Sunday, July 31

Today was my last day in Zimbabwe. I was supposed to be here for 3 weeks, but I am coming home a week early. Long story. My time here has been full of ups and downs, as with any experience, but at the end of the day… I got what I came for. Pictures. Lots and lots and lots of pictures that I will be able to use in my graphic design studies. Being here has solidified what I want to do with my life—graphic design and/or photography wildlife conservation. With changing schools one more time, I now know that I am on the right path. I always knew I wanted to do something art related, then I knew I wanted to do graphic design, but now I know WHAT I want to do with graphic design. I know what I want to make people feel and I know that I want to make people more aware of the world around them as opposed to living in their bubbles. I was hoping this trip would make me 100% certain that this is what I want to do with my studies, and now I am 1,000% sure that this is what I want to do. And I am relieved.

Most of my day was spent catching up on some much needed sleep. I’ve been waking up at 5am and doing activities until about 6pm. With the hot African sun and the hard labor, you get tired easily (and I think I’ve had enough of shoveling elephant poo for a while!!!)  In the afternoon, I went on one last research drive. See some of my last photos below.

Going on research drives has been my favorite activity here. It is the most natural setting for this release pride, but I have also gotten to know the lead researcher. In doing so, I have learned so much about lion prides, their social structures, behavior, what to look for, how to document their behavior, and more. Most people come here for the lion walks, but I personally do not like those. For starters, I didn’t learn anything about lions on the walk. When guests were on the lion walks, all they did was take pictures with the lions. Little did anyone tell us, the lions on the walks can’t be released into the wild one day due to the human interaction… Only their wild-born cubs will. For this reason, I disagree with some of the methods here. It saddens me seeing so many lions in so many small enclosures that many people besides me think are too small. The lion-breeding program here is understandable to some extent, but now there are no more enclosures left for the lions.

The whole point of the breeding program is to introduce new genes into the wild. A major problem with wild lions is that they interbreed, so there are no new genes being added into the wild. This combined with high cub mortality rates lowers the chances of survival. If this Ngamo release pride is successful, this model of breeding can be adapted to other countries and other species besides lion. For this reason, it is incredibly important what ALERT does here, though many find it controversial. It is not black and white in this case. There are negatives, but there are also positives.

Not many people get to travel to Africa as frequently as I have. Over the years, it has become a second home for me. I’ll miss stepping on the car tires to hop on to the back of a pick up truck… I’ll miss the wind blowing through my hair in the early morning as I stand on the top of the flatbed truck on the way to see the elephants… I’ll miss the sound the tall savannah grass makes as the wind blows through it… I’ll miss waking up to African sunrises and watching the African sunset as birds fly off into the distance… Africa is a magical place. You can’t truly know what it’s like until you come here. And I encourage everyone to at some point in time. You won’t regret it.

Saturday, July 30

Today was one of those days where everything kept changing. I was going to go on research in the morning, but too many people were on it. It wouldn’t have been good for photos since the vehicle is so small, so I didn’t go. In the afternoon, we showed our photography presentations to some of the staff at Antelope Park because they missed our presentations yesterday.

The lunch today was the best meal we’ve had out of all the breakfasts, lunches, and dinners. We had chicken tacos with pineapple, lettuce, tomato and guacamole. I haven’t been eating much meat here because no one knows what it is, but today’s meal was delicious.

After lunch, I sat by the river to photograph birds. There’s always a kingfisher that sits on the canoe but whenever I try to get a photo, it flies away.  

As I was sitting with my friend outside the coffee shop (my favorite spot) I noticed some horses and donkeys go into the river. So, I went on the bridge to photograph them. I also photographed more birds.

In the late afternoon, I was supposed to go on research… But that didn’t happen because the project coordinator made a mistake. The researcher was already in the field working on a scavenge feed (where a kill is put in a fenced area of land and the release pride have to use their hunting skills to find it). So, there was no research today. Now I’m scheduled to do research tomorrow afternoon since there’s no morning session like usual. Hopefully, it works out because tomorrow is my last day here.

More later…

Friday, July 29

This morning, we were supposed to go on a bird walk, but our guide didn’t show up. So instead, we did my favorite activity… research! I only took a few photos because I was talking to the lead researcher the entire time and learning about all the different lions at Antelope Park. She was explaining how you have to be very careful with your research because any decision to put lions together or separate them messes with their social structure within the pride. We were also discussing other lion conservation projects in other African countries and what they do differently that is more beneficial. Here are a few pictures…

In the afternoon, I had a special assignment to take photos of volunteers on the bridge. Originally, we were going to go out in a canoe to get a picture of the volunteers head-on. Lucky for me, we decided that we could take the photos from another dock… I still got a little wet (and muddy)! As I was walking back, I saw one of the rescue elephants by the water.

In the evening, all the projects at Antelope Park had a presentation with all they’ve achieved in the past month—research, stables, community, hands on lion conservation and photography. Research presented facts about who roars the most and who reacts the most to human noise (cars, tractors, horse safaris, etc). Stables presented mainly on their horse therapy program, where they work with special needs kids. Community presented on a new project they hope to achieve (re-building a school that is falling down and has a black mamba roaming around somewhere… The teachers are so afraid to teach in the building that they have class outside). Hands on lion conservation presented on how many hours volunteers have spent doing snare sweeps, alien plant removal, lion enclosure cleaning, meat prep/lion feeding, and more.

Finally, photography presented on how many hours we spent editing. Then, the other photography vol and I presented videos we made showcasing some of our best photographs. At the end, we had a little competition. We each submitted three photos to be considered for the African Impact Antelope Park cover photo on Facebook. The other volunteers and staff voted for their favorites… and mine won!

After dinner, we headed off to a remote area of camp with no lights. Why? We decided to try some astrophotography—shooting the stars. We walked across the river to the end of the walking path and eventually got to a big, open field with two small cabins. There were hardly any lights, except the dim lights of the walking path behind us, but it was perfect for viewing the stars. At the sleep away camp I used to go to, we could see some stars… But not like this. The whole sky was illuminated with thousands of stars… It looked like glitter in the sky. Never before have I seen a night scene so beautiful. Below is one of the photos I took of the Milky Way—not too shabby for my first time doing night photography!

After shooting the stars, we sat by the campfire for a bit. Usually, I go to bed pretty early since we wake up so early here but by the time we got back from shooting the stars, I couldn’t feel my hands (it’s soooo cold at night). So, we sat by the fire to warm up before heading back to our rooms.

The days are winding down and it’s now my last few days in Africa. There were some ups and downs, like with any experience, but at the end of the day, this was an experience unlike any other. 

More later…

Thursday, July 28

Today was a very special day. In the early morning, I got up to do boma. Boma is where the elephants are kept at night, and boma means you shovel elephant poo. I know what you’re thinking… Why is that special? Well, it’s what came after that. I was the only volunteer who decided to do boma, which meant it was just me (and the elephant handlers) working in the morning. We finished pretty quickly and then walked with the elephants until breakfast. Because I was the only volunteer, I was able to talk more with the guides and learn more about elephants. We talked a lot about poaching, and I learned that people from Zambia and South Africa poach animals the most. I also learned a lot about elephant behavior—how they use their tusks to take apart trees and eat the fibers from the middle of the tree branch, how they can lose their tusks in territorial fights, and more. It was really interesting and special being able to have that experience first thing in the morning. Here’s a picture of me walking with one of the four rescue elephants.

The day continued to get even more special. In the afternoon, I went on a lion walk with the three cubs.

Again, I was the only volunteer on this activity because everyone else had done it in the morning and elephant herding in the afternoon. There were a few guests, which wasn’t ideal for pictures of the lions (the guests were taking pictures with them almost the entire time). I have hardly any pictures of me, but today I was able to get a few!

But, afterwards…. Was very special. After the guests had gone, I got a VIP experience with the lions. I actually went into the enclosure with the lion handlers to take headshots of the cubs. In the volunteer lounge, we have a “meet the lions” board. The pictures of the cubs are from months ago when they were first born, and of course they have changed a lot. So, one of the lead lion volunteers asked for some updated pictures. So I did just that!

On the way back to the volunteer village, I stopped to shoot the sunset. African sunsets are unlike any other. The sun is huge and orange and the skies are usually shades of orange, yellow, and pink.

More later…  

Wednesday, July 27

Today was an early day, but also my favorite way to start to the day… research! At 6am, we headed out to see the Ngamo release pride. The researchers observe the lions and see how they react to noises from cars, people, etc. The researchers also look at the relationships between the lions to determine social structures. I took SO many photos today (even though the lions were sleeping most of the time… Remember lions can sleep up to 21 hours per day). Here are a few.

We sat in the caged vehicle for two hours observing the lions. We also got to see another beautiful sunrise.

In the afternoon, we had a day encounter. A day encounter is like the night encounter that we did last night where the lion handlers take a few lions out of the enclosures. We follow the lions in the car for hours to see if they go after any animals or make a kill. Like last night, we followed the lions for about 3 hours and there was no kill. The two chased some wildebeest, but were more interested in sleeping and lying down. Personally, I don’t think two lions are enough to make a kill as lions hunt in their prides. Females are usually the hunters, and both times we did encounters the lion handlers chose mostly males. Here’s one photo I took when I was bored… I’ve been playing around with minimalistic black and white photos as its something different. Maybe I can use it in my art one day!

More later…