Around the World in 50 Years (28 page)

Logistics are crucial on a trip of this length and variety of terrain. I toted everything I'd need—except drink, dinners, and detergent—because they'd be unavailable, or unreliable, or way overpriced in these countries. Since I didn't want to drag a quarter ton of crap through 13 countries for two months, and the African airlines permitted only 44 pounds, I organized a hub-and-spokes itinerary whereby I'd store my luggage at a lodge in Johannesburg that was gated and relatively safe in a city known for one of the world's highest crime rates. From that base I'd fly to different quadrants in southern Africa, travel through each by land for one to three weeks, and periodically wing back to Joburg for one quick night to replenish supplies and enjoy a hot shower.

As my route was far from doctors, I took a complete medical kit, from hypodermic needles—the ones in African hospitals are often contaminated with HIV—to six kinds of antibiotics and three antifungals. (Africa accounts for less than 1% of world drug sales, and offered few places that sold them.) Add a tent, eating utensils, binoculars, camera and peripherals, photocopies of guide books, eight paperback novels, water-purification pills, 70 packets of iced-tea mix, mountain gear, desert gear, rain gear, swamp gear, bush gear, game-tracking gear, snorkeling gear, etc., plus six 64-ounce plastic bottles packed with high-fiber, high-energy breakfast cereals, and I was lugging 130 pounds.

Money was another problem. Faced with few ATMs in the region, and no credit-card commerce out in the bush, I prepaid whatever I could before I left home and carried a hidden hoard of cash for the rest, each greenback selected in conformity with African monetary esoterica (e.g., they will not accept worn, torn, or crumpled bills, or bills with writing on them, or the older version of our $50 bill—the one with an ellipse around Ulysses S. Grant—and only the most recent, hard-to-counterfeit version of the $100 bill).

For accommodations, I planned to spend a couple of nights in my tent, followed by one in a downscale hotel to clean up, and occasionally visit a backpacker's hangout to obtain up-to-date info on which roads were open, which bridges washed out, which ferries still in business, and where the bandits and other bad guys were most active.

I got Hepatitis A and yellow-fever booster shots. Those vaccinations had once been considered valid for twelve years, but the international health authorities had recently dropped it to ten, which meant my official yellow-fever protection expired on the next-to-last day of my last segment, when I'd be en route from the Congo back to Joburg to reclaim my luggage and catch my flight to JFK. That one day should not have been sufficient to quarantine me, but I decided to be prudent and not provide some underpaid border guard with an easy excuse to put me in the pokey until I bought my way out.

On the first day of this trip, Murphy's Law kicked in and caused several setbacks: The Angolan Embassy held my application for so long that UPS was unable to deliver my passport back to me until three hours before I was scheduled to take off. The Transportation Safety Agency guards at JFK confiscated my lunch, a can of Chef Boyardee spaghetti and meatballs, insisting it was a liquid. A battery of violent thunderstorm cells delayed our takeoff for 100 minutes, causing my baggage to miss its connection in London. And on arriving in Joburg I learned that South Africa had just reported a swine flu epidemic in all of its nine provinces.

Most serious of all, my four-leaf clover was exfoliating. I kept it in the front of my plastic passport protector, and had taken it abroad for years for good luck and to mislead any anti-American terrorist kidnappers into thinking I was Irish. At South African immigration a pair of the leaves disengaged. How much luck could I expect from a two-leaf clover?

All in all, not an auspicious beginning for the easiest part of a hard trip.

Before leaving Tabo Airport, I bought several newspapers for the latest African news:

Nigeria
—Four guards burned to death by rebels attacking an oil pipeline.

Mozambique
—Ten tourists killed in bus crash caused by wild driver.

Kenya
—Continuing difficulties starting investigation of post-election slaughter.

Malawi
—AIDS orphans in high demand overseas.

Sudan
—Attacks continue in Darfur region.

Mauritania
—Muslim cleric denounces participation in Miss Universe competition.

Zimbabwe
—Violent demonstrations disrupt drafting of power-sharing constitution.

Uganda
—HIV infections reach new high, truckers blamed.

Oh, Dear Africa!

A clever headline in a Joburg tabloid captured my attention. The local prostitutes were petitioning for a raise in their rates to coincide with the influx of tourists expected the following year, when South Africa hosted the soccer World Cup, the biggest sporting event on the planet:

SEX WORKERS HOPING TO GET MORE BUCKS FOR THE BANG.

Next to it was a story about Bishop Tutu. That outspoken and highly quotable cleric had addressed a group of visiting missionaries and had concluded with: “In the beginning, we had the land and you had the Bible. And you said to us, Brothers, let us pray. So we bowed our heads and closed our eyes, and when we looked up, we had the Bible—and you had the land.”

The large banner welcoming arrivals at the airport also made me smile:

WELCOME TO SOUTH AFRICA

HOME TO THE BIG FIVE,

AND THE OTHER BIG GAME

Because I'd been fortunate to see all of the Big Five previously, on this trip I'd try to spot the Little Five: the elephant shrew, the rhinoceros beetle, the buffalo weaver, the leopard tortoise, and the ant lion.

Two days later, I arrived by bus in Maseru on the happy occasion of the birthday of His Royal Highness of the Mountain Kingdom of Lesotho, a pleasant, land-locked, little, and little-known, country in the southeastern corner of Africa. It's the only nation where every bit of land is above 4,500 feet, and 80 percent of it is above 6,000 feet.

I'd purposely chosen to return to southern Africa in their winter because I find it far easier to travel with a bit of bracing coolness than the oppressive heat, rains, and humidity of African summers. I presumed Lesotho would be more than merely cool in view of its high elevation and far distance from the Equator, and so it was, with ice blocking the sidewalk gutters of Maseru as the temp fell below freezing by six p.m. and stayed down there till nine a.m.

I had no space for heavy winter clothing, nor need for it after those first five days, so I'd opted for the “layered” approach to staying warm. And layered I went around Lesotho, often wearing, at the same time, two sets of ski underwear, two T-shirts, and two sweatshirts. This drew hilarious laughter from a sweet young thing who'd picked me up in the supermarket and accompanied me back to my guesthouse—where she uncovered my wardrobe redundancy.

I quickly grew to appreciate why the national dress of Lesotho was a gigantic, thick, densely woven blanket made from the exceptionally warm wool of their high-altitude sheep and goats. The men wore one wrapped around their bodies; the women often wore two, one from the waist down as a skirt and the other around their shoulders, with much additional clothing underneath. And they all wore ski-style wool hats.

On my first day out of Maseru, I miraculously managed to stay on a horse through God Help Me Pass in the Central Mountain Range and was able to survive the ride to happily celebrate both His Majesty's continued good health—and mine. The horse whisperers had assured me they'd provide me with a “gentle little pony,” but the beast they produced was at least 14 hands high, seemed to have a vision problem, definitely had an attitude problem, and understood no English—or pretended not to.

The only thing that saved my butt was the Lesotho pommel, an arch-shaped metal handle in the front of the saddle which the rider can, if necessary—and it was quite necessary—cling to with both hands. It offered the further benefit that, unlike the pommel on a Western saddle, it does not bump, bang, and batter your balls as you're pushed forward when trotting downhill; they safely slide under it.

Lesotho is totally unlike the rest of Africa. Its far-from-low Lowlands are reminiscent of the Big Sky Country of Montana, with wide flat plains and valleys surrounded by mountains. Its middling elevations are akin to Arizona, with multicolored eroded buttes and sheer escarpments. And its highest elevations are a touch of Tibet: a cold, gray, treeless topography surrounded by snow-covered peaks. It boasts the highest peak south of Kilimanjaro and the highest low point (4,593 feet) of any country on the planet.

I loved camping out in the countryside on those clear, cloudless nights, surrounded by snow-covered mountains close by, their steep whitened slopes and icy summits shimmering in the starlight, hardly believing I was in
Africa,
a wondrous Africa few travelers experience. I lay on my back on the chilly ground beside my tent and looked up at brilliant Vega and Antares and unfamiliar constellations I'd seen only in astronomy texts: Hercules and Lyra, Sagittarius and Scorpius, Cygnus and Vulpecula and, off to the side, Alpha Centauri and Beta Centauri pointing the way across light-years of black sky to the Southern Cross. I was at peace with the universe and, as I crawled back into my toasty sleeping bag, felt myself a most fortunate fellow.

Although spectacular, Lesotho is a pitifully poor land, populated by two million, 40 percent of whom earn less than $1.25 a day. More than half the populace is engaged in agriculture even though their country has little flat and fertile land suitable for farming. It has no commercial minerals save diamonds (including some real biggies, like the 601-carat Lesotho Brown and the 603-carat white Lesotho Promise); no big game to attract rich hunters; no forests, no ports, and no heavy industry, although it does have a big plant making Levi's jeans and exports more garments to the U.S. than any state in sub-Saharan Africa.

In a scene atypical of Africa, the treeless mountains of Lesotho are covered with snow and ice in winter. It is the only state in the world entirely above 1,000 meters (3,300 feet), and its lowest point of 4,593 feet is the highest low point of any country.

For many years Lesotho earned foreign exchange from politically correct, socially concerned tourists who refused to visit South Africa during the period of apartheid and flocked instead to Lesotho's gambling casinos. But when South Africa's race laws were rescinded in 1991, and its black citizens were allowed to rule their land and elected Nelson Mandela president in 1994, most of the tourists reverted to its warmer weather, Western amenities, and varied amusements.

Lesotho was left with few tourists and only two, mostly deserted, casinos. It survived on international aid, workers' remittances, garment making, Chinese projects (which come with tight strings attached), and, lately, the Lesotho Highlands Water Project, a multibillion-dollar-engineering marvel I visited that is financed by South Africa to capture, store, and transfer water to the part of South Africa where most of its mining and industrial activity takes place. When completed it will comprise five large dams to also furnish drinking water for the thirsty denizens of Joburg, about 200 miles downhill, and emergency drought relief for the Free State, while earning Lesotho royalties and satisfying all its electric needs.

Lesotho had proven to be such an ideal tourist destination, with spectacular scenery, good roads, virtually no crime, friendly people who mostly spoke some English; a salubrious climate, bright and cloudless winter days; and no malaria or other insect-borne diseases, that I was reluctant to leave.

I returned to Joburg to pick up some supplies and clean clothes, celebrate Nelson Mandela Day, and prepare to rendezvous with Anna, who was flying in for our visit to Namibia and Botswana.

I had a spare day and didn't want to hang around crime-ridden Joburg, which had 40 percent unemployment, so I took a quick round-trip down to Durban, one of my favorite cities, flying on South Africa's new, low-low-cost airline, Kulula, which was establishing a reputation as an offbeat company with a wicked South African sense of humor that tries to take the fear out of flying and replace it with fun. I got the message as soon as I walked onto the tarmac and saw the plane, painted bright chartreuse, with a vertical arrow in the middle next to the words
THIS SIDE UP.
Its companion aircraft, in the adjacent jetway, was designated as
FLYING 101
and decorated with signs naming all the parts.

To cut costs and time, Kulula did not reserve seats; you just boarded and selected whichever you wanted. When several passengers on my flight took too long to do this, the attendant grabbed her mike: “Come on people, we're not picking out furniture here. Just find a seat and get in it!”

Then came the seat-belt announcement: “To operate your seat belt, insert the metal tab into the buckle and pull tight. It works just like every other seat belt. And if you don't know how to operate one, you probably shouldn't be out in public unsupervised.” Which was immediately followed by: “In the event of a sudden loss of cabin pressure, masks will descend from the ceiling. Stop screaming, grab the mask, and pull it over your face. If you have a small child traveling with you, secure your mask before assisting with theirs. If you are traveling with more than one small child, pick your favorite.” When the laughter had faded, she added, “If you need to smoke, the smoking section is on the wing; if you can light 'em, you can smoke 'em.”