The Dream List: Once-in-a-Lifetime Trips (click link to view full article)
by: Brook Wilkinson
CAMEROON: ROYALTY IN BAFUT
The specialist: Cherri Briggs, EXPLORE; Steamboat Springs, Colorado
The Dream Trip: “Even with its recent troubles, Cameroon is special – it has such a rich cultural heritage, and it produces some of Africa’s finest art. In the highlands village of Bafut, you can visit the Palace of the Fon, the seat of an 800-year-old sub-Saharan dynasty. This is the last of Africa’s great cheifdoms that once ruled much of the continent. Today the king still has tremendous power. One of the many queens will guide you around the royal compound, including a museum full of artifacts on a par with those in the British Museum. Don’t miss the giant drum that called people to war – beaten not by living hands but with the severed arms of the enemy. While in the highlands, you can aslo visit the town of Foumban (pictured), the artisan center for that region of Africa and home to the Bamum people – whose cheif, at last count, had 77 wives and 506 kids! ($18,75 for two)”
Cherri Briggs
Tel: 888-596-6377
info@exploreafrica.net
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Exploritas program #15583
The following is an excerpt from an email to EXPLORE from Exploritas participant Anita Balch:
My trip to South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Zambia had been a dream for over 15 years. On my 68th birthday, I headed to South Africa from Hawaii with my good friend Ellie Katz. It was a highly organized, efficiently run trip by EXPLORE and Exploritas which would normally be hard on a “free spirit” like myself but I still managed to get my moments of unsupervision so that I could connect in a real way with the local people. Although all of the animals were exotic and breathtaking and the sunset over a pond with silhouetted giraffes was awesome, for me the highlights of the trip were connecting with local people like the lodge manager, Neeltjie, at Grassland Bushmen Lodge. Singing Christian songs and being taught Botswana songs by the kitchen help, reaching out and “touching” on a personal note, getting up at 3 a.m. and finding the lodge locked up at Motsentsela Tree Lodge and talking with the guard who shared his life story. How he left his home in Zambia, went by bus knowing no one, finding a job and then the real challenge of finding a place to live. Seeing our guide Sue Slogrove with a cook who had known Sue since she was a small child helped to make it another “reach out and touch” moment. But probably for me the highlight was the very warm and personable young man who took extra time to teach me proper greetings with the proper voice inflections at the Victoria Falls Safari Lodge. Every time we saw each other, it was like we were seeing family. I found the African people respectful, kind, thoughtful, and sincere. Of course, kissing CoCo the elephant’s trunk (after riding the elephant with Ruth Shaw from Atlanta, Georgia) rates right up there close to the top. I did the Gorge Swing while staying at Thorntree Lodge in Livingstone. I thought it was going to be like the “zip line” and I got there (with the kind help of Thorntree lodge manager) and it was stepping off a platform, free falling what seemed like a million miles and then being jerked to a standstill until you thought your teeth would fall out (AND THEY ARE MINE) and then climbing out of the Gorge…. The only thing harder would have been chickening out so yes, I did it, I am glad to have done it, and I am alive to tell it. Thank you, EXPLORE for making it a trip to remember always. Aloha, Anita