Tuesday 5 April 2011

Africa - Namibia

Howzit goin as they say in these parts

2 issues to clear up, the cc line does not indicate hierarchy in the emails and secondly Monica you are now included, my apologies, theres always one.

Anyways on with the show. I've been in Namibia since last Friday night and its been amazing. I think I'm finally getting used to the whole assembling/sleeping in/disassembling a tent the next morning routine that we are into now but it wasnt easy let me tell you but I figure if its good enough for the likes of Shakleton, Hilary and other notable like minded visionary explorers like meself its good enough for me! The group I'm in is 11 people in total which is half the capacity of the bus which is good as when the sun beems in the windows, which it does everyday, you can sit on the seat nearest the aisle for a little more protection from the sun. The bus is fairly basic, its built more for sturdiness than comfort but seeing how we've done about 800 miles in this first week I guess I'll take that.

The first day we done the Cape of good hope and it was windy as hell but was stunning views, got to see me first Ostrich as well which was nice. We camped the first night in North South Afica - if you get me meaning - and it was baltic but thankfully not a sign of things to come which I intially thought having packed only t-shirts and 1 long sleeve jumper. I was a little under prepared to say the least, I had no pillow or pj's or nothing. I was expecting some colonial style permanent wooden tarpolin tent covered things but it turns out its more the aldi make-it-yourself variety that I've had to become accustomed too. The group are all very well travelled and there are a few heading all the way to Nairobi on this trip which is 45 days in total - and to think of the abuse I got off some of you for taking a mere month! I'm glad I had my holiday last year so I can use the phrase "well when I was in asia....." There are a sound bunch though, I'm the baby of
the group, there all mostly early 30's right up to a couple who are in they're 50's I think.

The day after we arrived in Namibia we went canoeing on the Oranje river which was nice until I capsized and was violently hurtled half a mile down river till I swam to shore, I lived to tell the tale so its all good. We traveled on later that evening to see Fish River Canyon which is the worlds second largest canyon dont you know, very similar to the grand I thought. We got to see the sunset over that which was pretty cool. The next day we headed for the desert which is dry and hot - who knew. I managed not to get burned alive so I'm happy with that. We got up the next morning at 5.30am to see the sun rise over the dunes which was amazing and running down the side of a dune is really good fun, I recomend! We got a tour of the desert by an san bushman after that who talked in the click language which I thought was hilarious. He kept doing the ali G finger snap thing which kept me highly amused, the factual stuff was entertaining too, apparently they
dance to digest there food - I suppose thats why theres lots of fat white men, prbly be me one day come to think of it

We did a bush camp 2 nights ago so I got to sleep out under the stars which wasnt as bad as I thought. The lads from intrepid kept on messing that there would be wild animals roaming around but I didnt come across any so thank jebus for that. We arrived in this German resort town yesterday and it is very vell organised, all ze straze are in ze best efficient order and ze crais is mighty! I did me skydive yesterday and I have a dvd you're all going to enjoy - I was sweating like jill dando trying to get the key in the lock! Shouted for Ireland though and I had me kildare jersey on  so I kept it real ffor my homies in Cill Dara yo yo. I went sandboarding this morning which was crap doing the stand up one but great fun doing the slide on your belly on a piece of plywood - I got 63kph on me 2 runs!

Anyways thats all for now, the internet coverage here is crap so it'll probly be another week before you here from me. Heard Ireland got beat in the 6 nations by Scotchland - WTF?  Hope your all keeping well. there is a few postcards on the way, I didnt get everyone so if you have any complaints please forward them to whogivesafuck@Idont.com

laters

Ultan

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