December 2nd

Sleep Out!
"Wanna have a sleep out tonight?" This is the first we hear of the sleep out. Hmm aren't we already sleeping 'out.' The answer, no, sleep out would mean you armed with your sleeping bag in the middle of wild Africa! Sweet. So we all pack up our little overnight bags and half of us hike to our riverbed campsite while the other half drive to set up camp. Bloody hot day, I don't know if we mentioned Africa in the summer, toasty. Anyway, we get there and there is a fire going and everyone is sitting around, Aim and I hiked obviously. Side note here: I'll never understand how these people can be on the verge of physically cooking the entire day, and that is sitting in the shade mind you, and then at night sit by a bloody fire! It's madness!


Anyway, once we all arrive, we get our debrief . . . "So . . . every hour someone must be on guard duty" all our faces drop a bit, haven't been given this information prior. . "Two people must walk the perimeter of camp during their hour and if anything 'potientially hazardous' occurs, wake us up" I think Rob and Lance, just enjoy scaring us! But who wouldn't. So Amy and I got the midnight hour 'till 1am. Sweet.

So everyone hung out for a while then people began retiring. Now it's a given that most people aren't really going to sleep in this situation, considering the high level of mossies and, well, the accomodations, and also the possiblity of instant disembowlement by the leapord that recently had visited our campsite, leaving his lovely tracks as proof. So as Amy and I lay there in our mossie net rigged between two coolers, we anxously awaited our 'bait hour.' Probably got a few winks in staring at the stars, on our backs unable to move even an inch due to intricate rigging, but 12:00 rapidly approached. We got up on our own as our doom hour internal clocks went off and we began our shift. Luckily, by the Grace of God, Rob, the rifle keeper, was awake during our shift. The mosquitoes were apparently having thier way with him so sleep wasn't in the cards for him during our bait hour. While we 'guarded' standing around, eyes as big as bowling balls, ears straining to hear the slightest snake slither, we did hear some good stuff. The hyena, which we heard every night were active close by, the jackals competing, a strange unidenified cat noise, and yes, Zero the male lion told us he was around as well.

It was an interesting night and in retrospect a great experience. We had the opportunity to do it again, but unfortunately, Mine and Amy's were the only hands in the air when the question came up. :( oh well. Maybe next time. . .
-Amanda