Archives for June 2010

Report Card: Budget for Africa

June 21, 2010 By Danny

Africa was shockingly expensive. We expected that the touristy activities would be expensive but we underestimated the degree to this expense. True, eating in Africa can be cheap, lodging too, but that’s about where the cheapness ends. We definitely could have spent less here, but we wanted to do the “big” Africa things: safari, Kilimanjaro, mountain gorillas.

A reminder of how all this works. Every dollar amount represents how much the two of us, combined, spent on the average day in a given country. Airfare to and from the continent (very expensive to get to Africa) is included in transportation in the totals line and aren’t applied to any specific country. As always, visa fees are included in miscellaneous. For more information visit our spending page.

A couple of generalizations about Africa before we go into detail about each country. Most people in Africa do not travel long distances, that means transportation exists only for people of means and people with money. In most cases the buses we paid for in Africa cost more money than their counterparts in Latin America but were less comfortable, more crowded, and more commonly broken down. The roads were awful meaning more trips to go shorter distances and very few routes had service available at night. Then the expensive fees (Park entrances mostly; to see wild game and hike Kilimanjaro for example) are extremely high….These fees basically annihilated any sense of “budget” we had for Tanzania and Uganda. Visas also add up, we spent $645 each in visas.

South Africa: We rented a car and took that through the entire country, Swaziland, Lesotho, and even Namibia. Having a car did increase our transportation costs but seeing as we traveled 12,000 kilometers (7,500 miles) I still think the expensive car worked out to be far cheaper than public transportation would have worked out to be. Additionally the backpacker friendly Bazz-Bus would have been even more expensive and greatly restricted where we could go. Having a car also allowed us to carry a tent and our own food, drastically reducing our lodging and food costs. Even still this was not a cheap country and prices felt very similar to prices back in the US. Internet was also expensive but the presence of a domestic middle class who enjoys their own national parks just as much as the foreigners means that those parks, and all our activities are that much cheaper.

Mozambique: We went here for one reason….to hide from the hoards of X-mas while soaking up rays of sunshine on a nice beach. We went there, stayed put, and even managed to hitch a ride back with some South African’s we met while there. Scuba diving did us in on the overall budget but most everything else was pricey on account of our location on a tourist beach. The expensive visas to enter didn’t help the budget either.

Namibia: Namibia was expensive because we spent the better part of every day in the car, driving and burning gasoline, and then sleeping in National Parks. On one park, Etosha, camping with our own tent cost about $55….quite absurd by our standards. This was an extremely expensive country to travel in with huge fees at the attraction you’ve already driven hundreds of miles to see. Even still, having our own car saved money and our little 2 wheel drive car handled the dirt and shale roads without a problem.

Zimbabwe: We managed to Couchsurf here in two of the four places we visited, joining our host and friends for a trip to Great Zimbabwe and traveling to Victoria Falls on our own. Traveling and staying with CSers helped our budget out immensely, especially with lodging. https://ishouldlogoff.wpengine.com/wp-admin/plugin-install.phpTransportation was still high where it was on our own, quite high actually, but it was quick and efficient when the police weren’t looking for bribes. Fees at Victoria Falls were significant but not awful. Our largest expense here was the purchase and shipment of beautiful soapstone artwork that was pulverized before reaching the US. 🙁

Malawi: Super cheap country and the only expensive thing here was the Scuba we did in the crystal clear waters of Lake Malawi. We had a great time here and really enjoyed the chance to relax a bit. The reason miscellaneous is high is that we had to cross through Mozambique to get to Malawi from Zimbabwe and needed to purchase new visas; we applied those fees to Malawi rather than Mozambique.

Tanzania: Everything here is low except for activities. While on Safari and while climbing Kilimanjaro 100% of our food, lodging and transportation were covered in the overall fee for these activities. The true cost driver of these things were the park entrances (about $700 each just to climb the mountain in fees) so they throw our averages off a good bit. If we ignore the $100 visa fees and these activities we are closer to $90 per day, still high but in line with the rest of Africa.

Uganda: Seeing the Mountain Gorillas is an expensive activity, period. (At least the gorilla pictures and videos are cool)You have to pay $500 per person just to see them and then because you have to book that permit with an agency you need to either pay their fees on top of that or buy their transportation package…due to a series of events we ultimately had to do both of those things. The rest of the country is super cheap though, one of the cheapest places we’ve been to and still a pleasure to travel in. Bummer that the waters of the White Nile are due to be dammed and there won’t be any more Ugandan whitewater in the future.

Kenya: Things could have been cheaper here but trying to keep to a schedule, treating ourselves nicely on the island of Lamu, and taking advantage of the presence of my cousin who could fly home from Nairobi with gobs of souvenirs led to us spending far more than necessary. There really isn’t anything wrong with any of that though… At least the corruption makes for a nice travel story.

Ethiopia: This is a very poor and a very cheap country. There is a reason it features prominently in hunger porn commercials and South Park jokes. We treated ourselves nicely while staying in Addis Ababa and even still this was our cheapest country of the entire trip thus far. Traveling in the backseat of an overland car rather than paying for buses probably contributed a bit to low transportation costs but not as much as moving slowly and relaxing a bit while waiting for visas to be processed.

Sudan: This is a cheap country, cheaper to travel here than in Ethiopia. We spent ten days and spent $88/day, that means $880 for the whole ten days. Five-hundred of that was paid to the government for visa fees and foreign alien registration. That means it really cost us about $38/day for two people. Everything was very cheap and Sudan had the cheapest gasoline we’d seen anywhere until we entered Egypt. A very filling meal could be had for two for less than one dollar but that didn’t stop us for cooking for ourselves when we were bush-camping in the desert. Traveling with over-landers allowed us to do this and this country would have been a good deal more difficult without our friends in Kaspuur, the landy from London.

Egypt: We expected mass tourism and we absolutely found it here but were quite surprised at how budget friendly Egypt was. The sites were not outrageously priced to begin with but then we were given a 50% discount on pretty much everything thanks to our ISIC cards. Comfortable lodging was cheap, private, and generally included breakfast. Had we taken the train from Luxor to Cairo this would have been more expensive than driving but it would have saved two days of travel, one night of lodging, and a very annoying police escort. There is a lot to do in Egypt and truly something for everyone and ever budget. Seeing the pyramids and then climbing Mt. Sinai were absolute highlights. We passed on the beaches and diving of Dahab because we really didn’t feel like beach time.

Jordan: This isn’t really Africa but we’ve grouped it in here as part of the ‘Levant.’ It was an expensive place and we made it worse by paying for expensive transport to save a couple of days getting between the border and Petra. Additionally, the boat to Jordan from Egypt was not a cheap excursion. This was our 29th country and the first where a unit of currency was worth more than one US dollar.

Israel: Just like Jordan, this is a super expensive place and really is not backpacker friendly. We spent 100% of our time visiting with friends and staying with them as well so our price figures really aren’t worthwhile to anyone traveling there independently. If you do plan to travel here with a backpack be prepared to pay prices that would be considered average to high in Western Europe or the USA.

Foodie Friday: Currywurst

June 18, 2010 By Jillian

German cuisine isn’t exactly associated with curry, but apparently it should be. Currywurst is a national dish throughout German, found at nearly every greasy spoon and street cart. A sausage, usually with fries, covered in curry sauce (actually ketchup and curry powder), currywurst has somewhat of a cult following….there ‘s even a movie and a song. First served in Berlin after World War II, currywurst has taken on such a status that grocery stores actually sell ready-made currywurst. There’s even a currywurst museum (no we did not go!).

Opting for a less academic approach to food, we decided a taste test would be sufficient for “research” purposes. Naturally we found a greasy spoon near the train station (always the best fast food on the go!) where we were greeted by a rather plump, jolly man behind the counter.

Although German sausage is famous, it was the sauce that really made currywurst special. I would never have thought to add curry powder to ketchup, but I will admit it wasn’t bad. I wouldn’t drink a bottle of it, but poured over sausage, it actually tasted pretty good. But whatever you do…don’t forget the heaping pile of french fries!

Berlin: Something’s different here.

June 17, 2010 By Jillian

We landed in Berlin bleary eyed after getting up at 2 o’clock in the morning for our flight. (Danny never went to sleep) and immediately something was different. No less than 10 minutes after getting off the plane, we stood in line to buy train tickets, customs and immigration completed, luggage in hand. Right on schedule the train appeared, opened it’s doors and we were whisked away to the center of Berlin. It worked like clockwork. “German efficiency, welcome to Europe,” I thought.

There’s a lot to see and do in Berlin, but first on our list was actually the Egyptian museum. Crazy, I know, considering it has been two weeks since we stood in the Egypt Museum in Cairo. Of course we wanted to see Nefertiti’s head after reading the rather belligerent request for it to be returned on a billboard in the museum in Cairo. For the record, her head was very nice, but not nearly as incredible as we had hoped. In the Sudan we slept under the stars next to the pyramids of Meroe, almost all of which have been destroyed by an Itialian fortune hunter in the 19th Century. Taking the gold jewelry and treasure back to Europe, we assumed while at the pyramids that it had been sold and lost to history. You can imagine my surprise and frankly excitement when I stumbled upon her treasures in this museum. Like a kid in a candy shop I examined every piece with such excitement that I think I scared the guy next to me.

Honestly we spent most our time in Berlin at the museums, given that there are more than 70 of them and both of us are history buffs isn’t too hard to understand. We saw Checkpoint Charlie, remaining sections of the Berlin Wall, road our bikes around the Bradenburg Gate, the German History museum, the site where the Nazi’s famously burned books, and spent nearly three hours exploring the Isalmic Art museum in the Pergamon. By the time we left we were museum-ed out.

Besides the more traditional museums, we also spent a lot of time at museums and sites dedicated to World War II. As Americans it was interesting to see the scholarship and academic work on World War II from a German perspective.

Having hosted, traveled and met several German’s along the way, we were not surprised at the frank and sometimes painful displays related to World War II and the Holocaust. We found the Topography of Terror Museum, on the site of the old SS headquarters in Berlin to be particularly interesting for the displays told a complete history of the SS’s actions during the era with facts and images that we had never seen. We appreciated that the Jewish Museum didn’t focus only on the Holocaust when telling the story of Jew’s in Germany, instead providing a chronological history since the medieval period. We ended our visit to Berlin at the Holocaust memorial located symbolically near the Bradenburg Gate.

Somewhere in there we had time to grab a pretzel, a few beers and cycle all over Berlin. In fact the couchsurfers we stayed with kept us out late each night, not that we’re complaining, beer tasting in the park, barbecuing with friends, playing cards and having some rather deep political conversations. We thought Europe would be a relaxing break for us, but if Berlin is any indication we’re going to be exhausted by the time we leave this continent.

Jerusalem

June 16, 2010 By Danny

For most people, Israel is a destination that is visited via an all-inclusive tourist bus. That is how I entered Jerusalem for the first time, Jillian as well. We stopped at an overlook to see the Old City, sang a couple of songs, then listened to to religious music on the remainder of the journey to help set the mood. I imagine it is this way for most ‘pilgrims’ of any of the faiths that consider Jerusalem to be their spiritual holy land.

This time, things were different. Things were exactly as they were for every other city in the 29 countries we visited on the way here to Israel. We got on the bus in one city, and rode into the bus station at the next city. We entered Jerusalem without stopping for any scenic overlook and then were subjected to the standard display of security (which, in my opinion, was highly ineffective). Inside the station, the first thing we saw was a McDonald’s…Kosher of course. Much of the city itself, felt just that, like a city. It had some big and fancy buildings. People were going about their business. Tourists buying things in shops. Fancy hotels next to cheap ones.

Walking to the Old City my images of Jerusalem began to change. Outside the Jaffa gate were ritzy shops displaying the best in fashion trends. Inside the gate was shop after shop selling Judaica and other Israeli themed merchandise and souvinirs. I expected the Old City to have a market but I did not expect the Old City to be a market. Prices were high and we had a good laugh at the hoards of people bargaining hard to save a dollar or two. This was not the market we’ve become accustomed to.

Visiting the Kotel, also known as the Western Wall, was the most disappointingpart for me. A visit here, for us, felt a bit obligatory as Jews but what we found was hardly what we expected. Less than 100 meters from the wall, the holiest place in all of Judaism, was some kind of military function. Hundreds of troops were in uniform marching, more like goofing off with some level of forward motion, to a square with machine guns decorating tables.

The ceremony was in Hebrew so we are not entirely sure what it was we were witnessing but between what we saw and what we have pieced together in speaking to Israeli’s after the fact, lead us to believe it was a graduation for the paratrooper division of the Israeli Defense Forces. Since it was this division who captured The Wall for Israel they’ve held their graduation in front of it ever since.

I am not a religious man but I found the display, especially in light of the current turmoil with the Gaza Flotilla, to be deeply troubling. It made me feel as though this holy place was being treated like a trophy of war rather than a religious center. After all the traveling we’ve done I can safely say this was a unique experience, but for the wrong reasons.

In the end we had a nice time in Jerusalem, just as we did in the rest of Israel. As has been true of many places we’ve visited though it wasn’t the place that made it special but the people. We stayed with old friends in Tel Aviv, couch surfed in Jerusalem, and celebrated nice meals with family. These are the nice memories and the ones I most hope to repeat on our next visit.

Into the holy land

June 15, 2010 By Danny

Walking into Israel was, in a way, walking from Kansas into Oz. Gone was the bad internet, livestock sharing bus space with us, and people yelling at you everywhere you went because you are the western tourist. In place of these things was flat-screen TV’s, cans of Dr. Pepper, Falafel served WITH hummus rather than plain, and functioning highways. The first step to entering Oz however, is making your way through the twister…in our case that would be questioning about why we would go to a country like Sudan.

Mostly the questions were innocent enough but they did get annoying:

Agent: Why did you go to Sudan?

Me: It was in between Egypt and Ethiopia, it was just a transit visa to get across.

Agent: Why did you stay there 10 days?

Me: Well there is ferry that goes from Sudan to Egypt, that is the only border crossing, and it only goes once a week.

Agent: Oh, OK. Don’t you have a cell phone number?

Me: I had a SIM card in Egypt but it doesn’t work here, you can keep the SIM as a souvenir of having met me if you’d like

Agent: No, I just need the number so that I can have Mossad trace it and see if your a terrorist.

Me: I don’t know the number, we just use it to call taxi’s. You’re welcome to keep it though.

Agent: That will be a problem because you were in Sudan and now you don’t know the number to this random SIM card that you’ve handed over to me and don’t care about and have only had for two weeks.

Me: Any way we can speed this up for a fellow Jew?

Agent: How do I know you’re Jewish?

Me: I can drop my pants and you can see for yourself….

And so it went for three hours before the start of Shabbat, allowing us to catch the last bus north with space on it with only 30 minutes to spare. We arrived to Tel Aviv about one hour before sundown.

The most surprising thing to us about traveling in Israel was just how expensive it was. Our budget doesn’t quite show this expense because we stayed with friends the entire time, but a can or bottle of soda usually cost about $2. Shwarma cost about 3-5 times as much as it did in Egypt and falafel even more. There is no doubt in our minds that Israel is the most expensive country we have been to on this entire trip. It really felt like we were back in the US, save of course for the Hebrew all over the place.

So what did we do in Israel? We spent our time relaxing, going to the beach, avoiding most of the tourist scene, buying jeans (first pair to travel with us on this entire trip) and tons of dead sea beauty products. We relaxed, recharged and just had a nice time catching up with friends.

For those of you who might realize, correctly, that we were actually in Israel for this whole Gaza Flotilla thing, let me tell you what we saw while we were in Tel Aviv….nothing. Everyone was talking about it, many half expected to be in a new war within a week, but we witnessed no riots or protests of any kind during our stay in Tel Aviv. Opinions were diverse and those critical of the operation, like 90% of the rest of the world, were mostly critical of how the military botched a very simple job. The news differed only slightly from foreign accounts in its coverage, not forgetting to remind people of Egypt’s complacency in the matter…a subject many foreign news outlets seemed not to notice.

Report Card: Budget for Africa

Foodie Friday: Currywurst

Berlin: Something’s different here.

Jerusalem

Into the holy land

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