Yet another early rise to do one last game drive on our way out of the Kruger National Park so we could make our way into Swaziland and camp in another national park for the night. The border crossing guards were a bit grumpy with our tour guides when we got to the Swaziland border, but we but we all got in okay after our tour leaders were chastised for having the wrong paperwork. Oddly, they didn’t even look at our passports when they stamped them. They just wanted us to have a blank page open so they could stamp them more easily.
It became quickly apparent at the border that there is a very high AIDS rate throughout area. There were big piles of free condoms at the border gate and lots of billboards encouraging men to get tested and to stick with one woman throughout the country. Ironic considering the King of Swaziland has so many wives. A whopping 70% of people living in the area are considered to be carrying the AIDS virus.
Swaziland is surprisingly very beautiful with lots of green mountains and tropical agriculture including sugar cane, bananas, and pineapple. Surprisingly because it really seemed different from dryer, flatter South Africa. The cities seems modern enough with good facilities and modern shopping centres – at least compared to what I saw in South America.
Just before arrival in Swaziland I disclosed to my tour guides (and my group group) that I once had a Swazi wife and was especially curious to see the country. Of course, my guides made endless running jokes about me having to pay off my cattle debt (10-50 cows to the bride’s family depending on a number of circumstances).
We camped at one of the biggest national parks in Swaziland and went on game drive and walk in which was really quite different (being on foot) and quite good. It was a bit unnerving to be walking on the ground amongst baboons, zebras, giraffes, and other big animals. There were no lions though – they were kept in another area of the park. On the drive out to our walking area our ranger had to stop the safari jeep twice to clear a string of caterpillars crossing the road in single file without killing any.
After our walking safari we returned to our camp for dinner and an opportunity to be entertained with traditional Swazi singing and dancing by the national park staff. Lots of good high kicking that I first saw with a performance by Juluka in Philadelphia in the mid-eighties.
Overall the camp in the national park was a very nice place with a warm atmosphere. There was no electricity, but they put gas lamps for us out in the bathrooms which warmed the places up nicely during the cooler evening and first thing in the mornings.
