2009-09-22 – walking with elephants and birds in love

NB: this entry will eventually be edited with photos, links, etc.

Ya know, there are few things better than starting your day with an enormous fruit salad that also came with a waffle topped with yogurt and honey, followed by eggs, bacon, sausage, mushrooms, tomato, and fried potatoes. Seriously, what's better than that? Hmm? No, didn't think you could come up with anything ;-) And yeah, there are photos...

If anything, if you're in Mossel Bay, stay at the Aqua Marina for the breakfast. Otherwise, stay for the good conversations with the host and hostess. We could have stayed there all day...

But we eventually did head out along the Garden Route. After a short pitstop to buy some beach towels, our next destination was the Elephant Sanctuary at The Crags. This is a place where they do a “walk with the elephants” tour. You literally get to walk alongside an elephant. You have to walk in front of them, and hold your palm flat out behind you. They take your hand with their trunks, and you can feel their warm, wet breath from their trunk. The elephant Ms. Penguin walked with even sneezed on her! Anyway, the tour started with the first walk, using three young females. Next, our guide talked to us about elephant behavior, and the elephant handlers gave their elephants commands so that the behavior could be demonstrated. After that, we were allowed to approach the elephants to touch them – their faces, tusks, knees, ankles, tail, etc. It was all very interesting. Elephants have very thick skin and bristly hairs, and their tusks are nice and smooth. Their eyelashes are very bushy, but it gives them a very cute look.

We then did some more walking, and one of the tourists there rode one of the elephants (it costs extra). This was followed by a short lecture on elephant anatomy.

After the elephants, we went to Birds of Eden, an enormous aviary that is literally made for the birds. It's actually the largest free flight bird aviary in the world. We were quite hungry after walking with the elephants, so we decided to eat lunch first. The little restaurant is right in the aviary. Where all the birds are. Now, the intention of the aviary is to give people a closer encounter with the birds. Well, at the restaurant, this was taken quite literally. You could see that there were lots of birds hanging around, which was kind of expected – possible free scraps and all. But then the birds started getting a little bit too close and personal. First, a Senegal parrot jumped on Ms. Penguin. And then an Indian Ringneck Parakeet did pretty much the same thing with Mr. Penguin. It was cute at first, and although we had a hard time shaking them off, they eventually left us. But not for long. Within a short amount of time, they hopped onto us again. And again. They were almost like flies; big flies with feathers that we had to swat away. And then a new big green parrot decided to hop onto Ms. Penguin's head. And then on Mr. Penguin's head. This was going on all during lunch. Eventually one of the staff gave us a squirt bottle, and that helped a little bit ;-)

Incidentally, a lot of the parrots at Birds of Eden used to be pets, and they therefore seek human contact and company.

After lunch, we walked around the aviary and saw lots of interesting species of birds. However, our little green parakeet friend kept following us everywhere. It was there all the time, and was particularly interested in hopping onto Mr. Penguin; Ms. Penguin is quite sure it was in love with him. It's spring, you know... breeding season. The birds were all broody ;-)

We are now sitting in the lounge at Wild Spirit Lodge, a backpackers here in The Crags, just a few minutes driving from the elephant sanctuary and Birds of Eden. They have wifi here, so we are finally able to get up some blog entries and otherwise check our e-mail and stuff like that. We're also waiting for dinner – pasta bolognaise – and enjoying a cold beer. Life is good... :-)