Swaziland!

I left Mozambique on Wednesday with Wendy and her brother, David.  We have been having a super fun time, just relaxing, walking, talking... all the good things you do just that much better when you are on vacation.  I don't have tons of time online but I at least wanted to post some photos.  

Here they are:

The resident ostrich at Sondzela Backpackers at Miliwane Game Reserve in Swaziland.

One of the hiking trails through the park.  There are no predators here (except to jackal at night), so you can walk freely among the various deer-thingys, as I called them--those antlered things with hooves, zebras, and warthogs.

I think the Hippo is my favorite animal now.  It just looks so ridiculous with its massive body and teeny legs.  I kept staring at this one trying to make sure it was real and not one of those DisneyLand plastic cut outs.

Close up of the mama hippo.  They had a feeding at 3pm and I was amazed that there weren't electrical traps or men with guns around.  The only thing that separated the big-mouthed beast of a hippo from the tourists (or in some of my other photos, the school children), was a stone wall about 2.5 feet high.  I kept my distance.  this picture was taken with a zoom, through the trees about 150 meters away.

This was the view from the restaurant where I had a really good grilled tuna, cheese and tomato sandwich with chips.  In this photo you can see the croc, some kind of bird, and the hippo behind the bushes.  At one point a very brave wharthog came up to the croc and sniffed it.  We couldn't believe it!  Apparently it wasn't the season for the crocodiles to eat so this one wasn't hungry.