Windhoek on a whim

Since boarding the Tazara Express in Dar es Salaam, it seems like I haven't stopped moving. The forty-hour train ride was wonderful--the mix of scenery, travel companions, and overall comfort made it one of the most enjoyable train rides I've been on. After becoming friends with a Tanzanian man who uses the train on a regular basis, we convinced the conductor to upgrade my ticket from second to first class. The first class section was great--we had four beds to each train compartment, and in the caboose was a bright red lounge with very comfy chairs (unless I was sleeping, this is where I was). The train passed by a couple game parks in Tanzania, which offered views of elephants, giraffes, and warthogs. Because I was sitting in the lounge with my nose buried in "Angels and Demons" (which I finished on the trip), I unfortunately missed the wildlife show out my window. One thing I didn't miss, though, was all the children running alongside the train, shouting, waving and laughing. From Tanzania's coast to central Zambia, the children in each village never tired of running alongside our windows.

To me, traveling by land is usually a great experience; I love seeing how the landscape and people change as I leave one place and approach another. Looking out my train window, I watched tiny villages, beautiful national parks, tall mountains with waterfalls, and the occasional well-populated town pass by.

I arrived in Kapiri Mposhi at about noon, two days after first boarding the train. Once there, I purchased a (very expensive) visa and found a taxi that agreed to make the two-hour trip to take me and a few friends from the train to Lusaka. Once in Lusaka, my friends (siblings James and Emily, originally from the UK) and I made our way to the city's main bus station with the goal of finding a bus to Livingstone, located eight hours southwest of Lusaka. I hope this bus station was Zambia at its worst, because it was a dirty, incredibly hectic place with someone trying to take advantage of us literally every step we took in the station. Fortunately, James, who lives in Malawi, has been to the station once or twice, and knew how to navigate the chaos pretty well. We eventually boarded a bus for Livingstone that, we were promised, would be leaving soon. It left four hours later.

After waiting for the bus to leave for four hours, then being on the road for eight hours, James, Emily, and I arrived in Livingstone, the gateway to Victoria Falls, at about 3am. Fortunately, even early in the morning we were welcomed into Jolly Boys Hostel. In spite of the name, Jolly Boys is one of the best hostels I have ever stayed at, complete with a pool, pool table, a bar, a nice pillow reading area, and a kind of treehouse feel to the whole place. And it costs $8 a night! While visiting the Jolly Boys restroom, I noticed an advertisement for a trip to Namibia, a neighboring country that is extremely difficult to navigate without a tour group or your own 4x4. The tour was so attractive, well-priced, and convenient that the gears in my head immediately started turning.

In the morning I visited reception. They reassured me that, with only one month, traveling from Livingstone to Cape Town via Namibia would be a much better idea than making my way to Cape Town via Mozambique. After a bit more research, I booked my ticket to Namibia's capital, Windhoek. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Before noon, I put all my necessary items in a ziplock bag and headed to Victoria Falls with James and Emily. These Falls, traditionally called the "Smoke that Thunders," are intense. Because we are currently in the rainy season, the enormous curtain of water (1 mile wide and 108 meters tall) and the mist coming from it were much heavier than normal. The Falls are fed by the Zambezi River, which also serves as the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe. On the Zambian side, the best place to see the Falls is from an island that sits directly in front of the enormous curtain of water. Even standing directly in front, it's extremely difficult to comprehend the size of Victoria Falls--due to the heavy mist, it is extremely hard to see the Falls in their entirety unless viewing it by air.

Having been to Niagara and Iguazu, I can say that Victoria is definitely the least developed park. In a way, that was a good thing--I was able to sit on the banks of the Zambezi with my feet in the water, literally ten feet from where the water plummets off the edge. For much of the park, there are no guard rails, only dirt trails that lead to the river's edge. Victoria is also definitely the wettest waterfall. Standing on the island in front of the Falls, the "mist" comes in like powerful rain in all directions--from above, from in front, and even from below your nose. Standing in the mist of the Falls, in awe of its sheer size and power, was a highlight of my time in Africa thus far.

After returning to the hostel, packing my things, getting a good night's rest, and getting advice from James on my further travel through South Africa (he lived in Johannesburg), I boarded my bus for Windhoek, Namibia. Though the battered, grey bus was far from posh, the wind blowing in the cabin, the occasional elephant sighting, and some very friendly Norwegian passengers made the ride very enjoyable. I also had a chance to read a good amount of my new book, Nabokov's "Pnin."

Arriving in Namibia, I can honestly say this country is one of the biggest surprises I've encountered since leaving the US. Perhaps the surprise was amplified by the fact that I arrived from Zambia, an extremely poor country with a reported HIV/AIDS infection rate of 30%. Immediately upon crossing the border into Namibia, I saw big, clean gas stations and enormous supermarkets that would have been at home in Florida. There were picnic areas along the road. And all of a sudden German started appearing all over the place. As I learned, Namibia was colonized by the Germans, and the country only gained its independence in 1990. As some Germans on the bus told me, some parts of Namibia are more German than Germany, simply because they have retained German traditions better than Germany itself has.

Namibia's capital, Windhoek, presented me with even more surprises. This city of about 250,000 has beautiful German architecture, wide outdoor malls, and Mercedes and BMWs all over the place. In a way, I feel like I'm in a city modeled on a ski village in Colorado. This morning I smiled when a brand new BMW GS motorcycle passed me. After walking around a bit, I found myself in the middle of a beautiful street market, complete with arts and crafts, restaurants, coffee shops, and even several spotless malls. Needing some medicine, I wandered into a pharmacy where a German pharmacist advised me. Earlier in the day, my taxi driver told me, "We are like a little Germany in Africa. We have Lamborghinis!" This beautiful little Germany in Africa is truly bizarre, but I'm very glad I discovered it.

Because I've heard from friends back home and here on the road that Namibia is a gorgeous, fascinating country, I decided to book a spot with a one-week camping tour that goes throughout the southern region. I will be leaving early tomorrow morning, and returning the afternoon of March 6th. Having chosen the tour on a complete whim, I'm really not sure what's in store for me, other than getting to see the tallest sand dunes in the world and a few German towns by the sea.

My plans after my tour have also changed. Rather than making a 'J' route down the coast of Mozambique, further down the coast of South Africa, and finally to Cape Town, I have decided on a 'backwards 'J.'' First, I will take a bus from Windhoek to Cape Town. Once in Cape Town, I'll either take buses or rent a car and make my way eastward along the coast, finally reaching Johannesburg. From Johannesburg I will (time permitting) take a bus to Mozambique's southern beaches, which are supposed to be a highlight of that country. I will then return to Johannesburg and fly to Asia for the next chapter of my journey!

Sorry for being a bit long-winded. I've discovered it's harder to find time for the Internet than I was expecting, so my thoughts keep accumulating in my head until I can share them on here.

In general, I'm enjoying the backpacker lifestyle, skimming the surfaces of various countries, getting a brief snapshot of their cultures and lifestyles. It is definitely a contrast to the kind of traveling I've done before, which was almost always tied to work and, thus, a single specific place. When I was working in a single place, I was slightly jealous of those people I met backpacking across the continent. Now that I'm the one backpacking, I realize I would probably be very unsatisfied with this experience if I hadn't previously immersed myself for an extended amount of time in a single foreign country and culture. Driving by thatched-roof villages, I find myself wondering what it would be like to live in such a home, to share their food, and to become a temporary member of their family. My memories of Mongolia, Chile, and Uruguay temporarily calm my curiosity and keep me from getting off the bus, halting my journey, and spending the next few months in a village in rural Africa.