Number 6: South Africa 2005

Sorcerers and witches

The mouth of the Umzimvubu river. At the end is Port St. Johns

Shortly after christmas in 2005 we ended up in the little town of Port St. Johns on the wild coast in eastern cape province of South Africa. The town is situated at the mouth of the Umzimvubu River.

These crabs were all along the road and on the lawn of the campground where we stayed

The town was the principal port of the defunct Republic of Transkei (1976-1994). Of the population of 6,500, about 90% are Xhosa-speaking.

Due to silting up of the river mouth, the port of St. Johns was abandoned. However, it still is the local trading center for the surrounding rural communities and a pleasant, modest tourist destination with three beaches and a couple of nature reserves. The high indigenous population and the people coming from the local communities to the market in town make for an interesting mix in the few streets.

One of the activities on offer was the visit in one of the local villages including lunch and the performance of a medicineman. Although this certainly was made up for tourists, it still gave a little insight in the life of the locals. Little Lotte (6) and Hannah (3) were quite impressed.

The medicine man

The village medicinmen are called sangoma. During times of celebration (e.g. at an Initiation) the possessed sangoma is called to dance and celebrate their ancestors. The sangoma will fall into trance. When in trance the Sangoma the ancestors will be channeled (which is signified in Zulu traditions by episodes of convulsive fits) followed by the singing of ancestral songs. These songs are echoed back to the ancestor via the audience in a process of call and response. The possessed sangoma will then change into their traditional ancestral clothing and dance vigorously while others drum and sing in celebration (Wikipedia).

Sorcerers need witches

Later on the same trip we went to a kind of museum of Zulu culture called Shakaland. Although this also was done in best intentions, it was not able to give the same feeling and atmosphere as the little local village near Port St. Johns.

The tourist village of Shakaland

The meidicne man of Shakaland

Dancers of Shakaland

The exterior of the bookshop in the town center of Port St. Johns

And the interior of the bookshop

Selling chicken in the markete

  

Local medicine

The local cobbler was able to repair my sneakers

People in the market

One of the beaches of Port St. Johns

The hut of the sangoma

The main actors

The acoustic accompangniment

Dancing to unknown tunes

Traditional lunch

New friends

Riding lessons

There is not a lot to do in rural Port St. Johns. People try to get away

Number 5: Oman 2017

 The good djinn

Djinns, so ghosts, are important in Omani life. They might not be visible, but they might be responsible for bad luck and good fortune. However, does that also apply to the traveling foreigner?

In January 2017, four of us went down along the coast of Oman in a posh 4x4. It is a spectacular trip. Deserted beaches, breath-taking landscapes, you can camp anywhere and if you need something for dinner, you just buy a fish from a boat in one of the little fishing ports.

Buying fish in a desert port. The ice we got for free

At a certain point, after a couple of sharp turns and a steep descent, we end up on a bridge over a wadi. Below us towards the sea a lake surrounded by palm trees. Such a splendor of green is rare in the desert. Despite the hurry, we decide to take a detour. A bumpy track passes a construction site that is likely to become a parking lot and then plunges into the thicket of palm trees. We leave the car and I continue on foot with one of the friends. We arrive at a greenish body of water, a black Toyota pickup, a smoking fireplace and two Omanis in undershirts, who greet us warmly. They get something out of the firepit, which turns out to be freshly caught and roasted lobsters dripping from fat. After the snack, the men show us the rest of the oasis and the large lagoon. One of them convinces my friend to put on his Dishdasha and turban. Indeed, now he is indistinguishable from an Omani. I take a picture of him and the Omani owner of the dresses in the undershirt with my friends i-phone and after the return of the clothes we say goodbye and set off for the journey.

Chance meeting in a thicket of palm trees

Change of outfit

From the oasis the impressive road climbs through the mountains in hairpin curves until we suddenly drive into a fantastic panorama of the coastline and the sea. My friend wants his phone from me to take a picture and can't believe I don't have it. He thinks since I have taken a photo of him in the oasis I should have it. I know for sure that I returned the phone to him right after the photo. Nor is the phone with his wife. She suggests calling him on her own phone. We hear nothing ring, the phone cannot be in the car. We are driving towards a parking lot on a kind of plateau over the sea and stop…. if the phone is not in the car, we have no choice but to go back and search the oasis for it. Just when I get out to take at least a photo of the coastal panorama, a black Toyota pickup arrives and our two new Omani friends get out. My friend runs straight to them and asks for his phone. The two appear puzzled. Apparently they haven't seen the phone. During the subsequent discussion, someone walks around the rear of the pickup and points at the bumper. And in fact. There it is. My friend’s phone. With a maximum enlargement of the photo of the cars in the parking lot can see it lying there. But the miracle is that it stayed there all the way along the bumpy track in the oasis and on the winding mountain road.

Our new friends can only attribute this to a good Djinn who accompanies us.

Diversity of Omani landscape

The rough coastal mountain range

Camels "grazing" on the beach

Looking for a camping spot on the beach

Tents are set up. Time to prepare dinner

Sunset at another campsite

It is getting cold quickly in the evening. Late nights are rare

Number 4: Argentina - Chile 2008

Number 4: Argentina – Chile 2008

The jetty for the boat across Lago O'Higgins

While I was in Monte Leon (number 1), I read that it is possible to walk across the border of Argentina with Chile close to El Chaiten, the northern entry of Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. After a night in El Chalten, I took a minibus to what Google calls Rio Cañadon de los Toros, but what is locally called Lago del Desierto. It is a roughly 20 km walk across the border anyway, so I took the boat to the northern end of the lake and did not walk along the lake. The Argentine border post is at the northern end of the lake. The border guards looked at me in disbelief. In their opinion, I would never be able to walk to Chile with such a lot of luggage. Indeed, since I did not intend to come back, I had to carry everything. And unfortunately, I encountered a couple of really good bookstores on my way and that in addition to the camping equipment and a camera bag with a SLR and a couple of lenses must have made a load of some 40 kg. The border guards recommended me to use a horse. However, I am not a horseman, and there was no guide. They said there might be a group of caballeros arriving from Chile in the afternoon, but I had no intention to wait for something, which might never happen. I thought, that if the route was too long and exhausting for a day, I could as well just camp somewhere in the nomean‘s land.

The ascent from the lake to the water shed at the border to Chile was a challenge. The summer 2007/2008 was unusally hot in Patagonia. Instead of the usual variation of sun, rain and snow storms, all in one day, the entire january 2008 greeted me with blue sky. But after the coolness of the morning, the heat made the walk especially exhausting. But the sweat was rewarded by the view back over the lake and the towering Cerro Fitz Roy.

I was quite tired when I reached the border, which was marked by two big signs in the nowhere. The bridle path on the argeninian side changed to a gravel road in Chile. Probably there had been a forest fire recently. This attracts the horseflies, here called tábano, irritant big, but innocent insects, which like to sip on your sweat. Big and noisy as they are, they try to get into your nose, ears and eyes to drink. Hitting them does not help. Mostly they just fly away unimpressed and if you manage to squash one, they leave a sticky mess. And there are too many of them anyway. So better carry on instead of camping in the wild and being surrounded by these suckers.

Eventually, in the late afternoon, the turquoise waters of Lago O‘Higgins were visisble at the horizon. The colour comes from the minute debris of rock, which is carried by the runoff of the glaciers surrounding the lake. The lake is named after the Chilean hero of the war of independence, Bernardo O‘Higgins. Half of the lake is in Argentina. There it is called lago San Martin, who, guess what, was the Argentine hero of the war of their war of independence.

At the lake is the chilean border station, and a kilometer further on, a farm. They have simple rooms, dinner and, most important, beer. I pitched my tent between the horses on the lawn. About every second day, a boat cruises around the shores of the chilean part of the lake to serve the couple of remote farms and the odd tourist. The boat originates from Villa O‘Higgins, the southern end of the carretera austral, the 1200 km rough road built by Pinochet to ensure the independence of the southern part of Chile from Argentina. Before the road was built, this part of the world was only reachable by boat, plane or via Argentina.

Travelling down this road was my next goal, but that is another story.

On the way from the coast to the Andes: A destroyed water mill, a bent tree.... the photo shows the relentless wind on the Patagonian pampa

Few landmarks sand out above the pampa between the coast and the Andes

An Argentine motor home

Cerro Fitzroy, one of the landmark peaks of the northern parque nacional los glaciares

The northern end of lago del desierto, where the walk to Chile starts

Lage del desierto and Cerro Fitzroy on an unusual spectacular bright day

The border ... Chilean border sign 

The border, Argentine border sign

The road on the Chilean side

The goal is approaching: first glimpse of Lago O'Higgins

The shiny turquoise waters of Lago O'Higgins

The farm at the end of the road

Dining room where all the guests met

Kitchen

Power station

My tent

Glaciar O'Higgins calving into Lago O'Higgins