Photos de Durban and John's contribution

JEUDI 09/04  21H00

Good afternoon Europe (and the rest of the world),

I don’t know if you have already google translated Christine’s text from yesterday. Let me just rapidly summarize.

On Easter Sunday we should have stopped off in Maputo (the ex Lourenco Marques) capital of Mozambique. On the Saturday, as we were sailing down the east coast of Madagascar, there was an announcement on the loud speakers, followed up by a multi-language official information note to all cabins saying that the official Maritime weather service had advised Costa that a tempest was going to blow down the east coast of Mozambique and S.Africa which would render very difficult the cruise from Maputo to Richards Bay (our first stop in S.Africa) – waves of 7-8meters, force 8.9 storm etc. Given the average age of the passengers, there would have been a lot of “stress” etc if we had gone through such a storm.

Of course 80% of the passengers did not believe at all this story about bad weather – for them, there must be a security problem at Maputo (post Tunis drama?) – After all the Mozambique flag includes the silhouette of a Kalachnikoff A47 and Costa had issued some guidelines for what to do/not do in Maputo to avoid attracting problems!

So we sailed directly for Richard’s Bay and I queued up in the early morning to get a ticket to be off the ship early and possibly sign onto an unplanned excursion to a nature park (St Lucie Lake to see the hippos?). Unfortunately arriving early Sunday morning in the bay outside Richard’s Bay we joined a queue of at least 12 other ships waiting to be allowed into the harbour. Finally at about 15h00 we were tied up to a quay in the commercial harbour – next to the coal heaps and blocks of granite (Richard’s Bay is the largest coal export base in the world!). The city of Richard’s Bay is some 10km from the port and the only shopping centre that was open that day (Easter Sunday) closed at - 15h00! So Costa provided a score of buses to run us out to a very small marina/shopping precinct. 2000 passengers in less than 2 hours – what a panic!

After 30 minutes walking around with nothing to do or see, 2000 passengers wanted to go back to the ship! In the meantime the most enterprising local souvenir salesmen/saleswomen had set up their stalls on the quay side and that kept “the crowd” happy for some time!

Next day and back to our normal schedule: we had booked an excursion to a national park some 2hours drive from the port – Hluhluwe-Umfolozi – one of the oldest in S. Africa. I will not comment on the behavior of some of the Costa mob fighting over the seats in the 4 wheel drive jeeps that were to take us around the park – you could ask yourself “who are the most savage animals – those with 2 legs or 4 legs?”

The park was superb – really fine wild countryside, hills, valleys, river beds, scrub land, trees ….No electrical cables, no publicity panels/boards…No motorways or tarmac roads…

And then the animals – that was really quite moving. In all my life I never expected to see a troop of 30 odd African elephants walking along a dried-up riverbed in the bottom of a narrow valley. After seeing them from the hill overlooking the valley, the jeep driver then took us down to the riverbed, parked and we waited very quietly - the elephants then slowly walked past us on the other side of the riverbed, ripping off branches and shrubs to eat and spraying themselves with water from the puddles in the river bed.

Similarly we saw a herd of giraffes but some distance away. And much closer we saw several herds of wildebeest, buffalos, zebras, antelopes, waterbucks, a solitary wart-hog etc. We also saw a couple of rhinoceros but they were not in the mood to present themselves at their best for the photos!

Although we did not see any “confirmed” lions or cheetahs – although I saw the rear of an animal in tall grass which could have been a lioness - the trip was really excellent and truly “memorable”.

By the time we got back to the ship, it was gone 15h30 and the sun set at 17h30, the ship leaving Richards Bay at 18h00. So nothing else to do other than go through the souvenir stalls on the quayside (twice as many that day as on the previous day) and then a quick burst on the 3^rd floor walkers race track.

And the next morning at nearby Durban we had a second trip to a nature park – this time a much smaller “private” park – Tala - where we knew we would not see any lions etc, or anymore elephants but we would see many more animals. Luckily on this trip we were able to spend a lot of time filming and photographing a pair of white rhinoceros who most obligingly munched away at the grass less than 10 meters from our jeep! And we also saw a very impressive hippo who also spent a lot of time on the side of a lake before getting back into the water swimming away. Apparently more people are killed by hippos than any other “wild beast” in Africa! Plus we saw “close up” several herds of zebra, wildebeest, buffalo, antelope etc – plus giraffes but again not “so close-up”. This time we had an excellent guide who every time we saw an animal, stopped the motor of the jeep and spent 10-15 minutes giving us a very lively lecture about the animal in question – the “bless” bock who regularly sneezes to drive the bugs out of his nostrils before they “emigrate” to his brain, the giraffes who communicate by sign language using their ears (they do not have any voice box), baby zebras who identify their mothers by the stripped “barcodes” on their backs (they do not have a good sense of smell which would otherwise allow them to identify their parents), the flocks of aigrettes (white birds) who accompany the herds of zebra finding the insects in the “worked over” grass left by the zebras but also warn the zebras of the possible approach of “unfriendly” lions etc.

Even if we do not do or see anything else in South Africa these 2 excursions more than justified our coming here.

Next stop (tomorrow) – 2 days in Cape town: a tour of the town and then an excursion to the Cape of Good Hope.

Obviously it has been extremely interesting to visit S. Africa given its political and social history. The problems are enormous – a population of over 50 million of whom 8-9% are white, 79-80% are black the “others” being Indian, Arab, Chinese etc. 25-30% unemployment depending on the area. There are also some 5 million illegal immigrants from nearby countries with problems – with 3 million from Zimbabwe alone. There is a huge demand for higher education (as confirmed by the dozen or more private graduate schools we saw in Durban) but the S. African economy does not provide the job possibilities for the young black graduates. Continuing huge problems of poverty in the townships with massive problems of crime/insecurity – 18 000 murders per year compared with 600/year in UK, an estimated half a million women and children raped per year, 400 000 registered private security guards (more than the combined army and police force), 13% of the black population is HIV positive. There are estimated 1.2 million orphans in S.Africa. The rich blacks and whites live in guarded residences behind barbwire fences etc (which we saw around Durban) and there is a net emigration of whites from S. Africa for security reasons (we had already heard about this in Australia and New Zealand who both have growing white S.African populations). Yet it is the second economy in Africa (after Nigeria) and has so much “going for it” as a country in terms of resources, the existing impressive infrastructures and industries, the energy and motivation of the well educated young people and the strong “national culture”.   

  

Voici  les photos de Durban.

Un township à l'extérieur de Durban.

Le bush dans la réserve.

Notre chauffeur/guide très intéressant et passionné par les animaux.

Que vois-je venir? Serait-ce un animal Costa?

Un Koudou, une espèce d'antilope. Désolée, j'ai une photo de face mais en haute définition! Vous la verrez à notre retour!

Le mâle est à droite, tâches plus foncées. Un girafon de 2 ans environ au premier plan. D'après notre guide. 

Autruche femelle grise entre 2 mâles. Des animaux stupides toujours d'après notre guide. 

Un gnou "bleu". Il marque son territoire avec son urine et ses excréments et s'y couche pour le garder!

Jeu des différences...Cherchez les rayures!

Ces animaux sont appelés "Bless bocks" parce qu'ils éternuent beaucoup.  En Anglais "bless you" est l'équivalent français de "à vos souhaits".

Un jeune Hippo célibataire, toujours d'après notre chauffeur. 

Il rentre tranquillement dans sa mare. 

Troupeau de gnous.

Rhinocéros blanc en train de déjeuner.

Animaux dits "Costa" dans leur repaire appelé "Grand bar Mirabilis" et  dans leur activité favorite qui est de faire la queue...A gauche du pilier vous trouverez un des mâles de l'espèce du nom latin de Homo Britanicus. Animaux plutôt diurnes, ils deviennent très féroces quand on essaye de prendre leur place durement gagnée en se levant aux aurores...

Une rue de Durban à travers les vitres du bus. D'où le NAGTIU...

Entrée du jardin botanique.

Un ficus centenaire!

Une sculpture...je suis assise sur une tortue...

Petit singe rencontré dans le jardin botanique! Ils étaient toute une famille.

Vue de Durban depuis un belvédère. 

Une rue à l'extérieur du marché indien.

Le stade de Football construit pour la coupe du monde de 2010. 

Bouquet final dans la serre aux orchidées!