Nongoma Reed Dance and Weekend in St. Lucia

This weekend was definitely one of the most amazing and eventful weekends I’ve had in a very very very long time! We woke up early on Saturday morning to take the 4 hour ride to Nongoma, where the Zulu king lives. The ride was not so great… it was pretty gray and rainy but it cleared up once we got there. Nongoma is literally in the middle of nowhere, so we didn’t really know what to expect when we drove up. From a little ways away, we saw TONS of giant white tents and people everywhere. When we finally parked, we found out that our estimate of fifteen thousand Zulu maidens was a little off… there were literally 50,000 girls there to perform the ceremony for the king. It was staggering how many were there… and as the only young white women there, we felt a little out of place. The girls first went to collect their 20 foot tall reeds, then processed by province up the hill to the king’s palace. Along the way, they sang and danced and even posed for pictures for us. We weren’t allowed to go past the gate into the palace, but there they dropped off their reeds and performed briefly for the king before exiting out the back. We met up with them around the back of the palace, and they looked so happy and relieved to be done with what they had practiced for months to do. After, we waited around for a little to wait for the next part of the ceremony, where the king would address everyone, but apparently they had gotten started late because of the rain and there were still 2 more provinces that had to process in. We wanted to get to our bed & breakfast before it got dark, so we had to leave a little early. Still, we got to see an amazing tradition.

The bus ride to St. Lucia was almost as eventful as the actual reed dance. To get there, we had to drive through a game park. Though it’s not as big as Kruger, it’s well known as being one of the best in the country. The through road went literally right through the park, and 30 seconds into the drive, an elephant crossed the road! We were all absolutely amazed… our driver Sdu told us that we probably wouldn’t see anything!! Throughout the next half hour, we stopped many times to take pictures of zebras, rhinos, water buffalo, springboks, wildebeests and warthogs. It was absolutely insane!

We finally arrived in St. Lucia, a tourist town a few hours north of Durban right on the coast. The town was gorgeous and very safe, so we felt comfortable walking around at night. We all had dinner as a group then made our way back to the b&b. On the way, we decided to stop for a few drinks at a local bar, and ended up staying a few hours when we inadvertently became part of a bachelor party…. Definitely an interesting night. We all had a ton of fun though, and got back to the b&b not too late to wake up early (againnn) the next morning.

On the drive back to Durban, we got to stop first at the beach (which was absolutely gorgeous, even though it was a little windy), then at the estuary where we saw hippos! We were totally not expecting to see this much wildlife this early in the trip so we were all pumped. A few hours later, we got back to Cato, and I’ve been hanging out and relaxing since.

This week, were visiting hospitals, NGOs, and schools, so I’ll definitely have lots of exciting updates coming up!

Hope everything is well overseas :)