Day 333 / 98

Date: 11 March 2023
Sleeping location: Sondzela Backpackers, Mlilwane wildlife sanctuary, Eswatini
Distance (km today/total/total Part 2): 0 / 20525 / 5688
Estimated climb (m today/total/total Part 2): 0 / 183200 / 65200
Worst employee: tied three ways

Day in three words: Walking with beasts

I had a nice lie in (til 7!) but then a sad realisation that I’d left my coffee filters at the previous place. They are a special shape so my coffee is going to have to be filtered with whatever I can get my hands on - thankfully squished up toilet paper works fairly, surprisingly, well. The three cleaners arrived around the same time and seemed to take offence that there was someone staying there as it meant they actually had to do some work. They were unbelievably surly and unhelpful even though Sarah offered them some of the bolognaise for their lunch.

 

There was some good literature on the wildlife reserve*, including a comprehensive map of hiking routes, and we decided to go out for a stomp. The wildlife here are all non-dangerous apart from the hippos and crocs, and they are safe if you stay out of the water, so you can wander freely around. The paths wound through quiet woodland and we saw a couple of Wildebeest, calm as you like amongst the trees, and a load of impala which were not so calm but still let us get quite close before bouncing away. By “Hippo Lake” we had the exciting sight of four pretty big crocodiles in the water, swimming lazily around with big fish and the odd terrapin around them. They all seemed to be eating small fish which must have been shoaling around them. 

From here we decided to take the summit trail, which went upwards (obviously) and out into the open where the sun beat down fiercely on us. We stopped on a shady rock for lunch, where I annoyingly dropped, trod on and broke the cool sunglasses I’d bought in Harare, but Sarah did introduce me to the omelette sandwich which I was immediately on board with. After some more hot stomping we reached the top and the 360 degree views were excellent; you could see down into the valley I’d come through the day before, into forest on the other side and back down into the plains of the nature reserve. There was also a delicious breeze wafting around, and Sarah got very excited about how many types of butterfly there were.  

On the way back we saw a few Kudu from afar and ate some fresh guava that had just fallen off the tree, continuing the feeling of being one with nature and all that. This was burst when we popped into the reserve’s main camp to pick up some drinks and ask about the wifi and were both slightly taken aback by busy and touristy it was, more so than I had experienced in Africa since probably Egypt**. The restaurant did have a nice view over the lake so we had a beer then headed back to our quiet haven. Right outside the hostel was the most magical sight of the day; three zebras, two kudu, one warthog and a wildebeest all grazing together, lit by the low sun and backed by the mountains. 

I had a (deliberately) lukewarm bath, but before I filled it with water I found a tiny black gecko in there, clearly on its last legs. I lifted it out and gave it water and an insect to eat but it wouldn't be saved, and I think, though I may have misheard, that Sarah subsequently threw it out the window. We had more of the huge bolognaise but the cleaners seemed to have wilfully misconstrued Sarah’s offer of “some spaghetti” and had simply taken the entire remaining pack of dry spaghetti, so we had to have leftover spaghetti plus my leftover penne. Before bed we had a chat with the night porter,*** who said that the only time he ever left Eswatini was to go pick up some antelopes from near Johannesburg, and that his monthly take home pay was less than £100. He then spent quite a long time telling us about his various crop and livestock income generating schemes, so perhaps he is actually a millionaire and the night porter role is just a passion project - he does get to carry around a huge gun, after all.

*And on the other two major reserves in Eswatini, one of which apparently allows you to "Enjoy Bush Cuisine Beneath a Giant Sausage Tree" 

**And in that way where - how can I put this kindly - I can’t - the tourists are idiots, led like sheep from one predetermined activity to the next. Also, you could hire crappy mountain bikes for £7 PER HOUR, which is absurd.

*** Who Sarah kept referring to the "Nightman", which cracked me up because this is the name of a sort of boogeyman-like character from the TV show It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. https://itsalwayssunny.fandom.com/wiki/The_Nightman