moving to word press.
follow me at:
http://timredge.wordpress.com
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Monday, January 4, 2010
coffee table book
In case anyone out there is still reading this (which I doubt), I just added a link to the blurb.com coffee table book that I made of the trip. Just in case anyone wants one. I'm pretty sure I already gave them to the 2 people who definitely wanted one,. but its out there if you want. I make no profit from it, its just the cost to manufacture the books by blurb. Happy New Year!
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Western Cape, South Africa
Well, I'm in the final leg of this journey. I've been in South Africa about a week or so now, mostly in Cape Town, but I've just spent a few nights up in the Stellenbosch and Franschhoek Winelands areas. The first thing I have to say is that this doesn't really seem like the same continent that I've been on for the last few months. It's way more first world - for the most part. There are little things that pop out every now and then that remind you its Africa - like far too many people simply walking down the road miles from anywhere. It is an amazingly beautiful place though.
I'm flying back to SF a week from today and I have to say I'm pretty excited about it. I def feel like I've seen and done a ton of things and I have a much better idea of what this place is all about. I think I made good use of my first few months of unemployment and I'm ready to get back and enjoy some fun in SF with Tully. She was originally going to join me for some version of this final leg of the trip, but she wasn't able to get enough time away from the office to make the ~30 hour flights worth it. I'm heading back a few weeks earlier than planned (but having accomplished everything I wanted to accomplish) and we're gonna hit something a little closer to SF soon (almost anything is closer to SF!). So there may be a few non-Africa posts on here soon...
I may or may not get around to posting again before I head back. If we keep getting a good mix of crappy weather like we have been, maybe I'll get on again, but hopefully I find some things to occupy my time and stay away from the Internet cafes. Its is low season here and there are not many people around...pretty sleepy in general - even in Cape Town.
We were foiled trying to hike up Table Mountain during our 5 days in Cape Town. The 3 pictures here are from the best weather day we had, which still had Table Mountain cloaked in the "tablecloth" of clouds. We hiked nearby Lion's Head instead and got these shots (top to bottom: Camps Bay section of Cape Town with the 12 Apostles behind, the upper part of the City Bowl and some Table Mountain - with and without me).
The final shot is of the little rental car that Purvis and I are cruising around in for the next week with the Franschhoek Valley in the background. Yesterday (when this pic was taken) was nice here, but its shitty again today and we're taking off for some mountain driving and then the coast and hopefully some great white shark cage diving on the way back to Cape Town. It took me a bit to get used to the left-hand driving (including a few high pitched screams from the passenger), but now I'm settled and I'll prob need to do some adjusting when I get back home. Quite a bit more traffic here than on thesouth island of New Zealand, whcih was my only other left-hand drive experience before this.
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Victoria Falls
Here are some of the other pics I mentioned from Victoria Falls.
There are 2 aerial shots from the helicopter showing the falls - one that shows the falls and the zig zag canyon downstream that we rafted in (including the bridge that the bungee goes off of). The second shows more of the full width of the falls so you can see how low the flow is right now (the wall shown is 100% falls in the high water season).
I also included 2 shots from our trip to Devil's Pool at the top of the falls. You can see how close we are to the edge we are here and, I have to say, it was pretty scary. We swam out to the rocks where our guide, Prince showed us the pool and we were like "we're jumping into THAT?!?" Once we got it it wasn't so bad, but i never felt comfortabel enough to come fully out of the pool and sit up on the rock like Prince is. You could definitely feel the current pushing!
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Zambia Swimming
I'm in Cape Town chilling on a rainy morning so I thought I'd throw up so words to go with the pics I put up yesterday. Someone was waiting for the computer at my hotel so I threw up the pics only yesterday.
We were only in Zambia for a few days, but we (and especially me) crammed in alot of activity. I did the bungee jump, gorge swing, zipline combo over the gorge below the Victoria Falls the day we got there. The next day we went whitewater rafting in the morning and then did a short helicopter ride over the falls to get a very enlightening aerial view. I'll add some of those pics later if I get a chance.
The whitewater rafting was fairly insane, but a TON of fun. We did a half day which is about half the rapids you can do, but they are supposedly the craziest ones. We did 9 of the 10 "official" rapids - they didn't count the class II/III rapids in the 10 count and one of the 10 was a class VI called "Commercial Suicide" that we walked around.
Victoria falls is on the border of Zambia and Zimbabwe (the Zambezi River marks the border). It is 1.7km wide and about 105m high (the bungee from the bridge was 111m). Once the river reaches the bottom of the falls, it runs thru a narrow, zig-zagging canyon, which is where we rafted.
The first rapid is a gnarley class V called The Boiling Pot that you have to approach sideways because of where the entry point is. They used to enter upstream a bit to hit it head on, but years ago a giant boulder fell up there and killed some porters so they had to move the start for safety reasons. We didn't make it thru on our first attempt, but made it out to try again and got absolutely pummeled on the second try. That's the photo you see where only John and the guide, Potatoe guide are visible because the rest of us are underwater. The other shot with the rocks in the background (at the bottom of the post) is right before we enter the full rapid.
I just watched the video they filmed of us and it looks like we were each underwater for anywhere from 10-14 seconds! I was not as scared as I probably should have been. I'm not sure if I was held down or had been sucked down deep (the river is about 50m deep there) - probably some of both, but I did start realizing how long I was under and then finally came up right before I couldn't hold my breath anymore. Quite an intro to the river and the day at 9am.
The 3 pics where we are heading right to left (including the one where more than half the boat is underwater, but upright) are from one of the class Vs that we actually stuck- believe it or not.
The other 2 shots where we are going left to right are from our second class V wipe out of the day, which came fairly early. We were starting to feel like we didn't really need the boat at that point. It was a quite crash, but none of us where held under for nearly as long as the first rapid.
The other boat with us ended up flipping on 2 rapids as well, but they were completely different ones then we flipped on. The guides mentioned that the day had "alot of action."
Some of the people we rafted with recommended sitting in The Devil's Pool which is a little pool at the top of the falls literally right on the edge - something you can only do in low water months like now (low water months also make for crazier rafting). Rob, Tim and I got up early to do that the next day before our flight to Cape Town. I'll put up a pic later.
I wish it would stop raining here already.
We were only in Zambia for a few days, but we (and especially me) crammed in alot of activity. I did the bungee jump, gorge swing, zipline combo over the gorge below the Victoria Falls the day we got there. The next day we went whitewater rafting in the morning and then did a short helicopter ride over the falls to get a very enlightening aerial view. I'll add some of those pics later if I get a chance.
The whitewater rafting was fairly insane, but a TON of fun. We did a half day which is about half the rapids you can do, but they are supposedly the craziest ones. We did 9 of the 10 "official" rapids - they didn't count the class II/III rapids in the 10 count and one of the 10 was a class VI called "Commercial Suicide" that we walked around.
Victoria falls is on the border of Zambia and Zimbabwe (the Zambezi River marks the border). It is 1.7km wide and about 105m high (the bungee from the bridge was 111m). Once the river reaches the bottom of the falls, it runs thru a narrow, zig-zagging canyon, which is where we rafted.
The first rapid is a gnarley class V called The Boiling Pot that you have to approach sideways because of where the entry point is. They used to enter upstream a bit to hit it head on, but years ago a giant boulder fell up there and killed some porters so they had to move the start for safety reasons. We didn't make it thru on our first attempt, but made it out to try again and got absolutely pummeled on the second try. That's the photo you see where only John and the guide, Potatoe guide are visible because the rest of us are underwater. The other shot with the rocks in the background (at the bottom of the post) is right before we enter the full rapid.
I just watched the video they filmed of us and it looks like we were each underwater for anywhere from 10-14 seconds! I was not as scared as I probably should have been. I'm not sure if I was held down or had been sucked down deep (the river is about 50m deep there) - probably some of both, but I did start realizing how long I was under and then finally came up right before I couldn't hold my breath anymore. Quite an intro to the river and the day at 9am.
The 3 pics where we are heading right to left (including the one where more than half the boat is underwater, but upright) are from one of the class Vs that we actually stuck- believe it or not.
The other 2 shots where we are going left to right are from our second class V wipe out of the day, which came fairly early. We were starting to feel like we didn't really need the boat at that point. It was a quite crash, but none of us where held under for nearly as long as the first rapid.
The other boat with us ended up flipping on 2 rapids as well, but they were completely different ones then we flipped on. The guides mentioned that the day had "alot of action."
Some of the people we rafted with recommended sitting in The Devil's Pool which is a little pool at the top of the falls literally right on the edge - something you can only do in low water months like now (low water months also make for crazier rafting). Rob, Tim and I got up early to do that the next day before our flight to Cape Town. I'll put up a pic later.
I wish it would stop raining here already.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)