Day 30. Sun 16th May
Mwabvi, second trip, day 3.
There is another trip into the park planned for today, but with less walking!.
However this is delayed as the builders need more cement, and Lester's two
wives (two wives!!) need a lift to church, so the Bangula Taxi Service
leaps into operation and off we go to Bangula again. When we get back the
builders are out of water, so the barrels are loaded up and off go the
crew to the bore hole.
We finally get to the gate house about 8 and drive south-west to the
Mwabvi Staff site, which has two houses and ancillary buildings (now disused).
There is also a tourist camp site here, but the only evidence of this is
a small "shelter" (ie. grass hut with a hole in the floor). Lester and
I walk up to the "Where to go" Gorge (so called because you can't go any
further!). It's very beautiful here, and we see fresh crocodile droppings
but the depositor is not in evidence. Lester also shows me a rock that
has been used as a burial site up until about 20 years ago, there is still
one coffin in one of the holes, and a rock full of holes that used to house
beehives - there is still a wooden ladder built by the villagers to climb
up and collect the honey.
Back at the gate house Lester and I look at the park map, and Lester shows
me where we have been. He reckons we only walked about 10Km yesterday,
but I'm sure it must have been further. He and Gracious ask me to take
some photos of their families, which I do. Lester only seems to have one
wife in evidence now, and Gracious' wife doesn't want to be in, so his
kids pose on the motorbike.
After lunch we pop into Bangula again for petrol, and call in at the brewing
village on the way back to see if we can visit this time, but apparently
they are not brewing today, so I've missed it yet again. However, the day
is not lost, as Auxies drops me at the gate house and I spend a couple
of hours with Lester and the other park staff and the teach me how to play
Bao. This is a board game common across most of eastern Africa, and I have
wanted to learn ever since I saw people playing it when I was on the African
Odyssey. The rules are fairly simple but the strategy is very complicated
and one game can go on for hours and hours.
At five I have to get back to the site to pay the workers (the bricklayers
receive 200MK, about £1, per day, and the casual labourers 60MK).
One of the guys is demolishing a temite mound at the back of the store
building. I've never actually seen inside a termite mound before.
The smell in the cool box turns out to be the chicken. Auxies cooks it
anyway, but I am having none of it, and in the end even he decides it's
too far gone and chucks it. The steak doesn't look too healthy either,
but I make sure he cooks it well and it seems OK - there are no repercussions
in the night anyway, thank goodness. My desire to avoid having to go into
the bush at night has not lessened since the Kalahari.