If going to Africa is something you've considered doing yourself, you can read about the things we learned in our trip on this page on my home page.
Keith Peterson, Webmaster
 The beach on the east cost of South Africa, along the Indian Ocean, was very nice. We watched dolphins surfing on the waves and did the usual beach stuff. A little less usual was the fellow who was wading around the rocks as the tide went out, reaching into dark corners and recesses. Turns out he was looking for lobster and left with a large bag full of them. Observing their rather impressive pincers, we were reluctant to try to duplicate this process. |
 One ranch we visited had two cheetahs who had been there since they were born. Although not really tame, they were at least very used to humans. The residents treated them with great respect and made sure they were well fed. We were told not to run around the Cheetahs. Evidently they may think we were playing with them, and their reaction would be to chase us and try to bring us down, probably not gently. We kept forgetting but the kids always reminded us. |
 The Baobab tree is an amazing thing, and we saw a lot of them. This picture also shows a common setting on our trip: all the trappings for English Tea. |
 Just when you forgot about them, a cheetah seemed to show up. This gave me quite a start, as did another time when one ran through several of us doing about 40 mph. You could hear him cutting through the wind... luckily he was just showing off. |
 The same ranch had sugar cane, which was burned before being harvested. It looked pretty tame at this point. |
 But as the flames grew, so did the sense of adventure among the kids. And the sense of awe amoung the adults. In this picture you can also see the little sugar cane sticks that the kids were enjoying. |
 This was a difficult picture to get... the flames were intense but only lasted for a few seconds. I have several pictures showing only clouds of smoke, taken a few seconds too late. |
 This is an interesting juxtaposition. This Baobab tree had lived through several such harvest fires, and continued to live happily in the middle of the field. |
 The Baobabs are particularly unique against this skyline. The building is the guest house of the ranch we stayed at, and it had a wonderful view of the river valley we were looking up from. Several of the Baobab trees had large scars at their bottoms, made by elephants looking for water. Evidently these trees are like a sponge inside and their 'flesh' will provide water for those in need, at significant risk to the tree. |
 It's not easy to get this close to a pair of crocs this size. Any guesses how I did it? |
 Our son Michael was in his element when we went on a game drive. |
 It was pretty amazing to hear a cheetah purr.. it was not entirely a comforting sound. |
 The Impala were everywhere at Chobe game preserve in Botswana. They were pretty tasty too.. the lodge we stayed at had game for supper most nights. I told Debbie that I had never eaten a Chevy before. :-) |
 These little green fellers were pretty friendly, although they really only wanted to eat the rice from Cari's plate. |
 Africa is said to be known for their sunsets, and I guess this supports that theory. The water is the Zambezi river, before it falls over Victoria Falls. The land is Zambia, a country that seems to make it's neighbors worried. At the time we were there they were fighting about an island in the middle of the river. Whoever drew the map (I think it was the Russians, for some reason) did not specifically identify which side of the island the border went.. only that the river was the border. At the moment the Botswana army was occupying the island, but that was not expected to last since the island is under water for more than half the year. Such are politics in Africa. |
 It's pretty unusual to see a Lion up this close. This picture was taken in very low light, before dawn. The lions are only active for a couple of hours a day, at dawn. The rest of the time you can only find them sleeping. We saw over 30 lions, but only two of them standing up. |
 The Victoria Falls hotel is a fine British hotel, steeped in tradition, the perfect place for High Tea with the mists of Victoria Falls in the background. This is a view we don't often get in Illinois. |
 The water in this picture is about to get a ride.. this is about 100 meters above Victoria Falls. Not a good place to go canoeing. |
 "Such sights as angels must have seen in flight", part of the somewhat overused quote about this natural wonder. We were more impressed by the sound.. a deep thunder. It was amazing to have a cliff-level vantage point for such a dramatic falls. Truely awe-inspiring. |
 We did get aloft here, although it was not an inexpensive project. |
 The helicopter pilot still seemed to enjoy the falls. Or perhaps there was a 206 sharing the airspace. It did seem like he was a bit jaded with the flying, 12 minute rides all day long. |
 We did get to see some native dancers. This was a fun picture to take.. the screen was completely black until the flash captured the dancer, and he appeared like magic. |
 Curiously, in this land where wood seems to be the most common source of energy (for cooking, light, even to heat the water most places we went) the trees were all a version of Teak, very hard and very full of energy. The wood lit easily, burned down quickly to coals that lasted for a very long time. I can see why charcoal was not very common there. |
 Did I mention I got to fly a Caravan? Logged over an hour, but the pilot decided he really should do the landing himself. |
 Debbie got to do some driving herself, and proved her experience as a boat pilot. |
 Yes, there are traffic jams in Africa, but they seem different somehow... |
 I did mention the sunsets, didn't I? This is Kariba, a large man made lake between Zimbabwe and Zambia. The natives were quite surprised that British money and Italian labor could really tame their river god.. but 40 years later it appears the river god has given up for the time being. |
 Curiously, the British did not pay to have the trees removed, and 40 years later they are still sticking up all around the lake, and in some places in the middle of the lake at the strangest places. Seeing this I became even more impressed with Debbie's boat driving... more than she was impressed by my car driving (on the left side of the road) |
 It was a very peaceful place, in part because once the sun went down you might as well sleep, because this place had no electricity. Access by boat only, so there were many things they did not have. But every morning the caretaker built a fire under the hot water tank to give you your morning bath water. Shortly after we went to bed we became aware of loud crunching outside our window. It seems an elephant was eating a tree there... which we decided was better than his eating our roof. We let him be. Curiously, we never stayed under a roof that was not made of thatch our entire time in Zimbabwe. Evidently that's just the way they build them. If there is interest I can create a 'part two' to this page. I have about 800 more pictures... :-) Keith |