Safari!

One of the main goals of the African leg was obviously to partake in a safari. To do this, we contacted an agency dealing the trips and got one organized three weeks before while still in the Philippines. We knew little about the safaris in the area and requested a standard Kruger safari which we didn't get because all of them were full. But then it turned out this was a good thing as they recommended us to take a look at private game lodges in the Greater Kruger Area. They do similar safaris but are not restricted to sticking to the roads and there are no masses of tourists around. The other main difference is the price; the private ones charge more, but then you get to stay in a 4-star accommodation where I definitely feel very out of place. But I guess a bit of luxury once a trip doesn't hurt.. we did sleep on the airport floor on the way here just to retain our backpacker credibility. :p

After an early departure from Jo'burg airport we'd drive for 5 hours on two different minibuses to the game lodge, have lunch and set off for our first game drive adventure. And only 20 minutes into the drive we find a bunch of elephants. We turn off the engine and wait for them to surround us, and just stare awestruck as 15+ big animals (and a few tiny ones) flap their ears at us and munch at the vegetation no more than 3 meters away. After the elephants we find a sleepy lioness that won't be bothered by our presence much. At sunset we stop at a viewpoint for drinks - white wine from an icebox - and continue for two more hours after dark, locating promising animal tracks and seeing the African Buffalo for the first time. Score for the first afternoon/night: 3/5 of the Big Five and countless jackals, antillopes and birds seen. Also our lodge has a nice grassy area from where you can look down to a plain with a water hole, where all kinds of animals from crocodiles, zebras and giraffes congretate. And this is while sipping on an icy cold drink.

The next morning we get up at 0530 and head off in the insanely comfy elevated Land Rover and go looking for the leopard & buffaloes. And after a while we come across a herd of 100+ buffaloes. Here we descend from the vehicle and do a small bush walk. Our tracker & ranger had been receiving tips about lion tracks, so we go take a peek and are the first vehicle to find the lion pride. With 10 animals, this is one amazing thing to see. Sitting quietly in the vehicle with cameras rolling we get to see the lions hunting a Kudu antillope, not more than 20 meters from us. So far, the amount of animals we've already seen is just so unreal that I'm getting a bit suspicious even heheh. We finish the morning's drive with an hour long bush walk back to the lodge, and come across some more zebras and giraffes very close up.

On the evening drive we first did a bushwalk with elephants and then set out to find lions again; another big pride had been spotted in the area and it was best to make the most of it. Come dark, we'd soon find them and watched them hunting for a good hour, slowly following them in their midst. Quite intense to see crouching lions from a distance of 2-3 meters in an open vehicle. Later we ran into them again, this time to find them resting in the bushes as a big pile of sleepy cats. We didn't have time to look for rhinos, but that was covered the next morning when we spent 3 hours looking for them on both the Land Rover as on foot, and finally found 2 white rhinos in a thicket, too far and too quick for pictures. So that's 4/5 of the Big Five done and 2 game drives to go! Come on, leopard!

When returning from the last afternoon/night drive we came back to the lodge to find the local crocodile in the swimming pool of the lodge! The reptile would just swim around happily in the water that had mysteriously turned greenish yellow earlier in the day, as if to welcome the scaly fellow for a skinny dip. And after yet another dinner feast and a good night's sleep we went out for our last drive and found two male lions with their great manes sleeping and lazily trotting around, and made a visit to a dam that a hippo calls home. And despite the best efforts of the ranger team we could not find the leopard. We came so close a couple of times, finding half eaten impala carcasses that had been hunted down by the elusive feline, but didn't get a sighting. Nonetheless the safari exceeded all our expectations and we could start our journey back to Jo'burg with big grins on our faces.

See all the safari pictures here!

A Splash With Great White Sharks

After a couple of leisurely days of touring the wineyards and sampling their product quite effectively, it was high time to get some adrenaline pumping again and booked ourselves a full day trip to see the Great Whites up close and personal. So we went to do a "cage dive" some 2 hours by bus outside of Cape Town to "Shark Alley" outside Gaanbai, a place known for its largest white shark concentration in the world. Now, this activity has nothing to do with actual diving; you put on a wet suit and stand in a cage while the boat staff chums the waters around the cage and try to lure the white sharks to the surface using a bait (heads of yellowfin tunas, in our case). End result is that you get to view these animals made famous by the movie Jaws from a distance of under half a meter - and occasionally they'd even brush against the cage, extracting a nice cheer of "HOOLY F*CK! SH*T!" etc from the people occupying the cage ;)

The water was rather chilly at 15C but the long hooded wetsuit would work wonders and we didn't get cold at all during the adrenaline filled 15 minute time windows you got in the cage. I was really hoping to get nice underwater shots of these magnificent hunters, but the water was really murky with viz under 1.5-2 meters, and none turned out proper. I had a few chances for a nice headshot of an approaching shark, but missed both shots. Luckily the sharks would show themselves on the surface a lot, a couple of them jumping half out of the water a couple of times, smacking the cage and the boat around a bit. Quite a sight to see. We had 5 distinct sharks around the boat, largest of them being about 3.5 meters long.

We went with a company called White Shark Ecoventures, a pioneer bunch that have done a good job advocating the need to protect these creatures. Based in Gaanbai, they've been in the industry since the early 90s. They seemed to be pretty good in luring the sharks to pass the cage several times with every bait and had very accurate information about the area and the animals. One funny thing was that the seas around the Shark Alley seem to have a peculiar wave pattern, and 2/3 of the people on the boat were throwing up over the side. And they said sometimes it is everyone. But not us! All in all, what a day, money well spent!

See all the South Africa pictures here!

South Africa

This is it then, the last leg of our trip - Africa. Sort of a final frontier for us, with neither of us having never been to the continent. After 14 hours on the plane, having watched 5-6 movies and played some nethack we arrived to Johannesburg. Stayed quickly overnight in a hostel near the airport and come the next morning, hopped on a Kulula flight down to Cape Town where the weather was perfect and activities were plentiful. Not wanting to risk getting cloudy skies the next day, we took to the Table Mountain right after arriving downtown and enjoyed the views over the city for a few hours. Even beer tastes better when you have a splendid view!

Now, Cape Town is not exactly what I had imagined an African city to be like. European style cafes and bars all around - and where the hell are all the zebras, rhinos and huts made out of dung!? Anyhow, what a magnificent city it is; prices surprisingly low and indeed so much to do. It's not exactly Rio de Janeiro but good anyway. We explored the city on a taxi a bit and the second day went to do what all the good tourists do and visited the Cape of Good Hope and the penguin colony on the Indian Ocean side. Those little buggers in their tuxes get me in a great mood every time we see them. Also got to see some baboons in the wild around the Cape Point. It seems these guys aren't bothered about a crowd watching and taking pictures while they masturbate.

There's a lot of talk about how dangerous South Africa and especially Jo'burg and Cape Town are, but pfft, I don't think they would compare to some haunts in latin America. It's just that there's so many ignorant tourists here prancing around with cameras and thick wallets visible that there's bound to be trouble. Economic differences are still huge among the population even though Apartheid is long gone. And everyone seems to be a big comedian, even the staff on the Kulula flight (stuff like "Smoking and complaining are prohibited throughout the flight" being announced on the PA).

After a few days soaking up the city life we splurged whole 1.3e on first class tickets for a train and ended up one hour later in Stellenbosch, the wine capitol of SA. With some 365 wineries packed in a very tiny area, they boast thousands of different wines, some of which very nice. A wine tour we did included tasting 23 wines as well as a variety of local cheeses. Talk about good times! Naturally we did our best to do more sampling on our own, after all the small town is full of wine bars and shops both big and small. Very smooth time for 2 days. Really good value for money here, thumbs up from Fonzie for this place. But, the traveler in me wants to see something less civilized, so it is about time to move on.

Philippines Diving Detour

After realizing there was no way in hell our budget could sustain the damage from diving the outer Great Barrier Reef or even spend 3 weeks in Australia, we made a hasty detour to one of the Asian diving meccas, Philippines. While Asia was not on the proverbial menu for this trip, I'm just too glad to be here where living expenses are minimal and the diving is good and cheap. Arriving to the 11 million inhabitant capital Manila in the middle of the night was exciting. Had almost forgotten what real traveling feels like!

Manila holds little interest for a visitor like us, and early the next morning we hopped on to a bus, rode 3 hours to Batangas (port town infested with touts and pickpockets) and crossed to next island of Mindoro. Located rather close to Manila, its easy access brings in divers, locals and sex tourists. We stayed in Sabang, where most of the diving / girlie bar action is. While the food here isn't anything like the delicacies in Thailand or Vietnam, the reefs are teeming with life and coral is healthy and colorful. As for prices, well, diving costs about 1/3 of what it would be in Australia, and is better than there. Everything else costs about 1/10.

For the next 5 days we dived the nearby waters off Sabang, visiting numerous wrecks, meeting huge turtles and playing with countless nemos of all sorts. They organize trips to a few waterfalls and local villages in the jungle, and we went of course; who'd say no to a day of barbeque & beers by a natural pool under a waterfall. Talking to the resident diving community we got loads of nice tips about where to go next, and started talking to the people at Pandan Island about an Apo Reef visit.

Pandan is a small white sand beach island off the western coast of Mindoro. The beach is decent, not great but not bad, but that's not the reason people go there. The real reason is that the island is the gateway to the Apo Reef, largest atoll in Asia and one of Philippines' best diving spots. 30km off the Pandan island, it is mostly visited by liveaboard boats due to the 2-3 hour trip each way. We managed to get a spot on such a boat and did a 2 day / 1 night trip, clocking 6 dives and a lot of time in the sun on the deck. Weather being very nice and clear the diving was spectacular, reef sharks would come say hi on every dive, turtles were everywhere and schools of big jacks and tunas would surround us constantly. The visibility wasn't at its best but still around 20-30 meters. On the way back from Apo we were greeted by a school of dozens of dolphins, whee!

After returning back north from Apo we'd spend our remaining days in the country diving Isla Verde off Sabang and lazing around in the sun in the brilliant Floating Bar where smoking hot bartenders serve cold lagers & "jungle juice" with a big smile. Cheers to April and Eva! That concludes our Philippines visit. The diving was great, with 10+ different kinds of nudibranches seen, many great new friends met and amazing places visited. Soon it is time to return to Australia to spend cheery St. Patrick's Day with people who stayed back in Darwin during our little escape to Asia!

See all the Philippines photos here!

An Australia Pass-through

Our road to Down Under was a bit rocky. Making further travel arrangements with the laggy hostel WLAN in Auckland, we ended up having only an hour to reach the airport before the check-in would close. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, but karma would have it that no airport bus showed up for 45 minutes (they're supposed to run every 15 minutes) and we ended up sharing a cab with a scot who was skipping work to go the airport to see his girl after 10 months of separation. And he seemed to be in even more desperate hurry than us :) In the end we made it with good 5 minutes to go before closing time and made it on the flight..

And on to Sydney, the crown jewel of Australia's territory capitals and quite a hefty city world wide. Now, we are not big believers in advance reservations (read: we're lazy) but it hasn't been a problem before; this time, however, we'd walk around the town for 4-5 _hours_ and ask in 50+ places before finding a bed in a strange chinamen hideout on the outskirts of Chinatown. The less-than-clean ramshackle room and the stale stench of noodle soup was nothing after having almost given up and slept on the street. Phew! We had 2 days to spend in town for sightseeing, but decided that our little town walk through Central - Chinatown - Kings Cross - Harbour was kinda enough, and just visited the zoo across the bay to make sure we saw at least the kangaroos and koalas on the visit. Even with all the forewarnings from fellow travelers, we'd still be quite appalled by the prices in town: a beer could easily cost 10-12$ and a backpacker hostel room could be as much as 170$ a night. Gnnh.

Then it's off to Darwin, a laid back small town of a capital for the Northern Territory. Getting a place to stay was straightforward this time, the first place we asked had a cute room with a pool, and for less than stated in LP. For once! Like most of the Australia's tropic seaboard, Darwin's beaches are not swimmable thanks to the possibly lethal box jellyfish that infests the coastal waters. That's where having a pool comes handy, as the daytime temperature could climb up to 35C or more at this time of the year. With pretty much no plan to do anything special, we just hang around town, hoping to see a crocodile and trying out the local beers.

Darwin is a brilliant mix of aboriginals and local Crocodile Dundee look-a-likes, with enough small town feel in it to make a traveler weary of busy Sydney feel at home. Handful of bars on the central Mitchell Street are packed every night with the handful of tourists mingling with the overly friendly local folks. We spent the afternoons at the poolside bar in our hostel talking to the mostly Aussie crowd (thanks to the extremely strong AUD foreigners cannot really afford to travel the country properly at the moment) about their splendid huge country and adventures in it far and wide. After sunset it's time to head to the awesome Shenannigans pub, chatting and enjoying Victoria Bitter lager and Guinness.

Nethack: Ascension

One of the goals for the trip for me was to finish what I started almost 20 years ago - to win a game of Nethack. Probably the most complex computer game till date, Nethack is also considered by many as the hardest game ever made to complete. Before I've always been a very casual player, making no real progress, but this time I read all the spoilers, played really carefully and finally after 5 months of on and off playing, made it to the Astral Plane and sacrificed the Amulet, ascending to Demigodness and thus winning the game!

It took me about 3 months of sporadic playing the ascension character on buses, planes and hostel rooms mostly in the evenings. After having killed the Medusa and acquired the Shield of Reflection from Perseus, found a magic marker and made my first dragon scale armor, I knew I had a chance. And by the time I'd gathered 5 amulets of life saving, a wand of wishing, gotten a Frost Brand sword and enchanted every single piece of equipment to the max, I knew I was really close. And finally pushing through Astral Plane zapping my Wand of Death and wands of teleportation left and right to reach the proper altar was such an adrenaline rush.. The biggest (and a few times lethal) mistake I made was killing Rodney aka. the Wizard of Yendor on my way down, instead of clearing the way to the vibrating square first. I ended up killing the bastard 34 times, and he got me twice thanks to his Double Trouble antiques. Luckily I was carrying those amulets of life saving!

As a note to self, I completed Nethack in the morning of February 28th 2011, sitting at the poolside bar of Youth Shack Hostel in Darwin, Australia.

You offer the Amulet of Yendor to Crom...--More--
An invisible choir sings, and you are bathed in radiance...--More--
The voice of Crom thunders: "Congratulations, mortal!"--More--
"In return for thy service, I grant thee the gift of Immortality!"--More--
You ascend to the status of Demigod...--More--

Amulets
 h - an uncursed amulet of life saving
 G - a cursed amulet of life saving (being worn)
 Weapons
 a - the rustproof +7 Frost Brand (weapon in hand)
 Armor
 n - an uncursed fireproof +5 elven cloak (being worn)
 s - a cursed rustproof +5 dwarvish iron helm (being worn)
 F - an uncursed rustproof +5 pair of gauntlets of power (being worn)
 M - a cursed +5 shield of reflection (being worn)
 R - an uncursed +4 gray dragon scale mail (being worn)
 Z - an uncursed fireproof +4 pair of speed boots (being worn)
Comestibles
 A - 2 uncursed food rations
 N - an uncursed C-ration
 V - an uncursed lizard corpse
 X - an uncursed potato
 Scrolls
 K - an uncursed scroll of charging
 Spellbooks
 d - the cursed Book of the Dead
 Potions
 T - an uncursed potion of speed
 W - 2 blessed potions of full healing
 Y - 3 potions of holy water
 Rings
 e - a cursed ring of slow digestion (on right hand)
 f - an uncursed +1 ring of protection
 q - an uncursed +1 ring of protection
 r - an uncursed ring of levitation
 t - an uncursed ring of regeneration (on left hand)
 P - an uncursed ring of conflict
 Wands
 c - a wand of lightning named empty (0:0)
 p - a wand of death (1:2)
 z - a wand of teleportation named Empty (0:0)
 B - a wand of teleportation (0:7)
 C - a wand of lightning (0:5)
 D - a wand of teleportation (0:2)
 I - a cursed wand of magic missile (0:2)
 L - a cursed wand of teleportation (0:4)
 Tools
 b - a blessed greased bag of holding named -
 g - an uncursed sack named Emergency Holywater
 u - a +0 unicorn horn
 w - a rusty corroded +0 pick-axe (alternate weapon; not wielded)
 J - an uncursed towel
 O - the uncursed Candelabrum of Invocation (no candles attached)
 Q - the cursed Bell of Opening named Bell of Opening (0:0)
 Gems
 U - the blessed Heart of Ahriman

Contents of the bag of holding named -:

a blessed amulet of life saving
an uncursed lizard corpse
2 uncursed K-rations
2 uncursed lizard corpses
8 uncursed C-rations
2 uncursed food rations
an uncursed scroll of light
a cursed scroll of teleportation
2 uncursed scrolls of teleportation
a cursed scroll of create monster
an uncursed scroll of teleportation
a blessed scroll of identify
an uncursed potion of speed
an uncursed potion of full healing
an uncursed potion of water
2 uncursed potions of speed
2 potions of holy water
an uncursed ring of levitation
a wand of digging (0:1)
a wand of digging (0:3)
a wand of light (0:13)
a wand of create monster (0:13)
a wand of create monster (0:13)
a wand of cold (0:5)
a wand of lightning (0:0)
a wand of speed monster (0:6)
a wand of digging (0:7)
a wand of create monster (0:11)
a cursed wand of enlightenment (0:10)
a wand of teleportation (0:4)
a wand of digging (0:4)
a wand of magic missile (0:4)
a wand of magic missile (0:6)
a wand of wishing (1:0)
a wand of opening (0:7)
a wand of fire (0:4)
a cursed wand of teleportation (0:2)
a wand of digging (0:7)
a +0 unicorn horn
an uncursed thoroughly rusty skeleton key
a can of grease (0:4)
6 uncursed tallow candles

                                                                Final Attributes:
                                                               
                                                                You were the Envoy of Balance.
                                                                You were piously aligned.
                                                                You were fire resistant.
                                                                You were cold resistant.
                                                                You were sleep resistant.
                                                                You were disintegration-resistant.
     ┌───────┐       ┌─────                                     You were shock resistant.
     │·V·····│·  └┐ ┌┘                                          You were poison resistant.
     │··@·)··│····└┬┘    %                                      You were magic-protected.
     │···@··A&A·%$D[%                                           You saw invisible.
     │·······│····┌┴┐   $                                       You were telepathic.
     │·······│·  ┌┘ └┐   %   ┌                                  You were stealthy.
     └───────┘       └─┬─▒─┬─┘                                  You could teleport.
                       │   └─────┐           ┌─────┘            You had teleport control.
                       │         │           │                  You had slower digestion.
                       └─────┐   └┐         ┌┘   ┌              You regenerated.
                             │    └┐       ┌┘    │              You were protected.
                             └─┐   └───▒───┘   ┌─┘              You were very fast.
                               │               │                You had reflection.
                               └───────────────┘                Your life would have been saved.
Matti the Slayer           St:25 Dx:18 Co:18 In:9 Wi:18 Ch:14   You were extremely lucky.
Astral Plane $:0  HP:327(327) Pw:95(95) AC:-44 Exp:25 Satiated  You had extra luck.
                                                                Good luck did not time out for you.
                                                                You survived after being killed twice.
                                                                --More--


Vanquished creatures:

.. (snip) ..
The Wizard of Yendor (34 times)
.. (snip) ..

5602 creatures vanquished.

You genocided 14 types of monsters.
You used 5 wishes.

Goodbye matti the Demigod...

You went to your reward with 9217764 points,
Frost Brand (worth 3000 zorkmids and 7500 points)
The Book of the Dead (worth 10000 zorkmids and 25000 points)
The Candelabrum of Invocation (worth 5000 zorkmids and 12500 points)
The Bell of Opening (worth 5000 zorkmids and 12500 points)
The Heart of Ahriman (worth 2500 zorkmids and 6250 points)
       3 amulets of life saving (worth 450 zorkmids),
and 0 pieces of gold, after 140685 moves.
You were level 25 with a maximum of 327 hit points when you ascended.