Travel Summary of Africa to Amsterdam. Flights. Miles. Time. Kilometers. Climate. Weather. Find it all Here!

Posted by Chef D on Sep 26th, 2009 in Africa, Europe, Holland, Southern Africa 2009 | 0 comments

Time to call this one a wrap! Ben and I are just totally beat from the intense traveling. Here we are at Schipol Airport in Amsterdam awaiting our flights. Its 5am here, and Ben and I find ourselves watching the cleaning crew and graveyard shift getting ready to leave. We sit here reflecting on this trip, this was a trip of a lifetime! I am heading directly back to Dallas, Ben to Atlanta then to Birmingham, AL, so saying adios in Amsterdam (shortly), until I see him in Dallas in January.

In 23 days we covered the following ground-

14,058.8 air miles

3 continents (US, Africa, Europe)

Crossed over 3 massive bodies of water

drove 2,394 miles (South Africa, Namibia, Botswana) map of our driving trip

consumed roughly 6 pounds of wild game biltong

walked roughly 40 miles each

drank 41 gallons of water

crossed 6 borders

experienced 8 climate & terrain changes

ate zebra, giraffe, gimmsbuck, warthog, ostrich (and egg), panakoken, and many other treats- (you will just have to go back through all the food finds in the blog from the trip!)

saw some of the best sunrises/sunsets, wild animals, art, & architecture in the world!

That is some intense stats to produce in the better part of 3 weeks! Stay tuned for more adventures, we spent the countless driving hours figuring out where next. And of course how to become a full time tri-lingual “Ninja”-

Travel.Cook.Eat.

Thanks for following the Africa to Amsterdam Adventure,

Chef David & Ben

Border Crossing and Customs in Namibia, Africa to Botswana, Africa

Posted by Chef D on Sep 16th, 2009 in Africa, Southern Africa 2009 | 0 comments

Like always at any 3^rd world border crossing things don’t move very efficiently… we did wait patiently while the customs clerk stuffed her face with some bizarre sausage of mystery force meat. I wanted to get a picture of this but figured if I whipped out the camera I would have bigger problems than Barry Switzer when he cruised through the DFW airport with a hand gun!

After the 20 minute wait (standing there another sole in the office) she acknowledged us, took our passports and documents and gave us a “proceed”. Of course, we had to move another 15 feet away to pay someone else the entry fee to Botswana. Then another 15 feet to get our documents stamped…hmmm. No need for any comment… I am sure that force meat on the stick is the reason for this…

We laughed about this sign for hours…Who posts this in an official office? Even better yet, it just displays that things move slow (or is it a curious note to tourists that defines we move at one pace and do only one thing at a time????)

So after the ooos and ahhhhs of the border crossing a nice cattle gate was opened and a big sign read “Welcome to Botswana”! This is no joke, we crossed country lines through a hand opened cattle gate!

We entered into Botswana full steam ahead!

Keeping in mind how important it was to keep the gas tank topped off and water jugs full at all costs! We somehow survived the drive with wild herds of cows, donkeys, and goats walking along a two lane highway with cars and trucks doing an average of 140 km per hour!

It was insane, these animals would just stroll right out onto the road and sun bathe, cars would stop, go around, and move on. This is just the way it is in Botswana…

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Traveling the Trans Kalhari Highway. Driving Trans Kalhari in Botswana, Africa

Posted by Chef D on Sep 15th, 2009 in Africa, Southern Africa 2009 | 0 comments

Written by Chef Dave | 22 September 2009

The Road through Botswana… We woke up bright and early after a scrumptious meal with Monica and Jofee at their Lake Lodge, to take the daring trek through on the Trans Kalahari Highway! The first mission was to repair the “Flying Toaster”- which meant reattach the license plate, air the tires, reattach a hub cap, and for my OCD issue, clean the inside!

We took another route than the beach route, although our escort zipped off about 1 km. ahead of us. And we were swerving around trying to maintain some equal ground! The ground clearance was a big issue, and we did hit a few sand patches, but like love the “Flying Toaster” prevailed! (She only lost a hub cap, which I am quite certain will be found by some baboon and used as a Frisbee!

Mission II-

Racing the Clock….

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"I'm Chef David Gilbert and I created this site to share my passions for traveling, cooking and eating. So, pour yourself a glass of 2005 Stellekaya Orion or just heat up some Thai leftovers and come along with me as I travel, cook & eat my way around the world!"