After an eventful trip over to Africa (For Lisa anyway - her flight was canceled and she had to scramble to find a new flight) we finally reunited at the Johannesburg airport to make our way to Namibia. Once we arrived at the VERY small airport, in the middle of nowhere, we were greeted by a friendly face holding a sign with our names and off we went to the N/a an ku se Wildlife Sanctuary. Upon arrival we were shown to our very basic room and given the "grand tour" of where we were going to be volunteering. After battling jet lag all afternoon, we finally went to bed around 8 pm. Yes, we realize that's a bit early but hey, after traveling for more than 24 hours, we were just happy to have a hot shower and a bed to sleep in.
For our first day of activities we met the rest of the volunteers at the food prep area for the morning's briefing of the day's events. After that we were added to a group and then onto the daily rotation. It was enclosure patrol day and we were VERY tired from our VERY long travels. We had our induction in the morning and were informed of all the risks involved with working with the wildlife conservation program. Yes, we even signed the indemnification for (ie., we signed our lives away!). Our initiation onto the farm was to run around the rabbit enclosure to separate the male and female rabbits. We ran around, looking like idiots, catching them and looking for "boy parts". We'll let you figure out what that means.... Hahahahaha!
The basic schedule of the farm, besides on holiday's and Sunday is as follows:
8-10:30: Morning activities
10:30-11:00: Tea time
11:00-1:00: Later morning activities
1:00-2:30: Lunch
2:30-4:30: Afternoon activities
5:00: Baby Baboon bath time
Basically, there are three different groups that the volunteers are split into which then follow a rotation: Enclosure Patrol, Food prep, and Caracals. The first day, enclosure patrol, our group did the following: One person took the donkey cart out (thank goodness not us!) to check the perimeter of the farm for any holes in the fence. Another 2 people walked the carnivore enclosures to make sure the electricity was on. The others cleaned the baboon and rabbit enclosures in the morning. We also have the privilege of going into Samira's enclosure for some good pets. In case your wondering, Samira is a tame cheetah that purrs like a motor boat. In the afternoon we had a "project". We went with one of the project leaders to hang white painted cans on fence of the Lion enclosures. Yikes! We had to "distract" the lions while someone else hung the cans.
The next day was food prep without a fearless leader... We tried our best to follow what we were told (4 different people told us 4 different thing) so it was inevitable that we messed it up. Oooops! Nonetheless, all the animals got fed. The big baboons were short on food so we rolled up our sleeves, again, to mush together more food and then threw it to them over the fence. We also had to bottle feed the 5 baby baboons (several times and sooooo cute), the Senior Babies, the donkey, Eddie the baby lamb, and Lilly the baby springbok. We also got to go out and fee the carnivores. Our first carnivore drive felt more like a safari in the back of a pickup truck! We saw Kudu, Oryx, Springboks, warthogs, and baboons. It was great. Then we had afternoon feedings.
Caracle Day: Caracals are tons of fun... They're like big house cats! The morning starts with feeding these guys and then going to play with Orey the bat ear fox who has several fused vertebrae and can't walk well. After that we get to go into the enclosure with the Caracals and play with them and give them pets. After that we take the baby baboons our for a walk where they proceed to jump all over you and pee on your lap. Nice... It's a good thing we can do laundry. :-) In the afternoon we get to take the baby leopard cubs out for a walk. They're absolutely amazing.
To be perfectly honest, this wildlife sanctuary is amazing. We're enjoying ourselves immensely despite the huge poisonous scorpion we found on the wall. And yes, it was right before we went to bed one night. We got a shoe and beat the heck out of it. We even smeared it outside of our door to prevent other scorpions from entering. Hahahaha! We haven't had any more. Perhaps that's because it rained ALL day yesterday. We're on the schedule to have the baby baboons later next week. They'll go to bed with us after their baths. It should be an interesting experience. Hopefully no more bites and hair pulling!!! But I'm sure that's inevitable. They're such cute little babies: Marlin, Gus, Bonnie, Clyde, and Lola. They even like to put their fingers in our mouths and try to give us kisses. Hahahahah!
We had a Bari (BBQ) for dinner last night which was fantastic... The food was great as were the stars. It's amazing how may there are!! The weather has been good for the most part. Cool in the evenings/mornings and warm during the day. Just perfect. And we've had warm water to shower with in the evenings which is much appreciated after a hard day's work. We always seem to find our way to bed by 8 or 9.
We're at N/a an ku se Wildlife Sanctuary for another week. Then we head off onto our safari for a week. We're really excited about that but hope we're not too disappointed after so much interaction with animals.
Sorry this has been such a long post but we're not sure when we'll have the chance to do another post. Hope everyone is doing well!
-Jen and Lisa
Sunday, May 16, 2010
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