Tag: birds
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Nobody suspects a pigeon….but flamingoes?
We had driven through four landscapes since we left the giant dunes of Sossusvlei. We ambled leisurely through over 120 kilometres down to the coast. Venturing past mountains of rugged rock, more dusty flat pans as far as the eye could see, raggedy, stoned hills covered in tufts of hardy grass, and sporadic, stoic, shadeless,…
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Why did the one-armed man stab the pigeon-killer in the neck?
Side roads, unfit for any mediocre vehicle, lead to places the mind can’t imagine. It’s why we take them. A trip to Diaz Point! Awaiting us was a dilapidated shack of a cafe, some basic, eerily soulless and empty back-packer-esque dorm rooms which were falling apart, a weather-beaten, crumbling house, and some out-buildings which were…
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A corpse, a lot of blood, and a Chelsea smile
Back down the river in the bush north of Ruarwe, we found a new splotch of blood on a large rock by the river. This time, it wasn’t from the floods that came spurting out of my finger. Apart from my unfortunate digit, I haven’t called for the medic for many weeks now! On the…
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Perfect for a paddle…and a few cannonballs
As far as we know, and as far as we like to guess, no human has travelled up this river valley since the mid 19th Century. We assume there was some exploration at the time of slavery, and it may even have been used as a route to escape the lakeshore horrors. There really is…
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Look what we found! …and a Side Stabbing Snake
Tasting with their feet, an abundant and colourful butterfly population are constantly around us as we expedite up the river. Green water snakes hunt fish, spiders cast their webs as sails to catch the wind and transport themselves hundreds of miles, the rare blue-faced monkeys that live here (which actually have a red tint in…
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Leopards, Crabs, and Unknown Poison
Last night, Matt cooked dinner. As he picked up some kindling to move it onto the fire, he was bitten or stung by an unknown creepy crawly. A regular occurrence in the wild if you’re not paying a lot of attention. Losing feeling in his hand and with the numbness spreading up his arm, he…
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A thirst-quenching cauldron full of vivid hallucinogens
Sleeping in a hammock is rather good for keeping you off the jungle floor, if you can sleep! It’s perfect for catching a few winks, but to sleep through the muggy night is rather like trying to sleep in a kitchen drawer as someone is trying to close it shut, while at the same time an electric…
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