track our trek

we left beautiful tofo armed w/ a loose itinerary for the rest of our drive, and headed back to south africa by way of swaziland. we drove the 8 hours straight thru and across the border into manzini, swaziland's sleepy capitol. swaziland is known for its national parks, hiking and trekking opportunities. the country is very poor, and it is estimated that a staggering 35% of the adult population is living with AIDS! condoms are distributed at the borders and there are huge advertising campaigns encouraging monogamy and safe sex.
with the better part of our first week of car hire up, we opted for only one night in manzini, as we were anxious to push further along the coast... another day of driving brought us to umhlanga, an upscale beach town outside durban. after our 4 nights in tofo roughing it in an open dorm fighting mosquitoes and all manner of other creepy crawlies, natassa was ready for some creature comforts in a proper hotel. so we left her at the 4 star cabana beach hotel and headed off in search of more affordable accommodation for ourselves. we found the lovely thekweni house just down the road & stayed for a couple of nights relaxing and lounging on the high-priced sand outside natassa's hotel! we didn't spend much time in the water b/c there were more bluebottle jellyfish in the water. paul and his wife, owners of thekweni house told us about their 21 year old daughter who is riding her bicycle alone from spain down through west africa and eventually home to south africa! at the moment she was in guinea, headed towards ghana. mother and grandmother were fretting a bit about how she would make her way around the congo safely...incredible! can you imagine?