Malealea Lodge
Trip Start
Jun 08, 2008
1
21
28
Trip End
Aug 15, 2008
Malealea,
Lesotho
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Well, in an apparent attempt to confirm my theory about the cyclicality of things in life (more on that later), today's meals were a total disappointment - particularly when compared to yesterday's wonderful dinner. We have sandwiches for lunch every day so it is actually difficult for us to have a bad lunch. I already buy my own bread because I want better bread than the cheap stuff used by the tour, but today the sliced meat provided for filling the sandwiches was really the bottom of the barrel. It even made bologna seem fancy. (I found out later that it is actually called "polony" - a sort of cheap knock-off version of bologna!) And dinner was a dried out but sweet (cooked in marmalade) fish with dry rice.
I discovered that the reason for the decline in the quality of our food is that we have overspent our food budget for the trip so far. The cook is given a certain budget with which to work, and it seems to be calculated to not allow much in the way of quality or pleasure in our meals. This seems like a silly way to treat customers. I for one would rather pay a little more for better food. As I mentioned, I already buy my own bread. Now it looks like I'll have to start buying my own coldcuts.
Anyway, we left the Drakensberg bright and early and drove along the northern border of Lesotho, stopping in a small artist's colony town (Clarens) for an hour to go shopping, walk around, and use the internet. I only had time to read my e-mails and check my stock prices. I only check them once a week now because I don't want any bad news, but luckily they have been up every time I've checked lately. Related to this, and regarding my comment about the cyclicality of life: Isn't it interesting how my stocks plunged nearly every day when I was on that nightmare tour - but now that I'm on this enjoyable tour, they are up every day? It would have been nice for things to have been a bit more balanced, but life - at least my life - seems to go in wild swings. Related to that, I often think of the answer that the great speculator Jesse Livermore gave to the person who asked him if it was worth all the worry involved in his work. Livermore responded that given a choice between being worried and being poor, he preferred to be worried.
At the town of Ficksburg we crossed into Lesotho, my 82nd country, and the last new country that I will visit on this trip. By late afternoon we arrived at our lovely home for the next two days, the Malealea Lodge.
In the evening, while waiting for dinner, I got into a conversation with a group of lovely high school girls from Durham, England (in whose castle I slept on my trip to the UK in 2003). We talked about books (we are all avid readers); traveling (ditto); and I even gave the girls a basic explanation of how the stock market works. These girls were amazingly bright - and funny - and I expect them to achieve big things in their lives. One of them - whose name I won't mention - I would have married on the spot, had I been a year or two younger. I regretted that we couldn't talk more but we were all tired from the day's strenuous activities (them a six hour horse ride and me an eight hour truck ride), so we all went to sleep early, also partly because the electricity is switched off here at 22:00.
27 July - Malealea, Lesotho
For perhaps the first time on this trip, we were able to wake up at the civilized hour of 8:00, have breakfast at 9:00 and then start our walking tour of the local village at 10:00. The tour led us into local shops, homes and even the local bar. It was a unique opportunity to see African life from the inside. I took lots of pictures, which are displayed here with comments. [Ha - obviously this was written before I lost all of my pictures later!] I hope you enjoy the tour as much as I did. [Now it looks like you won't.]
We got back to our lodge late - at 13:30 - and had a very meager lunch. Yesterday I complained about the quality of the coldcuts, thinking that it would have been better to have nothing to put on the sandwiches rather than such crappy meat. Well, today I got to test my wish: we got no coldcuts to put on our sandwiches. Instead, there were only vegetables and cheese - plus an egg salad. We were all grumbling about the lack of substance to the meal, but as I mentioned yesterday, this is due to "us" having overspent our food budget. I certainly don't blame our cook or tour guide for this state of affairs. It seems that the management of the tour company just doesn't realize what it costs to feed people adequately - especially hungry guys like myself.
In any case, we kind of made up for things with a delicious stew with rice and green beans for dinner. So at least for now, I'm full - and happy - again. To a large extent, a tour is only as good as the last meal that it has fed us! When people are hungry, they forget all of the other good things about the trip. I would therefore encourage tour companies not to skimp on food for their customers. It's an area where it is possible to gain - or lose - a lot of goodwill.
