Replace the fear of the unknown with curiosity

February flew by after returning to St Francis. Our first weekend back (the 16^th & 17^th), the WildREACH team from Grahamstown brought 16 students to the centre. We had a fun-filled weekend of boat rides, scavenger hunts, scientific studies of the rocky shore, and lessons on eco-footprints, oil spills, predation adaptation, and acids & bases.

Checking out the species of St Francis's rocky shore

The next week we began a scuba diving course with CMAS. I was so excited to start diving – if you know me, I’m a bit of a fish, and I was stoked to finally breathe underwater! The course was a great success (minus a bit of trouble equalizing my right ear) and I am now a certified CMAS One Star Sport Diver and can dive up to 20m in depth. I can’t wait to do my next course! I’ve already seen many different types of fish and corals, as well as pyjama sharks and even a manta ray! 

During the last couple of weeks, I’ve been doing little day trips to places near St Francis like Pletternberg Bay, Tsitsikamma, and George. Last Sunday, the destination was Addo Elephant National Park. It was a beautiful hot day and we saw plenty of the massive creatures the park is named for!

BEBE ELLIE SO CUTE

Sadly, my the internship part of my trip to South Africa has reached its end – work officially finishes on March 8^th. I’m sad to say goodbye to the Sustainable Seas Centre and St Francis, but I hope it won’t be the last time I see everyone here!

Luckily, I’m not leaving South Africa just yet – I have another month to travel and I’m STOKED. Blair and I will be travelling up the east coast to Sodwana where we’ll be doing some scuba diving, followed by travels through Mozambique and Swaziland, then a safari in Kruger Park. After that, Blair will be travelling back down to St Francis with Alex and his girlfriend Lindsay. I will continue north through Botswana and Zimbabwe to experience the mighty Victoria Falls! I apologize in advance if I am slow with blogging about these adventures. Hopefully when I post here again, my travels will have gone smoothly and I won’t have malaria or anything. Until then, tot siens, hambani kahle, nibe nelanga elimnandi, and sala kahle!

One trip ends, another begins

After our shark cage diving adventure, we drove to Swellendam (northeast of Gansbaai where we did the diving) to the location of Up the Creek, easily the COOLEST music festival I’ve ever been to!! Everyone camps on site so the festival has a great community feel. But the best part of Up the Creek is that during the day, the bands perform on a stage ON THE CREEK, and everyone just chills out on floaty devices in the sun!! It’s a gigantic pool party with awesome music – I couldn’t think of a better festival!

Luckily none of us got sunburned due to regular sunscreen application parties. By the time the sun went down and the bands began to play on the upper stage (featuring awesome musicians like Jeremy Loops and bands like Desmond and the Tutus and December Walks), I was exhausted but so pumped that I continued enjoying the fun.

A near-drowning dog sought shelter on my floaty for about an hour!

On Sunday, we said goodbye to the floaty madness of Up the Creek and drove to Outshoorn, our final destination of the trip. We explored the vast and challenging Cango Caves, followed by a foiled attempt to go ostrich riding (Chida desperately wanted to go but it was too rainy!). Then we piled into the car for the long final stretch to St Francis – we got in at 9pm that night completely wiped.

I could get used to being a cave spelunker ... 

We had less than 12 hours to enjoy a break at our apartment, though – the next morning we were up early to drive to Port Elizabeth to drop off our car rental, where we immediately picked up another one. Our holiday was swiftly followed by a business trip! We drove to the SST head office in Grahamstown, where we spent a day making preparations for the week ahead. We were on an assignment to Hamburg, the little coastal town I mentioned in a blog a while back. We drove there on Tuesday and over the course of the week we met with community members to discuss the development of posters, booklets, and other educational materials that would improve the sustainability of Hamburg’s fisheries and agriculture.

We had an extremely rewarding week – I finally spent time with kids, running educational programs and visiting the local high school. There was even time to just goof around and make friends with these awesome little tots!

One of the most amazing moments of the week was on Sunday, when we were invited to a traditional Xhosa ox slaughter. The feast honoured the deceased head of household, one year after his death. When we arrived, we were taken into a small hut to be greeted; Alex and Blair were seated on a couch, Chida and I on the floor. Speaking only in isiXhosa, we were warmly welcomed to the feast and into their clan - we were the only white people in attendance, and the family was very grateful for the work we were doing in the Hamburg community.

Enathi, myself, Sirkka, Chida, and Nozeti

As women, we were required to wear long skirts and spent the afternoon completely separate from the men – cooking different food, and receiving the least desirable parts of the ox. I had my first taste of traditional home-brewed South African beer, which tasted like watery smokey milk. I spent the afternoon enthralled with everything I saw, and playing with kids whose language I couldn’t understand – but that didn’t get in the way of fun!

I was so sad when our weekend in Hamburg drew to a close and we had to head back to St Francis. I learned so much about South African culture, communication, and time during that week. It was easily one of the most memorable parts of my trip!

JAWS

As you, my loyal readers, may recall, back in St Francis I volunteer at a penguin rehabilitation centre. Before we left on our trip Trudy, the woman who runs the centre, had offered to hook us up with friends of hers who do shark research in the Western Cape. We were keen to get out on their boat, so we got in touch with her contacts and organized a day that worked – February 1^st. What we didn’t realize until the day before was that we were actually going shark cage diving, not on a research vessel. Personally, I had been having reservations about shark cage diving – not due to fear, but for ecological reasons. It seemed unfair to bait sharks for human enjoyment. However, since Trudy had helped arrange it, I decided to give it a try.

The dive operation was smooth and well run – we were fed a breakfast feast before heading out on the boat, where scientists and volunteers told us all about the area. When we reached the site, there were several other shark diving boats in the area, and I wasn’t expecting our boat’s chum to draw any sharks our way. But within a couple of minutes a 4.2m male Great White Shark swam up to our boat, splashing its tail and jerking as the bait was tantalizingly pulled out of reach. I was at once enthralled and disgusted – the shark was incredibly magnificent, but it was being treated like a dog, drawn to the boat by the smell, confused by decoy seals and bait bunches, and made to parade in front of tourists.

Before I had a chance to process all this, I was shepherded into the dive cage. The water was icy cold and I was extremely thankful for my wetsuit. When a shark was spotted, we were barked at to go underwater – and it was really cool to see the shark up close. But I kept wishing I were out of the cage, diving with the sharks peacefully, without banging noises and shrieking captains and boisterous onlookers.

The shark cage diving operation wasn’t all bad, however. I could see there was genuine science occurring (their research vessel pulled up next to ours after a couple of hours), and the crew was quite knowledgeable. What I respected them for most, however, were their efforts at saving a shark that had become wrapped in fishing line. For the past four days they’d attempted to bait and catch the shark in order to take it onto their research vessel and remove the fishing line that was cutting into its skin and would kill the shark within a year. Unfortunately, they didn’t have any luck catching the shark when we were there.

The fishing line is very obviously cutting into the shark's skin.

Would I shark cage dive again? Probably not. I don't think it's a very conscientious industry on the whole. But I'm happy that part of what I paid went into shark research, and I am thrilled that I got to see a part of the world that EVERY major wildlife documentary film crew has been to to film Great Whites. 

"Shark Alley", an area where hundreds of Cape Fur Seals make their habitat, and make delicious meals for sharks.

Points, Princes, Paternoster

On Tuesday we drove south from Cape Town along stunning winding roads, enjoying incredible views of the ocean and mountains. A quick pitstop at a lighthouse provided us with spectacular views! We stopped for lunch in Simon’s Town at The Meeting Place and had one of the most delicious meals of the trip. Afterward, we checked out the famous penguin colony at Boulder’s Beach.

Those dots on the rock are penguins, I swear!

Our afternoon was spent in Table Mountain National Park (confusingly named, since it does not contain Table Mountain - see the map for clarification!). Along with throngs of other tourists, we stood on Cape Point as the wind howled around us. Eager to escape the crowds, we hiked out to the Cape of Good Hope (the most South-Western point of the African continent) and frolicked with rock hyrax.

Cape Point

Rock Hyrax

Cape of Good Hope

We camped in Zandvlei that night, enjoying a nice mountain view. Chida and I befriended the security guard, who was French Congalese and relished the opportunity to speak his native language!

The next morning, we drove back up to Cape Town for a bit of shopping on Long St, followed by an afternoon of our favourite activity – WINE TASTING! We tried seven wines at the Warwick winery, where we were also treated to a romantic story about a silversmith who fell in love with a princess. He had to win her hand in marriage by creating a cup from which they could both drink at the same time, which he could only hold with one hand. The king thought this was impossible. Think you could do it? Check out the solution http://www.warwickwine.com/weddingcup.asp. Later, we ate an amazing meal and tried eleven different wines at the Guardian Peaks winery. Delicious!

We slept in Somerset West that night, and got up early the next morning to drive up the West Coast. Our first stop was the town of Paternoster, where we ate mussels on an enchantingly beautiful beach (and even braved the chilly water!). We continued on to West Coast National Park where we spent the afternoon chasing ostriches and feasting our eyes on the views of the park’s beautiful lagoon, the Atlantic and even Table Mountain in the distance!

Paternoster

Fishing boats at Paternoster

West Coast National Park

Our drive that evening took us back past Cape Town and Stellenbosch - False Bay was resplendent in the fading light – the sky lit up in fiery orange, and the mountains were tinted a lovely pink.