Author: Joel

Castilla-La Mancha and Extremadura, Spain

Bullfighting and Fending off Bulls

Joel

We came to the very first town in Spain, called Villanueva del Fresno, and immediately discovered a recommended hiking trail just outside of town. It was twelve kilometres long but we found at the turnoff that there was really no safe place to park our campervan – so we drove and drove along a narrow beautiful laneway past many wildflowers and grazing livestock to find a place to ditch the van. Three kilometres later, we found a place to park next to a very old stone bridge across the Rio Alcarrache.

Well, that made our hike easier. Now down to a six-kilometre loop, we set off to hike along the river amongst grazing bulls and cows – which made a few of us a bit wary enough to opt for the other side of a barbed wire fence. Eventually, we found the trail cutting inland and worked our way back to the campervan. We decided this place was so nice it was going to be our campsite for the night!

Needing dinner and being high on castle exploration from earlier in the day, we decided to head back into Villanueva del Fresno for another snoop around narrow cobblestone laneways, central squares, and a castle. Like many of the villages we visited, the young children would all head to the village square to play after school.

We tanked up our water supplies again and headed for the village castle. This one was much more of a pile of rubble than the Castelo de Mourão, but it was situated with beautiful views of the surrounding countryside.

We discovered a local bullfighting ring in the village, so we decided to pop by and see if we could have a snoop. After a circumference of the structure and a few tries at the main door, and caretaker popped out and invited us all in for a free guided tour. It was only used a few times a month, but it was interesting to see the inside. Having seen a real bullfight in Mérida, Venezuela at the age of 8, I was not keen to see another.

After our bullfighting tour, we set off to try and find a place to eat dinner. There were a few recommendations in town, but neither opened until 9PM – as with most of Spain. To kill some time waiting, we found a pub open and drank ourselves some local beers. And what was on the big TVs in the pub? A live graphic broadcast of a bullfight going on in neighboring Seville. I chose not to watch, but many of my travelling companions could help but sneak a gory peek from time to time.

Finally, 9PM arrived and we heading down to the recommended restaurant. It turned out to be one of the best meals of our visit. They seem to be big on garlic around here, but that doesn’t bother me one bit.

Afterwards, we headed back to our planned camping spot late and I pitched my tent in the headlights of the van on the other side of a cattle fence, so I didn’t get visited in the night. A beautiful spot that turned out to be our favorite over the period of our travels, but I can’t say I slept great thinking about farm dogs visiting or whether a farmer might want us to move on.

Alentejo, Portugal

Medieval Castle Exploration

Joel

Woke up early with the intention of hitting the highway, but realizing we needed breakfast and groceries, we found ourselves making another visit back inside the walled city of Évora. This time we drove and parked just outside the gates.

All stocked up, we got out of town and headed for Spain – making a stop along the way in the tiny village of Vendinha. We picked up that almost every town has a central square with free-flowing drinking water, so we filled up our jugs for the next day’s supply. We also discovered wine is very cheap – and doesn’t seem to cause migraines, so we were making sure we always had a bottle for meals.

After more coffee stops along the way, we pulled into the small village of Mourão for a homemade lunch and a bit of a snoop. Another gorgeous little-cobblestoned town with a castle on a hill overlooking the area. It seems every town has a castle of varying upkeep dating back to medieval battles between Spain, Portugal, and Moroccans.

Not being sure on the cost of entry to the Castelo de Mourão, we decided to just sneak up and walk around the perimeter to see what it was like for free. When we got around to the front, we discovered it was wide open for anyone to explore with medieval spiral staircases that led us up to the tops of the towers and castle walls. It was full of grazing sheep and had the usual church inside – which was still being used by the community. It was a very cool and unexpected find.

After we satisfied ourselves with the town of Mourão, we crossed into Spain. Expecting to find some sort of passport control, we simply saw a sign marking the country boundary instead.

Alentejo, Portugal

Roman Ruins in Medieval Évora

Joel

After a quick and early breakfast, we left the chilly Atlantic coast and headed inland for the warmth of southern Spain. We found ourselves driving on many brand new and deserted multilane highways over long expensive bridges to get around to the east side of Lisbon. Eventually tired of the multilane highways, we decided to try out some back roads for the last third of our journey to see the real Portugal. We found many cork tree farms and eucalyptus plantations and explored a few. We also made the obligatory stops for Portugal espresso coffees and custard pastries a few times.

By midday, we arrived at our destination for the night. It was the beautiful town of Évora. Évora is another UNESCO World Heritage Site surrounded by medieval walls and containing many narrow cobblestone streets, cathedrals, and even Roman ruins. Not a place to even think about driving a campervan, we instead explored the tiny laneways for the for rest of day on foot. The Roman ruins were my first and were amazing to see and think about the builders thousands of years ago. We managed to get on top of the highest cathedral for a good look around the city and surrounding countryside. A very beautiful place.

Before heading back to our campsite, we had a crazy dinner with wacky waiters at a weird restaurant in the walled city. So far, I have not been too impressed with Portuguese cooking: Big on meat, not so big on vegetables. The meat always brought out very undercooked as well, seemingly being merely blanched before being served.

19,000 steps later, I was back in my tent at our campsite – which was a hike in itself outside of the walled city.

Lisbon Area, Portugal

Secret Stairwells

Joel

After a good night’s sleep with earplugs, I woke up early to get back up on the roof and get some pictures. A few of my travelling companions were also up, so we decided to sneak out early for a bit of a look around and to find some local coffee and pastries. There were numerous cafes within easy walking distance, so we dropped by a number of them for multiple coffees and more custard pastries. Fully awake, we headed back to our hostel for our included breakfast.

We packed up and drove into downtown Lisbon to check out a few sites for hitting the road for the rural life. A few recommendations were a ceramics shop that sold pottery by the pound and a castle overlooking the city. It quickly became apparent that driving a campervan would be a challenge in the tiny narrow streets of Lisbon, so we ditched the vehicle near the ceramics store and hoofed it down across the valley to get up to the Castelo de S. Jorge. A big climb and many steps later, we found it extremely popular with other tourists and with long lines that we decided weren’t worth waiting in, so we explored the tiny alleyways surrounding the area. There were lots of really cool tiny twisty roads to get around. After satisfying ourselves with a good introduction to Lisbon, we headed back down through the valley and back up to our car on the other side.

Our aim was to hit the highways and explore some old country towns, so we started out by heading towards the sea to a town called Sintra, which has the distinction for being a UNESCO World Heritage Site for its “Cultural Landscape”. The hilly countryside and small villages were beautiful and seemed stuck in time. We ended up visiting the tunnels and underground spiral staircases of Quinta da Regaleira. It was designed and built in the late 1800’s for a very wealthy coffee businessman and used for Tarot initiation rites, among other things. An amazing place.

Afterwards, we headed up the coast to find some camping along the beach at Erisceira and to see these huge surfing waves Portugal is famous for. We ended up at a bit of a dodgy and mostly vacant campground with no toilet seats or toilet paper. Even though we had been on our feet for most of the day, we hiked into town for dinner and found a beautiful historic town with more cobblestone streets and white painted dwellings. It had very cool old laneways and ocean views reminiscent of images of Greek coastal communities. Had another fish dinner on snapper while watching the sunset over the Atlantic Ocean.

27,000 steps later, I headed for my little tent. A walking record for me.

Lisbon Area, Portugal

Hello Lisbon

Joel

Arrive in Lisbon after flying 20 hours on an interesting flightpath that took us over parts of Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Cairo, Tunisia, the Mediterranean, and Spain. I meet up with my travelling companions at the airport exhausted, of course. We were to meet up with our campervan supplier at the airport, but there was confusion about where and when we were to meet. Eventually, they picked us up in a tiny car we couldn’t all fit it (some caught the subway). We drove about 1/2 hour south of Lisbon over a golden gate looking bridge and past a giant Jesus to a small country town for briefing and van pickup.

Headed into our Lisbon hostel on the outskirts of downtown. Found a great view of the town up on the roof. The six of us took over a dorm room and claimed bunks for the night.

After a bit of recuperation, we embarked on a hike down the beautiful leafy and cobblestones Avenue da Liverdade to explore the streets, admire the old architecture, and find some dinner. Along the way we snack on roasted chestnuts, got out shoes polished where applicable, and ate some custard pastry. We eventually found a fine fish restaurant on a steep side street and have nice codfish dinner.

About as much as I could handle on 48 hours without sleep, I separated from the group and headed back to the hostel to crash for the night.

Kenya, Rift Valley

Born Free

Joel

For my last weekend in Kenya, we made one last trip into the Rift Valley. This time we visited the very beautiful Lake Naivasha National Park for a bit of easy hiking and a bit more wildlife spotting. We did another crater rim hike, but is was not nearly as spectacular as Mount Longonot – although it did have a lake in the middle. It was fittingly called Crater Lake. We could see giraffes on the volcano floor along with a number of warthogs. Outside of the crater were plenty more giraffes, impalas, and other herbivores.

Crater Lake Volcano Hike

We stopped by the Ranch House Bistro for lunch as we started our return journey to Nairobi. Afterwards, as we continued our trip, we dropped by Elsamere for a cup of tea and a browse around the house that was home to George and Joy Adamson of “Born Free” fame. The property was named after Elsa the lion – and star of the same film. There was a 45 minute documentary to watch and many of their possessions on display. The house was built in a beautiful location on the shores of Lake Naivasha. A group of baboons, and later, colobus monkeys, swung around in the trees next to the lake to keep us entertained.

Kenya, Maasai Mara, Nairobi

Angry Elephants and Wounded Lions

Joel

My final Naboisho Conservancy safari had us stalking injured lions for a while.  The male lion had a limp and one of the lionesses had a nasty looking open wound on her inner leg. There must have been some fighting with the elephants overnight, we were told.  The elephants had been quite noisy near our camp all night and they woke me up with their trumpeting repeatedly. 

Perhaps the elephants were still a bit spooked or stressed out from the night’s encounters because they seemed quite hostile towards us in our safari vehicle. One wrapped his trunk around one of his tusks (a sign of flaunting his tusk at us, one of our guides said). Another projected his ears straight out, a sign of hostility. We also saw plenty of zebras and the usual herbivores, but still no leopards!

Sometime shortly after the morning game drive, I began to feel quite sick all of the sudden. Was it my malaria pill? No, it must have been a bout with gastro, because I got very sick on way back to airport. My car sickness was probably due to a number of things, but being called half way to the airport to let us know my flight had arrived 45 minutes early prompted my driver guide to start racing down the very poor four wheel drive tracks – which was about as much as my stomach could take.

As the sole passenger on my first flight, we flew straight into the Maasai Mara National Reserve and parked the plane. All of us on board (me and the crew) had to disembark and wait for an equal sized connecting flight from there back to Nairobi where we were treated with yet more horrendous Nairobi traffic chaos on our return. Some entrepreneurs had created roadblocks on freeway entrance ramps so they could demand bribes from drivers to get out of the traffic. Fortunately, they didn’t interfere with us.

Kenya, Maasai Mara

The Naboisho Conservancy

Joel

The camp I stayed in was quite interesting, because it was genuinely in the middle of a completely wild area – full of predators. We were allowed to walk around the immediate camp during the day, but as soon as twilight and nightfall came, we were strictly forbidden from leaving our tents or the main building without a Maasai Warrior escort. If we did need to leave our tents for whatever reason after dark, we were to call the front desk for an escort. Fortunately, our tents included flushing toilets and showers – one indoor and one outdoor. We were not permitted to use the outdoor showers at night.

The Naboisho Conservancy was gorgeous. I went on game drives every chance I could, and even through in another morning walk with some other guests. We saw several jackals and hyenas and a lion on the drive out to our walking spot, but fewer animals once we were out there.

On the evening drive we found another cheetah, this time male with no collar – but he wasn’t nearly as active as the female we saw earlier – just laying around.  Also saw evidence of a fresh kill by our local lioness, and suspected she was tucked away feeding her young in some bushes.  There were a number of jackals nearby waiting for their chance to grab their share (which tipped off our guides that something was up).  We saw lots of giraffes, ostriches (including females running), and came across a pride of lions on our way home.  They were initially relaxing on the sole road back to our camp, blocking our way about 1km away, but then one of them started digging out a warthog hole under a big bush.  Eventually the lion gave up when it encountered what appeared to be too many roots interfering with its quest to widen the hole.

The next morning we went out on a great morning game drive in the hopes of finding some leopards.  We followed a new track along a stream that was full of hippopotamuses swimming and running around feeding on nearby grasses.  Also saw lots of elephants and some giraffes.  Excitingly, we got the land cruiser bogged in a creek and our driver and his assistant took about 1/2 hour of fiddling around with the jack, branches, and rocks to finally get us out.  We also saw lots and lots of baboons.

The evening safari found us plenty of lions, elephants, giraffes, antelopes, zebras, etc…

Kenya, Maasai Mara

Not sure my insurance would have covered this…

Joel

I had the chance to do a walking safari with spear wielding Maasai Warriors in the Mara this morning. They have been living in the area for countless generations, so I put my trust in their ability to protect me from the local predators using their traditional techniques. First we drove to a shorter grassy area for better, safer visibility.  There were two walking in front of me, two walking behind, and one next to me who also served as a guide. We did hear a lion bellow for its pride part way through our walk. They claimed it was probably 2kms away at the time.

Naboisho Conservancy Walking Safari

Sounds exciting, but most animals kept a wide berth. I found that staying in the truck gave far better photo opportunities. That afternoon I headed out with another couple for an evening game drive. I was quite thrilled to come across my first wild cheetah! A very beautiful animal. We stalked it for about 45 minutes and watched its cat-like behavior as it tried to pursue prey.

It was interesting to see how most of the herbivores would stand up to the carnivores with tremendous confidence, and send out the alarm to their fellow herbivores – all to protect their little ones. The cheetah was regularly rebuffed by teamed up prey (using strength in numbers), and eventually chased out of the area by three hyenas. 

It is also interesting how most animals seem total unfazed about a safari vehicle shadowing them just meters away. Elephants would sometimes react, impalas would always move on after we would stop, but most would just ignore us – not realizing there were people inside.

Kenya, Maasai Mara

A hop, skip, and a jump

Joel

Headed off for an exciting week living amongst local predators in the Maasai Mara area in western Kenya – part of the same region known as the Serengeti in neighboring Tanzania. I stayed in the Naboisho Conservancy in a beautiful camp overlooking plenty of wildlife.

I almost didn’t make it to the airport for my flight there due to the horrendous Nairobi traffic, but with minutes to spare I was boarding my tiny plane. A propeller driven plane, it only had 12 seats and 3 passengers. In order to get to my camp, we were required to make four hops to other deserted airstrips along the way. The runways were all dirt with the exception of the first being just grass. 

Nairobi Flight hops to Naboisho Conservancy

I eventually arrived at my final destination only to be greeted by my safari guide. As he drove me to the camp via a very bumpy game drive he pointed out many giraffes, zebras, and other animals.  After settling in for the afternoon, we headed out for an evening game drive that found us a female lioness, which we stalked for about a hour.  She was believed to be nursing offspring nearby.