BAG puts it up to 100 1/2, so I'm down to 14.5 kilograms of stuff INCLUDING camera bag. Went to "Snack up" Delores and Michael and there's a "Do Not Disturb" sign! Having sex? Lost my COIN purse somewhere! NOW Delores knocks and says she absolutely CAN'T do a safe-deposit deposit NOW at CHECKOUT because she's not supposed to HAVE stuff and it was SUCH a hassle yesterday---so I take ALL cash ALONG! Lock two bags and she says porter will be up for both. So I finish this in HASTE at 5:45, got to put THIS into Frontier Spirit sack which stays here till July 25th, and take IT and LAUNDRY downstairs to check OUT. [BEGIN BOOK #2] Guy picks up bags at 5:45, and I'm down to borrow 40 from Michael to get 2 return for 38 phone bill. Onto van at 6 AM, to airport at 6:30, check in with "Mr. Box" for four of us, and fill out Departure Form at 6:45. Departure guy finds "Mr. Box" a RIOT. Through at 6:50 and told to go own escalator PAST No Entry sign. Try to get duty-free (no southern Comfort, so I settle on Harvey's Cream Sherry) only to be told customs prevent liquor into Botswana! Pity. Down and get a ham and peach and cream cheese sandwich and a pineapple drink for 8.70R, much better than Sandton Sun's 25R basic breakfast. Just as I finish "breakfast" they announce flight and we board bus and I do this to 7:15---we'll be off at 7:30? Michael give me window, Marung magazine has DETAILED map of Okavango Delta. We get towed backward at 7:35 AM and off at 7:45. Fluid shapes, like river deltas mouth-to-mouth, might have betrayed native villages as we pass into Botswana around 7:35. At 9:30 on landing declare $565 and 1500R. Hope it's OK! Toilet door BROKEN! 9:35 still not starting down, and at 9:28 "Twenty minutes to Maun, temperature 18C = 64F. Nice! Land at 10, last in all the line (front of plane) and through Immigration and Customs by 10:30, and Delores shouts, "We've got our OWN plane." Into OUR plane, ONLY three passengers plus pilot, at 10:40, about 30 minutes to Camp Okavango. Take off at 10:45 over dryer southern delta, but it gets greener and fills up as we go north, landing at 11:15. Trundle stuff to restaurant, then WAY around to #4. To get juice at 11:30 and find lunch is at 12:30, unpack, and talk with delightful Marcus, Joop, Joop and Eloise. Then walk HOT airstrip, chasing lechwes, Michael and Delores return, I wander around hippo tracks, elephant droppings, and HOT beach to back end of camp at 2:45. Sit apart from cigar and cigarette smokers, get jacket, and run to push-boat docks, I leaving third with 17-year-old blond Joop, who Delores photos with me, with GLEE. Pleasant chat and ride, walk a long (uneventful) way, and back and beers and boats to 6:10 PM sunset darkling. To bar to ask for Apricot Sour and Sloe Screw, and end with Cin and Cin, talking of trip and cameras and dine at 7:30 on chicken, FREE red or SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 18 11/19/92
white wine, pumpkin, potatoes, peas, and good chocolate cake and GREAT cream for dessert. I excuse myself, pee, take pills, lower a DOZEN blinds, zip myself in, write these notes to 9:06 PM (wakeup at 6:30 with tea), and get ready for earplugs against the snoring, ratchety frogs, and the clanging JANK of the nightjar.
SUNDAY, JULY 12: To sleep immediately and not wake until 3:45, the first SOLID sleep of 6 1/2 hours of whole trip? Have to pee, so I almost fill two drinking glasses, then back to bed and sleep almost at once. Dream fragment of me and three attractive men, one of whom hugs me from the back and I can feel his small erection, hoping he won't want to have sex that way and will be content with my skilled fingers rather than my amateur anus. Then wake at 6 AM, a total of 8 1/2 hours sleep, averaging with the 5+ of the night before to almost 7 hours/night. Dress with parka and sweater and out to pee and dump two glasses down toilet and wash with HOT water and get ready by 6:35 when COFFEE comes. Drink all three cups of water and milk and four teaspoons of, I guess, Nescafe. Hope it doesn't addle my stomach. Open tent to morning light and sounds and get to campfire ashes at 7, obviously NOT the time we leave. Help moves around setting out al fresco breakfast table for others (I THINK we have brunch at 11) and debate WHO to ask for the battery I left charging last night and forgot to pick up in my haste to sleep. Doves and parrots call, and a small rodent scampered along the margin of a swamp, hopefully more exotic than a rat. Delores and Michael come out at 7:15 and we're onto the motorboat at 7:20 and roar off through great morning slantlight on papyrus and marsh grass and swamp grass shining in the straking light. Through thick and thin channels, a few distant flying birds, a splashing hippo too soon gone, and a chance near frozen sitatunga. Dock---run aground, actually, at 8:45 and start off through grasses that rapidly get hot. A very distant single and then pair of sessebos, and later herds (maybe a dozen or 18 in all) lechwes. At Delores's limit of crotchety endurance she sees a Nile Monitor hide in the deep-hollowed trunk of a tree. Luckily she has a small flashlight in her jacket pocket in her Frontier Spirit backpack, so we peer about two feet down to see a circled tail, a startlingly large left front claw, apparently four inches across, and a top view of an unblinking left eye. She guessed it at about three feet long and a year old, reaching 5-6 feet by 3-4 years (they say it's the third largest after the Komodo Dragon, found on a FEW adjacent islands like Flores and Sumbara; and the Malaysian Water Monitor that they've seen a few of that can reach three meters in length). Two-day old elephant tracks, lion tracks from last night, lechwe skull gnawed by lions, and trees that remain green year-round. Long trek back to boat by 10:40, a welcome Schweppes Lemon Soda, and then a fast boatride back, sweeping through wide and narrow channels, stopping once for a foot-long baby crocodile that only the guide and Delores sees, then another that I see and the guide LIFTS IT OUT for fabulous shots. I hold its firm muscular snake-like body. Dock at 11:55 and HOPE for brunch but they say "Wait." Write til 12:10 and THEN sit to eat. PINK wine for brunch, but NOT refilled. Eat good meat pies with "Mrs. Ball's Hot Chutney" and salad with avocado and cold mousse (that aches one of my right rear teeth), and then the huge black feeds the birds and I sit with my video camera until they finish lunch and set out tea stuff by 1:45, so I leave to shower and brush my teeth---and I seem to have left my tube of shampoo somewhere! Have to start collecting hotel supplies! Finish all my ablutions by 2:45, shoes VERY dusty and sandy, socks FILTHY, and it's warm enough to put on ONLY a Galapagos tee shirt up top and same dirty jeans below. Let's HOPE there's laundry at Camp Moremi for THREE days next. I request ANOTHER power boat ride for PM tour and Michael and Delores can't make up their minds until tea at 3. I put on LIGHT sunblock to get used to "desert" sun and time: sunset about 6:10 PM now, and sunrise not til AFTER 6:30 AM. I wonder if we've crossed to TROPICS? Cute German (?) guy lounges in hammock, reading. Smoke SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 19 11/20/92
smells from "donkey fires," as they call them, for powering kitchen appliances. Smoke lies hazy in the air at 2:58, no birds (no bread, only tiny seeds or merely sandy dust) in feeder, but all squawking back and forth in trees. Remind myself I haven't PHOTOED the place yet. Do so, have black tea to protect my "brushed teeth," and go off at 3:25 with Italian couple (newlyweds) from Milan with same guide. Through DIFFERENT (some even narrower) channels and a lechwe, young, bounds out of brush ahead of us, swims across, and scrambles up the opposite slope. They sweetly insist I "join" their group. See some LARGER crocs underwater and sunning themselves, photo within two FEET. Birds, too. Then we fish, I make funny gaffes casting; guide catches a large TIGERFISH, with big teeth,then I catch one! Stefano takes my photo. Back in RAIN of small insects on eyeglasses and windscreen by 6:20, cool, and drink a sloe comfortable screw to everyone's delight (Joop Senior even orders one), and delightful talk with French couple about fancy dining. They recommend "Les Trois Marches" as an upcoming place. Dine at 7:30 on lamb chop, french fries, good carrot/celery/cauliflower mixed vegetables, and delicious guava mousse. Sit around the fire a bit, Mark shows slides, some GREAT ones marred by poor narration, weak repeats, and a Rollie that KEEPS reversing! Back to hear hippo splashing in two-nights-from-full moonlight, and try to video moon, but probably fail. Pee and in to write this to 9:55 PM, getting tea at 7 before breakfast at 8 and leave at 8:45 to Camp Moremi, 3 1/2 hours away by BOAT through channels! Almost nod off around fire; will I sleep 8 1/2 hours again?
MONDAY, JULY 13: [One MONTH from today will be first TOTALLY HOME day!] Wake at 4:30 and then at 6:10, lie thinking, then jerk off under quilt with flashlight and rubber band, slurping up cum and drying by 7 AM when waiter unzips and BRINGS IN tea. Wash hands and face, empty solitary pee-glass, brush teeth to remove cum-smell, and back to drink tea outside and write this to 7:31. Pack and shit a solid shit and get to breakfast, one egg for me and one for Delores, and bacon and corn porridge that's REALLY blah! Jungle oats more substantial and tasty. Find I'll need my wallet to pay the bill, so I rip the bag apart BEFORE breakfast and lose my citronella bracelet in repacking, at the bottom of course, so I have to rip bag apart AGAIN as the huge black comes to pick it up for the boat. Pay a 70 pula (about $2) bill on AARP, buying a 15P map---TERRIBLY expensive! And leave a 40P tip. Jill and Mark are TERRIBLY new at this---having owned it for three months after spendthrift woman had to sell it after eight years. Put on sunblock for face and hands, write notes to 9:15---so much for leaving at 8:45! Boat leaves at 9:20 an goes through MANY channel-scapes: trees, reeds, papyrus, lilies, ELEPHANTS and wine-stop, other boats and at 12:30 PM we meet Terry at Camp Moremi, unpack, lunch for we three at 1, beef (smelling HIGH) stew, three-bean vegetables, cheese and white wine. I look at books to 2:45, seeing Pilcher stories and read to page 66 of Larson's "Far-Side Gallery 3." Back for camera bag and have tea with Dai and Joan Williams from Capetown, and Frank and sick wife (from his cigars?) and Terry DELIGHTS us by saying we can have HIM drive ONLY us. THEN (after baboons, hammerkop, plovers, and waterbucks, BLACK driver meets us to say a LEOPARD has killed an ADULT IMPALA. We follow through HUGE dust and start waiting at 4:30 for leopard that I can't SEE to MOVE. Finally he does and I SEE him, VERY light tan color, and he LEAVES hill. Terry says we must get out at 6 AM tomorrow to see it return. Then to giraffes and zebras and lechwes by waterhole and fish eagle and GREAT orange sunset with zebras and impalas, and LOTS of forest sounds as I watch last of sunset at 6:45 PM from raised balcony. Get LOST finding cabin, finding Delores and Michael's after THEY find MINE, number 3, which is actually the LAST used, and as I write these notes to 7:15 there are dropping sounds (from marula trees, the fruit, OK) and DRAGGING sounds against sides of tent---NOT OK! Glad I have EARPLUGS! Wash hands and face and bring lantern inside---makes HEAT, too. Then CLOSE blinds outside and get to 7:30 dinner and I have gin and tonic and great Cointreau on ONE rock. SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 20 11/20/92
Dinner over at 9:10 and out to "Conversation Pit" for "elephant suicide: he put his trunk up his bum and blew out his brains." And electrified fences against elephants. Frank (sign) INSISTED I take a "torch" against the hyaena "whose pug he'd seen today." Feel GREAT as I get to bed.
TUESDAY, JULY 14: Wake at 1:15 and pee, then at 6:15, thinking the tea would have been sooner; out to pee, empty and wash one glass, and observe a FABULOUS moonset at 6:30. Back to tent to find tea there. Drink one cup, shit, wash other glass, gulp another cup of tea, and get to Delores and Michael's to find THEM just served tea and "ready in five minutes." I get to unpeopled lounge to retrieve my battery and leave off my torch at 6:55. Terry stumbles around to say "I thought you were leaving early too," and doesn't offer any idea of WHO would MAKE it so, and added, "Your guide will take you out in the car whenever you're ready." So I remount to the zebra-chair on the balcony and write all this til 7:03 AM, sun obviously up, and HERRE they come down the path. It's Delores, saying "Michael will be along in a minute." We get out to two cars and get pointed to second one. Oh, what I thought were two tiny TRACKER seats on the hood turned out to be two SUNSCREENS on the folded-forward WINDSHIELD. Terry and ET fuss with radios, but ours seems not to receive. Delores fusses about trouble of climbing in the back with a backpack, and hopes Michael isn't "hunting for my stupid HAT." "Here he comes," she says at 7:10, Terry tinkering away at apparatus in the rear of HIS car while two blacks dust and polish the exterior. I remind myself I've GOT to write CARDS. Off at 7:12. LEOPARDS! Two VERY close! Giraffes, hippos, four wild dogs filling screen, distant sessebos and tranquil impalas and wildebeest, but skittish baboons. Back at 10:30, brunch to 11:30, copious, then shower with GOOD hot water, chat with Frank and Annaliese, whose flight at 11 came and went at 10 and returned at 3. Read more Larson, and after tea go on boat tour at 3:25, seeing fish eagle, herons, ibis, a flock of red lechwes on the island, kingfisher, bee-eater, a hippo forehead at the end and an incredible full-moon rise, pink and huge, and nice wake-shots at sunset. To an island at 4:55 and off after not much at 5:20, and Soda Water drink to 5:35. Back at 6:25 and absorb sunset til truck gets back at 6:45, reporting leopards, wild dogs, and giraffes. Terry says he found spoor of THREE leopards. I write to 7:05, no one up for drinks yet. Squinty told to clear the seventh seat, since Eric's not in tonight either. I'm feeling VERY lazy, and worried about left big toe, SORE forming inside what MAY be proud flesh. HOW do I fight this infection on TRIP? Michael moves around in near-darkness with his camera. Philippe and Rosaline seem to stay somewhat apart. Going to be a quiet evening? It's warm enough that I think to jerk off later, getting nicely squiffed before. Get a dark Kir at 7:10, after Michael and Terry start chatting at the bar and July 14 is duly observed with the Versailles couple. Dinner is pork chops and potatoes and vegetables and a LOVELY chocolate cake COVERED in ALL VISIBLE SIDES with icing, PLUS whipped cream to put on top. Three glasses of wine; then a DOUBLE Cointreau makes the fire-pit pleasant, and get to my room at 10 PM to bed.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 15: Wake at 1:15 AM to fill one and a half glasses with pee, then again at 4 to FILL both and leave bladder partially emptied. Worry about my toe, try but DON'T do lightwork, and doze until 6 when I put flash on and hear guy outside with "Hot milk" that's thankfully tea. With first glass to john to crap, but ALL the lights are out and there's no SOAP to wash out glass. Back to tent to return with flash to shit a smelly shit and hassle toilet-paper holder and over to find DIRTY PAW MARKS on sink---hyena ate my soap? Three quick cups of tea and all the ROAD lights are out! Guess we're just too early for service? French couple walk down trail, taking picture of "sunset," as I write this at 6:45, Delores and Michael not out yet. Terry wanders in and comments, "You're still writing your LETTER!" HIS soap was also eaten, and when I say "I remember path light being ON" when he said "Path SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 21 11/20/92
lights are turned OFF at night," he responds, "I left a few on for you because you were at the end of the line." When I said, "But I thought the JOHN lights were left on," he said, "I guess they just ran out of fuel; we'll have them all checked today." And then he has the optimism to ask me, "And when are Michael and Delores coming out?" I say, "Yes!" So TERRY drives off with French couple, saying they have to be BACK by 10 AM, so THEY want an early start, and I head Delores's distant throaty cough at 6:51 AM, followed by a loud bang, and the Mourning Doves have started, the orange light of false dawn has faded to TRUE blue of real dawn, and the full moon is paler in the western sky as I write that at 7:52 (hearing the distant lion-roar that Terry said woke him at 3 AM), and take the flash upstairs, now light enough to see to write. Also forgot to ask if BABOON could have knocked over my water jug and two glasses and few medicines from the outside rear of the tent, AND whether baboons could have pissed from the trees to make me momentarily think it was RAINING until I saw the cloudless starry sky. Michael finally arrives at 7:02 AM and Delores says, "Mr. Hyena must have been in the bathroom, and I was here and Michael was here, so who was in the bathroom?! 10 AM switch to videotape #4. No more leopards, but four lying lions, and lots of birds. Back at 10:30 and breakfast 11-11:30. Read Pilcher "Flowers in the Rain" to 3:10. Tea and (something I can't read) and water and off at 3:45. BEAUTIFUL Sable Antelopes and NOT REALLY much more---SEARCH for lions and see giraffes at dark after sunset. Back at 6:45, MAGICAL sky-color after beer. Read and Squinty makes a Surf Rider and two Spanish and one Australian sit by themselves and Eric and Terry and Michael and Delores and I talk and enjoy popcorn til 7:40 dinner of beef, mashed potatoes, and squash and coconut pie dessert. I photo dinner and drinks after. Marta, from Santander and Madrid, a delight. Weak flashlight to pee and STILL the bathroom BASIC light and "passage" lights are BOTH out. Write this to 9:30, getting a wakeup call at 5:30 for last time before 9 AM breakfast and leave at 10:30. One hour and ten-minute flight (WITH Terry) to HIS Chobe Lodge. We can WALK to Zambia for $15 passport stamp, only one kilometer from Ilala Lodge. AGAIN in my tent my bath things and pills have been KNOCKED OVER. Bed by 9:35 PM and up to pee 3/4 a glass at 11:55 PM, new "early" record time.
THURSDAY, JULY 16:Wake again at 4 AM and complete the filling of both glasses. Dream LAST night of having to get something (an itinerary?) DUPLICATED, and Mom gets very annoyed that we won't have enough time to do that before we have to leave (for lunch?). This morning there's something about an IBM deadline that sets me to thinking of Mozelle Duckett, Cathy O'Sullivan, Herman Washington, Madge Mao, Judd Boykin, Jan Wickburg, George Carson, Ann Jensen, Bob Matsil, Vicki Palko, Tony Taddeo, and the SBC days when I wake at 5 AM. Look at watch in failing flash-light at 5:20 and 5:25, and up to shit a copious boose shit at 5:30, washing one glass (pleased to see the soap's still there, even though the lantern on THAT side is out, as is the one on the path between, but there IS one still on at MY turning of the trail. Back to get the second glass, dump it in the grass, and wash my hands and face, seeing dim BIG baboon shapes racing under the trees and across the path just beyond my turnoff. Also chittering sounds like young hyenas, and a LOUD angry baboon roar startles me on the john, just as a VERY loud plop of a HUGE Marula fruit just at my back in the soft sand at the tent edge last night actually got a Dennis-like "UH!" out of me. Smell smoke at 5 and my water's PIPING hot as I wash, and now as I write I hear the hawking up of early-morning phlegm from a throat behind my tent, probably tending to my water-fire. Write all this by 6:06 AM, obviously SOME plans misunderstood or gone away---or did they say we met TODAY at the dining room for tea, as we do daily in Chobe? Walk to dining room and pass porter bringing tea at 6:20! I take mine on the balcony; THEY arrive at 7 AM! So much for early start! I take termite hills and Michael gets a hoepoe, but NOT much more. Back to breakfast and pee at 8:50, pack and pay 104 pula for 60P tip, 18P postcards (for 24 cards, a bargain from Terry), and SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 22 11/20/92
26P bar bill. Lose cap, and find it in pocket of jacket I packed and we're off at 10:15. THREE planes and LOTS of people at the dust-strip and fly off in FRONT seat at 10:35 for BUMPY flight over desert, though animals STAYED at Savuti though marsh hasn't been wet in nine YEARS. Gasp a few times and land at 11:30 at LARGE Kasane Airport, built eight months ago and HARDLY used. Into truck and get to POSH Chobe Game Lodge and they're in room 210, Liz and Dick's suite, and I'm next door at 209, nice enough. Unpack and out at 1 to buffet lunch, VERY filling, and down to "small boat" at 1:30 to find foulup: NO BOAT for us. Liz (black hostess) tries to placate Delores, who's "very upset; we should have priority since we're paying more money by renting the suite." Now comes the question, will Michael drive the boat? 1:52 and negotiations go on. And then we DON'T go, scheduling boat for 1:30 TOMORROW. Liz offers a bottle of wine but Delores refuses. Photo Lilac Breasted Roller. Up to room to shower and brush teeth and videotape to Clayderman (?) music to IDENTIFY it. Clean clothes (moleskin on foot still damp) on and to lobby to wait for 3:45 tour at 3:35. At first I find the HUGE herd of elephants, one DRAMATICALLY crossing road, AND the kudu that ALSO cross, but he finds MORE elephants and then leads us to five lions at sunset, great. In at 6:45 and I CLIP toenail on SORE toe and get Delores to push at it and AGAIN say it's not INFECTED, just SORE. To dinner, NOT very good onion soup and stuffed beef and even Shiraz wine, and back at 9:30 to just plain collapse into bed.
FRIDAY, JULY 17: Wake at 4 but DON'T have to pee til 5:30---PERVERSE. Dream of attentive guy like Bruce from Gay Circles and I going to a concert in a hall LIKE State Theatre only FLAT top floor with folding chairs and TABLES around which we, by mistake, sit as he socializes easily and I feel OUT of it. At intermission HE greets friends and I'm JEALOUS he knows more people than I do AND is more attractive and winning. Up at 5:25, knocked at 5:30, decide to change to roomier BOOTS, and write this to 5:50, listening to RECORD sensual things about Chobe: 1) yesterday, CLOUDS in sky, 2) this morning, WIND blowing in trees! Get John again and we leave at 6:15 (they have JUICE as alternative to tea or coffee!) in DARK to get GREAT hippo shots in sunrise and THREE Cape Buffalo detach in a small group and LIONS attack, getting down ONE huge one that keeps screaming and thrashing, and then there's ANOTHER scuffle and ANOTHER buffalo goes down. We watch the second feast and then OTHERS begin to chase a THIRD buffalo, smaller one, and they say the first attacked one ESCAPED! We watch 5-6 lions gorge til 8:30 and back SATED with filming. Breakfast 8:50-9:20, mushroom-cheese-scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon and FOUR tiny glasses of juice, visited by bird and mongoose. To boat at 10 after cleaning teeth and GREAT views of hippos, Nile monitors, sacred ibis, great white egrets, and a an elephant, not to mention vultures and bloody lions. And set-up shots of placid Cape Buffalo! Back at 12:15 and write three cards to Alice, Joe, and Dennis, but stamps only in SHOP, closed during lunch. So I'm back to write this and put 40R in my pocket for non-hotel independent shop. And write two more cards by 1:30 boatride. I'm not first, caretaker shouting for Leonard. HOT in sun but SURPRISINGLY cool on water, in breeze. MORE hippos, crocodiles, birds, and add ELEPHANTS drinking at start. And fires in Namibia, as well as three military jets and 2-3 armed BOATS and later armed forces in JEEPS on roads. Don't even ASK if anything's brewing. Michael reminds us of 3:05 PM, and we dock at 3:20, Michael tipping, I think $20 US for the THREE of us. Drop off film and pee and down to cash 10R into 70 pula, buy ten 20t stamps and get ONE pula changed into two 25 pieces, three 10 pieces, and four 5 pieces, with three (rather pretty) pula prisms as 50 pieces. I'm TOLD to put AIR MAIL on, but they SUGGEST it takes three weeks for cards to deliver. Off at 3:50, since they're late, and back to crowded lion-kill site to see an almost EMPTY carcass, one guardian lion, and the vulture tree. Turn the other way and pass kudus, six towering giraffes with heads together, then quick drive to INCREDIBLE elephant herd (maybe 40?) crossing SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 23 11/22/92
the road, and then MORE elephants and three MORE. Then long road back by 6:45, feeling TIRED from busy and FILMIC day: 31/2 rolls of film and 1:45 hours of video! Paste on eight stamps and have to write three more cards, to Actualism, Sherryl, and Pope, and finish just at 7:30 as Delores knocks. The "Mushroom and Bacon Normand" is GREAT, but chicken curry is ONLY better than beef, just as my BEEF last night was JUST better than Michael's mutton. Desserts good. To board to see A person from room 207 in OUR car, and Delores makes guy take the interloper off. To room and disrobe at 9:05 prior to a glorious jerkoff with rubber band, pillows, and cotton swabs to 9:50 PM.
SATURDAY, JULY 18: 3:40 pee. 5:45 up with a surprised jolt JUST before telephone wakeup. To juice at 6, Delores and Michael joining John and me in the truck at 6:15. Down to lion-kill site for HUNDREDS of vultures and some storks, and then through road after empty road for hills and trees and river and poor stuck Zambezi Princess, stuck for past three weeks on drying Chobe river. Tourists were removed and others brought in as to a STATIONARY hotel. A great lilac-breasted roller and back to breakfast at 8:15, the Abercrombie and Kent truck thankfully NOT for us. The chef cooked MY omelette and gave it to ANOTHER tall white with glasses, and only joked with the WAITERS about his mistake, not stooping to apologize to ME. Delores and Michael just fuss about coffee and toast and I take films of dining and public areas and front of lodge and route to rooms by 8:45, now ready to pack. FORGOT pills last night, so THREE times today! Finish at 9:15, leaving bag at Delores's after photoing her pool---but FILM didn't work! BACK to REPHOTO Chobe Game Lodge til 9:45, when I put back Delores's key and climb into van with two who go to Victoria Falls AIRPORT, who warn us to keep our cameras DRY at the falls. Terry says we should say hello to MARK at Spurwing Island. [2:45 to Crocodile Farm, and 7-8 dance at Victoria Falls Hotel. 8:30 AM flight of Angels at 9 AM. 1:30 transfer to airport. $10 US on leaving country. 90 kilometers from Chobe to Victoria Falls.] Everyone still chatting, after filling out Botswana EXIT and Zimbabwe ENTRY forms, at 10:02 AM. Off at 10:03 AM, and get to border at 11, through at 11:30, and to Victoria Falls town at 12, town of three banks, Wimpy's, Makasa Sun Hotel (with Victoria Falls Hotel beyond), and we drive around circle of Mobil gas station to Ilala Lodge. In and throw stuff into a closet and meet for lunch at 1, then down long path to Falls. Glorious, spray-y, and wet, with a hot walk back, MISSING the 2:45 departure to the Crocodile Farm, getting the 3:05 return, to farm at 3:15 and tour of increasingly large animals to 4, including three cats: Serval, Caracal, and African Wildcat---VERY kitty! Out at 4:10 to falls DIRECTLY via the baobab tree, and they return to the hotel and I get to Danger Point until 5:50 and LOVE cute tanned legs on guy, photoing him, and get shot of bridge at 6 and chased out of park to Victoria Falls Hotel via a British guy and German gal, who spent US $100 per person for helicopter and can't afford African dance. Walk through SUPER hotel and have 5.20 drink at 6:30 and feel GOOD til I go to dance at 6:45 and find that what they call malachite in gift shop is painted PLASTER. Photo LOTS of dance from 7:10-8, and back to Ilala for HUGE dinner, and STUFFED to bed at 9:30, hoping to get up to falls tomorrow at dawn. Wake at 11:30 PM to pee!
SUNDAY, JULY 19: Wake at 4:30 and decide I've GOT to go to see the moon over the falls. Shower, brush teeth, sort out new pills, get out flashlight and all film into shoulderbag, and at 5:40 leave for falls, no one at reception to tell "No hot chocolate to my room" to and NO one to change money with. To gate at 5:50, breaks in cloud letting four-day from full moon THROUGH to LIGHT the 6 AM - 6 PM sign, but people show up at 6, saying "Good morning," and I grit, "No, it ISN'T!" Finally, the car pulls up at 6:10, everyone gathers around, and I push through first, furious, until guy says, "Wait, my friend," and I shout back, "Yeah, I'm sure your friend." Only had 4:95 ANYWAY, not 5 for entrance fee. Push to left to Livingstone's statue and moon TRIES to come SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 24 11/22/92
through, but sun is ALREADY lightening the east. Take photos when I can, the wind is at least AWAY from Zimbabwe side. Get to Danger Point at 6:30 and take good shots, and start back at 7, getting to hotel at 7:50; knock on Delores's door and they say they're about to go to breakfast. I put stuff away, hook up battery, which signalled it was going out on the recharger, get pills, swallow Dramamine at 8 for flight at 9, and up to find that they're eating. Order cheese omelette with bacon and sausage and toast, and WOLF stuff down with glasses of juice, til 8:25, then dash down to pack all junk into duffel and camera bag by 8:35, get into their suite, and find car waiting for us. To airport at 8:45 and I get knife from Marks of Abercrombie and Kent and go to john-darkness and PRIZE OUT end of "rewound unused" film! Two others, including CUTE triangular-headed Japanese with doe-eyes from crocodile tour yesterday, along; and Delores and I push into REAR, behind the wing, and Michael in the front SAYS he has the worst seat. Off at 9:06 and I film and film and snap and snap, twice around MY side and twice around Delores's side, lower each time, and great vistas and shoot out MY window AND across Delores out HER window. Hotels and vistas and gorges and bridges and river and islands and elephants (hope I GOT them), and I'm shooting BLIND and BLINDLY. Shoot off last of 36 exposures and go to video extensively, beginning to blink at 1:58. THAT runs on and on as we circle and land with smoke from falls at end of runway and film STILL going. Out at 9:21, 15 minutes precisely, and we'd decided IN the Abercrombie and Kent van to PASS UP the "tour of the walk to the falls" (which I'd done TWICE already, anyway) and go for ZAMBIA. Marks, the driver, says he can drive us TO the border. At 9:50 we're on line at Zambia immigration, going fast. To falls on OTHER side at 10, Marks leaves us, I photo 1914 War Memorial and shops, and views are GREAT, across bridge in real RAIN (I'm glad I kept the plastic bags AND the passport with me). Photo and film and GREAT views, and out to part ACROSS from Danger Point and see guy on VERY edge, and I sit on edge and get shot by them and have a GREAT time. I'm down to hydro-plant effluent, then we're to hillside over DRY gorges, higher and lower, and to OTHER side where people are having a RELIGIOUS ceremony. AND great RAINBOWS, DOUBLE once, appear, to make up for the lack of moonlight this morning. Delores gets anxious to leave, and I try to enter Field Museum but there's a CHARGE in Kwatcha, and I'm haggling, then have to leave when Delores says "We're LEAVING!" Relief---only a model in a pit ANYWAY! DEMAND a Fanta and give a 10-rand note and get 140 Kwatcha back. Delores has a gulp and I gulp the rest, and off at 11:40 for border. Walk and walk, two GAY guys pass mid-bridge, good shots back and forth, Delores and Michael impatient with me, and I plow on at my own start-stop rate. Hot and tired and footsore to various custom-booths, and finally GET the Zimbabwe money-entry form they were OUT of when we arrived from Botswana. I quip "How many times were you to Victoria Falls? TWICE, once from Botswana and once from Zambia!" I'm relieved they decide to go DIRECTLY to lunch, and when I check OUT of room 14, everything's on the SUITE bill and I own them $80 Zimbabwe! Down to put all papers and sweaters into duffel as they pack, and we're out by 1:25 to get ME into the Abercrombie and Kent car and THEY take ten minutes to check out, saying they have to fill out twenty forms. To airport by 1:50, and check in bags to 38 kilograms and Delores and Michael squabble and SQUABBLE and I catch up on a day's notes. Camera film and video film hand checked and they complain about Abercrombie and Kent's telling us they have powerful x-ray equipment. Go pee when Delores says "Boarding in five minutes," and they're starting in at 2:35, loaded by 2:45, and I'm up to date! My PEN runs out at 1:20 and Michael gives me a Sonesta one. Window shutters on our Air BOTSWANA plane for our Air ZIMBABWE flight---FULL, including fat Australian and couple from Madrid. Off at 3 PM, up to 11,000 feet and I realize I packed spray can in luggage. Five minutes up and start down, landing at 3:20. Say twenty minutes on ground and we're off at 3:47. Say 35 minutes to Kariba. Land at 4:25, having only AT LAST flown over Lake Kariba, of "wet baboon photo" fame. SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 25 11/22/92
Get bags, get into plane IDENTICAL with this morning's with honey-legged pilot, and take off at 4:45, Delores in back, me and Michael in middle. Over Lake Kariba AGAIN and land at 5:05 to a STABBED WOMAN (face, jugular, chest, all over) loaded into plane. To hotel at 5:30, part a village and their Zebra quarters is WAY down the hill and HUGE, but my room #8 is small and fairly tacky: toilet seat bruised and used, window frames replastered and painted, louvered windows won't close completely, letting in sounds of neighbors talking and hacking. Delores is furious about having to move tomorrow, complaining that "Everything Zimbabwe Abercrombie and Kent had done is messed up: no private vehicles (which turns out to be $400 for a HALF DAY!), no suites with queen-size beds. After THREE beers and fruit salad for lunch, I just pile on two gin and tonics at $3.80, or 75, and the bar snacks are great: chicken and beef marinated bits, chicken and guinea fowl necks, and lush chicken wings. Manager comes over at dinner to say THEY can stay and I can have a luxury room at NO extra charge! Driver comes around to schedule 5:30-8:30 drive, two sunset drives, and the "Night Eyes" tour from 9-10:30. GIRL picks up wakeup times and my hot chocolate order. Menu is ALL of asparagus spears and sauces, cream of tomato (acidy taste) soup, and lapenta, local fish dried and salted. Then we ALL have the fillet, best yet, mine OVERDONE, as was Mike's. Assorted desserts put me over edge to sleep, along with Mukuyu Nouveau, 1992, for $35, not other for $17, or $3.50! To room at 8:50, totally wiped out by day, and get to swaybacked bed at 9:10, good feeling anyway.
MONDAY, JULY 20: Wake at 1:10 AM to pee and again at 3:50, then at 4:40, but doze and get rapped awake at 5;15 with a tall glass of hot chocolate, not quite sweet. Dress and out to awful German and his kids, but we have a private vehicle and get off at 5:35 in JUST touch of false dawn. Impala, bushbuck, and CLOSE to buffalo by 6:15, then stop to photo scenery, and blond-haired legged guide has LOTS of data and information: termites eat the woody substances FOUR times to change it to earth; nutrients went from natural Kariba weed to the new Pannicun repens to the NEXT phase? Mud-ooze REFRIGERATES (because it's non-heat-absorbing, dark, and cold) termite-mounds which extend down to water table, and are kept at temperature of 36C ALWAYS. "Mud" on trees are TERMITE tunnels; white bodies hate sun. Dark-green trees are Mopane, light-green "orchard" trees are "Apiculatum." Acacia "knobthorn." Impalas are GOATS, their bacteria enable them to browse from trees AND graze on grass! Their kids eat their parents' dung to get the bacteria. Buffalo eat everything, too. Duikers, waterbuck (which secrete an ODOR I may have SMELLED before) with extremely heavy coats, distant rollers and fish eagles, and birds, antelope, and more buffalo. To breakfast at 8:30, good sliced grapefruit and hard cinnamon buns before cheese omelette with bacon and toast and jam, and leave at 9 to schedule the ground hide at 10:30 for the three of us; I'm told to PACK and leave bag for moving later to my new quarters. I get back to #8 to shit, write this to 8:30, and get interrupted by guy polishing the glass sliding doors outside AND inside, so they UNLOCKED it when they made my bed! Now to shower and brush teeth and pack, shower VERY contrary: cold on ALL the way STILL scalding hot unless hot taps turned ON and OFF to STOP and START water. Pack and shut off lights and carry cameras to check-in and I'll be moving to ROAN. Vicks up nose (I seem to be getting some kind of ECZEMA above my left eye at the nose and brow juncture) and salve my lips and sit at 10:30 waiting for Mike and Delores to decide WHEN they want BACK from the ground hide, 11:30 or 12. They arrive at 10:35, want to return at 12:15 for 12:30 lunch. To hide at 10:45 and see CLOSE impala and mature (white band on leg) bushbuck. Pickup at 12:15, but lunch not ready. I unpack in Roan, lovely, and back for HEAVY light lunch and to room for video and camera shots, then change to long-sleeved shirt for 2 PM drive. FANTASTIC elephants with Warwick, born in Zimbabwe, and buffalo and impala and birds, then RED termite mounds, sunset waterbuck and SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 26 11/22/92
trees, and back at 6:30 to find no laundry in room. Complain, then watch strobed dashes of moths into the bright lamp below the bar, thinking to video it but don't as I don't the grasses before the sweet-smelling pomerians (?). Dinner is again great, pork and cheese-covered cauliflower, at 9:05. Delores reminds me that the night tour leaves at 9! Dash for video camera and sexy Mick takes out a gabby gal trying to make him, a French couple next to me that seems to talk politics and time the whole trip, and two teenagers from Pretoria jokily trying to pick up the German gal between them in back. Impala, elephant, gallego, HIPPO, buffalo CLOSE, and more elephant making their way uphill. Back at 10:45, exhausted and to room to bed at 11, rising briefly to throw an Angel Seed off my balcony, mild temperatured enough for nudity.
TUESDAY, JULY 21: Wake at 2:05, and again at 5:35 with memory of an oppressing dream: I'm at some religious or political meeting that turns radical. Those who DON'T agree are ordered to file out, but I get awful feeling we're being led away to jail or death. Forget my jacket and shoulderbag, so I determine to return to get them, passing groups of screaming fanatics who are going to turn the fairly peaceful occasion into a violent demonstration. Wake uncomfortable emotionally and shit and write this to 5:55, not due to meet for plane til 7:30. Fairly contented thoughts before getting up at 6:30, figuring to have SOME breakfast BEFORE 7:30 departure. Out at 7:05 to meet guy bringing tea, so I say "Put hot chocolate on terrace." Up to check out, $97 Zimbabwe, "forgetting" tip that makes me feel back, but not very. Delores and Mike out at 7:40, breakfast STILL not ready, so I have SWEET chocolate and photo bar and environs and to car at 7:55. Driver says woman was stabbed by husband for her sexual wandering, and HE felt no guilt until the next day, when he botched stabbing himself in the stomach rather than going to jail. "That's the way it is here," he said. NO currency OUT, which makes ECONOMY poor. Zimbabwe had 12 million people and NO resources in industry and NO social services. Botswana has diamonds and gold, one million people, so EVERY man is GIVEN two cows and land by the government and "is succeeding brilliantly." Zambia, at seven million is in between the two. Rhodesia broken up in 1964, with independence in 1980. AIDS: 60-70% of National Zimbabwe Army is HIV-positive, but there's little AIDS as yet. In ten years might be a disaster. Off at 8:05, 40 minute flight, land at 8:50 after relatively smooth flight over Lake Kariba and "huge foreshores," at Kariba TOWN, then the Zimbabwe escarpment (rather gradual) and large plain in the Rift Valley (not part of Tanzanian Rift) before Zambezi River, which is the border, then a small plain, and Zambia escarpment. Sapi River, small this-side Zambezi tributary, flooded EVERY year but LAST year because of drought. Chikwenya CLOSES November-April during wet season because touring is impossible in the mud. Impala and baboon along road, HUGE baobab tree that Mark poses under for scale, and Elspeth garrulous about trees (mopane is "yellow-coin leaves" in green, and Natal Mahogany is EVERGREEN, huge, and elephant-resistant. Start toward camp at 9:05, in at 9:30, for explanation of "Keep doors closed against baboons, DON'T cross Sapi River, LOOK for animals in camp, DRIVERS will go for early-morning game rides in a bit, WE can go to hide after breakfast to start day here, and then afternoon game run ends after dark, when at 6 PM the electricity comes on for charging batteries ONLY. So I BETTER carry SPARES. Finish this at 9:50, stomach rumbling for brekkie! Elspeth is daughter of Charles and older woman; Tall One is staff, as are a few other guys, stall OUTNUMBERING nine guests at breakfast (plus four on a morning cruise with packed breakfasts) for 13 total. Talk to Jackie and Bob from Weehawken, and pour Apricot Crush STRAIGHT before I find it's a 4:1 CONCENTRATE. Scrambled eggs and bacon, hot toast, granola cereal and 1/2 orange. Then we're taken to "River Hide" at 11:15, after brushing teeth, and it's MUCH too far from impala, waterbuck, baboons and babies, for MY lenses. Picked up at 12:45, having leafed through guidebooks. Lunch is cold chicken legs, cold sliced beef, a cabbage salad and a spinach salad, "lemon SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 27 11/22/92
barley" drink, and hot-from-oven fresh rolls. Guy from Philly lights up cigarette and I suddenly feel VERY tired, back to lie down at 2, exhausted and hot and faintly depressed, until 3 PM drugs for 3:15 tea and LOUD Joan and Delores, and out at 3:30 with cute Clive and Delores in front, Mike in middle with couple from Harare that call elephants "ellies" and me in back next to 50-ish Bob and camera-carrying Jackie. They want a video camera next. Elephants, kudu, impala, bushbuck, baboons [scrub hands(?) last night], sunset over Zambezi with Zambia fires in distance, this camp SURROUNDED by hunting concessions so the animals are gunshy and people-fearing. Beer over grass. Elephants VERY seldom in musth in this valley: river in good condition; 1900: 4000 elephants NORMAL in Zimbabwe, in 1989 68,000 elephants are WRECKING countryside. Temporal gland secretes in STRESS: helicopter over, the gland SPURTS liquid: "This elephant's secretions are food-stress related, not good quality OR quantity of food." Will be a population DISASTER because HUNTING them has been forbidden. Elephants NOW reaching up "on hind legs, like a circus act, ONLY HERE." Due to TERRIBLE pressures on terrain. Family herd protects baby elephants, but in food-shortage time they SPLIT into smaller and smaller family groups, til ONLY mother and CALF are left, which are vulnerable to predators: lions too FIVE babies in this area last year, VERY high rate. TERMITE queen (foot long, lying one egg every three seconds) LONGEST lived insect: 20 YEARS for one mound, then dies out. Warthog BOAR has FOUR warts, SOWS only TWO warts, below eyes. They KNEEL to feed on grass roots and tubers. 5 PM, start 6th reel (11th hour of tape). 58" kudu-along-spiral horn versus 1.3 METERS for the sable. Plan to ELIMINATE tsetse fly (and trypanosomiasis) from Zimbabwe and bring in all cattle---will be a DISASTER! Acacia albida (MOST abundant) produces 300 kilograms of 15% protein PODS in SPRING, and LEAF in area's WINTER to feed animals THEN. MOST important. TUSKLESS elephants GENETIC, hunters killed TUSKERS, so many more TUSKLESS bred. We see NOT water hyacinth, but KARIBA WEED (popular name for weed imported from South America) that covered 3/4 Lake Kariba and furnished fertilizer for Pannicum. Chikwenya is REMOTEST camp in Africa. Lights pick out impala and a GENET, related to a mongoose (which I thought it was) for first time. Zebras and buffalo too, and one female lion in dark. Back at 6:45 and told dinner is at 7, which it is as I finish now. Get out flash and pee and debate why drums haven't gone by 7:05 when John and troupe from tents 5, 6, and 7 come by to GUIDE us through possible animals, to dinner! Chat with Bob AGAINST Joan, here with him the past THREE days, and drink FREE gin and tonics. Flame Lily wine with beef on rice, okra, and carrots, and strawberry cream mousse for dessert, then brandy, and John shows GREAT slides from April-November of Chikwenya, and then in parade back to tents to finish this at 9:30, drums at 6 and tea there at 6:30 and only three or five of us in Land-Rover in AM. Velvia (from Delores they're $7 at COST) are CHEAP at $8.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 22: Wake at 12:20, regurgitating awful stuff---brandy?? But back to sleep before peeing. Up again at 3:40, and brave barefoot walk to drape towel over shoulders and shit under stars! Wake at 5:40 and lie quietly to 6:03 drums. Dress and over to orange drink and three burnt rusks, and into Russell's car with Bob and Jackie at 7. NOT MUCH. Only 6:41 on NEW videotape now. HOOF pressure pulverizes sand into DUST, forming hard cap underneath that forms NEW dust that WIND blows away or water washes away. TERMITES move into cap-areas because there's no seepage into it---they take 40% of grass underground. Termite's VEGETATION breakdown produces METHANE, atmospheric NITROGEN lost to AIR. Impalas PUSH OUT bushbuck and reedbuck, then DOMINATE. DOMINANT species push out OTHERS, forming monotonous MONOCULTURES, which are UNSTABLE, since ONE disease can devastate entire area. Same for ONE tree and ONE insect: termites. Of course, the UNSTATED dominant species here is Homo sapiens, taking away all the farmlands, marshlands, breeding grounds, migration routes, basic foodstuffs, and natural environment! Baby tortoises SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 28 11/22/92
eat hyena-drop-calcium for SHELLS! Suckling buffalo best and a quiet look at dying Africa. Back at 9:55, shit AGAIN and write this, and go to breakfast. Guy fries me only one egg when I wanted two, but Mike gets one and doesn't want it, so I get it. I'd said I wanted the platform and suddenly Mike and Delores want it too! And Jackie comes along. We leave at 11 and see an elephant stretched FULL up to get a acacia branches---best of AM. At platform there are DISTANT impala and baboons, vultures and a stork at an unseeable hill, and various birds. All three read and only I stick at WATCHING (rather lovely) countryside. Invent the line, "Nothing much happened until the lion attacked the rhino," to which I expected "You saw a lion attack a rhino??" (but didn't get, twice) and my response would have been "That hasn't happened yet, either." The "either" really doesn't belong, but I think it makes it sound better. Pickup at 12:50 and slow back to 1;10, drums for lunch then, and there are some kids, maybe 12 years old ("16 or older" of Delores notwithstanding). I ask for and get glass of white wine with spaghetti and meat sauce, good crisp pea pods, and lush avocado chunks. Fruit salad dessert, and hot whole wheat fresh-baked rolls this time. Elspeth says we five (three + Amy + Sara who went with us to the hide this morning) can go on the river at 3:30 (Mike and Delores say they DIDN'T want to go until they saw the trimaran MOTORIZED with SEATS. Elspeth was nonplussed (great line!) and said they'd booked OTHERS on in the morning to be back 10:30-11, and WE had to leave at 10! So it's boat this PM and drive tomorrow. Finish lunch at 1:40 and shower in still-hot water from yesterday afternoon, then do my teeth (the SECOND Proxibrush breaks and when I go for a replacement there's a baboon right in front of my cabin! Trim beard. Also Delores wanted to take PICTURES of me and my QUARTERS (?) but I shouted that I was showering. I bet she was turned on. Put Angel Seed in pocket for Zambezi River. Write this to 3:10, drums late again. Drums go at 3:15 and on my way to tea I look for "large-leafed tree beyond the workshop beyond the kitchen for the big leaf I found on arrival that might be tobacco" and can't find it. Look at map and find that the main north-south road we flew over goes from Lusaka (Zambian capital) to Harare (Zimbabwe capital). Clive drives us off at 3:45 past where he lives with another guy and where the managerial family lives, and into three canoes boarded together with Mike and Delores and one girl in front, and me and the other girl behind, girls on the "off right," and we in the best places. Elephants drinking from distance, bee-eaters coming and going, but poor Clive's tigerfish loses its corks as he throws it and it SINKS, AND he leaves the drinks in the Land Rover, AND he takes it personally when the mother elephant shoos off her youngster from drinking before we get close enough for photos. Glorious sunset colors and back at 6:35. I sit in front and watch the colors fade, then turn chair to watch stars as a SLOW shooting star cruises past, FLARING in the center of its trajectory. Then a SNORT quite close behind me sends me inside, listening to hippos bassooning to each other and at least three lions roaring their guts out. John picks us up at 7:15 in a group and I have a gin and tonic and start on the Flame Lily wine early. Chicken, squash, and peas delicious, and jelly roll and cream for dessert. Elspeth and her mother "Tufty" and we three talk politics and government and AIDS and I hear about aerosolized BONE as means of transmission for first time. FEELING VERY MELLOW. John walks us back at 9 PM, and I hear We get drummed up at 6, PACKED, and tea at 6:30 and out with Russell at 6:45 to take Amy and Sara to plane at 9:45 and back at 10 for breakfast and to plane at 10:45 to Fothergill and Spurwing (whose goose we saw today). Finish this at 9:10, deciding to go to BED and pack when I WAKE in MORE light tomorrow. Bed at 9:25 PM.
THURSDAY, July 23: Wake at 12:20, again at 2:30 to pee. Look at watch at 4:15 and 5:20, then write at 5:40 of mingled thoughts and dreams: compassionate feelings and thoughts toward Dennis, but as in a movie. A "memory" of seeing Frederic March or Celia Johnson in "In Which We Serve" as the penultimate SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 29 11/22/92
Oscar movie to see, "remembering" it as not very memorable, leaving only ONE Oscar film to see, when the fact remains I still have to see Mary Pickford's and Emil Jannings's films for TWO to see. Up at 5:45 to dress and shit and pack. Finish early, at 6:15,and drag my chair to the banks of the Zambezi (magic!) and write the familiar chain of thought, this time initiated by tying my bootlace in the dawn dimness: my fingers have touched these eyelets (aiglets?) so often that the leather and metal KNOW the fingers, making the boots sacred objects to the hordes of secret adorers who watch, absorb, and cherish my life (as if I myself don't watch, absorb, and cherish sufficiently for my idea of the worth of my life?), so that when I discard them, they're sought out and preserved by my followers (in THREE senses of the word: disciples, trailers, and constant observers). Leading to the "me-web" encasing the world in a trail of molecules I leave behind in exhalations, excreta, and ejecta as I move among the seven continents and over the three oceans and connecting seas and rivers. A cosmic diagram that I (only, but why not EACH individual??) trace out to a portended final pattern that solves the equation to some universal mystery that only my mentality, or will, or craziness, or arrogance, or worth, or SIGNIFICANCE---I think THAT'S the significant (ha) word: I WANT my life to be significant, and if MY actions don't produce the effect (the influence, the books, the photographs, the writings, the friendships, the "changing-your-life words"), they nevertheless have permanent, cosmic, MEANINGFUL significance (a tautology?) for the world OUTSIDE myself---there's another necessary facet: something that EXCUSES to MYSELF my selfishness and self-centeredness---no interest in family or children or BLOOD relatives, only in "chance" encounters that I hope might have (again) some cosmic significance in a pattern that only I can weave. Of course, all individuals PERFORCE etch life-paths of their OWN, yet since LACK OF SELF-WORTH seems to be such a UNIVERSAL lack (which I alternately claim and disclaim, like Charles Magistro's description of Hitler's presumed combined inferiority/superiority complex) that it might BENEFIT all if they could, at least for A MOMENT (caused by their reading my words, of course), feel that THEY TOO are in some way important, the TRUE center of the ENTIRE (not ONLY their own, a DOUBLE Giant Step) universe. Now the hippos call from the water of the Zambezi into which, yesterday, I dropped an Angel Seed, and the birds call from sunrise fading, and people chat going toward tea at 6:30, so I stop. Tea to 6:50 and off with Russell to drive: Trishaplesenor (?) NOT eaten by animals, but Monarch BUTTERFLY MUST get male-hormone "pattern" from it! Mopane BRUSH broken by elephants into multiple rootstocks, stunting them for life. Then mopane TREES survive stunting, all LIKING alkaline soils which make FARMING impossible, so "natural park" is ONLY possible use. Goliath heron LARGEST species. Take two British women to plane by 9:15 and back to camp, NOT seeing Elspeth's nyalas. Breakfast and finish packing and get off at 10:20 to plane at 10:30 and off at 10:35 with same pilot, me in FRONT seat to ask about smoke/dust screen, held down by high-pressure system which will let it blow OFF when the pressure lowers, sometimes so bad he has to fly on instruments in winter, and zigging to avoid thunderstorms in summer. Thirty-five minute flight over airstrips at Mana Pools and Kariba, and land at small Fothergill at 11:10 to be taken by Anthony by boat to even smaller Spurwing, greeted at reception and they get Goose and I get Bee-Eater. To bar for drinks and back to unpack to find power comes on at 12:30 and I can recharge in ROOM. Will meet Andy Webb at lunch to plan excursions, ME to the GORGE! Fan delightfully cooling and I count through films to find I used TWO "unmounted" without recording them, and I'm about to go to 33 of 42, much AHEAD of use, though I'm just past hour eleven on video, very comfortably reserved in bag. Write this to 1, put shirt on and call at the Goose for lunch. Cold cuts and beer is what I choose, the "British chef" has strange ideas of banana fritters---and STRAWBERRY ice cream? Delores REALLY TRIES to dissuade me from taking the Gorge tour, while NOT budging an INCH from her conviction that she'd be bored SOUTH AFRICAN TRIP - 30 11/22/92
with it and wouldn't WANT it. Finally Mike says, "Why don't you just let Bob do what he WANTS to do?" and she rather quiets down. I tell Andy Webb I want to go tomorrow AM, and after a hem and a haw he says OK, and I CAN go NEITHER outside the electric fence of the enclosure, NOR beyond the first ridge, NOR to the other side of the harbor, all for fear of buffalo and lions. I wander toward BASE of camp and the road is FULL of colorful stones, of which I collect about twenty, with two shells and one evocative piece of wood. Encounter only an impala, ants, various geckos, and lots of pesky flies. Generator chugs away and I enjoy crushing piles of "sticks" that termites have totally digested into RED DUST. Africa doesn't have soil, it's covered with TERMITE EXCREMENT. Maybe TERMite root in TERMinate and TERMinal! The final end of all is termite excrement! Back to Bee-Eater at 3:15 and wash stones and leave them to dry in ashtray above closet. Update this to 3:35, RELIEVED to hear 6-year-old asking "Are we taking the same boat?" even though I KNOW Delores is getting a PRIVATE Land-Rover with Andy, our PRIVATE guide. Game drive tonight, water canyon 12 kilometers away with "interesting tributaries," and klipspringers and baboons and lots of birds. Gorge AFTERNOON trip leaves with kids. Hope the woman knew what she said when she said tea was on the lower terrace and not anywhere else? JUST as I'm about to check out Goose to make SURE they hadn't left, the black brings down a plate of great heavily-buttered lightly-jammed pancakes (cold) for tea AND the drums sound, so I'm back to eat a pancake and sit contentedly waiting for the earth to move at 3:37 PM. In just TWENTY days, at this clock-time, I'll be HOME! Delores and Mike arrive laden with cameras, and Andy is speaking to tea-takers, so we go over and drag him away at 3:45, and he's a lively narrator and listener. Three male elephants and long drive along "highway" to foreshore for distant waterbuck menaced by three lions, which actually ATTACK and mess it up. Then we sit, not ALLOWED to drive off roads, through sunset at 6:15 as four of the SAME lions menace two OTHER waterbuck, and we're BACK to photo huge MALE lion, and back to see ANOTHER aborted lion attack and the TWO get away. Back on tree-lined dusty roads by 6:45, and stoves are stocked so by 7 I get into hot shower and wear SNEAKERS to dinner for first time, changing even JEANS and getting TWO gin and tonics while watching fire twelve kilometers away (and don't forget girl from next DOOR bursting in and saying "The drums are going" at 7:30 before realizing wordlessly she had the wrong HOUSE! To dinner at 7:40, Delores and Mike really WORRIED about me, touchingly. Cream of carrot soup is about as watery as lunch's spinach soup, but cheese bites with bramble jelly interesting; Mike's choice of Nyala white wine OK, which I sign for $35 including Delores's diet cokes, my gin and tonics at $4.70, and good pork and applesauce and potatoes and carrots and coffee mousse and just cheeses. sit rapt in starlit skies til 9:10, deciding Delores will NOT let Mike return to me after "at least walk me to the room" blatant by Delores. Write this to 9:20, generator loud in ears, and I GUESS I brush teeth before bed before 5:30 hot chocolate and 6 AM meet Andy in Reception for early lion check, quick brekkie, then a boat to the Gorge JUST THE FOUR OF US and a fish for the fish eagle (the clincher for Delores). On July 11 I wrote on page 107, on July 23 page 189, for 13 days for 83 pages, or 6 1/2 pages per day, or for 15 days left, 87 pages, ONE more book for total of 276 pages or about EIGHTY typed pages, WOW! Brush teeth METICULOUSLY and get ready for the morn by 10 PM.