Cradle of humankind was interesting. It was cool to learn about all the history and see the animals. We stayed at the Cradle Boutique Hotel and the hotel rooms were little huts with thatched roofs. The first unofficial game drive we went on was a drive, then a walk. We saw antelope, wildebeest, monkeys, giraffes and a zebra. On the walk, we went to a cave that you had to crawl into. I was very scared of going into the cave but I had to. Mom was very encouraging even when I saw a bat hanging from the fall inches from my face. When we got to the bottom there was just enough room for 4 kids and one adult so mom and dad sat in the shaft thing. On our way out mom cracked one of the bones on the floor and it sounded super weird.
The food at the hotel was super good. I had the best risotto in my life there and I tried an ostrich! They also had a kid’s drink called an Appletizer. It is basically their version of Martinelie’s or sparkling apple juice in a can.
Visiting a Famous Cave and Museum
On Saturday we went to the famous caves. They were really big and cold and there was a lot of history about all the bones found there. The second cave was just a museum; there was no actual cave. It started with a water ride that is just floating through tunnels. It was fun but not thrilling. Then you went through a vortex tunnel. A vortex tunnel is a tunnel where you go in and stand on a platform and the walls are a tube around you and the tube around you spins so it feels like the platform is falling sideways. They are really cool! The rest of the museum was pretty cool but one fact that stood out to me a lot was that there were 5 massive extinctions and could we be the sixth? Could we also bring our own extinction upon ourselves? This thought was intriguing and scary. I do not think that the extinction of humans will happen in my lifetime but it could. There was a thing called a kiddies cave and what I imagined was a playroom but it was a literal cave.
The Glow of a Wildfire, Just Over the Hill!
That night as we were eating dinner we could see a huge wildfire just over the hill that was just one mile away from us! The next day we went for a game drive and we got to see the amount of burnt land. There was a line of black. Burnt, not burnt, burnt ground not burnt ground. There was still some smoking ground. It turns out the fire was started by arsonists who were attempting to burn down a movie set for a movie about a Zulu king named Shockra. They did not succeed in burning down the set or coming within three hundred feet of it. But they did succeed in burning down 2,000 hectares of ground.
Cradle of Humankind was my third favorite place in the first three places we stayed. I would recommend it as a weekend but not for too long.
