The flight from Australia to South Africa was long and uneventful. Instead of being productive, I watched movies for the entire 13 hours while Sara sporadically worked on photos for the blog. Before leaving Sydney, I was a little nervous because I didn’t know what to expect. As we descended into Johannesburg, nervousness turned to excitement of what lies ahead!
During the early planning stage of this world trip back in Summer 2014, we decided to take a safari to explore Africa. We ended up with Nomad Adventure Tours on a 29 day journey starting in Johannesburg and ending in Narobi, Kenya. We added the planned itinerary to the map. A few family members were so excited about what we were doing that they decided to join us! They chose a shorter safari that will meet up with ours about a week into the trip. Because we are on a budget, Sara and I will be sleeping in tents while everybody else splurged for the accommodated option. During the journey, we will be out of civilization for days on end. Sara and I are both really excited!
When we arrived in Johannesburg, I was amazed at the size of the airport. There were many more 747s and A380s then I expected. For the large passenger volume, they didn’t seem to have enough customs agents working and we had to wait in line for a long time. We collected our luggage, exchanged all remaining Australian dollars and found a train to the city.
The train stations were the nicest we have traveled though in awhile. There were signs and information everywhere to help; unlike Sydney which had nothing to guide a foreigner through the stations. The trains themselves were quiet and ran very smoothly over the tracks. The only downfall was there seemed to be a limited number of train stations for the size of city.
At the end of the train line, we had to get a taxi to travel the rest of the distance to the hostel. Our taxi driver did a good job getting us to our hostel, even if he did run a few red lights. Our hostel was on a completely dark street with walls and barbed wire everywhere. I actually didn’t think it was the right place until I saw a sign. We rang the bell and were greeted by a friendly host. He explained that they haven’t had power in several days but at least their wifi is working. That was fine with us especially once he said that he’ll give us a discount for the first night.
We had a full day in Johannesburg to take care of any last minute business and to explore the city before hopping on the safari. I wasn’t feeling too well when I woke up the next morning so we ended up taking it easy and worked on the blog most of the day. When we did leave the hostel to get lunch, we were shocked with what we found. Every house and building was surrounded with a tall wall, topped with either barbed wire or an electric fence! Are they trying to defend an army? Several restaurants we walked by had permanent signs promoting that they were powered by generator, so the power problems must be common. We needed a bit of cash for our safari so I went to an ATM to pull out $10,000 ZAR (about $800 USD). After the first $4000, my wallet couldn’t hold any more because the ATM was only giving out $100 ZAR notes. I felt extremely uncomfortable carrying around such a wad of cash, but we didn’t have any other choice!
As I write this, we are preparing to leave and meet the safari in the morning. We don’t know if we will have any internet at all during the next few weeks but anticipate being totally disconnected. We plan to keep working and having posts ready for the next time we have a connection. But if we disappear for a few weeks, just know we are sleeping under the stars trying to keep the wild animals away from our tent.
