Africa – 20th Sept 2008 – Day 19

We had arranged with Ben our guide that we would do a long morning walk starting at 09:00. We went down to breakfast at 08:00 and thankfully John was feeling back to his old self.

Again breakfast was up there as the best so far, lots of variety.

We met Ben at 09:00 to start the walk, however whilst John’s tummy was better he had bent down to pick up a bottle of water and pulled his back !!!. We started our walk anyway with John bent over a bit but keeping up. Two of the dogs came along with us Eli and Mafi, they can sense if there is any danger out there so it was good to have them along.

The objective of the walk was to track down the mountain Zebra, we walked along tracks and through tall grass land but found no Zebra, just a couple of Oryx and Coudoo. When we started it was quiet cool but by about 11:00 it was stifling. We stopped at a large rock outcrop for 10 mins to recover. The dogs were really tired especially Eli, we shared our water with her.

After the stop we headed back to the lodge but the grass was so long that poor Eli was really struggling. Ben picked her up and carried her back to the lodge which she seemed to appreciate.

Once back at the lodge we went back to the room to have shower to cool down before lunch and right behind us was Eli. She came into our Bungalow and chilled on the cool floor, we can’t tell Heather this as she will be very angry with us, but we got it on film.

Lunch as again really good and we met the Suzi who is Jens wife again perfect English. During Lunch we had a call from the local Audley agent (he had been trying to get us for 2 days). He had a call from Audley as a result of the email we sent re our waterburg plateau lodge experience and has offered us free wine at the next lodge and a free game drive. However John is holding out for something more substantial. Later on we logged on to our email, Audley have apologized for the Waterberg stay and have offered us a full refund for that part of the holiday.

After we had both booked in for a message with Melanie. Fiona went first, we had booked a head, face and neck message for 45 mins. Whilst in the massage parlor, John relaxed by the lovely cool pool. The bright red dragon flies darted about the place, diving down for a drink every now and again. John also went down to the natural hot pools, alternating between the hot and cold stone baths in order to relax his lower back. The hot spring area is great, with a large thatched roof, hammock chairs, sumptuous sun beds and a wonderful vista. The massage turned out to be absolutely brilliant, she is one of the best masseurs we have come across. She has trained in several countries like India and Thailand. She also worked on John’s bad back, so here’s hoping it gets better soon.

The rest of the afternoon was spent round the lovely pool and thermal spring baths. We met with a nice couple of ladies from the UK who live together near Kingston. They were on a three week Africa trip, also arranged with Audley.

We like Huab Lodge very much and wish we were staying another day, it couldn’t be more different to the first lodge, even though most of the clients are German everyone makes an effort and you never feel awkward. The host Jan, has a wonderful sense of humor.