Scott and I start a Western Africa cruise on Friday, December 19, starting in Barcelona, Spain and ending in Cape Town, South Africa, this is a 26-day, 25-night cruise and the cruise will end January 13, 2016. All photos in this write-up were taken by me unless otherwise noted.
I left New York on Wednesday, December 17 and flew to Barcelona where I met up with Scott at the Barcelona airport on Thursday morning (18th), he’s flying from Los Angeles.
On Thursday our first night in Barcelona before we board our cruise ship we will be staying at the Grums Hotel & Spa, a 4-stars hotel located in one of the most emblematic and central zones of the city. The location is within walking distance to several attractions and close to the cruise port. Once we feel confident about the weather and any flight delays, we'll try and do something interesting near the hotel.
Our cruise ship is the Seven Seas Voyager. The Seven Seas Voyager is considered a small, luxury cruise ship, carrying only around 700 guests, making it intimate and exclusive. The Voyager is a sister ship to the Seven Seas Mariner that Scott and I were on for our Easter Island & French Polynesia cruise in February of this year. See the following Voyager photo lifted from the Seven Seas Internet site, this attachment also shows the location of our cabin on Deck 7, starboard side.
The 13 cruise key Ports of Call will be (and see the following map):
Barcelona (where we start the cruise) & then Cadiz, in Spain
Lanzarote & Tenerife, in the Canary Islands (part of Spain)
Mindelo, in Cape Verde
Dakar, in Senegal
Banjul, in Gambia
Abidjan, in Ivory Coast
Sekondi-Takoradi, in Ghana
Lomé, in Togo
São Tomé, in São Tomé & Príncipe
Walvis Bay, in Namibia
Cape Town, in South Africa (where we end the cruise)
We won’t be returning to the USA until January 24 as following the cruise we will be taking some very cool tours in South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Botswana. We will spend several days in Kruger National Park, and then later a helicopter ride over Victoria Falls, following that we will tour the Chobe National Park and the Okavango Delta.
Note: I prepared the above email a few days ago, ...before I hurt myself, and now I can’t use my right hand much, so this trip will be a challenge. See photo below. I just figured out how to dictate my Gmail's. I'm so excited.
This is the story on my hand, the Saturday at 4:30 before I left NY for Spain. I was on my way to happy hour and I also was delivering a Christmas present and was in a hurry cause I didn’t wanna be late. I was racing across 13th St. and tripped on the sidewalk and took a spill. I initially ignored the fact that my right hand baby finger was crooked, but ultimately I went to the orthopedic intensive clinic and they put my hand in a cast. I also had a big wound on my head and my knee so I’m a bit of a wreck now
I don’t have much use of my right hand and my left hand is really clumsy. I’m dictating with my iPhone so I may have some typos.
Thursday, December 18
Met up with Scott at the Barcelona airport. We stayed tonight in Barcelona at the Grums Hotel & Spa.
Friday, December 19 (Barcelona)
Due to my right injured hand I’m using the iPhone’s voice-to-text (called Dictation), which lets you speak words and have them typed out. It’s working out pretty good, I make corrections on my iPhone as best as I can, but I’m sure I don’t catch them all.
In Barcelona Scott and I stopped sleeping long enough to go for a short walk to the pharmacy and down by the harbor. On our walk we saw the following funny looking trees, they are called silk floss trees, and are native to South America. The ones we saw were a gift from Argentina. The bottle-like trunk is used to store water. In their native Argentina, the tree is known as "Palo Boracho," which literally translates to "drunken stick," a reference to its swollen, bottle-like trunk that sometimes tends to lean to one side.
We were trying to go see a Sorolla exhibit but just kind of ran out of gas, but on the way we saw the Christopher Columbus statue at the bottom of La Rambla, a tree-lined pedestrian boulevard. The statue was built for the 1888 Universal Exposition to honor Columbus's triumphant return from the Americas after his first voyage. The statue is marking the spot where Columbus came ashore and met the monarchs. In the statue Columbus is pointing out to sea somewhere, the pointing direction is debated I think. Maybe he's saying something like “Oh I can see America from here” or maybe he’s pointing to the large Columbus statue in the center of Columbus Circle in Manhattan? 🙂
A fun fact: The Barcelona monument is 131 feet tall, while the Manhattan monument is only 76 feet tall.
Our ship departed Barcelona around 7 pm.
Saturday, December 20 (Sea Day)
Currently Scott and I are sailing in the Mediterranean Sea, but there has been nothing to report other than just the trials and tribulations of jet lag plus dealing with life with only one hand.
Somewhere along here we received the following message from the ship, “…during a portion of our voyage we will be sailing through an area where enhanced security measures are a standard practice designed to ensure the safety and peace of mind of all of our guests and crew. Please be rest assured these precautions are routinely implemented to provide an additional day of care during your journey. We will be dimming all open deck lights, and temporarily shutting off the funnel light, at night we will have additional security personnel on board while in this region...” Shades of the Somalia, right?
The last time Scott and I were in the Mediterranean Sea was earlier this year when we did the 10-night Mediterranean Cruise, also starting in Barcelona, Spain but ending in Italy.
On our current cruise to West Africa we left Barcelona Friday evening and we get to Cadiz, Spain tomorrow (Sunday) morning. In Cadiz we’re going on a pretty cool cruise tour I think, so I may have photos and stuff to report then, but so far nothing. It’s been hard to deal with my hand, or lack thereof, plus the jet lag. So far Scott and I have slept a lot. We will sleep, wake up, eat, go back to sleep, wake up, go eat, etc. etc. The attached map shows the location of our ship a few hours ago, and by the time get to the Strait of Gibraltar, it will be dark and we will be asleep again.
I’m excited as Cadiz is where Christopher Columbus sailed from on his 2nd and 4th cruises. I’ve always been amazed at how small Columbus's ships were, compared with today’s cruise ships.
Sunday, December 21 (Cadiz)
We docked around 8 am I believe. Cadiz is widely considered the oldest continuously inhabited city in Spain and Western Europe. It is in the southern part of Spain, and mostly sunny weather, but about 50 days a year they have rain. Today was one of the rainy days, Scott and I started off with a little bus tour, but it was difficult to take pictures from the bus because it was raining so hard, but anyway I took the following photo from the bus, of the structure that is the entrance from the old city to the new city, called the Puertas de Tierra (Land Gate), a historic city gate and defensive wall in Cadiz.
There were lots of these built to keep out a series of invaders. Cadiz was occupied a lot starting with the Phoenicians, then the Carthaginians, the Romans, the Moors, the Goths, the French. and Pirates. The most famous pirate being Sir Francis Drake. At least to the Spanish he was a pirate, to the English he was a national hero.
The next photo is the Monument to the Constitution of 1812 that commemorates the centennial of the signing of the Constitution of 1812. This constitution was established during the Peninsular War (Napoleonic invasion) as a response to limit the king's power. The monument was commissioned in 1912 and completed in 1929.
All along the coast many buildings have watchtowers on the roofs, they communicated to the ships from these watchtowers with lights and flags and that’s how the ships could come to shore. There’s about 198 of these along the coastline in Cadiz. The following photo (to the right of the photo) shows the Casa de las Cinco Torres (House of the Five Towers), an iconic 18th-century building located in the Plaza de España. It was a grand 18th-century Baroque summer residence built for a wealthy merchant, and known for its distinctive five towers used for spotting ships.
In the next photo you can see a typical narrow street in the old town, at the end of the street is a cannon (which doesn’t really show up in this photo, but there are plenty of these cannon photos on the Internet). They used cannons that weren’t functioning to plant on the corners to protect the corners of the buildings from the horses and various vehicles that would go by that could damage the buildings, which is pretty clever I think. The new part of town has wider streets and everybody in Cadiz lives in an apartment or a flat. There’s no room for single-family homes, so that’s my history lesson about Cadiz.
Later after the bus tour were the flamenco dancers at the La Cava tavern, located a couple of blocks from where our ship docked. These were among the best flamenco dancers I’ve ever seen, they were absolutely fabulous. The guy that’s singing was emotional. The dancers danced beautifully and interacted wonderfully so it was a great event. And they didn’t make fools of the audience by having people get up and try dancing.
We had wine and tapas (small Spanish snacks) and had a great time. Then we had our choice to go out in the rain for a walking tour or go back to our ship. We came back to the ship because I couldn’t get my injured hand bandage wet and Scott had gotten sick so I needed to check on him. See the following 5 photos of the dancers.
Tomorrow will be a sea day as we cruise to the Canary Islands, our two stops will be at Lanzarote on Tuesday and Tenerife on Wednesday.
Monday, December 22 (Sea Day)
Tuesday, December 23 (Canary Islands, Lanzarote)
This morning Scott and my ship docked at Arrecife, the capital city and main port of the island of Lanzarote which is the fourth-largest Canary Island. Our first tour of the day was to the Timanfaya National Park which is known for its moon-like landscape, or moonscape. It was amazing, I’ve seen it before but this was a little more up close and personal, and I was really taken with the various contours and colors of the natural landscape which is all volcanic, the park covers about a fourth of the island. Astronauts from both NASA and the European Space Agency have trained at Lanzarote's volcanic landscapes since it strongly resembles the Moon. Below are three photos of the moonscape, showing the various colors.
The history of the volcanoes is interesting, going back to the 1800s, but the island itself is 15 to 20 million years old, so it’s all pretty darn interesting. We went to a place where it’s still warm so the first thing the guides did was pick up some lava, over 100F, and put it in our hands, ...warm but not "hot,"
Then we went to a place where they put some brush in a ground hole, which was much hotter, it took maybe 60 seconds for the brush to catch on fire.
Then we went up a little further where the lava temperature was around 300F just below the surface and they poured water Into the hole and you saw the big spout of steam that came up.
That was amazing and interesting, it was a real enjoyable time to see that moonscape and all of the “experiments.”
After the moonscape tour Scott and I hopped back on the bus and went through more and more and more moonscape with some very interesting craters, and stalagmites kind of things and then well you can see what was next. They were waiting for us at the camel station at the entrance to the park.
Almost all of the camels that take the loads of the tourists are females as our guide said the males just don’t work very hard. Manuela was quite docile but as you could see, she had her face covered up so she couldn’t spit or bite, not that I’ve ever had that problem with camels before.
The camel ride was a lot of fun. Below are a couple more photos, the first photo is of some other folks in the camel ride.
After Scott and my camel ride our next island tour took us to a winery, the Bodega Antonio Suarez, a well-known, family-run, winery and vineyard located in the unique volcanic landscape of the La Geria wine region. It’s a very different looking winery from what you normally think of because the plants are in hand-dug volcanic craters protected by stone walls. The lava rocks (see photo below) retain water and the moisture that comes with the winds and dew is enough to keep the plants watered, and the soil is very very rich.
They put some of the ash in the pits of these holes that they dig to plant the vines and other plants they grow.
They had just harvested so there weren’t many nice big plants to see, but I took a picture of one that they left just for us to look at, pretty cool huh? In La Geria, the most important grape is the Malvasía Volcánica, a unique, native white grape.
They have thousands of these pits with vines and plants growing in them across the countryside and it’s all done by hand, really amazing, and the wine is excellent. Lanzarote wine has a distinct flavor due to the island’s special soil I'm told.
From a distance, the whole area looks like some bizarre art installation. See the following two photos.
On our ride around the island we noticed that all the houses seemed to be white with either green trim for agricultural areas or blue for the ones near the ocean. I found out this is known as the Manrique Influence, as artist César Manrique pushed for this look. He was a visionary artist, sculptor, and environmentalist from Lanzarote.
Sometimes you will read there are seven islands in the Canary Islands, sometimes you will read there are eight islands. Why the difference you might ask. Here’s what I found out. "In 2018, the General Commission of Autonomous Communities of the Senate unanimously approved a historic motion granting La Graciosa the status of the eighth inhabited island of the Canary Islands, moving beyond its designation as a mere islet. This decision marked a milestone in the island’s history and its recognition as an integral part of the Canary archipelago.” Interesting stuff.
I enjoyed today's visit to the Canary Islands. In 2024 I was in the Canary Islands with my friend Sara as part of a 12-night cruise, but we didn't stop at Lanzarote. I visited the Canary Islands in 2018 also.
We leave the island of Lanzarote tonight and cruise to our second and last stop in the Canary Islands, the Tenerife island, we are scheduled to arrive Wednesday around 8 am.
Wednesday, December 24 (Canary Islands, Tenerife)
Today Scott and I arrived at the island of Tenerife in the Canary Islands, this was our 2nd and last stop in the Canary Islands on this cruise.
First, I want to mention that the Canary Islands are named after "dogs" that the Romans found when they came here around 40 BCE. The “dogs” may have been large, wild dogs, or some say maybe monk seals that were called sea dogs. The Latin term for the Canary Islands is Canariae Insulae, meaning "Islands of the Dogs," derived from canis (dog) and insula (island). The yellow birds that we know today as canaries were later named after the islands, not the other way around. I had always thought the Canary Islands were named after the Canary bird, but no, named after “dogs."
With that bit of history out of the way I have a few photos to share. The first picture was taken at "Playa de las Teresitas" (translates to Las Teresitas Beach), a famous golden-sand beach in the village of San Andrés on the Tenerife island. It was Christmas Eve today in the Canary Islands. The beaches were full of people, it never occurred to me to go to the beach on Christmas Eve, did it occur to any of you readers? Certainly not you New Yorkers, maybe some of you in Florida or California.
Scott and I took a 4x4 excursion to the other side of the island, and like the island of Lanzarote, Tenerife is also volcanic. But Tenerife seems to have better water so it’s very green as we went over the rolling mountains and hills and they were such a contrast to the ones we saw in Lanzarote that I took a ton of pictures, but most of them didn’t turn out, cause they were guardrails in them, but the following three photos don’t have guardrails in them.
The last photo is a beautiful formation of the black sand beach. I waited and waited and waited for a big wave to come. It was fun to see the big wave shooting above the rock, but every time I turned to talk to somebody or somebody talked to me, a big wave would come and I would miss it, so my photo below has only a little wave. If you look close to the photo you can see that there is a walkway for people, but it certainly could be dangerous.
That’s my story and now we’re back on our ship and I’m waiting for Scott because we’re having Christmas goose for dinner.
Earlier I wrote that we had rain in Cadiz, well we had rain in Tenerife as well, and half of the trip was aborted because of rain. But that's OK cause we needed to get back to the ship so Scott could get more meds.
There was a huge ship that docked next to ours. It was the AIDAcosma. I was reminded of the ship Costa Concordia since both ships belong to sister cruise lines (Costa Cruises & AIDA Cruises). The Costa Concordia was the ship that tipped over in Italy, and the captain abandoned ship before all passengers and crew were evacuated.
I looked out our cabin's window and there was a huge tanker parked next to the AIDAcosma I was wondering if they were refueling from the oil tanker or if that tanker just happened to be there, or maybe was there to keep the AIDAcosma from tipping over. I thought that was a pretty funny thing to think, that maybe the tanker was there to prevent the AIDAcosma from tipping over.
Later in the day when Scott and I came back from our so-called 4x4 excursion exploring the island that was aborted due to rain (more of a 2x4 excursion ha ha), the tanker was gone. I guess the tanker wasn't to keep the AIDAcosma from tipping over, It was to refuel. I just thought it was kind of a fun fantasy to think that the tanker was there to keep the AIDAcosma from tipping over. The AIDAcosma is one huge tall ship, with 11 passenger decks compared with 6 passenger decks on our cruise ship, the Seven Seas Voyager.
But since I am writing about the AIDAcosma, that ship has a very distinctive paint job on the hull. I believe all of the AIDA Cruises ships have the iconic, colorful design with giant, puckered red lips on the bow and a large eye with eyeshadow on each side, along with blue waves extending down the hull. I wish now I had taken a photo of the AIDAcosma (and the tanker). Several other cruise lines use hull art also, which I love the looks of, like the Norwegian Cruise Line.
In late 2022 my friend Sara and I signed up for an Eastern Caribbean islands cruise on the Norwegian Gem, which had beautiful artwork on the hull, all gemstones, which gave the ship its name. Most cruise ships I've been on have just a single color paint job on the hull above the water line.
I’m attaching below photos of the AIDAcosma and the Norwegian Gem (all lifted from the Internet of course).
AIDAcosma below (2 photos)
Norwegian Gem below (one photos)
Thursday, December 25 (Christmas Day and a Sea Day)
Christmas at sea with Diane and Scott... not much new going on except there is caroling in the lobby where they will dump artificial snow from the high balcony. Beautiful but too bad for the cleaning crew.
I did go to the lecture about staying safe which covered some ideas of danger I never thought about. They had videos of pickpockets that they call matadors because they usually cover their pickpocketing hand. Tip #1, if someone asks you to watch their bags don't because pickpockets working in teams can come take the bag and when you go to confront them you become the victim and you lose your wallet for someone elses new trinkets or underwear. Who ever thought of that. and more. I'll watch it again.
Dinner last night was goose, tonight turkey yippee.
Friday, December 26 (Sea Day)
Today is our second sea day as our ship sails from the Canary Islands to Mindelo in Cape Verde, which we should reach tomorrow morning.
The first photo below is of the Atlantic Ocean, which is 13,000 feet deep at this location.
The big news of the day is we had a pirate drill. They announced on the intercom that it was an exercise, but that they also said there was a suspicious boat coming close to us. So everyone has to go off of the decks, off of the cabin balconies, out of their state rooms into the hallways and lie down. You should’ve seen the hallway strewn with antiquated bodies. We all just kept laughing and laughing cause somebody said they’re gonna have to come through with a derrick so we can get up. It was pretty darn funny. We were told that the only thing they worry about is a ship coming close with machine guns and that’s why we had to have the drill and to lie down in the hallways. I didn't hear what happened to the suspicious boat.
But speaking of pirate drills, back in 2016 Scott and I were on a cruise from Dubai to Singapore and it seemed that every night just as the sun went down and the lights in the ship went on, the staff rushed around and closed all of the curtains. I protested, as I wanted to see out. But it was not negotiable. The steward said it was unlikely that pirates would try to board a cruise ship, however they were taking those precautions. Coincidentally that ship was also the Seven Seas Voyager, the same ship Scott and I are on this Western Africa cruise.
On the 2016 cruise a fellow passenger told me that some friends of his were on an ocean cruise and the pirates did threaten them. The ship's staff had everyone go into the hallways. Then they asked for volunteers to man the fire hoses and the staff ran barbed wire around the perimeter of the ship That thwarted the pirates.
So much for pirate drills. I have had tennis necklace envy ever since I saw the Dodger baseball player Yamamoto wearing his blue sapphire tennis necklace. So today I went to craft time and made my own. Attached are necklace photos, but you can tell it isn’t sapphires. The second photo is just a crop of the first photo.
Saturday, December 27 (Mindelo in Cape Verde)
Today Scott and I were in Cape Verde, although Cabo Verde (or Republic of Cabo Verde) is the country's official name since 2013. But many people still refer to it as Cape Verde so I'll stick with that. Cape Verde is an archipelago nation of volcanic islands in the central Atlantic, about 385 miles off West Africa. The country consists of 10 main islands and islets. Our ship docked at the São Vicente island at Porto Grande (Portuguese for Grand Harbor) in the city of Mindelo. The islands of Cape Verde belonged to Portugal before it became an independent nation in 1975. The city of Mindelo is the second most populous city in Cape Verde and a major culture hub.
While still on our ship we noticed a beautiful three-masted ship sailing out of the harbor (see the photo below). It was the Sørlandet, a Norwegian heritage tall ship and I later found out that it is currently a training vessel for high schoolers, and was en route to Suriname, South America. The objective of the ship’s sailing activities is to offer the general public an experience in traditional life on board a tall ship. The Sørlandet is open for charter cruises (no previous sailing experience is required) and is the oldest full-rigged ship in operation in the world (launched in 1927). Interesting stuff.
After we left the ship we went on a walking tour, first walking along the shore and we saw what appeared to be abandoned fishing boats (photo below), but we were assured that they were well used because fishing is 75% of the economy and tourism is the other 25%.
After we saw the fishing boats we went to the fish market. There were typical people selling fish, cutting fish and doing all that fish stuff. I took the following photo of that live-more-or-less-maybe-not-so-live sculpture of the fish. Red Drum fish maybe. Everything piled up, and it was pretty interesting.
Next we were taken to Le Goût de Grills (translates to The Taste of Grills) restaurant for refreshments, music and a dance performance. The lady dancer appeared to be pregnant and her costume was makeshift at best. The dancing was sweet and very basic. I figured out the steps but could not wiggle my fanny quite the same. You can see the stage and musicians in the background. See photo below.
After that Scott and I walked along the water and went by the big acacia tree shown in the following photo. The Acacia trees in Cape Verde are different from the ones Scott and I saw during our 2018 Africa Safari, it wasn’t as tall and sparse and didn’t have the big thorns like the ones in Africa. The statue partially hidden by the tree is of Diogo Afonso, a Portuguese navigator credited with discovering the islands of São Vicente and Santo Antão around 1462.
We went to the Municipal Market or holiday market as they called it, (photo below), where a variety of goods are sold, including fresh produce, handicrafts, and local products.. What was interesting to me was in all those little booths. They had a whole section of what looked like dried out weeds. That's the place the Witches or Strega or whatever they call them use to make their potions or teas to cure people of whatever. It can be anything from a cold to diarrhea. I thought that it was interesting that it was very very prevalent in that market.,
This is where we had the excitement of the day. There was a lady with a cane and a hat that we thought was mild mannered and very sweet, and then there was another woman who walked by her, who pointed her finger at the sweet lady, and that lady bit her. Yep bit her. and the bite-ee so to speak walked right in front of us with blood dripping off of her finger screaming "I’ll find out who you are and where you are and I’ll sue you etc. etc. etc." People tried to help her but she didn’t want any help. We don’t know what happened other than that. We later learned that the lady that was bitten is from England and she is officially a lady and her husband a Lord. They insist on being treated as such. So it makes it kind of a sad story because who would ever bite another human being, but it happened and then for it to happen to a Lord‘s wife, the Lady just kind of tickles me.
While on our walk we saw a couple of relief wall sculptures on the side of a building. The following photo shows one wall sculpture depicting 5 figures dancing. The sculpture is signed "Ro and Nild Interart 95" at the bottom right. Ro and Nild were a collaborative duo of visual artists, famous in Mindelo.
The next photo shows another wall sculpture that shows 10 figures in dynamic poses, showing a musical performance or celebration of some kind. This sculpture was also signed "Ro & Nild" at the bottom right, but not shown in this photo.
For no special reason below is a Google Street View that shows the two above relief wall sculptures.
Scott and I also went to the Centro Nacional de Arte, Artesanato e Design (CNAD), a national cultural center and museum in Mindelo, and some of the art there is just wonderful. The art was unusual and interesting, creative. The blue hanging down Mobile thing (following photo) was made from plastic that had washed the shore and I thought that was kind of a nice use of rubbish.
Below is some Atelier Piká Pedra art being shown at the museum. Atelier Piká Pedra art is a Cape Verdean artisan studio specializing in unique, handmade crafts, primarily using stone, metal, and paper.
The photo below is of a facade of the museum building. The big colorful circles are basically the emblem of the island, thousands of drum heads and each color stands for a different note in the Cape Verde music and also some of them are tributes to people that have sent money home to support the Cape Verde economy. They were quite colorful and big and nice. The circles are on at least two sides of the building (that I could see).
The photo below is of a ceramic sculpture by Brazilian artist Miguel dos Santos, I thought it was almost a little creepy, but fascinating.
The museum tour was a really nice experience, and better than the biting if I have to say so.
The photo below shows the port area, with our cruise ship (Seven Seas Voyager) docked at the pier.
The photo below shows Praia da Laginha (translates from Portuguese to Laginha Beach or Little Lagoon Beach), a prominent beach and port area.
And then back to the ship, we had a nap and went to the lectures and just were very busy.
This photo below was taken from our ship and shows the city of Mindelo with Monte Verde mountain in the background.
Tomorrow is a Sea Day, and then Monday we will be at Dakar in Senegal.
Sunday, December 28 (Sea Day)
Monday, December 29 (Dakar in Senegal)
This morning Scott and I arrived at Dakar, in Senegal, Africa, it’s our first stop in an African country since this cruise began.
The sunrise was so spectacular I had to take a photo of a large cargo ship on the ocean horizon as we approached Dakar. Welcome to Africa where the sunrises are orange instead of pink. Sort of in your face.
I’m gonna start this by saying this particular trip or excursion. It was so devastating that when I got back to the ship, I couldn’t do anything but sleep and later go for a drink. I will share some of the gory details, Gorée Island (a small island off Senegal) is a mixed bag. It was seat of the French government that ruled Senegal for many years and also overall the slave trade. From the governor’s mansion, one of the pictures in this that I will mention again, there are islands like Goree Island all along the West African coast, and I suspect the conditions and all of them are similar.
The next photo I took as our ferry from Dakar approached Gorée Island.
The following photo is the entrance to Gorée Island, a UNESCO World Heritage site off the coast of Dakar, Senegal. Gorée Island is recognized globally for its history as a major center of the Atlantic slave trade.
The following photo was taken near where the ferry dropped us off, you see it’s just kind of a normal looking island. It’s a town Square, we were there pretty darn early so the businesses hadn’t opened, but the merchants were already setting it up to try to get us to buy stuff.
The next two photos show the waterfront of Gorée Island, with lots of boats. The building in the first photo is Fort d'Estrées, built by the French in the 1850s to defend Dakar's harbor from the British, which now houses the Historical Museum of Senegal. The prominent red building in the second photo is the historic House of Slaves (Maison des Esclaves).
The following photo shows a long row of pink buildings for schools that were set up by the French and the following beautiful yellow-ish alley that also had and still has hospitals and schools. The schools were really a big deal back when the French were governing the island.
The next photo shows the Governor's Palace which looks pretty rundown. When Dakar got their independence in 1965, It was no longer used for that but ostensibly a museum that wasn’t open. And they were raising goats in the front yard.
The island is busy. 1500 people live on this island with lots and lots of children so their schools are full. They are 90% Muslim and 10% Christian and they get along fine. They have desalinated water. The big industry is tourism.
In the next photo is a school, a kindergarten. The school is named after Mame Coumba Castel, the spirit of that island, a maritime divinity who took the form of a beautiful woman.
We walked past a catholic church, the first photo shows the Church of Saint Charles Borromée, built in 1830 during the French colonial presence. The second photo shows a crèche at this church, which was particularly interesting because here it is an all black country and the figures of Jesus and all were white.
The next two photos show where Scott and I walked down another alley, which had a Baobab tree which is their pride and joy. It’s not as big as some of the other ones we’re gonna see, but the tree is interesting because it’s roots go really really deep and go all the way out to the sea to nourish itself and there’s the fruit of the tree and the inside of the tree are very important to the culture.
The following photo shows a mosque, the mosque is the little beige building, and according to our guide, it’s the only single story beige mosque in Africa because most mosques are green and white. Now the new rules of Islam are that you can pray in your own home, you don’t have to go to the mosque if the mosque is far away, so it doesn’t get heavily attended
So I had to take the following photo of the hair salon. I’m sure you’re all gonna rush over to Gorée Island to have your haircut there. I didn’t either, even though I needed a haircut I didn’t do that before I left. My hair is this big fluff ball right now as you could’ve seen from some of the photos.
The next photo is of a shop and I just thought it was kinda nice. It’s so nicely contained and has a lot of merchandise. Items for sale include clothing (dresses, bags), accessories (jewelry, scarves), and other general merchandise. Next to it is another stall selling packaged foods and household items. By the way we weren’t allowed to take pictures of people because they don’t want their photos to show up on the Internet or on postcards which was a very interesting idea because usually your told they feel like you’re stealing their soul or something when you take their pictures
OK so now for the difficult part of this trip the guy in blue in the following photo was kind of our guide and he was taught English. He was so preacher. He wasn’t an Imam, and a translator. He was so charming, I approached him because I thought he was interesting looking with that totally blue outfit. He explained to me that the overcoat was a grand Boba and underneath they had a form-fitting Boba and then he had trousers and then he had his fez and then his shoes. It was all color coordinated, you could tell he had a little style issue. He translated what we heard happened in the House of Slaves.
This is the part that’s so hard. Slavery was going on in Africa for over 300 years. They shipped over 20 million Africans to America, most of them to Brazil interestingly enough, but they also sent them to the West Indies to America and to Cuba and the Caribbean. Here's how it worked, the Africans were kidnapped from their villages and brought to the various islands as I mentioned. First they were weighed if they weighed 120 pounds the men were put in a special cell because they were high priced if they had big muscles, the women were also weighed and they did tell us the differences between the weights. The women and the children were completely separated from the men and all lived in horrid conditions.
They were only allowed to go outside once a day to do whatever they had to do and were fed until the slave boats came, which they came every three months. Then the ones that didn’t weigh enough were then put in a special room where they were fed beans and palm oil to fatten them up for when the slave boats came back after the three months. It was sort of like how they force feed geese to get their livers bigger so they can then kill them to make liver pate. That was the example they gave us about it
The children were put in a room all to themselves without any access to their mothers. They were completely on the opposite sides of the House of Slaves, and they were sometimes sold, and I don’t know they didn’t talk about that, but they were also sold. Interestingly, the virgin women were put in their own area and if a virgin woman was impregnated by one of the slave traders she was freed and could go back to her village or go wherever to have her baby, but she was freed and there’s a lot of history about these mixed races.
Women leading the rebellions in Africa, but nevertheless this went on for a long time. In fact those ladies would go out and try to get pregnant by the slave traders.
What was really the horrific stuff we were told about how they were punished, how they had to wear these chains around their ankles with a big heavy ball in between their feet. Such horrific stuff, it just made you cry. My heart was broken to think about people treating people like that. The commentator at the slave house said that nowadays they can’t believe that the slave traders would live on the second floor with toilets and kitchens and servants, while these people were being treated so badly downstairs, it was like the contrast between heaven and hell.
And it was and if they were bad, the punishment was even more awful. The next photo shows the House of Slaves, the left side went the men, the right side, women, and children. the middle with the back were these dungeon areas on the first floor. There were also areas underneath that floor, where the punishment stuff went on. they had to be on their knees for the entire time they were there. The ceilings were high enough for them to ever stand and they never got to go outside for anything and you know what that means.
That open doorway to the sea in that photo was called the Door of No Return because if they went through that door, they never came back to Africa. And that door was also the Door of No Return because when somebody got sick or died, they took them out that door and threw them in the ocean. They didn’t try to heal him. They didn’t try to give him medicine. They just took them out and threw them in the ocean and with those chains on of course they drowned, so that’s why I was just nauseous. I went knowing it was gonna be bad, but it was even worse than I imagined because I just can’t figure out how people could do that to each other. I asked the guy in blue how these people let this happen to them and he said they didn’t let it happen to them. They were kidnapped at gunpoint or with horses that came alone and scooped them up. He said they did not let it happen. They only had spears and the people had guns so the only choice would be to die or go. Sorry for such a cheerful note, but that’s the story.
Tuesday, December 30 (Banjul in Gambia)
Banjul is the capital of the Gambia and it is THE Gambia like it is The Bronx. The biggest city however is Serekunda, which has 400,000 people, The trip today took us inland through Serekunda through the daily market, the first picture you see is of donkeys bringing goods from the farms into the center market. Every day everybody goes and buys all of their stuff.
The market was blocks and blocks and blocks along both sides of the street dirt roads, other than the one paved road going through the middle of it. It was teaming with people, all buying stuff. Some with some wears on their head including firewood. Some with luggage carts and wheelbarrows. It was quite the mob scene and traffic jam. See the following photo.
Then we proceeded to a museum in the cultural center. Well it was limited. I’ll just put it that way. The hut you see is the women’s hut in The Gambia men are allowed to have four wives. The wives all live in that hut. and each woman goes for two nights to spend the night with the head guys, then returning at dawn. Helps you understand why there’s so many children in these communities.
The next stop was the palm wine stop. They explained that the palm liquid when extracted from the tree is already somewhat alcoholic. They gave us a sample of that which was .001% alcohol. it was tasty, kinda like pineapple. They also gave us palm wine fire water which just tasted like the alcohol Everclear, not much taste at all, it is stored for a few weeks to reach that level. They say if you drink too much you start counting the stars or see elephants. There was a demonstration of how they climb the palm trees to get the palm liquid. A guy climbed up about 5 feet and then he turned around and asked for a tip, that was our palm wine harvest demonstration. See the following photo.
After that we went to the beach resort, meantime we’ve been traveling for four hours more or less in the back of a truck with some padding on the seats, on very bumpy roads. The infrastructure in the Gambia is non extensive. At the resort they serve lunch and a beer. Some people actually went into the water and swim we didn’t . The next photo is me waving goodbye to The Gambia from the back of the truck.
The Gambia is very poor. They said it is the smallest and poorest in Africa. 60% unemployment. The market didn’t look like that I was also told that Ivory Coast was the poorest country in Africa. Well, we’re going there next so I’ll be able to compare.
Wednesday, December 31 (Sea Day)
Thursday, January 1, 2026 (Sea Day)
Friday, January 2, 2026 (Abidjan in Ivory Coast)
Scott and I were in the country officially known as République de Côte d'Ivoire (the French name), although Ivory Coast (its historical English translation) is still commonly used. The name change was in 1986.
It was news to me and I think it important to know that many ports in West Africa had slave houses at one time! In some places we were spared the details for which I was grateful. And in some it was local slavery as well as exported. So sad.
At Ivory Coast we were first taken to a cultural center for a Zaouli performance, a traditional dance of the Guro people in Ivory Coast. The mask was a smiling lady but the dancer was a male. Amazing footwork. We never saw the dancer's face, or any parts other than the feet. Next is the very short video (about 1 second).
We were told that Ivory Coast has the largest Catholic cathedral in Africa, but the following photo is from the St. Paul's Cathedral in Abidjan, the second largest Catholic cathedral in Africa I believe. This photo shows a very clever Christmas tree in front of the church.
Inside the church were beautiful stained glass windows, with a definite African theme, depicting scenes such as the arrival of the first missionaries to the region and native West African animals.
Then to the highlight of my day, the Jardin Botanique de Bingerville (Bingerville Botanical Garden), or simply known as the Botanical Garden, and is locate about 12 miles from Abidjan. It wasn't the New York Botanical Garden, but was very large and nice for local residents to enjoy themselves. Bingerville is considered part of the greater Abidjan area. I love palm trees. A huge area was a palm tree grove designed to create a sense of serenity. See the following photo.
There were also big trees, I think the name of the one in the following photo was Ceiba (Silk-Cotton) tree), it could shelter about 4 people if an animal was about to attack them. And yes that is me in the tree.
Then to the Center Technique Des Arts Appliqués De Bingerville (translates to Technical Center for Applied Arts of Bingerville (C.T.A.A)). Inside the center was the Charles A. Combes Museum which was filled with fabulous wooden carvings. Mostly of women's heads, but some men. I chose this one, as it was a bit unusual but representative of the collection. The sculpture is titled "Chanteur Bété, 1961.” It is a representation of a Bété (an ethnic group) singer. Chanteur is French for "male singer."
Charles Alphonse Combes (1891-1968), French painter, sculptor and writer. Born in Paris and died in Côte d'Ivoire, he adopted Ivorian nationality upon the country's independence. In 1937 he opened a private applied art workshop and then taught at the National School of Applied Arts in Bingerville. In 1975 his former artist's studio became the Charles Combes museum.
Saturday, January 3, (Sekondi in Ghana)
The twin cities of Sekondi-Takoradi Ghana, are huge and I was told they had the best fabric items on the West Coast anyway. So I dragged Scott on a quest for that and some more tape to wrap my finger which I mentioned I injured before we left on this cruise. That wrapping got so dirty I could stand it, so I changed it a lot. Only to begin worrying that I would run out. If I got it wet I would be out of luck. I'd purchased a shower sleeve that extended at least 12" beyond my hand. It was cumbersome to say the least and I wanted to reduce the size of my protective splint. Well, the market had no fabric for tourists, only rubber tires, pots and pans and used American clothes and food items, like a basket of snails on some ladies' heads. I told Scott it was his appetizer on the hoof. See photo below.
I found the tape, but couldn't buy it because they didn't take credit cards or US currency. But more on hand injury later at our next stop at Lomé, Togo.
We took the shuttle bus back to the ship and waited for our tour, but not before we went to the vendors at the dock by the ship where I met Enoch and his beautiful painting of a lion. I explained I was also an artist but couldn't buy his painting, but we became fast friends after that. He was the friendliest vendor to a non buyer I've ever met. He is Enoch Agbemenu, a painter who captures local life and landscapes on canvas with acrylic. There is an interesting 11-minute YouTube video I found on him later at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sj4-xlcBeIg.
In the afternoon, we took a tour to the Albert Bosomtwi-Sam Fishing Harbour. Most of the buses were red and said something about the tours, except this one from the Martyrs of Myanmar. Isn't this an amazing thing to print on the side of a bus?
The Albert Bosomtwi-Sam Fishing Harbour in Sekondi, Ghana, is famous as one of only two major fishing harbours in Ghana. Albert Bosomtwi-Sam was a Ghanaian lawyer and politician.
The fishing village was enormous, 267 fishing boats and 424 canoes, the boats had 26 crew. They were all back in their villages as they don't fish on the full moon, because the fish aren't cooperative. I thought it was interesting that some of the boats had "Hebrew 11" written on them. Of course, I had to look that up. Here's what it says, "Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see." That must give them courage.
So the 3 weeks that the fishermen are out, that's about 1000 people on the boats, plus the support staff at the dock is pretty congested I'd think. They were away and resting the day we were there. Below is a photo of another interesting boat.
One of the things you don't think about is keeping the fish fresh while you fish, they have an ice making facility on the dock. They did a demonstration of the chunks of ice they make for the fishermen. You can see the huge rectangular pillars of ice in the background in the photo. They continually produce Ice so they can supply it all the time and the fish is inspected by several government agencies. It was really impressive.
The bus then took us back to a hotel for refreshments and a cultural show. The local beer tasted very good and the show was fascinating, constant drumming and the dancers were amazing. I said to Scott, "I think I know why Africans win marathons, they are used to using so much energy, WOW!!!” See photo of one dancer below.
Sunday, January 4, (Lomé in Togo)
Lomé is the capital and largest city of Togo. The official language is French but I learned Togo's residents also speak indigenous languages. Togo is considered a poor, low-income country but appears to be a beautiful place with many interesting things.
The photo below is just one I took as our ship came into Lomé, looked like a tanker being escorted by some sort of law enforcement boat, but that’s just a wild guess, I just like the picture.
Below is a photo of our ship (Seven Seas Voyager) after it docked.
When we got off the ship, we were greeted by this big troupe of dancers, very noisy and colorful. I stayed worried about the stilt walkers (photo below), as sometimes they swayed a bit too far in my opinion, but they hadn't just fallen and injured their fingers.
We docked in a shipyard with all sorts of wonderful gantries, heavy equipment, cranes, etc. I loved it, not so glamorous but very picturesque, at least to me. Below are several photos.
One of the first excursions we signed up for was an authentic voodoo ceremony, not a performance or presentation, an authentic cultural ritual. I met a lot of travelers who were waitlisted for this. Even so, I think there were 5 or 7 buses taken to this village in Sanguera, an hour from the ship. Sanguera is an area within Lomé,
Well, all 200+ of us arrived at the village and had to go through a purification ceremony. I couldn't see what they did (no photos allowed). It involved fire, chanting, and cornmeal. Then we were allowed to pass into the area where the ceremony was just starting. We were there for 2 hour but this annual ritual was going to last until midnight. It seemed unprogrammed, but they knew what they were doing. Drumming, dancing, making circles with cornmeal in the sand, and more. People would go into a trance; it was like they were having a seizure.
Other people would wrap their arms around them and calm them down, and they would start dancing again. There was no explanation. A smoke ritual happened right in front of us, a man fell into a trance there, too. The dancers were energetic and sweaty and would rub the cornmeal on themselves. Then a guy was on his knees in what appeared to be a shaman who put a live chicken on his head and then killed the chicken while on the guy's head. I was told it was penance for something, and for it to be truly forgiven, blood had to be shed. They used chickens instead of people. This was for everyone who needed to be absolved of something. I felt honored and confused about being allowed to witness this. There's more, like the man who ripped off his clothes in a trance. It took a nanosecond for someone to cover him up.
Several folks regretted not being fast enough to get a photo. We think that if we white-es hadn't been there, they wouldn’t have covered him up. The drummers and dancers were nonstop. Locals filled in behind us to be present for the ceremony and maybe to watch us watch. Below are a few photos.
Here is a photo of my abbreviated finger splint. It’s still cumbersome but easier in many ways, still doesn't work with a computer mouse.
Monday, January 5, 2026 (Sea Day)
Tuesday, January 6, 2026 (São Tomé in São Tomé and Príncipe)
A strange name for a country. The São Tomé stands for Saint Thomas, and the Principe is in reference to the Prince of Portugal. São Tomé and Príncipe is an independent, sovereign island country making it the smallest African nation. São Tomé City is the capital of São Tomé and Príncipe. That’s about all I know of the names.
I don't have much to write about this stop. The harbor was filled with containers, but not the super-heavy-duty equipment of Lomé, Togo. The harbor is not a deep water harbor so our ship anchored offshore, and we tendered in, meaning the lifeboats were used to transport us to shore.
Our tour was labeled "African Art and Lunch." I was expecting to get some insight into the stunning African art I'd seen at the Met and other museums. Not so fast, Diane. We went first to CACAU (Casa das Artes Criação Ambiente e Utopias) Art Museum, some interesting pieces, but not what I was hoping for, and no explanation. There was a display of the workings of the CACAU plantations and the deplorable conditions that the workers lived in, and the still not very luxurious overseer's quarters. Below are a few examples of the art we saw.
Below is a photo of an interesting old building outside the museum. I don’t know anything about it other than it appeared to be made entirely of wood and in a state of disrepair, just the stuff my camera loves to photograph.
After a while we went to the National Museum, which had been a fort, but was also yet another slave house. Attached is an aerial view I lifted from the Internet of the fort/museum. The fort was built as a defense against pirates.
It had mostly Portuguese furnishings on exhibit with gruesome photos of the treatment of the slaves. We listened to the history of independence. I remained optimistic that we were going to have an educational experience about art and didn't look at the disturbing pictures. We explored the fort and went back to the art museum for lunch.
The following photo is a bust of Rei Amador, a historical figure from the 16th century known for leading a major slave revolt, and is a major national hero in São Tomé and Príncipe. Note our ship in the background
The next photo was taken from the top of the museum, I just loved the view.
The next photo shows the St. Sebastian Lighthouse on top of the fort/museum, an active lighthouse.
Scott and I got lost on the way back to the ship and a local led us into the immigration hall which was great, it was a shortcut. We came back to the ship, had a nap and went to the top deck to watch the sun set and wait to cross the equator, which happened after dark so I didn't see that line that runs around the middle of the earth. I'm sure if it had been daylight, I could have seen it. That was the best and most beautiful part of the day.
Below are photos of the sunset, taken from our ship.
Wednesday, January 7, 2026 (Sea Day)
Thursday, January 8, 2026 (Sea Day)
Friday, January 9, 2026 (Sea Day)
Saturday, January 10, 2026 (Walvis Bay, Namibia)
Our ship arrived at the Port of Walvis Bay in Namibia Saturday morning, we were able to dock as it is a deep-sea port, so no need to tender like we did at our last port, São Tomé. Namibia is famous for its dramatic landscapes, including the world's oldest Namib Desert.
Once off the ship Scott and I took an hour drive through the desert to the Namib-Naukluft National Park to see a 800 year old plant called Welwitschia which is considered a living fossil. We were told they live for an exceptionally long time, typically 400 to 1,500 years, with some plants estimated to be over 2,000 years old, making it one of the planet's longest-living plants. There are both male and female plants that are pollinated by flies and a few species of bees and wasps. My first impression of this plant was that it was useless other than being ancient. But a quick research on the Internet told me the plant plays a crucial role in the desert biodiversity. Below are a couple of photos.
After that we drove on washboard gravel road for about 35-45 minutes. My watch recorded it as 7700 steps. We arrived at a place known as the Moon Landscape, which was used as a backdrop for one of the Mad Max movies. Below are a few photos.
There is a handmade directional sign there that has a small painted image of male and female restroom symbols. The sign was funny to me, we went there for folks to use the loo.
After that we drove to the Goanikontes Oasis Rest Camp, a stunning resort and camp in the Moon Landscape area. The camp offers lodging, a restaurant, a natural swimming pool, a small zoo, playgrounds for kids, hiking/biking trails and is near the Swakopmund River. The oasis has historical roots as a settlement, the current main house was built in 1907. We saw a bunch of old rusty trucks that begged me to take their photo. Below are some of my photos from the camp, including one aerial view I lifted from the Internet.
On our way back to the ship our guide told us a story that he swears is absolutely true, about a man going somewhere leaving his wife in their house in an oasis. She couldn’t go out for a week because there was a lion sleeping on her front door. When he came back they moved to another oasis to avoid the lion but the lion followed them to the new place. True story or not, I had to laugh.
Later back at our ship as we were leaving I took the following photo looking towards Pelican Point. Pelican Point is a peninsula with large flocks of pelicans as well a large colony of up to 100,000 Cape Fur Seals, which unfortunately don’t show up in this photo as I didn’t have my Panasonic Lumix ZS99 camera (with the 30X optical zoom) with me at the time. Our ship captain referred to the Cape Fur Seals as "seals," but the locals refer to them as "sea lions." That’s an interesting question, are the Cape Fur Seals really seals or are they sea lions, I won’t even get into that as it is confusing and I don’t know the answer.
Our last port on this cruise will be at Cape Town in South Africa on Monday, January 12th. After that Scott and I will spend several days in Kruger National Park, and then later a helicopter ride over Victoria Falls, following that we will tour the Chobe National Park and the Okavango Delta.
Sunday, January 11, 2026 (At Sea)
Monday, January 12, 2026 (Cape Town in South Africa)
Scott and my Western Africa sea cruise is officially over now as our ship docked on the afternoon of January 12 in Cape Town, Africa. Cape Town is known as "The Mother City,” and was the first city established in South Africa. It is South Africa's second-largest city by population (Johannesburg is the largest).
After we debarked from the ship we met our local guide and took a tour of the city on our way to the Radisson Collection Hotel. We took a cable car to the top of Table Mountain, an iconic flat-topped mountain that gave us a great view of the city, as you can see from the following photo.
We later walked with the guide who pointed out Signal Hill from which a cannon is sounded everyday at noon except Sundays and holidays. It was started in the 1800’s I think to help ship’s calibrate their equipment. The history of Cape Town includes Portuguese, Dutch, German, and French.
The next photo is of Lion’s Head, an iconic peak in Cape Town
The following photo shows the top of Table Mountain, featuring the famous "tablecloth" cloud formation, which supposedly resembles a white cloth draped over a table.
There’s one mountain called the Devil’s Peak which has the story that a retired Dutch pirate used to go up there to smoke and got in a contest with a stranger who turned out to be the Devil. The Dutchman won, the Devil got mad and condemned the area to be covered with clouds that looked like their smoke.
Later the clouds were awesome pouring over the peaks like waterfalls. The following photo shows the Twelve Apostles, a series of magnificent mountain peaks, along with Camps Bay, a popular, high-end suburb known for its beautiful white sand beach.
The big pastime of the locals that go up is to look for dassies, a cute rodent looking animal that is really a rock hyrax which shares traits with elephants, namely teeth and toenails.
We had beautiful views of the waterfront that is being redesigned to accommodate more ships, both passenger and cargo. And the wealthy side of town with all the beaches. The water is in the mid 60F degrees but everyone still goes in. One beach was called Maiden Beach and was only for women as the Dutch didn’t allow both genders to swim together. And there was the men’s beach with a high wall so the women couldn’t see the men. This beach became a notorious spot and the wall was torn down a few years ago.
Along the beach drive there was an art installation of giant spectacles (Ray-Ban sunglasses) symbolizing Nelson Mandela looking towards Robben Island, where he was imprisoned for 18 of his 27 years. He was imprisoned by South Africa's apartheid government for his leadership in the anti-apartheid movement, his is an inspiring story to look up.
Tuesday, January 13, 2026 (Cape Town in South Africa)
Scott and I were up bright and early this morning, our room faced Table Bay. When I woke up and looked out there were zillions of porpoises feeding in front of our window. This was before breakfast. Well, maybe 20 or more. I missed the photo op. We started off with a sumptuous breakfast where I tried a granadilla, a tropical fruit. Kind of yucky looking but tasty. I had to ask how to eat it.
Call us crazy but after breakfast we went back to Table Mountain. The mountain boasts of being the smallest of the 7 floral wonders of the world with the most species of a genus that sounds like firebush is Dutch. See the following photo for a banner that states Table Mountain as one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature.
We saw lots of bushes and the peaks we missed the day before. And some 🦎 lizards. Our guide was better informed on today's trip.
The next photo is a view from the top of Table Mountain, from this location we could see all the way to the Atlantic Ocean coast.
It was finally clear enough to get a photo of Robben Island where Mandela was imprisoned for 18 of his 27 years.. See the next photo.
The next photo is an aerial view of Camps Bay beach and the surrounding area in Cape Town, taken from the top of Table Mountain.
Our bus tour was to the central city where we learned a lot about Apartheid as well as seeing Nelson Mandela waving from the front of city hall. It’s a life-size bronze statue, unveiled in 2018, replicating the historic moment he addressed crowds as a free man in 1990. I forgot to get a photo but am including one I lifted from the Internet.
The next photo is a street scene in the Company's Garden area of Cape Town, featuring a large wooden art installation known as the "Arch for Arch," created in honor of Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Tutu was the South African Anglican bishop, theologian, and anti-apartheid activist who won the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize for his nonviolent resistance against South Africa's racial segregation system (apartheid). The "Arch for Arch" is named as a clever pun honoring Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who was affectionately known as "The Arch," and the structure itself is an arch.
The next photo shows one side of the Castle of Good Hope, a historic fort in Cape Town, South Africa. It is the oldest existing colonial building in South Africa. Although not shown in the photo the fort has a distinct pentagonal shape when viewed from the top, similar to the pentagonal design of the US Pentagon. The Castle of Good Hope was built in the 17th century, whereas the US Pentagon was built in the 20th century.
We also passed an art deco building ("Mutual Heights") that some say reminds them of the Empire State Building in New York due to the “ziggurat design and verticality", only it has African reliefs and it’s not very tall. I didn't get a photo of this building, but lots of photos on the Internet.
My last photo shows Table Mountain at night, I took this photo from the Victoria & Alfred (V&A) Waterfront area where our hotel (Radisson Collection Hotel) was located.
Wednesday, January 14, 2026 (Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge)
After breakfast and check-out from our hotel in Cape Town, we transferred to the Cape Town Airport for a flight to the Skukuza Airport, a small airport located in Kruger National Park where Scott and I will spend a few days wildlife viewing through guided game drives.
We flew on an Embraer ERJ-190 aircraft that had two General Electric CF34-10E turbofan engines.
The following photo shows the entrance sign for Skukuza Airport, the word Skukuza in the sign has certainly an unique font.
I had heard that the Skukuza Airport was the "prettiest airport in the world,” and after seeing the terminal I believed it. The terminal is noted for its authentic African architectural style.
The next photo is from inside the terminal and shows a life-sized rhino statue which serves as an educational display regarding rhinos, which are a highly poached species in the region.
The following photo was taken on the drive from the airport to the Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge with Candy, our personal ranger. His full name is Candy Hlatswayo and he even has his own Facebook site. Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge is located within the Sabi Sand Nature Reserve. The lodge has a reputation of a “luxury home in the bush”, service excellence and effortless personal attention.
The next photo shows two impalas, which are ubiquitous. They need population control in addition to providing meals for the larger animals. I’ll have more photos of herds of them later. These were just the first animals we saw before we even got to the lodge.
The following photo shows some warthogs and babies. The last time I saw them when I went to Africa they were kneeling to eat but here the grass is tall enough they can stand up. And it helps them hide from the big guys who find them tasty enough.
The next photo shows the first of many zebras. I have more photos of zebra butt photos that you can even count. Our ranger told us that food is so plentiful here that you never see a skinny zebra. When I did my 2014 Camino de Santiago Pilgrimage I saw so many cathedrals I just started referring to them as “another bloody cathedral, or ABC for short, as in a bloody lot of cathedrals, ” On this trip I have another term, ABZ, short for another bloody zebra, or as in a bloody lot of zebras.
After the zebras, we saw the following gnus, or better known as wildebeests, they are also plentiful but not like zebras. They tend to hang together. Candy confirmed wildebeests are really really dumb.
Note, all of the animal photos in this email so far were just made on the drive to the lodge with Candy, we haven't even been on our first game drive yet.
We finally arrived at the Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge, the literature says “"Sabi Sabi" comes from the Tsonga word "tsave," meaning "fear" or "danger," inspired by the mighty Sabie River which runs through the reserve, known for its crocodiles and hippos; the repetition (Sabi Sabi) emphasizes the area's wild, untamed nature, a fitting name for the historic reserve.” And "Sabi Sand" means the reserve is named after the two rivers that flow through it: the Sabie River (forming its southern boundary) and the Sand River, which runs through the middle.”
The following photo shows Scott in our beautiful cabin hanging his hat on a wonderful giraffe coat/hat rack.
The following five photos are from our afternoon game drive after we had lunch at the lodge. When game viewing, everyone wants to see the big 5…elephants, rhinos. lions, Cape Buffalo, and leopards. The leopards are very elusive because they are solitary except when moms have babies that I think are called cubs. But we didn't see any leopards today
The following photo shows two more zebra butts, or ABZ as I mentioned earlier, and one wildebeest.
The next photo shows a black rhino, black rhinos are critically endangered.
After the rhino is a photo of an elephant, elephants are also considered endangered also.
The following two photos show two spotted hyenas which eventually got too close for comfort in my opinion. Candy and Jack (our tracker) said they were the ugliest animals. I agree but I’m biased by the movie “The Lion King,” how the hyenas were portrayed. Spotted hyenas are not listed as endangered.
Thursday, January 15, 2026 (Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge)
Scott and I started off the morning very early on a game drive. The first animals we saw were the two Cape Buffaloes shown in the next photo.
Next is a photo of two of the four lions we saw.
After the lions we ran across this rhino resting in the grass.
After passing the rhino we ran across this elephant. The elephant is the world's largest land animal, comprising two species: the larger savanna (also known as bush) elephant found here in South Africa, and the other being the smaller forest elephant found in other parts of Africa.
After the morning game drive Scott and I had breakfast back at the lodge and spent the rest of the morning relaxing. In the afternoon we went on another afternoon game drive. The first animal we ran across was the male giraffe, the males are significantly larger and heavier than female giraffes we were told, 40% heavier or an average. South Africa is home to the Southern Giraffe, which has two subspecies, and I don't know which subspecies this one was.
After the giraffe, it was ABZ time, that is another bloody zebra, as in a bloody lot of zebras. Zebras are close relatives to horses, both belonging to the same genus. This is the Plains Zebra. This one is looking our way and no doubt thinking "I am NOT a striped horse, so DON'T even think about trying to ride me!"
Before ending this game drive I took the following panorama photo of the savannah.
So on a safari, you have coffee or tea, then bounce around for 3 hours come back to the lodge for a big breakfast, take a shower and a nap, have lunch, free time to look at the expanse of the savannah for wildlife in our case baboons and monkeys, have high tea, bounce for 3 more hours, come back for a quick drink and dinner. Then go to bed to get up at 5 to do it again. It is wonderful but too much to eat
Anyway, that was it for this day, two game drives, one in the morning and one later in the day. The seven photos above are just a few of the many I took that day.
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Friday, January 16, 2026 (Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge)
Another morning game drive. We didn't see any new species, but I did take the following photos of some lions. That's Jack our tracker in the first photo.
We stopped a few times and were allowed out of the land cruiser. Once was for gin and tonics in the bush. And another time to taste a nut or fruit from the Marulu tree. It tasted and looked like a CB Lychee, and is also worshipped as a healing agent and a spiritual connection to the ancestors. Our tracker Jack talked about it for that connection. He had consulted them after getting married and finding a job. Jack has 6 kids. Because elephants travel for miles to feast on the fruit, locals call it 'The Elephant Tree’.
By the way, South Africa is very Christian and they used rhythm for birth control, at least in the villages.
Our personal ranger Candy talked about the benefits of elephant poop for healing and nourishment for the bush. I sort of think he knew we whitees would be a little squeamish about ingesting dung stuff, and he enjoyed entertaining us.
Below is just a scenery photo I took from our lodge, for no special reason.
That evening we were entertained by baboon and monkeys all around us being naughty and even making a ruckus on our roof. Below is the only photo I was able to get of a baboon, one of the largest species of monkeys. The largest monkey species is the mandrill.
One things I didn’t mention was that when we went to our cabin after dark or before dawn we had to have an escort because of animals, but we didn’t encounter any of them, only the little gifts they left on the trail. No pooper scooper rules for them. We also learned that leopards came through at night when all was dark.
Saying goodbye to South Africa back at the Skukuza Airport and heading for Johannesburg, South Africa, I took this last photo of the back of one of the buildings at the Skukuza Airport because of the construction materials. Almost all the roofs are thatched. They last a really long time but require some maintenance and occasionally replacement.
We are now in Johannesburg, South Africa at the InterContinental Johannesburg O.R. Tambo Airport Hotel. Not as exotic as the Sabi Sabi Bush Lodge where we were for the past 3 days. The airport is named after Oliver Reginald Tambo, a key anti-apartheid activist and former president of the African National Congress. But look who I found in the airport, a life size statue of Nelson Mandela made from small, colorful African beads, which is outside one of the shops in the airport.
Saturday, January 17, 2026 (Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe)
After a short flight from Johannesburg, South Africa, Scott and I are now in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. The photos below were taken at the Victoria Falls International Airport.
Later we were transferred to the Victoria Falls Safari Lodge in time for the "Feeding of the Vultures." A dedicated staff member feeds them everyday at 1:00pm. They have a whole thing about saving the vultures and how important the vultures are to the safety of the area. They are scavengers and clean up the carcasses so disease doesn’t spread. The hyenas come and also clean the bones. It’s the bush sanitation crew. I took some photos of the vultures feeding but decided not to include any of those photos in this report, it’s not a pretty sight.
After the vultures it was a happy place to go see Victoria Falls. It is the tallest of the big 3: Niagara Falls (North America) and Iguazu Falls (South America) being the other 2. Niagara pours the most water and Iguazu the longest. We were welcomed with a beautiful rainbow. Below are some photos, Scott and I are in one of them.
I also ran across this beautiful flower, known as the purple flame lily or Carson's lily.
Later Scott and I went to The Boma, a Dinner & Drum Show which was a fantastic dining experience. It was a four-course buffet-style meal, featuring local cuisine and game meats, plus energetic traditional dance performances and interactive drumming. The food, music and dancing were loud, energetic and boisterous When we arrived they tied African fabric over our shoulders (called a chitenge) and offered a welcome drink. We were then taken to a space where our faces were painted (it was optional) with a couple of stripes for the men as if they were a local warrior, and dots for the women to symbolize beauty. See the photos below. The second one is a selfie (or is it called a twofie or us-ie or we-sie) of Scott and me with our painted faces.
The next morning at the Victoria Falls Safari Club I ran across the following watercolor painting. At first glance it kind of reminded me of the vultures, but the birds in this painting are Southern Ground Hornbills, and are not vultures, not even scavengers, and not even closely related to vultures. They are not a bad looking bird with their black feathers, large bill, bright eyes, and long eyelashes. So I took the following photo and sending it in lieu of a photo of the feeding vultures.
Sunday, January 18, 2026 (Helicopter ride over Victoria Falls)
I’m still behind on sending out my email reports, but trying to catch up. I took some photos on our Sunday (18th) helicopter flight over Victoria Falls but haven’t had time to look them over and select a few to send. Until then I have 10 frame grabs from a video that the Bonisair Helicopter Company made of our flight. The actual video size is over 300 MB and I don't know if I can forward something that large.
The first frame grab below shows Scott and I filling out some paperwork before our flight.
The next two frame grabs show Scott and I in a presentation the company gave us about our upcoming flight and a little history of the falls, safety tips (don’t let the prop hit you in the head, etc). Another couple took the flight with us, there were four passengers on this flight.
The next two frame grabs show Scott and I leaving the building and getting into the helicopter, which was a Bell 206L-3 LongRanger III, manufactured by Bell Helicopter Textron, which has an Allison) 250-C30P turboshaft engine. I worked for the Allison company at one time during my engineering career.
The following frame grab shows me in the co-pilot seat. I told them I had a pilot's license so they actually let me do the takeoff.
I was just kidding about me doing the takeoff, they didn't let me do that, I don't have a pilot's license, although Scott does.
The next frame grab shows the helicopter in flight after takeoff.
The following frame grab is shows Victoria Falls. What a spectacular sight!
The next two frame grab shows the helicopter landing and us getting off the helicopter.
And while I’m at it, also included here is a photo of the cockpit instrument panel and avionics stack of the Bell 206B-III JetRanger helicopter that we flew on over Victoria Falls. I didn’t get to touch the panel even though I was in the copilot seat and there was a switch that said COPILOT INTERCOM (top-left of the photo).
And finally, two aerial views from Victoria Falls that I took with my camera from the helicopter. Similar to the frame grabs from the video I sent earlier. The view was stunning.
.Also, below is a photo taken after the helicopter ride.
Monday, January 19, 2026 (Chobe National Park-Day 1)
After Scott and I spent a few days in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe we drove to Kasane, Botswana and stayed a few nights at the Chobe Safari Lodge. Going into Botswana with a real trip, first we had to exit Zimbabwe immigration, which was not hard but going into another country was something else. First we had to go some place, get out of the vehicle, walk-through this water bath for our shoes, get back in the car, go through the paperwork, show them our yellow fever certificate, then we went a little further, then we had to unpack our suitcases and dunk all of our shoes into the same sanitation water foot bath, and then put our shoes in the back of the van so they could dry out, so we could put them back in our suitcase. When we got to the lodge we went through some other customs, but our room in Chobe Safari Lodge was absolutely gorgeous with a beautiful, beautiful view.
On our drive through Botswana we saw these tall guys on the side of the highway. The giraffes found near Chobe Safari Lodge are Southern giraffes.
And later we took an afternoon boat cruise into Chobe National Park, on the Chobe River That river goes through four countries (Botswana, Namibia, Zimbabwe, and Zambia) and changes names numerous times in the same country. It ultimately goes into the Indian Ocean.
The next photo shows a group of hippos grazing in a grassy area.
After that we saw a group of elephants coming to drink in the Chobe River. The following is a 14 second video.
The following photo shows two baby elephants playing in the water. We were told elephants were excellent swimmers. Look closely as I think a crocodile can be seen in the background, above the riverbank, but very blurry so hard to tell in this photo.
The following two photos are landscape views of the Chobe River in Botswana, taken from our boat cruise. Beautiful!
The next photo shows a small herd of Cape buffalo grazing in a grassy area.
Chobe National Park boasts the largest elephant population in Africa, estimated to be at least 50,000. And I think maybe we must have seen all of them, at least a bunch of them as shown in the next eight photos. Elephants bathing, drinking, and swimming, it was a magical experience.
Below is a large bush elephant.
The photo below was touching for me, a baby elephant suckling from its mother.
A mother elephant and her baby taking a stroll.
The following photo is yours truly with some wild elephants in the background.
Below, two young elephants near the river.
Below, the same two young elephants near the river.
Two elephants interacting in the river, probably a way of play for the elephants to test themselves.
In the photo below, an African bush elephant is standing near the water's edge on the left, and a large Nile crocodile is resting on the grassy bank on the right.
The last photo for this report is of another Cape buffalo further along the river.
Tuesday, January 20, 2026 (Chobe National Park-Day 2)
In the morning (at 6:00 am of course), Scott and I went on a game drive and saw the following cutie pies. Although monkeys aren’t my fave, I thought this kind of cute. This is a female Chacma baboon carrying her baby on her back. The Chacma is one of the largest species of monkey.
We later saw these two elephants out for their breakfast. Amazing animals. As you know, elephants are the world's largest living land animal.
The highlight of the early hours was a black backed jackal, so cute I wanted to bring him home. They are recognizable by the black and silver "saddle" running down their backs as seen in the following photo.
Below is a photo of the national bird of Botswana, the Kori Bustard, which is one of the world's heaviest flying birds. It used to be that only the royals could hunt and eat it. And whomever wanted to marry the king’s daughter had to risk death or something to kill one to ask the King for her hand. It may look small in this photo, but the males can get up to 5 feet tall and weigh over 40 pounds. The females are much smaller.
Below is another "tower" of giraffes. A minimum of two or more giraffes standing together is considered a “tower.” The two young boys were play-fighting, look at what they do with their necks. Giraffes are the world's tallest living land animals.
The following photo is a Ringtail mongoose. A big family, I chose the cutest one to take a photo of.
And we passed this gorgeous tree, it made me happy seeing it, but I don't know exactly what it was, maybe the Gum Arabic Tree. The photo was taken on the way back to the lodge.
Below is a photo of the shaggiest bird-of-paradise I’ve ever seen, back at the Chobe Safari Lodge.
And below is a photo of a big, very big bug at the Kasane Airport, that I’m glad didn’t come to visit. We were at the Kasane Airport to fly to the Kwara airstrip and overnight at the Kwara Lodge so that on Wednesday we can do a game drive in the heart of the Okavango Delta, Botswana.
The Okavango Delta will be our last stop on this journey, the Okavango Delta is home to some of the world’s most endangered species of large mammal, such as the cheetah, white rhinoceros, black rhinoceros, African wild dog and lion, and we hope to see many of these.
Wednesday, January 21, 2026 (Okavango Delta, Botswana)
Seeing all these beautiful animals has not been boring for Scott and me. The first four photos below are the ones we’ve seen the most, hippos in the water, elephants commuting, giraffes standing tall, and zebras looking sassy and pretty.
But hey, here's a new one for you. We saw an ostrich couple, I am showing the male below as he is babysitting. He's protecting the young ones from the rain with his wings. If you look closely, you can see one little head poking out curiously. The female (not shown in this photo) just sat there looking composed and not responsible. I wondered why they were in the middle of a field in the rain. They prefer open areas so they can run away if something comes upon them. The ostrich has the longest neck of any living bird. That long neck serves as a lookout tower to spot predators from a distance.
Later we went to rescue someone who got stuck. Then we got stuck, so the third vehicle had to come and rescue both of us. While we were waiting, we watched a hyena smelling something foul, yum, yum to him that is.
Once unstuck, we left the hyena to find his scavenger meal and saw some stunning antelopes and big birds, a few photos are below.
Below is a Wattled Crane, it is the largest crane species in Africa, standing up to 6 feet tall.
Next is a Marabou stork, it is sometimes nicknamed the "undertaker bird" due to its dark, cloak-like wings and skinny white legs.
The following photo is the common tsessebe antelope, they are one of the fastest antelopes in Africa.
The next photo is a female Bohor reedbuck, only males have horns.
And the last photo is a male waterbuck, a large antelope, and only the males have horns.
So back to the lodge for brunch about 11:00 a.m. We started at 6:00, our wake-up call was at 5:00. Just so you know, great white hunter business isn't for sissies.
In the late afternoon we went on a boat cruise. I didn't take a photo of the boat but below is a photo I lifted from the Internet.
The trip started with a lot of excitement. There was a waterbuck swimming like its life depended on it. AND IT DID. The guide knew there was something after him or he wouldn't have been in the deep channel. Then we spotted them, there were 3 wild dogs after the antelope. It is somewhat rare to see wild dogs, I think. They are making a comeback from near extinction, as I understand it. They can swim, but only short distances, like between islands, so the waterbuck had an advantage and got away. Below are 2 photos.
Waterbuck swimming for its life.
African wild dog, also known as the painted dog or Cape hunting dog, watching a meal swim away.
We continued and saw amazing grasses on the riverbank, including papyrus, the likes of which I've never seen. It was beautiful. Most of the time, you see it, they are sort of spindly, but not these. They were hearty and abundant and beautiful. Below are 2 photos.
We were on our way to the rookery. You can see all sorts of birds in these photos. Sacred Ibis, egrets, and storks, to name a few. We were there after the chicks had gotten their feathers and flown away, so it was sparse, they said. I thought it was a lot of birds for a small landscape. They didn't all get along, so we saw a few disagreements, but mostly the beauty of the various bird breeds.
For all those birds and the ones that had flown the coop, it didn't smell like an unkempt bird cage, so we had our gin and tonics and watched them from the boat.
Then the sun went down, only there was no sun yet again, so it mostly just got dusky. On the way back, our boat's steering broke, and we had to join another one, leaving the tracker with the boat in the near dark. Given the wild animal situation, I asked him if he was scared. A crocodile or a hippopotamus could have capsized the boat and eaten him. He said he'd be fine as if anything got close, he'd start the motor, and it would scare them away. The driver of the other boat, also a tracker, drove us back to the vehicles and went back to tow the other boat and the tracker back to the dock. They arrived safely in the lodge a half an hour later while we were dining on kudu stew, yum.
That was the end of this day.
Thursday, January 22, 2026 (Okavango Delta, Botswana)
Today we went on another game drive and saw the following hippo, elephant and giraffe.
Later we went back to the kill site with the lions. They were still there. The lion in the 3rd photo below looks bored, but wouldn't you be when the King lion is sleeping on the food so you don't get any?
The bored looking lion below was waiting for his turn at the feast.
Then we saw another tower of giraffes, they are so amazing.
Then another hippo. They spend up to 16 hours a day submerged to protect their sensitive skin from the sun.
In the photo below, I had to do this, sit in the tracker's seat on the very front of the vehicle. I did this while we were having an eating and drinking break from all the hard work of game driving in the passenger seats. The blue thing at the bottom is the tablecloth for the make-shift table where the goodies and drinks are served. And the brown-y green thing I was wearing was our poncho uniform in the rain in the bush. We only had one occasion where we did not wear them on all the game drives in all locations, but these were the best; they had a warm lining, which we needed. And yes I was posing in this photo, pretending I'm pointing out wild game to tourists.
Finally, we had a beautiful sunset in the bush as shown in the photo below, vibrant hues of pink, blue, and purple, a striking contrast with the silhouetted trees and the green vegetation.
Then back for dinner and sleep.
Friday, January 23, 2026 (Okavango Delta, Botswana)
Friday morning we went out again, but not a lot of excitement as the drive was cut short so we could pack. we saw more vultures, and guess what, the hyenas had found a meal. The vultures were waiting for their turn. These two share the job of being the bush's clean-up crew. We were told that when you see white pooh, it is hyenas' because they chew on the bones. I know TMI, but it's fascinating, isn't it?
The photo below shows the national flower of Botswana It is called the Kalahari Devil's Claw. Here's a blurb from Facebook about it. "Did you know that the flower of Kalahari Devil’s Claw or Sengaparile is Botswana’s national flower? Sengaparile is indigenous to the Kgalagadi regions and other arid parts of Botswana. The plant is famous for its medicinal capabilities in dealing with different ailments. Due to the strong thorns covering its seed, Sengaparile is said to symbolise the strength and tenacity of the nation of Botswana.”
I don't recall if I’ve mentioned in other travel reports that I read about 7 books called "No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency" several years ago. When we booked this trip, I googled and discovered many more, so I downloaded 3 and listened to them at the gym. I asked our hostess about them and if they were a true story. She said, "Yes, not about a single person, rather about the general nature of the people." It is very true, I found most of the people in Botswana similar to the characters in these books.
In the next photo you see the puddle jumper (Cessna 206H Stationair,) that took us to the airport in Maun, Botswana, where we boarded a bigger plane to fly to Johannesburg, South Africa on our way home. The Cessna 206H Stationair is an interesting plane, reminding me of my skydiving days back in Florida. The plane is often described as the "SUV of general aviation airplanes," and often used for skydiving due to its high wing, large cabin with easy-exit doors, and the ability to carry 4-5 jumpers.
The next photo is another view of the Okavango Delta in Botswana, a vast inland river delta and UNESCO World Heritage site.
The following photo shows Scott admiring the statue of Oliver Reginald Tambo at the O. R. Tambo airport in Johannesburg (Joberg as it is called). The statue symbolizes the nation's triumph over injustice and depicts Tambo holding the Freedom Charter. Oliver Reginald Tambo was a South African anti-apartheid politician, revolutionary, and the longest-serving president of the African National Congress (ANC).
Oliver Reginald Tambo and Nelson Mandela were lifelong friends, legal partners, and key ANC leaders who spearheaded the struggle against apartheid in South Africa.
It was a wild, wonderful journey. Not a trip, a journey, maybe you could tell from all of the above.
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PS: The full resolution photos can be found at the following site.
