Gary Kirkpatrick

Artist and travel blogger.

Videoslideshow- Chobe River and Park, Botswana, Our Safari

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This is a slide show from our safari in Chobe National Park, Botswana, not far from Livingstone, Zambia.  Half of the time is on the river and the rest on land.  Some close ups of quite a few critters.    .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z85NCjOCA4U&list=UUl7YKIwsWVvA_jQrQVcxYRg

Tanzania to Solwezi, Zambia- a slideshow set to Zambian music

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These are photos from the moment we landed in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, across 1500 km of Tanzania to Solwezi, Zambia, where we met up with Travis, who is serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer in a small village not far from Solwezi.  Coming up,  our days in his village.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKXpMILbwFU&list=UUl7YKIwsWVvA_jQrQVcxYRg

Some watercolors from Zambia

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Here are some of the drawings I have done here in Tanzania and Zambia.  We started in Dar Es Salaam in Tanzania.

Tazara Train
Tazara Train (from the journal I kept)

 

The countryside in Tanzania:

Huts in Tanzania (from the journal I kept)
Huts in Tanzania (from the journal I kept)

 

The plains of Tanzania  (from the journal I kept)
The plains of Tanzania 
(from the journal I kept)  Sold

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Update from Lusaka

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June 14th

Hello from Lusaka, the capitol of Zambia. 3 fantastic days in our nephew’s village (he is in Peace Corps), what lovely people and what a totally fabulous welcome we received! Rustic conditions, to put it mildly, even the bus rides were arduous and there was a 1 1/2 hour walk in the dark but under a full moon to end the 12 hour day. More to come when I have time on the net.

If you have a Facebook account you can read my hand written journals with illustrations.  I have not uploaded to google+ yet.  I can not post them here without more work than I can probably manage to do right now.

From Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania

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Seven hours from Madrid and you are smack dab in the middle of the Islamic world.  It hardly looks it from an air traveler’s point of vierw.  Dubai is flooded with oil money and the large modern steel and glass buildings strut out from the coastal landscape as you descend.  The world’s tallest building seems to zig zag its way into the clouds.

Three hours and a $15 quiche for one lunch later we were on our way.  It’s about 5 hours to Dar Es Salaam.  Fortunately we slept a bit along the way.  In my case, I struggled with much pain in the coccyx.  It seems I need a special pillow as not even the ibuprofen worked.

Once at the airport it took an hour to get the visa and $100 each.  Quite expensive for a three day visit.  Fortunately our ride was still waiting as we emerged and we got into a small van, only slightly beat up.  It took another hour to get to the hotel we’d booked.

Along the way people offered a wide variety of goods for sale to the drivers stuck in the traffic.  Women wearing brightly colored dresses carried a root vegetable on their heads, their skull cushioned by a round cloth.  Men carried sporing goods, traffic warning triangles for when you break down, bright plastic watches, and large bags of cashews.  Local buses lumbered in and out of the lanes.  These buses have been around a while.  It’s hot, about 92f/32c and the bus windows are all open.

Our downtown hotel sits on an unpaved street.  We are warmly welcomed, ushered everywhere from the front door to our hotel room.  A gorgeous huge bed is also very welcoming, as is the fully tiled bathroom.  You have to wait for the hot water tank to warm up, but once that is done, it’s a great shower with room for a pony.

Our traveling companions are in the hotel next door.  They have made the trip from Texas, arriving the day before.  We had a very spicy curry, a decent pizza, some tomato soup.  Nary a fried grasshopper in sight.

 

Travels

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Our time in Valencia is coming to an end, at least for now.

On June 1 we are joining two other RPCV (Returning Peace Corps Volunteers aka ex-PCV’s) who lived near us in Panama for a two day train trip across Tanzania.  There might be some wildlife along the way but mostly small viallages, open expanses and hills.  That journey ends in Zambia, where we meet up with our nephew who is a PCV there.  We spend a week in his village (just six houses there) before traveling across the country to Livingstone.  This is the location of the famous and fabulous Victoria Falls.  Tons of wildlife in the river and nearby.  280px-Victoria_Falls_2012

There are lots of critters in the area including elephants, giraffe, zebra, antelopes.  Lions and leopards are rarely seen.  There are also vervet monkeys and lots of baboons. The river above the falls has lots of hippos and crocodiles, the latter weighing up to a ton!   There are otters and a wide variety of raptors and waterfowl.  Riverine forest is found above the falls,   Mopane woodland savanah dominates the area however.    We are staying in a backpacker hotel just 8 km from the falls and so we can go often, with transport provided by the hotel.

We return to Madrid after an 8 hour visit to Dubai, where we hope to ascend the world’s tallest building.  After an overnight in Madrid (we are leaving our big bags with a friend there), we fly to Paris.  We are renting a friend’s flat in Courbevoie for the month while she is gone.  Courbevoie is famous for the impressionist painting executed along the river.

After Paris we are in Trieste for a month.  Trieste is almost due east from Venice on the Adriatic, on the border with Slovenia, and 90% of rural dwellers speak Slovenian, while Italian dominates in the city.  Trieste was part of the Austria-Hungarian empire from the 14th century until it was ceded to Italy at the conclusion of WW1.  It has a mild climate, with a high of 28C (low 80’s F) in the summer.  We have never been there but it is a city well worth visiting.  Since it borders Slovenia, it and Croatia are readily visited as well.  We have rented a one bedroom flat near the old port.

From September – late December we have rented a flat in Rome from a couple visiting New York during this period.  It is a small house  near Tiburtina station and a tram line.  Trains and trams are generally faster than buses, which must contend with tons of traffic.  We are not near a metro.  Where we go next year has yet to be determined.  We do think Valencia is in our future, however.

 

 

 

 

More about Valencia’s symphonic bands (with link to a video)

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Peg writes:
You may know my penchant for these Valencian symphonic bands.  We can hear groups of this caliber almost every week at the beautiful Palau de la Musica here in Valencia.
In any case, we heard this composition by Bert Appermont, a Belgian composer who was born in 1973, last Sunday.  It tells the story of Lamoral, the Count of Egmont, a descendent of one of Spain’s wealthiest families, who was a general serving under King Philip II of Spain in the Low Countries (Belgium and Holland), in 1560 ruled by Spain.  He was born and raised in Holland, however, and after years of military training in Spain and distinguished service in the army, began to protest strongly against Philip II’s cruel and tyrannical government.  He was eventually imprisoned and beheaded.   To make a long story short, his death sparked the 80 years war that resulted in the independence of the Low Countries from Spain.  You can hear the entire story in this piece.
This is a typical band from our area.  There are more than 600 of them, most with music schools attached.  These people all have day jobs, many of them having nothing to do with music.  They do it out of love, often living in the town where they went to the local music school.  Sometimes their kids play sitting next to them – I’ve seen a few who look like they’re about 12 years old.  Until they are good enough, the kids play in the school band. This performance was taped during a band competition in the area.

St Pat’s Day in Trafalgar Square

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Went to St Pat Day event at Trafalgar Sq. with 100,000 of our closest friends today. We listened to a harp concert, and the Commitments on loan from the musical ongoing here. It was a bright and sunny day. A friend I met in Spain but from here met us there and we walked past Big Ben (leaning 3 degrees), Parliament, and across the river. Lots of activity on this beautiful day- which started out badly when the parking lot machine wasn’t working and the call in number wasn’t either- but ended well as we got no parking ticket either.