Swimming with dolphins, Kizimkazi, Zanzibar

Who knew dolphins crapped so much?

We are a short way offshore, near the southern tip of Zanzibar island, a place called Kizimkazi.  It's  a calm morning, and we have just found a pod of around 17 bottle-nosed dolphins. Dula, our skipper, manoeuvres the boat into position and gives us the go-ahead to jump in. I'm already kitted up - mask, snorkel, fins - and I jump in. There they are, a few metres away.

They are amazingly relaxed, happy to swim right up to me. For the next hour, there are dolphins all around: under me, next to me, behind me - and when I dive down, over me.  All the time, they keep up a continuous chatter, with much squeaking and clicking.

Two females are clearly on heat. Maybe this is why they ignore us so completely, the males are far more interested in the girls, and what their male rivals are up to. There is great deal of sensuous rubbing and some of the males are visibly aroused.

At the end of a magical hour, they head off and, without visible effort, quickly disappear into the blue.  The end of the show...

We were incredibly lucky with our encounter - these dolphins are a well-known tourist attraction and, in high season, it can get hectic, with boats vying for position, lots of people in the water and some pretty atrocious behaviour.  There are concerns about uncontrolled visits stressing the dolphins (web link here.  If you catch it right, though, it's pure magic

If you're lucky enough to see the Kizimkazi dolphins, try to do your bit: take a bit of time to find a reputable skipper, someone who won't push too hard and put undue pressure on these wonderful creatures. And spend a bit of time learning about the do's and don'ts of dolphin viewing. You'll have far more fun as a result... I did!

Oh, I nearly forgot about the poo: it's true, they were voiding all the time. I suspect it was to do with  the level of sexual excitement. Any marine mammal experts out there who can shed some light?

Here's a link to a Kizimkazi dolphin video - not mine, sadly!

view video

Ndutu in the green...

It's been very wet, with trucks getting stuck and the gulleys full of water. But the sun has been blazing for the last 5 days, a strong easterly wind has been blowing and the plains are drying fast.  There is a haze of dust in the air, the sky bleached to the palest blue. Long lines of wildebeest are trudging across the plain, heading west in search of water. But it won't be long now before the rains break, the grass greens up again and the plains will be dotted once more with animals as far as the eye can see.

We're in the woodland, photographing a Woodland Kingfisher, gorgeous in aquamarine and black and a long red bill. In the crotch of an umbrella acacia, a smear of russet. In my binoculars, the image resolves itself - a leopard sprawled on a branch, paws dangling languidly. It is a large male, but shy. As we try to approach, he fixes pale green eyes on us and then comes down from his perch in one fluid motion. 

In a gulley lie three lionesses, flat on their backs, paws in the air, utterly oblivious to us a few metres away.  A herd of wildebeest and zebra approaches, feeding in the dense grass along the valley bottom. The lions aren't hungry - sleek bellies show they've fed recently - but one of them gets into position, a perfect ambush. One by one the zebra move past at a safe distance, unaware of the danger lurking nearby. A wildebeest wanders closer, head down and munching. There is a bush obscuring his vision and the lioness uses the chance to move, closing the gap to about 12 metres. She crouches, then charges forward, a tawny blur. The wildebeest swings around and runs - straight at her. This isn't in the script and she turns tail and flees. The moment is gone, her chance blown. She wanders back to her friends and settles down once more to sleep

Out on the plains, the cheetah are doing well. We find 2 mothers, one with 5 tiny cubs, less than 2 months old, the other with 3 well-grown youngsters in tow.

These young cats are very playful and are intrigued by the car. They try chewing on various bits of it, then one jumps up on the bonnet and peers at us, amber eyed, through the windscreen.

We watch a fascinating interaction when another cheetah moves purposefully towards them. Is he interested in the mother, or possibly a threat to the cubs? It turns out to be a young male, maybe a litter mate that got separated from them, or possibly one recently  turned out by his mother and is feeling confused and lonely. There are some tense moments when they all meet, with growling and flattened ears, but no violence, and eventually the family continues with the hunt, leaving the newcomer alone once more.

It's our last morning. We make our way slowly along shore of lake Ndutu. There are hundreds of baby wildebeest carcasses on the waterline - a herd has crossed the lake, and the babies, some no more than a week or 2 old, became exhausted struggling in the mud. A disreputable looking marabou stork  picks at a carcass in a bored way.

At the end of the lake, a crossing! But not your standard crossing, with hundreds of wildebeest flailing through the mud - instead, a family of banded mongoose runs to the water's edge. They are nervous, some of them standing up on their hind legs to scout for danger. Eventually, one trots into the water and they all follow, bounding through the shallows like tiny otters. Is this the first recorded mongoose crossing?

Village Meeting, Loliondo

‘But why can’t you employ more night watchmen this year?’

It’s 3pm.  I’ve been sitting on a hard bench since 11 this morning, without a break for a drink of water, let alone lunch.  This particular question has been worked over for at least 45 minutes, with no end yet in sight, and we haven’t even touched on what I consider to be the crucial issues facing the assembly.   It's going to be a log session...

The village elders are an interesting bunch: a group of Maasai men, with a smattering of women, for the most part dressed in red shukas (Maasai blankets), with lots of stretched earlobes and bright beadwork on show.   They are the elected officials of the village government, the people who decide what can happen in this part of Maasailand, adjacent to Serengeti National Park.

It can seem pointless and frustrating at times.   I’m a guide, so I spend most of my time (lucky me!) introducing visitors to the wonders of the African bush.  I don’t relish the long hours going through the minutiae of village contracts - always dealing with the same issues, year in and year out. 

 And yet, these village meetings, where we sit together a few times a year and talk about all the ‘stuff’ of running a safari camp on community–owned land can be of great significance to wildlife and conservation.  And besides, it’s all part of the job description.

Across much of Maasailand (and elsewhere in East Africa) wildlife numbers, which have done remarkably well over the years, are now in decline – largely due to recent increases in human and livestock populations.  Predators are routinely killed because they are a threat to cattle and goats, while vast herds of domestic stock roam across the land, consuming all the available forage, leaving nothing for wild herbivores.

The Maasai themselves are struggling: overstocking means that they suffer big losses every time there is a dry spell.  There is much talk about climate change, but increasingly, people are realising that the land just can’t support all those cattle, the backbone of their economy for hundreds of years.

Which all seems terribly gloomy.  But there is a silver lining: some communities, especially those bordering national parks, are living on a gold mine, in the form of tourism dollars.  But how to unleash that potential?

For a would-be investor, there is a complicated bureaucratic and political landscape to navigate.  Anything to do with land is a potential minefield, so village leaders are rightly very cautious about any commitments they sign up to.

Luckily, there is a growing band of safari operators across the region who believe in community-based tourism and who are putting in the time to talk to the owners of the land - the local communities - and are investing.  Success means a win-win-win situation: a great safari experience for camp owners and visitors; a steady source of precious income for villagers; and a safe haven for threatened wildlife populations, a precious buffer zone for beleaguered parks and reserves.

It’s dusk by the time I get back to camp.  A pregnant moon is hanging low in the east.  A herd of wildebeest is walking across the plain in front of us, their demented grunting (mooing? honking?) fading to a distant oceanic rumble as they move away.  In the distance, a hyena calls.

Later, we're sitting around the campfire enjoying a pre-prandial drink. Jenny, a first-time visitor to Africa, says: ‘Can’t we cancel the rest of our trip, and just stay here instead?

Suddenly, the tedium, the hours in a dusty village office, my aching back, the overly sweet tea – it all seems hugely worthwhile.

Skeleton Coast Safari

NamibRand landscape

 Namibia.  So familiar, yet so utterly different.  As we drive into Windhoek from the airport, we could be in Maasailand: the same scrubby, thorny vegetation, the same low, dry hills.  But the city is immaculate, the traffic runs like clockwork - all very unTanzanian!

We head out to the NamibRand Nature Reserve, an area of huge views, stunning sand dunes and unexpected wildlife.  Easiest to see are the oryx and zebra: the oryx in particular have a wonderful habit of standing on top of the dunes to catch the sea breeze and cool off.

Oryx catching the breeze

Oryx bulls fighting

But we are soon captivated by the tiny stuff: Toktokkies, Dancing White Ladies, Barking Geckoes and Armoured Crickets.  (The first 2, by the way, are Tenebrid Beetles and a very cool Trapdoor Spider… while the gecko and cricket just stepped out of a sci-fi blockbuster).

Dancing White Lady (Trapdoor Spider)

Armoured Cricket

All around us, tracks tell a story about the denizens of the dunes: Cape Cobras and Golden Moles appear to dive and 'swim' through the sand from time to time; once we see where a cheetah has passed by.

But the real treat is yet to come: one day, a small Cessna buzzes out of the blue and taxis to a halt on the small bush strip. Out gets Andre, a soft-spoken man with twinkling eyes in his weather-beaten face, our pilot, guide and host for the next 3 days.  Without mucking about, we are soon taxiing out again and we set off on our adventure.

Bliss.

We buzz the giant dunes at Sossusvlei, then fly west over an ocean of smaller dunes, the wave-like forms marching to the horizon.  Then to the Atlantic coast, where we spot seals and (once) a pod of dolphins and circle over a shipwreck half submerged in wind-blown sand.

Flying flamingos

Shipwreck

Salt works

First sight of the Atlantic!

We land on a shingle beach: Andre produces a picnic, simple but delicious, which we eat with our fingers.  Then we're off again, landing this time in a canyon, where we see Bushman artefacts and strange rock formations.

Bushman art

Later, we float over an enormous landscape, range after range of weirdly sculpted hills and ridges.  The sun is sinking towards the western horizon by now, so the drama of the scenery is amplified by huge shadows.

Alpha Alpha Charlie's shadow as we land at sunset

Oryx standing on his shadow

Tectonics, Namibia style

We sleep that night in a simple bush camp overlooking a huge stretch of desert.

In the morning, we head out on a short drive looking for desert lions. We find instead a dodgy-looking desert lion researcher and his even dodgier-looking vehicle. This turns out to be the legendary Dr Philip Stander, who tells us a little about his project over lunch. (One male lion recently walked 90 kms overnight, an unheard-of feat of endurance in our East African lions.  He then proceeded to cover 75-80 kms on the 2 following nights!)

Reluctantly we take leave of the Good Doctor, climb back into Alpha Alpha Foxtrot and set off once more.  When we land, there is a totally clapped-out looking land rover, all rust and bulging tyres, parked by a shed.  This turns out to be out trusty steed.  Low pressure tyres mean that we float on top of the sand rather than ploughing through it, as we swoop and glide through the endless dunescape.  It is a magical ride: we lie flat to peer through a magnifying lens at the sand, which turns out to be a jewellery-box of garnet, quartz and other gorgeous crystals.  We surf down the face of a dune on our bottoms, setting off a slo-mo landslide, the flowing sand moaning like an orchestra of didgeridoos.

Sliding down a sand dune

Jewellery-box sand dune

It is a day of huge fun - we all revert to childhood, howling with the sheer pleasure of it all.

There are many ore spectacular moments: the desert ellies in a gorge; the rhinos spotted from the air, the stall warning squealing as Andre banks hard overhead; but nothing else quite matches up to the fun we had in the dunes that day.

Where's Waldo?

Sitting upstairs in our office, I heard a loud commotion from the tree just outside the window - lots of birds all calling and swearing, very agitated.  Clearly there was something up.  So I scanned and scanned and eventually saw green, green scales among the green, green leaves - and a head, staring indignantly at me, clearly not enjoying the attention.  A lovely Green Mamba, maybe 2m (6'+) long, looped and coiled in a dense patch of leaves.

Mambas occur here, but this was my first time to see one near the house.  They are shy, arboreal creatures, moving gracefully through the treetops, hunting mainly for birds.

Jules is convinced he (she?) is after our lovely Kingfishers...

Bushmen in the Kalahari

It was fascinating to spend a bit of time with a Bushmen family in the Kalahari recently.

The Bushmen (sometime also known as the San) of southern Africa’s drylands belong to the Khoisan group, the original hunter-gatherer inhabitants of much of Africa, who have been displaced from most of their traditional range by later arrivals, peoples with new technologies and lifestyles.

Recently, their way of life here has been threatened by a Government relocation policy, with some claiming that this has been spurred by the need to clear the way for profitable diamond mining and tourism interests.

Wikipedia has this to say:

‘Since the mid-1990s, the central government of Botswana has implemented a relocation policy, aimed at moving the Bushmen out of their ancestral land on and near the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) into newly created settlements, such as New Xade. The government's official reason for adopting the policy is as follows:
"Over time it has become clear that many residents of the CKGR already were or wished to become settled agriculturists, raising crops and tending livestock as opposed to hunting-gathering when the reserve was established in 1961
"In fact, hunting-gathering had become obsolete to sustain their living conditions. These agricultural land uses are not compatible with preserving wildlife resources and not sustainable to be practiced in the Game Reserve.

"This is the fundamental reason for government to relocate the CKGR residents."
The government has also explicitly denied that any of the relocation was forced. The official website states:
"Government's policy has at all times been based upon the consent of those concerned, at no time has government contemplated the use of force."
However, a 2006 court ruling confirmed that residents had been forcibly and unconstitutionally removed.’

I think it is fair to say that the Botswana Government has, on the whole, done an honorable job of looking after its citizens, spending its diamond and tourism cash far more wisely than has been the case across most of sub-Saharan Africa.

But it is also true that indigenous peoples around the world (think Native American, or the Aborigines of Australia) have suffered at the hands of their new political masters.

One thing that particularly struck me on my recent visit concerned hunting. Botswana used to be a well-known tourist hunting (love the ambiguity…) destination but has recently banned all forms of hunting. Which applies equally to the Bushmen. I was told that, in certain areas, Bushmen can apply for a license to hunt small game such as springhares and porcupines, so they can demonstrate their survival skills to tourists.

When asked about this policy my guide responded: ‘Sure, hunting is banned, so of course that must apply to Bushmen too. Otherwise it would be unfair.’

But: what happens to a hunter-gatherer when he can no longer hunt?

On a rest break while walking through the bush, my bushmen hosts were astounded to hear that Tanzania has recently passed a law granting the Hadza (Tanzania’s very own ‘bushmen’) title to their own land. On this land, they are entirely free to live as they always have, by hunting and gathering – this provoked a gasp of amazement and a burst of animated talk. Finally, my translator: ‘They are very lucky, these Hadza.’

I can’t help wishing that the Bushmen had a similar deal: a piece of land to call their own, with full rights to live a traditional life. Surely we can make a special exception for these amazing people, who until recently eked a living from an exceptionally harsh environment in a truly sustainable way?

Deep down, I’m sure the government’s claims are mostly right: that most bushmen WANT to live as agro-pastoralists; they WANT access to healthcare, education and clean water from a tap, they WANT to take their place in Botswana's economy and society; even so, there must be a few who want to live as their forefathers did.

Is that so very much to ask?

The Mighty Zambezi

Just as you can't write 'leopard' without prefixing it with 'elusive', it appears that Mighty and Zambezi just have to go together.

Which is fair enough - it is a magnificent river, especially the awesome spectacle of Victoria Falls.  It doesn't matter how much you've read and seen before about the Falls (and we all have) - when you stand on the lip and watch this huge mass of water hurl itself over the edge, the great curtains of water falling in slo-mo into the chasm below, the roar and mist rising from the abyss, it takes your breath away.

We sit in Devil's Pool, a natural jacuzzi inches from the lip.  It is ludicrous how much fun this is, squirming onto the rock ledge to peer over the lip and into the depths as the water swirls past your elbow.  Health & safety - sorry, can you spell that please?

A couple of days later, we find ourselves floating down the same river in canoes. The same river, but how changed from the restless power of the giant that you see at the Falls; here in the Lower Zambezi National Park, TMZ is a wide and lazy body of water, meandering between low-lying islands with happily munching elephants and gape-mouthed crocs lying on the banks.

What a great way to experience the river this is, floating slowly with the current, with plenty of time to take in the teeming life on the river bank - everything from gorgeous Carmine Bee-eaters to monitor lizards and drinking elephants.