Having met Chop, nobody is going to mistake him for a central American illegal alien.

+1

Nice TR.

jal - Went to Monaco for someone else, have been there before and have no interest in it myself. Canaries will be solely to find a sailboat.

p4b - Look at the spread on Malawi Kwacha. looool



After about two months in Dar, I was well rested and ready to move on. Had a crazy time finding padded envelopes there, going to 14 different stationary stores with no luck at all until I finally found the TZ version of a miniature office depot and grossly overpaid for 3 large bubble padded ones. Not that it mattered, as the one I sent never arrived. gg, TZ postal workers.

Was getting ready to book a bus to the Serengeti when I decided to check flight prices for the lols. When I saw that the bus was about $15 and a flight was about $45, that was a no brainer, especially knowing I'd be able to get a nice aerial view of Kilimanjaro based on the flight route from Dar. Locked that one up and a few days later:




the view from the plane of actual Kili was underwhelming. Just another mountain, really. Maybe if the weather had been more clear.

Stayed in Arusha for a few days to get the lay of the land and found I was constantly swarmed by touts. I had read it was bad in Arusha, but ended up impressed anyway. Had taught myself a few choice Swahili words/phrases for telling people to **** off in an escalating manner, and never had to go beyond level 2 of that in Dar. In Arusha, I was at level 4 on the first day. That continuum looks something like:

1: no thank you
2: no, I don't want it
3: please leave me alone
4: go away
5: go **** yourself

I also learned how to say "I'm not a tourist, I live here" which actually worked a couple of times, somehow.

Stayed at some random mid-range hotel with one of the most compelling pieces of art I had seen so far just hanging on the wall:




art is highly personal and completely subjective, but that one really connected. Would have bought it from the hotel if I thought it wouldn't just be stolen in the post office. Ended up buying a similar smaller piece later in a different town and successfully mailing it back via registered parcel post.

Arusha is a small town focused pretty much entirely on the tourism industry with a focus on Serengeti and Kili. Added another one to my internet cafe collection:




but again Google Fi worked just fine. Good thing, since the hotel wifi was effectively non-functional.

I had been exchanging messages with a guy from Dar about possibly doing a shared safari together, and we ended up meeting in Arusha and getting along, so after some research on self-drives, which I strongly prefer but are not very cost effective due to the Serengeti fee structures, we ended up booking with a local operator and joining a Scottish couple on their honeymoon and two Israeli women in one of those huge modified Land Rovers with a pop-top.

We decided to go for a 4d/3n camping trip, broken up as: Tarangire, Serengeti, Ngorongoro Crater. It was about $180/day/person which is a pretty good deal for this kind of thing. The Dar guy paid about $60/day for being a TZ citizen.

The Israelis showed up late, so the four of us and the driver piled in at Arusha and headed down the road:




stopping first at Tarangire, where we immediately found some lions eating some kind of carcass. They were on the other side of a pond, so it's tough to see with the photo from my phone, but they are the brown blobs just left of center next to that bush:




horrible photo, but will help you appreciate some of the later ones.

Much like Kruger, any time there were cats sighted, there were catjams:




that's rotating the phone 90 degrees from the previous photo.

We managed to get very close to a bunch of giraffe:




which the Scot dude was very excited about as those are his favorites. I deliberately put him in this shot so he'd have a sweet photo later on. Also got a bunch of him facing the camera but not going to wreck his anonymity on a random internet forum.

If you look closely, there's a tiny little bird riding on the giraffe's back. That was very common to see. They eat the bugs that land/crawl on the giraffe and hitch a free ride at the same time.

A de-Scotted & de-birded photo to show how close they get:




never really cared for giraffe, but being in Africa changed my mind, now I like them.


We managed to be one of the first five or so vehicles to show up at what eventually turned into a 20+ vehicle catjam:




which gave us excellent viewing of:




yeah, that's a small group of lions eating a cape buffalo alive. They seemed to have partially crippled it, so all it ever managed to do was stand up and take a few steps, at which point they'd immediately jump on it and bring it back down again. They spent most of their time chewing on it's tail and licking the blood that was leaking out. The buffalo let out some really heart-rending moos. Got a bunch of video and can confirm that nature is indeed metal.

Our driver (and most of the drivers) were cordial and polite with each other about not hogging the good viewing spots. We only stayed about 15 minutes before moving on so someone else could get our good viewing spot, which I was fine with.

Lion kills are rare in Tarangire, so seeing two was lucky, especially one that close up and personal where the prey animal was still alive.

We also saw a bunch of other animals there:





(note birds on neck)

and spent a solid 5 hours in the park before heading north up to the southern edge of the Ngorongoro conservation area to camp for the night. Scots had their own tent and Dar Dude and I shared another one. Next day it was on to the Serengeti, with a brief stop at the Crater on the way:

After that brief photo op to look out into the Crater, we continued on thru the NC conservation area for a few hours and eventually arrived at the Seregenti proper:




it was much less crowded here than in Tarangire, and we had multiple sightings with either no other vehicles, or only a couple. The driver/guides all communicate with each other via radio to convey sightings, but the Serengeti is just so vast that even when a radio call goes out, the distances make catjams much less likely, outside of a few hot spots. This allowed us to observe for longer periods of time and without idiot *******s from other vehicles yelling at the animals or whistling at them (this happened all throughout Africa in all parks) trying to get their attention for a photo. jfc I hate humans.

But we saw things like this:




in peace, which was nice.

We also had a cook who traveled with us and prepared breakfast/dinner each day. The lunches were all boxed, but we never went hungry:




and the campsites were just fine:




those little animals were spotted mongooses, which I <3

There were other more colorful denizens:



as well.

The animals are wild but habituated to humans, so they don't freak out when vehicles do this:




although I find this kind of thing horrible. Give the poor thing some space. That photo isn't even on a road. The guides have no problem just driving off the roads directly at the animals, which is against the rules and subject to heavy fines, but there is little to no enforcement and they are tip hustling so it happens.

Unfortunately, the two Israeli women were pretty bad at safari-ing, and despite all of us agreeing to wake up before dawn to maximize viewing opportunities, they rolled out of bed about 45 minutes late when we woke up at the Serengeti camp, which had the other four of us pretty irate at them. Should have fed them to the tsetse flies, but the flies were too distracted by the fly distraction flags hanging up around the camp:



which they are drawn to instead of humans. Good thing, since sleeping sickness is a *****.

We still managed to get out early enough for a good sighting of this hyena:




and I captured it half-heartedly chasing a gazelle on video for a few seconds as well.

Lots of elephants later in the day for the Scot Girl who really like them:




and various other safari animals as well. Saw a leopard in a tree but it was far off and the photos all came out horrible. It's too bad I have no clue how to take photos and don't want to carry the weight of a real camera with a real zoom lens around, but they are just too heavy for my travel style.

We ended the day down on the Ngorongoro Crater rim, with a plan to enter the next morning. Our cook Habibu made us bush pizza for dinner:




and we woke up at oh dark thirty for a quick tea and breakfast:




before heading down into the Crater.

The Crater wasn't that impressive imo. It had some rhinos, which were pretty far away, and a bunch of various herbivore prey animals. Also had a few hyena and this old dude:




who was just trying to get his nap on:




while six cars of idiot humans kept yelling and whistling at him for their ****ty selfies. I felt pretty bad for him.

Knowing what I now now, I'd have skipped the Crater for another day in Serengeti, unless I was obsessed with seeing a rhino. Which I wasn't, as I had already seen them up close multiple times already in Namibia, SA, etc.

On the last day, we found a small group of lions right off the side of the road on the way back to Arusha. This young male:




took off after a warthog at one point, which I managed to capture on video, and it was pretty exciting, moreso for the warthog, I imagine. Spoiler alert: the warthog escaped. Mostly they were just cats being cats and laying around catting.

We saw a fair number of Maasai as we drove thru the park:




and stopped briefly at one village to learn more about their culture. I had learned a few basic Maa words (hello, thank you, how are you, etc) and they were very impressed that I had taken the time to learn some of their own Maa language and wasn't just speaking Swahili to them. It's really tough to put into words how much of a difference it makes when you treat people with respect by learning a little of their language. Especially when they are a minority ethnic group living in a country with a different predominant language.

They were very used to tourists visiting and did some routine rehearsed things like singing, the jumping contest:




showing the inside of their homes:




and their school:




as well as trying to sell some jewelry. I told them I only really wanted a pair of Maasai sandals:




but they didn't have any for sale. They make them out of discarded tires and they are super tough. If you look closely, you can kind of see that the bottom shows the tread pattern. They were very amused that I was interested in the tire sandals instead of the jewelry or crafts.

We gave some money to the school on top of the village tour fee ($6 or so), because the kids here have literal nothing and are pretty much just sitting in the dirt trying to learn their math. Reminded me of rural SA and Nam/Bot.

Those sandals are great. That's the business opportunity you should be investing in!

As always, awesome updates.

We headed back to Arusha after this, and stopped at some generic tourist outlet where I picked up some scrap tanzanite. I had been looking for this for a while, but it's super expensive because it's only mined in Tanzania and far rarer than diamonds. I didn't want quality stuff, just some scraps as an interesting souvenir. The margin on the scraps is obv far lower than on jewelry grade pieces, so I had all but given up hope when I asked at the jewelry desk of the place we stopped. The girl unfolded a black piece of cloth with a bunch of scraps and sold me nine tiny pieces for about $8 total. It goes for ~$400/carat (a carat is 0.2g / 0.007 ounces) so I was pretty stoked.

Added another internet cafe photo to the collection:




and then it was on the bus to Nairobi. Some Maasai women at the border were entertained and pleased that I was able to say "no thank you" in Maa:




but money changer dude never got off his phone to even attempt a hustle.

Had a welcoming site arriving in Nairobi:




which I eventually did show up at later, only to find that the only poker game they had going was a private 2-4 PLO that required an invitation to play, so I drown my sorrows in American Fried Chicken:




and some goat:




from Swahili Plate:




while admiring my extra Obama stamps that I picked up while sending postcards:




and documenting my collection of interesting banknotes acquired thus far:




I'm particularly partial to the Zambian 10 Kwacha note, as I don't think I'd seen a banknote with a porcupine on it ever before. The purple Moz rhino is obv GOAT as well.

Good to hear some new stories

My daughter was in Monaco for a couple of days last month with a friend of hers. Would have been amusing if y’all had run into one another.

+1 on feeding late wakers to the tsetse flies. I did not realize this, but found out recently that moose populations in the USA#1 northeast are falling pretty hard. Warm winters permit large tick populations, and moose are apparently susceptible to the same. Somewhere around fifty thousand ticks are sufficient to kill a moose, who apparently do not have helpful African birds to assist them.

Great updates as usual! I've been thinking for a while now about an Africa visit as my 50th birthday present to myself next year. I definitely will be doing it tourist style rather than chopstick style though, lol. No chicken buses for this mzunga! If you were going with the sole purpose of seeing the best variety of animals/scenery where do you think you would go? I really liked the way you traveled in the early stages where you rented a vehicle and stayed in the parks.

Fly to Johannesburg, get a car at the airport, and lose yourself in Kruger for a week. Do it in the shoulder season if possible. If you have at least 3 weeks available, spend the next two driving west along the south coast to Cape Town, or fly to Vic Falls and include a day trip to Chobe.

If you want far less people but somewhat more skittish animals, fly into Windhoek, get a 4x4, and head up to Etosha for a week, with another week on the Skeleton Coast if possible. Make sure you know how to drive in sand.

Either of these will meet the animals/scenery requirements and I can give more specific advice later if you decide to go with one of them. Look thru my photos from South Africa / Namibia / Botswana here and on FB to get an idea of what each place offers. I can also send you more when I get back to USA#1, I posted <1% of what I took.

Never made it to Madagascar, but the biodiversity is off the charts, recommend looking into there as well.

Man, lions have a nice setup - the women go out and get the food, while the dudes kick back and eat when it's time.

Thanks for the updates, Chop.

The thread that continues to deliver.

A couple questions:

- Iirc you had methodically packed light for this leg of the #chopworldtour. Looking back, how’d that go, and what would you do differently if you planned a similar trip again?

- Caribbean: what are your rough dates, and likely destinations? Fruit Saklad may or may not be there for his fake job for awhile in Q1 2019.

How amusing?!?!?!

!!!



Your Friend,

Sak

I somehow have to be able to find this post for once I make to the Southern part of Africa!
Thanks!

Auto-inflating PFDs with integrated harnesses are the way to go, but really, just don't fall off the boat. Get the West Marine offshore PFD. It has the harness, is the same as the super expensive ones (unless you prefer the spinlock style), and is one of the very few times going with the WM brand will save you money.

Can't answer that last question because it is AIDS. Put down the Buzzfeed style guide and feel free to try again in your own words.

Do you ever do drills for falling overboard? It seems useful but I imagine a ton of people don’t bother.

Packing light worked well. Very glad that I took so little clothing and relied on laundering what I had with me more often. Glad I went full nit and got the scale and weighed everything beforehand as well, every gram counts.

Not much I'd change from what I executed on.

- Ended up never needing my external mouse but glad I had it.
- Probably only ever really needed 2 malarial test kits, they were far more commonly available than I had guessed. Had 4 at one point, that was overkill.
- Had a second belt that I never needed, that was a mistake but it was fabric and super light.
- Glad I lugged around the thinkpad despite its ridic weight, as a chromebook just wouldn't have been adequate.
- Glad I brought sunscreen because it's damn near impossible to find, but barely used it due to mostly being in the rainy season or on the shoulder of it for most places.
- Very happy I had a sleeping bag liner, that came in useful a lot.

Having been traveling full time for almost 6 years at this point, I've kinda got things down re: what I do/don't need, so not many surprises anymore.

Caribbean depends on what boat I end up on. Most likely destination will be St Lucia with arrival in mid-Dec, but not staying long if that is the case. Will head up to USA#1 for the Dec holidays.


Last time I did a MOB drill was 2008. Most people don't bother. Far more important to just not fall off the boat in the first place. You fall off the boat in daylight with someone around to see/hear it, you're probably fine. You fall off at night when you're the only one awake, you are dead.

Thanks for the replies.

if that happened to you, what would you do?

I’ve thought about it, and god damn that’s gotta be one of the worst ways to die...I’ve read just diving down as far as you can and breathing in is the quickest/most painless, but I don’t know that I could do that.

I’d probably lay on my back until I ended up drowning anyway.