Reillys Rock Hilltop Lodge Mbabane

... were awesome and there were some beautiful flowers in bloom. We headed back when the weather started to turn; it looked as if it was going to rain. New arrivals on camp later that afternoon were a group of overlanders (Nomads truck) – ugh!! Luckily for us with how the pitches were spaced out we didn’t hear the noise they generated, and with rain setting in just before dark they retired to their tents early enough ...

... for their kids&#8217; fees. <br><br>I spent the evening at the Lodge having a couple of beers. I had a good chat with a Dutch guy, who was a sales manager for a company whose head office is in Ireland. He was here with his wife to visit his daughter (who was a right moody cow by the way) who works at the Lodge. Then I spent the rest of the evening with John, 2 Irish girls, who raised up £17,000 to build a school in the area, James, a british guy who is to help building ...

South Africa is a throwback to another era, and I don't mean their obsession with skin color. I mean their dedication to original backpacker principles and hippie ethic&#8230; and their general lack, and high prices for, Internet (always rare, never well done). It also includes Woodstock-like rock festivals, hippy-dippy travel guides&#8230; and BazBus. BazBus may not be the Gray Rabbit or Green Tortoise of US PacNW fame, but those ...

A very small kingdom between South Africa and Mozambique, that you can cross in 2 hours. A king that has more than 100 wives and chose a new one every year during a ceremony where all the maidens of the country dance in front of him, hoping to be chosen... A kingdom where the media cannot criticize the King and his actions/decisions... <br><br>I was not sure of what to expect of Swaziland. As beautiful as Lesotho? As developed as South ...

... a bride). It was fun to see some vervet monkeys running across the rooftops. The guide was quite good at explaining things, but the sun was ducking behind the mountains so the lighting was not the best for photography. We walked about 400 meters to view Mantenga Falls from the distance, but it was too far away to elicit anything more than, &#8220;Oh, that&#8217;s nice.&#8221; <br><br>In the village Sophia did not want to get dressed up as a Swazi girl, and there was ...

... are very helpful, particularly in finding directions and or getting around the bus stop. People will literally walk you to the bus that you need to take. That was great. However, you need to ask people directly for help. In Swaziland, the people are much less friendly and colder than in East or North Africa. Everyone keeps their head down and does not say hello. When I was in Kenya, everyone would say "Jambo" (hello) whenever you walked down the ...

... doctors seeing the patients besides when we come there 4 days per week....so then no one sees the patients for the remaining 3 days of the week!! Pretty messed up huh? There were 3 cuban doctors who used to take care of the patients there, but then they got into a car accident, 2 died and 1 survived and had to go back to cuba. In the meantime, one of our docs decided to step in and fill in there....and they just never got someone else to ...

... of the hospital to start rounds. first of all, the children are in these tiny hospital beds, 20 to a big room. then the mothers sleep on chairs next to the child's hospital bed. there is not a whole lot of free space in these big rooms. and unlike the states, the nurses don't do most of the care for the patients...the mothers do. so the mothers feed the children, change the diapers, wipe them down etc. the nurses weigh the children, hand out food/supplmentation/formula, and ...

... to be doing well and the baby is still being worked up for HIV. Then again, next patient we saw was a gal who was pregnant and has HIV. We went over her meds to make sure that everything else is good. When they get to 28 weeks in the pregnancy they get started on anti retroviral medications. That was interesting and deciding which medications to start. One halllmark of pediatric HIV is noting how the kids are developing. Often, acutally more than ...

... if only West Africa was as easy!!! Beautiful country, an oasis of green in a bowl of mountains. Seem like a very friendly bunch with locals and kids waving. Very similar to Lesotho but a little richer I think with a lot more children going to school (at least that's the way it appears). One thing we did notice were the tree plantations which are EVERYWHERE!! Oh and the albinos.... still seeing quite a number of them. Drove through the ...