South Africa, East Africa, and the Seychelles--Introduction

Motivated mainly by my attempt to collect several countries in southeast Africa and the Indian Ocean, we embarked on a voyage on Silversea Cruises Silver Spirit from Cape Town around and up the African coast and then on to Mahe, Seychelles.

Another view of the area

Originally, I was going to collect 5 new countries from the cruise (Mozambique, Madagascar, Tanzania, Kenya, and the Seychelles), but a couple of months before we left, the cruise line announced that they were cancelling the Madagascar stop, due to an outbreak of the bubonic plague there (wusses!).  Instead they substituted a  stop at Mozambique Island, which is part of the country of Mozambique.  I narrowly missed out on another country, as we stopped at Mamoudzou, Mayotte, one of the Comoros Islands, but when Comoros declared it's independence, Mayotte decided to remain a territory of France. Despite these setbacks, I finished the trip having visited 127 countries.

Warning: you're not going to see a lot of wildlife in the upcoming pictures, but you will get a feel for how people in south-east Africa and islands in the Indian ocean live.

Next: Days 1-8: South Africa