NOVEMBER 2019 - eSWATINI

It's a damp welcome back to Hlane (the siSwati word for 'wilderness'). proclaimed a Royal National Park in 1967, under instruction of King Sobhuza ll.  It's the country’s largest protected area and hosts the traditional 'Butimba', or royal hunt (reintroduced to their former home: elephant, white rhino and lion - the emblem of royal Eswatini).



 


Some residents appreciate the rainstorms

 

After a damp night, it's a bright morning






 and, down by the water, 

everyone is building or nurturing


 


And others leave the water



A spot of lunch (buffalo - is that very bad taste?!)











Next morning, a common, or variegated, spotted bush snake, a non-venomous (a passing guide assured us(!), distinguished from mambas or boomslangs by being heavily speckled with black spots) insectivore colubrid. About two feet long but no fatter than my thumb.  Beautiful.





And onward to quieter Mlilwane




The countryside is peaceful




 



And a wide campsite...




Next morning, an hour down by the waterhole,







And then
 












Back by the waterhole, thunder rolled and lightning cracked.




 Just as well we hadn't reckoned on bbq again this evening!!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

THE SILK ROAD - SEPTEMBER

Image
We're following the Silk Road (popularly known as the trade route from China through Central Asia and Northern Africa to Constantinople).  We're on just the part that passes through Uzbekistan: Tashkent (the capital) to Samarkand, then Bukhara, and Khiva.   Stopping off at the end in the biggest city in Kazakhstan, Almaty (capital until 1997) , and an overnighter (when our flight times home were changed at the last minute!) in the new capital Nur-Sultan (until recently, 'Astana'), as we're flying with the national carrier, also 'Astana'. Quick quiz before some facts about the Silk Road and Uzbekistan: name the other 5 '-stan' ('land of...' by the way) countries, alongside Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan... The Silk Road (or Route) seems to wander about between China (some even say Japan) and Turkey, depending on what period you're looking at and whom you believe.  Some routes go north via Russia, others dip into...
Read more

TWO MORE ALMATY NIGHTS

Image
After a good nigt's catch-up sleep and hearty breakfast, it's a short walk up to Central Stat e Museum, one of the largest in Central Asia, established in the 1930s and contained within this building since 1985.   The museum houses the most significant collection of Kazakh historical, archaeological, and modern cultural and political artifacts.  A few highlights...     And a nice cafeteria in the basement for chicken+veg lunch  It’s a 1 mile walk to the Kok-Tobe cable-car which feels rather like an out-of-season seaside town with horrible piped music, sad-looking golden eagle for costumed photos; good view of town though, the mountains and tall Almaty Tower The Ferris wheel gives that little extra height       but the 'Beatles'(!?) statue is quite bad Coffee and view-admiring until sunset   ...
Read more

SECOND TRAIN JOURNEY - SAMARKAND AND ARRIVAL IN BUKHARA

Image
And so onward for our next train trip (post-Soviet but notice the identikit station design!?)   Bukhara ('Buxoro') is Uzbekistan's fifth-largest city (300k inhabitants) but I reckon that number must by doubled by all of the tourists.  The area has been inhabited for five thousand years, with the present city existing for about half that time, serving as a centre of trade, scholarship, culture and religion. Our cab drops is in the Lyabi-Haus area, a plaza built around a pool in 1620 (Lyabi-Haus means 'around the pool' in Tajik) which is one of the tourist centres... and to give you an idea of what I was looking at and the surrounding architecture And, yes, the obligatory bridal couples in search of a picturesque backdrop As well as pools, until the 1900s, Bukhara was watered by a network of canals where people gathered to gossip and wash.  As the water was not changed very often, the city became famous for plagues and water-borne...
Read more