Month: December 2017

“Jason,

Just wanted to tell you thank you so much for such a great trip. Trip of a lifetime.  So glad you set us up in S. Africa in Cape Town at that great B&B—what a bunch of nice folks. (you need about 2 weeks in this town—-just so much to do—-we hiked, kitesurfed, drank a lot of wine, rented  bikes, went to an outdoor summer concert in Kirstenbosch Bontanical Gardens, meet the nicest people, and so much more). Then off to Ngala.  Wow. Was that different from our first Safari 27 years ago in Kenya (that was also a trip of a lifetime—-just not so fancy).  The folks at Ngala are just amazing. The game viewing, the peacefulness, the food (honestly they could cut that food by 75% and it would still be excessive). It was was such a kick.  We had the best guide.

Funny story, our guide had left his backpack, briefly, at the entrance of the lodge the other day.  A hyena quickly drug it off and destroyed the contents of his bag including his binocs!  Not good.  We gave him ours when we left—-he was so pumped!  See photo of him hugging John. Honestly, he was tearful!

We also met, while there, two folks that were consulting on behalf of &Beyond —-their job is to figure out how to sell this sort of place to more folks.  I gave them your contact info as you are the one who set us up as I did ZERO research. I think they thought we were kind of nuts for not researching it—-whatever.  Best surprise I have had in a while—-thanks again.

Incidentally, we did get to the Apartheid museum in Johannesburg. We got to the airport on our final day very early. We found a place to store our luggage for the day and uber’d it to the museum.  Fabulous.  Traffic was tough. We had a lot of time and much better than sitting in the airport.

Senegal. Another story.  Had a ball seeing our daughter in her village. 2 full days of hard travel from Dakar to get to her village—car travel, 4 x 4 travel, on foot.  She has no water/electricity. Bucket showers, eating out of the same bowl and amazing star gazing at night as no light pollution.  Never felt in danger. People are great. It is just a challenge.  Hard to get to any one place and so much smog —it is indescribable how poor the air quality is EVERYWHERE.  All due to:  cooking fires, constant burning of crops and garbage and then cars in busy cities.  This place is not for the light hearted.  Terrou Bi was nice. They lost our reservations coming and going.  Took a lot of time to “prove” to them we had these reservations.  They were nice all the while.  They did store our luggage for the 2 weeks we were in Senegal, however, free of charge.  We took tiny back packs while in Senegal. Left are “larger” bag with the Terrou Bi—mind you, we had very small bags due to the Ngala restrictions.  Men with guns on site and constant checking of bags and under cars for bombs.  Honestly, unpleasant.  I think the place is a target. Gracey isn’t actually allowed to be in Dakar as a PeaceCorps worker due to risks.  I get it now.

You are a rock star!

Leslie Root and John McGrory

PS-yes, that’s me milking a cow. Has to be done twice per day.  Gracey typically does it.  Note—knees covered always while in Senegal—-due to cultural guidelines in their faith.

PS—here is a great story about Senegal. John left his iPhone in cab in Dakar.  A brand new iPhone 7. He didn’t have the find-my-iPhone app turned on—-yikes.  Not good.  The cab wewere in was so beat up and rough.  The cab driver brought the phone back —yup, drove back to the Terrou Bi—he was stopped at security and searched a million times—-John ran to him shouting “I know this guy”—-the driver pulled out the iPhone and John gave him a big hug. The security folks were dancing around. Everyone was laughing.  it was great!  John did give him some cash for his good deed.  Just a great story about the people of Senegal.