Addison Thompson Visits Namibia

It has been a crazy two weeks. Last Friday I went to a girls’ field hockey game against a big rival.  They lost, but it was still fun to watch and to learn about a sport that I have never seen or heard of before.  The closest comparison I can make would be if soccer was played with sticks and a small ball.

The next day, Saturday, I went to the store and got a camera so I could take pictures.  I spent some time messing around with my new camera and then we had to leave to go to Cape Town.  One of the other parents at the school, who has season tickets to the Stormers, was kind enough to invite me to a rugby game.  That game was very interesting to watch.  Rugby is a cool sport because it combines some of the contact of football, but it is fast paced and has more action.  There was even a fight.  One of the players didn’t like something about the other and he started an on-field brawl.  The refs were able to break it up but it looked like those punches hurt.  The Stormers won the game.

Sunday was a quiet day because everyone had been up late the night before. School was busy that weekend and Bridge House had a sevens rugby game.  The next day I felt sick so I stayed home from school and packed for my trip to Namibia.

One of the adults owns and operates a game preserve in Namibia and he offered for the exchanges to come for the weekend and go on Safari.  On Friday morning I woke up at three thirty to drive to the Cape Town airport.  After a two hour flight to Windhoek, we had a five hour drive to Onguma Game Reserve.  We arrived at about three in the afternoon, settled in, and relaxed for a little bit.  After a wonderful dinner of lamb and pork kebabs, we went to bed early.  Shortly after we went to our tents we heard the sound of a male leopard walking by.  We woke up at five o’clock the next morning so that we would be able to see the animals.  We drove to the Etosha National Park and drove around for a little bit.  We saw impala, springbok, gemsbok, cheetah, leopard, kudu, and elephant.  The most interesting thing we saw was a leopard stalking some springbok, but they moved off in the wrong direction and we did not see a kill.  Afterwards we returned to camp and rested before a night game drive where we saw a few genets.  The next day everyone was tired so we slept in.  We went on a drive and saw a few more animals.  That night we had dinner at the Red Fort, which is one of the lodges inside the reserve.  The dinner was wonderful and we could see some animals near the waterfall by the lodge.  The final morning we drove the five hours back to the airport to discover our flight had been canceled.  We spent the night in a hotel and made it home the next day.  This is what I have been so busy with.