Hippos, sugar cane smoke and getting passed by 10 tons of burnt-out-headlight death; St Lucia!

A few days have passed since our first meeting with Fr. Loftus, and it is apparent that through all the talk and planning about what exactly can be accomplished with our project, he is kind of excited to show some new visitors around the area. I don't think they get too many. When we asked him about it he said that besides other Servite priests, they had around 4 laypeople hang around. In the last decade.

On this particular day he volunteered to show us St. Lucia, a World Heritage estuary, game preserve and lake home to crocs, flamingos, hippos (Ryan's favorite), rhinos, zebras and elephants. John rode shotgun and the rest of us piled into the dusty bed of the truck and rattled down the highway passing eucalyptus, mangroves and hawkers along the way, all the while choking on the fumes of the exhaust and looking out the back of the truck, disoriented because from that perspective it looked like we were traveling at about 80 in reverse on a US highway. Bad to break our acclimation to left-sided driving... We finally arrive and spend the day cruising around the park, checking out the crocs sunbathing (saddly not feeding on the tasty seagulls mere feet away) spotting hippos in Catalina Bay from 300 yards out, almost grabbing a poisonous frog happily sitting on a post, and ending the drive at a breathtaking little spot named Cape Vidal. Unfortunately the only rhino presence we saw were their not-so-little gifts they left all over the road. This was lame because on the way out of the park the two workers we picked up to take back to the entrance said that on most days they usually block the road for minutes at a time. Probably depositing their deposits in the process. Oh, and on the way back from Mtubatuba to Richards Bay, we were literally inches away from our deaths. Apparently it is ok for tanker trucks with one headlight out to pass rows of cars getting onto the freeway at night in a haze of cane smoke. Inches. I would have taken a picture of this beast's tires wizzing by, but I forgot to pack my macro lens. More pictures and updates to follow, plus pictures that didn't make it into the other posts. Every time we edit down to use them in posts we always struggle to pick ones that tell the story, rather than just act as a virtual slideshow. Problem is there are so many to choose from, so we'll try to include a grab bag post every week for the ones that didnt make the first round cuts...

This next week sees us visiting another game reserve, and making visits to the individual missions to assess their needs in detail. The sights are cool, but we hope to get more in depth soon and post it to the blog. Stay tuned.

Words: Hamrock

Pics include: Cape Vidal, Fr. Loftus as Safari guide, Darryl sticking his head out the window and getting spiritual, Catalina Bay's dock, Hippos that look like rocks from far away, a male Kudu, croc signs, crocs just chillin, monkeys, probably poisonous frog. Enjoy.

Photo credits in this post from the top: H, H, H, C, H, H, C, H, C, C, H