Caves, "wild"life, and antibiotics.

The prevailing theory is that the illness is bacterial. It isn’t getting better and I’m not the only one, so I determined I was going to have to visit a South African doctor. But it was going to have to wait until Sunday, because Saturday was Cango day.

We left at 8 am and drove about two hours to reach the caves, which are a huge tourist attraction. I’m not usually a fan of touristy type landmarks, but this place is truly amazing.

Only about one fourth of the caves are open to the public because they have had major problems with vandalism and mold, and the parts of the caves that are open are no longer forming. Of course, this triggered my selfish need to see things almost no one gets to see, but unfortunately this isn’t a case of bendy rules. Just the carbon dioxide that humans release when they breathe damages the growth of the formations.

But the caves we got to see were spectacular enough. The first chamber used to be used as a concert hall, but they had to cease their events in 1994 because they couldn’t control the crowds. Drunk people kept climbing all over the formations and breaking pieces off to take home as souvenirs. Way to ruin it for the rest of us, guys.

 We spent about an hour and half in the caves, then piled back into our vans and drove to the Cango Wildlife Ranch for lunch. I ate an ostrich burger. Ostrich is an odd meat. You would assume it would taste like our concept of bird meat, but it’s actually more like red meat. It’s often served in steak form and you can choose a temperature. Kinda gamey, really good, and super popular here in South Africa. The entire park was covered in peacocks.

The thing I love most about wildlife ranches in foreign countries is just how close you can actually get to the animals. It’s probably completely irresponsible and not that safe, but it sure does make for some amazing photographs.

At the end of our tour, it was time to visit the big cats. Like this fat ass jaguar.

Or the extinct-in-the-wild white lion. Complete with giant lion testicles.

We had a few “encounter” options where you paid to spend one-on-one time with a selection of animals. It shouldn’t surprise you to know I chose the cheetah. 

They sanitized our hands and took four of us in to a pen with two handlers and two adult cheetahs, but the cats were having none of it. Apparently they had fed the larger one some vitamins that morning, which consisted of forcing them into his mouth, and every time the trainer approached he just trotted away. The second one was lounging on the roof of a shed and had no interest in moving. So they ushered us out and to the enclosure next door. I snapped a few pics in one of their faces as we walked by. No zoom, no filter, all cheetah.

The cats in the next pen were younger, and a little more rowdy. For much of the time, they were playing with the handlers’ fingers or rolling around in the grass. They also LOVED pets. Cheetahs purr, and they do it really loudly, so it was very easy to tell when they were happy. When my turn came up to pet him, my cheetah wouldn’t stop playing with the handler, but when I reached up and scratched his head he immediately went limp and just purred.

It was cool, ya’ll. Really cool. When our time was up, they released us back into the zoo. We wandered into an enclosed exhibit where a lorikeet hopped up onto my shoe and rubbed his face against my leg until I literally had to shoo him off. Then a pigmy marmoset jumped up onto my shoulder and rode around for a while. I don’t have pictures yet because other people took them, but I’ll try to load them up when I do.

It was a long and amazing day, and I slept well (or as well as I can sick). The next day I and two other girls when to a very kind, old doctor who barely looked at us before prescribing us some antibiotics. The visit cost about $55, the antibiotics cost $0.80. You read that right, $0.80. No health insurance. I’m flying to SA the next time I get sick.

Honestly, it’s been well over a week now and I’m starting to get really tired of being sick. I can’t sleep through a night because of the coughing and I have a pretty constant headache. I’ve only been taking the meds for a day and a half, and I think they’re helping, but my cough is still terrible and my voice sounds pretty pathetic. They benched me today at site, just kind of letting me float around and help where I could, so I know they’re a little worried about it as well. Here’s hoping for the best for the next few days.

Update again soon.