June 18, 2004
So, we're in Swaziland (David would like to point out that it's the Kingdom of Swaziland), the last absolute monarchy in the world. Or so they say. We got in Wednesday evening, after a long bus trip from Pretoria. We're camping at a backpacking place called Sondzela in the Mlilwane game reserve. The park and the site are lovely, though we're the only ones camping. The fact that it's winter and rather chilly may have something to do with that. Fortunately, it has yet to get below freezing, but it has come close.
Yesterday, we spent three hours on horse back, more apparently for the viewing pleasure of the animals in the park, than for our pleasure in seeing them. I'm sure we made quite the spectacle, but we had a lot of fun. We got within 20 feet of some of the antelope species (impala, nyala) and zebras. David was especially impressed by how calm they all seemed, though he thought the zebras were laughing at the horses for being domesticated. We also saw warthogs, wildebeest, crocodiles, hippos (including a 5 month old!), kudus (another antelope type) and blesbok (related to the goat, apparently, though I would guess rather distantly, given their appearance, which is not very goat-like). These last animals, though, were all more skittish of the horses, so we didn't get as close.
Everyone seems very nice, though our hiking boots seem to excite a lot of giggles from the kids. We took a mini-bus to come into Mbabane (the capital) this morning in order to get our visas for Mozambique. The mini-bus here is similar in idea to the grand taxis in Morocco, but is a VW passenger van, which seems more practical than the Mercedes sedan. Also, at least on the main roads, they actually only allow one passenger per seat-quite a novelty after the cramming aspect of the Moroccan taxis.
Swati is the official language of Swaziland, along with English which is also the official written language. David's doing his best to learn as many Swati words as possible, though we're sadly limited in our memory capacity. Leeha'sh, by the way, is the word for horse.
Sunday we're hoping to leave for Maputo, the capital of Mozambique. From there we'd like to enter Malawi at the very southern tip, but there may be transport issues with that route. We'll let you know. There may also be internet issues (as in the lack thereof), so it may be a week or so till we write again.
