Xmas and things...

Well its been a while since the last post. So here are some of the things we have been doing...


This house belongs to an old friend of mine. Rough in Africa huh?















Ash sitting on Lance and Janes veranda.








The Drakensberg
Before we left for the Berg, we attended Alisdair's Christening. Nick went out with Bungy and Roys kids the night before, so spent the whole time puking in the parking lot while we were singing carols....



This is Alisdair on the veranda at the house.














I bought a little remote controlled glider that is great fun. Its called a Fling. Can you see it in the top right of the picture? Once again Ash is doing well with the camera....








The Xmas Festivities
The usual hectic flurry of activity preceded the meal.




After Nick had fed much Burbon to Christo, Bill bravely asked them to extract the stuffing from the tin foil. Amazing that it ended up in one piece. Christo said that it was the best thing he had ever tasted.








The masses...













Scott told an extremely funny and appropriate joke very eloquently























The Acsent of Mount Derrier


This is the view from the veranda of the house in the berg.

We decided to climb it - departed at 8am in the rain. The rain caused a number of people to drop out so only a hard core of veteran climbers attempted it. The Son and Air even made it, which was astounding. 8 am!







This is us at the top. The rain on the way up prevented pics on the journey. It had nothing to do with exhaustion I promise (I am still stiff 3 days later).

Audrey did very well, even though she decided that 75% was good enough, she responded well to the "2nd street extension" lie.









The obligitary group pic on the top.
















Bill took this of us at the top with his telephoto lense.








The route that Ash decided to come down was near vertical so we went down on our backsides. Not a bad way if you dont plan to wear your shorts again. There was much hilarity on the descent, the ascent had a lot less chatter...















Bill (rather meanly) took pictures as we got back...



























Here are the mountaineers in front of the massif











See the damage to the shorts???

Audreys Comments....

Audizzle -
Well that was something I didn’t expect. Coming home from a game drive to see our lodge terrorized by a rogue elephant and the occupants at the time terminally scarred (or exhilarated) by the incident, almost being charged by two other elephants on a testosterone binge and a lonely rhino ( in its defense we did rudely interrupt it drinking by a waterhole on a game walk). Suffice to say I did not successfully sleep until I was almost comatose from exhaustion. Why? You try sleeping (being the sheltered only child who before now had never seen a giraffe in the wild) with baboons screaming at a large leopard growling not too far from our hut. It was very exciting and I have apologized to Christo a million times for digging my fingernails into his flesh every time I heard a suspicious noise. I managed to see the Big 5 in 3 days (with the leopard on our first game walk which I am chuffed to announce). I think one of the highlights though was the tiny impala carcass not half an hour after being half eaten by a cheetah. But alas, I did not see said cheetah or one of my favorites – the hippo.
I would certainly do it again, but I have to ask all the beetles, the mosquitoes and the impossibly large spiders to leave the vicinity of my bed at a 10 meter radius at least.
Africa is beautiful and I can understand why people have stayed even after all its faults. Christmas is soon and I do miss my family but since I’ve got another one it’s not too bad =P. Over and out.

Friday 19th. The more scary things from the game reserve!

The Number 3 Scary thing. Being on foot.

Walking through the bush with "The Big 5"!
The big five (ie the 5 most dangerous animals in the bush to humans) are defined as the Lion, Elephant, Rhino, Leopard and Buffalo. So when one is wandering through the African bush on foot (albeit with a ranger with a large gun) these 5 trend to prey (ha ha) on ones mind a little.


The Africans say that the buffalo has a look that means "You owe me money". See?

Fortunately we were encased in a metal object with a large fast engine when we saw this herd. I think I would still be running if we came across these guys on foot.






The rangers said we should "climb a tree" if a Rhino charged us. There are a few problems with this philosophy:
1. Most of the trees there, have serious (and I mean serious) thorns
2. When we came across these 2 - there were not many climbable trees in sight.

When I took the picture, the shutter made an extremely loud and alarming noise that I had not noticed before. I realised that we are small and puny creatures and should not be in the domain of very large, fast, unpredictable animals, unless encased in metal with NOS enabled engines. After that I took photos of bugs and flowers...



The Number 2 Scary thing. Elephants on the Road.
Some hints on elephants:

When observing elephants be especially aware of the following:
1. Are they in "must" (sp). This is a condition that the males get into for the mating season.
2. Is the sweat gland running over? Look just behind the eye and see sweat running down.
3. Is the back leg wet? See the dark inside of the back right leg. They urinate on them selves. The females find this attractive, proving that they are as complex as human females.

If you believe that they are in "must" - be very afraid.


My wife knows all these things as she has spent many hours in vehicles with "wilderness" types who have absolute disregard for their own safety. Unfortunately for her she was in a vehicle with people who have very little experience of "musting" and scoffed at her pleas for fast evasive action. So when this guy suddenly turned and charged (note ears flapping - another bad sign) the driver was caught unawares.
Note to self: when looking through a camera lens the animal is MUCH closer than it appears!
Sorry about the blurriness of the picture but my arm still bears the nail marks, and let me tell you they dont look like they can move quickly, but that ambling walk is just done to placate us puny humans.


The Number 1 Scary thing. Having an elephant in camp.

Well it all started out innocently enough.....


Audrey (who is a game spotter of note) saw this guy very close to our camp.....











He wandered around - this picture was taken standing on my bed.











Then he went down to the river to cool off...

This was taken from the veranda









Then he walked right by... Just like the fly (OK its getting late and my bed is calling)

I think Audrey might be slightly disappointed if she ever goes to another game reserve as this is not an everyday occurrence...






Then he disappeared. So everyone (wilderness savy types included) disappeared off on a night drive in the bush. Nick, Jen and I (Scott playing DS in his house) were having a drink on the porch when....






We noticed him walk by the house. It was a bit like Jurassic Park....

Thats the bedoom window











He pushed over a tree, just for fun. I am sure he was saying "See this is how strong I am, puny humans. Do not mess with me".









I had forgotten by this time how much noise my camera made when facing large, fast unpredictable animals, but I wanted to get some evidence of having an elephant in camp.

But I did not hang around to get a better shot with more light. Do you know the ground does move when they walk? It is amazing...







This is actual proof of what can happen in this place.....
















This is how you cross a human walk way












This is in the middle of the houses...

Would you ask him to leave?









The next day Jen told NuNu and Elliot (those wilderness savy types) all about it.

They were very off hand about the incident and NuNu kept saying that this was the best thing he had ever tasted (Dad - click on the picture), could he have another? Which Jennifer refused - a first for her.





Well thats all for now.. Will send more in the Berg, if I can drum up the energy...

Wednesday 17th. Post Zulu dancing and Game Reserve. The fun bits....

Before going to the game reserve the family went to the traditional Zulu dancing thing. The dancers decided to take A and A into the troop... As you can see by the smiles, there were not too many protests!



















Then on to the game reserve in Marks very nice Landrover. Fitted 7 with no problems. I found the game viewing amazingly interesting, could have been that I had a decent camera. The animals I liked best (except for a majestic giraffe) were the babies.. See below...



I though a baby cow might have got mixed up with the wildebeests.











This is the white Rhino (straight bottom lip and grazes grass)...











Ash has the steady hand for these long distance moving shots. Talk about "hanging on"!













These guys were very shy...











My personal favorite














Just butt ugly!

























Nick liked the war paint on the Nyala

















He was just superb!













The morning walks.
Every morning Elliot and NuNu would collect the willing ones at 5:15am and we would walk for a couple of hours through the bush. The numbers dwindled rapidly from 9 on the first morning to 3 on the last.


This is a Rhino "place for shitting". The round ball, at the bottom of the picture, is being pushed by 2 very small (relatively) dung beatles. I believe they might have bitten off a bit more than they can chew - literally.





















The son and hair even made it for the first walk, which trust me, was a mammoth effort.













Drinks on the porch of Gqoyeni before dinner (alas still no waist reduction happening). The cook was Alphius (sp) and he made a fine breakfast, lumpy Multebela porridge, which all 5 of our kids devoured, followed by eggs, bacon, mushrooms, toast etc etc







The next post deals with a few of the more interesting things that happened during the three days.

Durban - Saturday

We are now in SA and what a pleasure to have a decent Internet connection that does not drop out. I changed the wireless connection at the house to have security and I am sure there are a bunch of people in the Kloof area that will have to start paying for their connection...

It is fairly daunting to read about a finger puppet called Al, that has the ability to blog coherently, post amazing pictures and allow comments. We do realise that he is in Spain and is doing more than slothing and eating.

Jen is delighted to be in the family again. We had the ubiquitous braai last night with the entire family except for Steve and Noodle.



This little guy insisted on visiting us at our rooms - but he was very hard to capture on camera as he never stopped jumping. Talk about ADD!

This was the final supper at the resort. Tulsi was the manager at the bar and looked after all of us with dedication, humour and efficiency.

These clothes might appear fancy, but I am still itching!

All evidence of a flat stomach have disappeared {sigh}.

Breakfast in Kloof. Another tropical Paradise. Jane is really going out of her way to make sure we are being fed in the manner to which we become accustomed.

Audrey and I decided that we have a "desert stomach" that can always take another helping.

I did play squash with Lance yesterday, so at least my body did get the idea that its only purpose was not to consume food.

Cousins catching up.

Nick cant be live the cost of things in SA. Smokes are less than $2 a packet and the biltong/beer is wonderful and affordable.