Saturday, September 11, 2010

Wildlife is the best life


Saturday 28 August
My first walking experience in the bush. At 6.30 am five rangers pick us up.  Four of them are training for their grade 2 walking qualification. Seth is fully qualified to walk into dangerous game with guests.
Mark is our guide for the day. It’s a walk in which Mark will be assessed on his guiding abilities and his abilities to track and get close to the animals. Each of the trainees has to pass six walks in total to get the qualification. Every walk tracking either elephant or rhino (neushoorn), will become more difficult. Mark is doing his fourth walk today, so Seth will not help him much.

Josh and I are excited; walking in the bush is something totally different from going on a game drive. We drive in direction of Pipeline Pan. This is the place where we saw two rhino and mother lion with her three cubs on our first game drive. Even before we reach Pipeline Pan, I can smell a kill. And indeed, around the Pan we find five carcasses. The smell is terrible, I hold my jersey in front of my mouth and nose.  I don’t understand why the male nyala is still coming to drink at this place of danger.
We can’t see any fresh tracks of rhino or elephant here, so we carry on and I don’t mind moving on away from the smelly Pan.

We carry on, chatting to the rangers in the game drive vehicle. We pass two giraffes, ‘indlulamithi’ in Zulu which means ‘past the trees’.
Then Josh spots a hyena. Right next to the vehicle. Josh and I are surprised: the rangers only saw the hyena after we shouted and we were already next to it then. I’m lucky; Josh is my personal excellent ranger. :-)
Mark is looking for tracks, soon we follow the tracks of two rhino; a mother and her calf. We drive around a bit to find the right place to start our walk. Josh spots a male rhino on the road in front of us. It comes into our direction rapidly. We quickly move backwards, but the rhino wanders off  into the bush.
We find a good place to start. We get off the vehicle. Two of the trainees make themselves a walking stick in less than five minutes.
Mark professionally gives us guidelines for the walk; checks our conditions, checks our allergies, checks our water and he tells us who to follow. Mark goes up front, followed by his tracker Paolo, followed by me, then Josh and the three other rangers. We are on our way!
The first few meters, I find myself holding my breath all the time. I relax, but feel the adrenaline and the tension from Mark trying to find his two rhino. Mark finds their tracks easily, we follow close in line. Mark shows us the rhino dung, the shape of the tracks in the soft sand and soon I’m looking at every track as well. Than the terrain changes a bit. There are less sand patches to find and so Mark had a hard job trying to follow mother and calf. We stop regularly and give Mark some time to get back on track.
We bump into a road. The road that we saw the male rhino on. I immediately recognize it. It takes a little while until the rangers do. The tracks of the male go further on the road to the right. Other tracks disappear into the forest. Seth and Mark try to find more tracks, we wait. Yes, there we go again: we follow the tracks into the forest and soon find a sandy patch where the two rhino have been sleeping for a while. That’s a good sign; it means that we didn’t get far behind, trying to retrace the tracks.
Some more very warm rhino dung. We walk onto an open sandy patch, suddenly Mark tells us to quickly walk to the thicker bushes. We run. He tells us that he spots mom and calf about sixty meters away.  He takes his sock with ash, gives it a swing and the ash shows the direction of the wind perfectly. We try to come closer while we stay downwind. From this position the rhino will never be able to smell us. It is Mark’s goal to give us a close view without the rhino even knowing that we’re there.
We walk around a thick bush and then I can see mother rhino for the first time. She’s still far away. Mark tries to walk closer, but the loose branches and leaves on the ground make it difficult to approach the rhino without them knowing, so we turn around and try another angle.
I step on a leaf. We wait, tensely listening for a reaction. When we are further away from the animals Mark explains that we have to walk in each other’s footsteps in order to make as little sound as we can.
We approach the rhino from a new angle in an area with fewer branches and leaves. I follow the steps of the tracker. It requires high concentration. We get closer, I can see them both now; mom and calf in full view! We sit down. Josh and I glance at each other and smile: what an amazing experience to share together. Mom and calf graze calmly. White rhino eat grass whereas black rhino eat from trees. Mother and calf walk closer to us, still grazing; I think they are only thirty meters away from us. Mark tells us softly where to go when things get out of hand. But we don’t need to act. After a little while just sitting and enjoying, we quietly tiptoe away from the animals (to be honest I tiptoe and the men just walk J).
Wow! Everyone is excited, not just us. The rangers tell us that this was probably one of the best and closest encounters with big game in the last couple of days.
We still have to be aware and quiet but the second half of the walk is clearly much more relaxed. We chat, laugh, look at tracks and dung. Mark askes us five questions to either identify a track or dung. I like this, because this is how you learn quickly. We see tracks of rhino, elephant, genet, porcupine, dung beetle and tok-tokkie beetle. We look closely at the elephant tracks. Marks tells us; you can recognize which way the elephants have been walking by the marks on the track. At the back of the track you will hardly find marks and the shape of the front of the track is a little bit pointy.
We look at nyala dung and Mark answers my question on what the difference between Impala, Kudu and red duiker dung is. A crowned hornbill and a Yellow Bellied Greenbul fly by.

We drive back. Mark obviously relieved. Seth drives fast, they chat, we look around and Josh spots a rock monitor lizard. The car slows down; this lizard is very rare. And we are lucky.

Sunday 29 August
Josh and I head of to Sodwana Bay, a very popular area of coastline. We drive out of the reserve and follow a unfamiliar road through the community. We pass beautiful round houses made of clay with  thatching reeds for the roof. The laundry swings in the wind as it hangs over the fence.
We stop, put our bags in the boot and give a lift to two local guys. I try to speak Zulu to them, but they answer my Zulu with English. Josh tells me that Zulu people who can speak English often rather practice their English. I can understand, for me it’s obviously the other way around. I’ll get my chances. 
We decide to a little detour and visit Muzi Pans, a highly recommended place for birding. I can’t believe my eyes when we take the turn-off from the N2 and drive into a totally different landscape. The Pan is wide; the plants and trees are lush and green. We park our car and walk into the field, between the cows. As we get closer to the water to watch the birds we find fresh hippo (nijlpaard) tracks.
For me it’s paradise. I have never seen the birds that occur here before. A yellow-billed Stork, open-billed Stork, purple Heron, blacksmith Lapwing, black-winged Stilt etc. A Zulu man collects thatching grass. 

We carry on. The vegetation changes. We drive into the dunes, huge dunes, the second highest in the world Josh reckons. I can smell the sea close by. I am excited, I’ve never been this high up the coast. Sodwana Bay is magic. The sea is blue and warm, much warmer than the sea at Muizenberg beach close to our home in Cape Town. We eat a delicious home-made Tuna-sandwiches, Josh reads and I look for shells.  
 

A local boy washes his freshly caught fish in the sea.

After a beautiful sunset we make our way home. We drive into the sand forest again and pass Forest Lodge. It’s pitch dark by now. In the distance we see two eyes reflecting. As we slowly drive closer we see it’s a leopard. Leopards are shy and not often seen, so we are very lucky to have this encounter. We follow the leopard for a little while as he marks his territory. I am amazed by the graceful and lithe movements of this big cat.

Monday 30 August
It’s early in the morning, Josh has just left for work, and I drink my tea on the veranda. I listen to the many birds that sing their morning songs. The sky is painted with light pastel colours. 


I hear branches cracking and I look to my right. Thirty metres from where I am sitting a giraffe is moving about. Wow! I realize that I dreamed about this encounter last night…
The giraffe stares at me for a while and then a second one pops up. It strokes the first giraffe on the neck with his head.

Together they stare at me. I am surprised to see two baby giraffe walking closer to me through the thick bushes. I thought this would happen one day but I am amazed by their entrance to our open field in front of the house. I walk closer, outside the fence, to see them better. I find a little hill to sit on. I see the giraffes eating from the trees. Mom and Dad,  I guess,  show the baby giraffe the way.

I hear more branches cracking.  A fifth giraffe, an adult, makes its entrance onto the open field. One of the giraffes makes a loud sneezing sound, I reckon to warn the new giraffe for my presence. Immediately after the sound the giraffe stops and looks around for any danger. The giraffe warns a few more times, but finally gives up and the fifth giraffe makes its way on the open field, past the place where I sit. He is only ten meters away from me!
Later that morning the monkeys find a way to get into the house. They eat to apples out of the kitchen and when I walk in, they quickly flee into our room. I chase them out and find some nice presents on the floor. I remember Ross’ words: never leave a window or door open when you are not right there!
I make a compost heap, bake bread, clean the kitchen, clean our room and walk around the house with the binoculars around my neck. I spot birds and check them in our bird book. Before I know it, Josh is home again.
We look up a Potato Bake Recipe on the internet and make ourselves a delicious new meal for dinner! It tastes even nicer after a good Karate training session!

Tuesday 31 August.
I walk outside, it’s early in the morning. Hearing the sounds of the birds I can no longer stay inside. I still have my pyjama’s on. I see two birds right in front of the house. Their faces are red, surrounded by a black collar and their body is a kind of beige. I find out in my book that I’ve just seen two black collared Barbets. The colours of the birds here in South Africa are spectacular.
A little later I see an African Hoopoe flying by. I have seen this bird in books when I was young; I never thought I would see him in reality!

Josh finishes early today and I fetch him from work. We leave straight away to go for dinner with Josh’s uncle and aunt, Simon and Jennifer. I am more and more amazed by the variety of the landscapes in the area. Simon is staying at a beautiful lodge, Nkwazi, right on the wide Pongola River.
 

When we arrive, we drink a beer and Simon takes us on his boat. We need to be quick before the sun sets. I see my first hippo in the wild. Eleven all together. They don’t like us getting too close. We go a bit further and find nine white rhino. 
We have a delicious dinner and I get to meet my new family. We hear the sound of the jackal in the distance.

Wednesday 1 September
I fetch Josh, for Ross lets us know we can come on Game Drive with him today.
We meet the guests and start our drive, beginning in the Sand Forest. Ross explains the history behind ancient Sand Forest, once on the bottom of a sea. He shows us the endangered Lebombo Wattle Tree with orchids growing in it: Christmas decoration he jokes…  

We drive and chat.. Then suddenly, almost unnoticeably because of their camouflage colours, we are a few metres away from Phinda’s biggest lionesses close to Imagine Dam. The lioness walks past us to the Dam. She is just metres away. Woolly-necked Storks hunt on the shore. 

We carry on trying to find the breeding herd of elephant. The tracker spots them and seconds later I see a herd of 15 ellies rapidly rushing through the thicket. They are on their way to the water and we can clearly see their excitement!
A Purple-Crested Turaco and group of Starlings welcome the ellies to the Pan with their lively singing from up in the tree.


Once in the water they splash, amazing to see! A three months year old calf steals the show. 

We turn around, away from ellies to make space for other Game Drive vehicles and meet two rhino just ten meters away from us.
During the drink stop we enjoy each other’s company and the dried mango, biltong and cashew nuts. 

Thursday 2 September
We drive to Richards Bay at five in the morning to hand in my visa application. I am nervous, for I know how long the queues at the Cape Town home affairs office are. We get there right in time and are the first in line. Fortunately Josh chats to the head of immigration to make sure that we don’t have to fly back to Cape Town to hand in the application. In one and a half hours’ time, everything is sorted. Relieved we celebrate this milestone with a well-deserved brunch.

We visit Advent Hope Christian School on the way back. This is the school I might be working for the coming months. We are welcomed warmly. I am shown around by one of the teachers. I chat to the grade 1 teacher and I get all excited to start my own class 1 in Cape Town. Monday I will come back to the school to observe and see where I can help.
Friday 3 September
The Chinspot Batis sings me good morning with its call: “Three blind mice”. (e, dis, dis)
Ross shows me some more birds around the house; the grey flycatcher fans her tail when she sings. 


A female nyala visits me inside the garden fence while I am working.
Saturday 4 september
We leave our house early in the morning in Ross’s car to do some transecting at Zuka, an area of Phinda up in the mountains. Ross is busy assessing the vegetation of the various areas on Phinda.
We find an endangered species of aloe in between the burnt areas.  

 
The morning sky is amazing: the rays of the sun shining through a thick pack of clouds. A giraffe eats its breakfast close by.

I try a yellow monkey apple, but spit it out quickly: it’s still very sour. In a few months’ time the monkey apples will all be yellow with sweet fruits inside. Ross describes the taste as a mixture between mango, papaya, pineapple…
Ross’ car starts to sound funny. We stop and check and find that the fan  is loose. We drive back to Forest Lodge to meet the mechanic. We arrive and at the moment we stop the car, the water tank bursts because of the loose fan. Luckily it happened here and not on the challenging roads of  Zuka.
We drive behind Ross as he takes his car to the workshop. He hopes to get it fixed today. It will  turn out only to be ready five days later.
We drive back from Thabankos’, the workshop, and get a puncture. We put on a new tire but unfortunately this one seems to be flat as well. I am amazed by how quickly help arrives. Soon we are on our way back to the workshop and this time to get our tire fixed.
Sunday 5 September
We make a birdbath in the garden and make a proper braai pit from cement. 


Julian the leopard researcher stops by and invites us to come with him in the afternoon. We are keen, this is much better than a game drive even!
Julian tracks the leopard with radio signal and we spend the evening driving through thick bushes where I thought I would never drive with a car ever. His car is a though one.
And it gives us the opportunity to come very close to the leopards. I reckon we are five meters away when we see a young leopard eating from its kill. Mom lying close by, checking us out.
We learn a lot on this drive. We even visit the hyena den again and see a genet running on the road in front of us.

Monday 6 September
When I enter the staff room at Advent Hope Christian School the morning prayer has already started. All the teachers, mainly from Zimbabwe, sit behind their desks, looking through the work in front of them. They sing beautiful songs, in perfect harmony. I’ve got goosebumps. It’s a privilege to be here. They pray together and the principal introduces me to the teachers. He explains that I will work at the school till the end of November. I have not agreed to anything yet, so I add that I will observe first and see how it goes.
During assembly the principal introduces me to the whole school as ‘the teacher who comes to work with us for the coming months’. They are definitely very excited to have me here, that’s for sure.
It’s nice to see how this school operates. I learn a lot and see a lot of their culture reflected in their teaching. All children wear the same green, white and grey uniform with nicely polished shoes. The classes are big. All about 47 children. I would say far too much to give them all the attention they deserve. The English teacher, Beauty, agrees, but what can she do about it?  
A lot of the children in the class look very tired. During the lessons I see them eating and reading their books. The teacher does not say a word about it and teaches mainly the front row of children.
Tomorrow, Beauty says, I can teach the Grade Fours English. I agree and look forward to teaching again. 

I drive back home. I feel uncomfortable. I realize that I cannot work at this school for the rest of our three months. I’ve got so much else that I must and want to do. It’s been great to see the school and get a little insight into how they work with the children, but I want to concentrate on my future job. 
At home Josh notices my worries and I decide that I have to tell the teachers tomorrow that I am not coming anymore. I find it difficult because they are all such warm people, but for me it just doesn’t feel right to work there right now.

Ross gets an sms. Phinda is on 50/50, a South African TV program about wildlife. We drive to the canteen and watch this program with quite a few of the staff. A genet glances up into the canteen from the deck outside. I am happy: now I get a really close look at him.
Tuesday 7 September
Early in the morning I leave home. Before prayer I want to tell the principal and Beauty that I won’t join Advent Hope Christian School for the coming months. After prayer I tell all the colleagues: they are sad but understanding.
It is a relief when I drive home. Advent Hope Christian School is a good school, with warm teachers, but I need to focus on other things right now.

Ross invites us to come to the Bird Hide at Forest Lodge. We see a beautiful Narina Trogan and then have to leave the hide because of the rain. We have to make a proper roof on it soon!

On our walk back to the Lodge, Del-Marie tells us there is a male ellie right next to the Forest Lodge deck. We walk there and indeed, a big bull is eating from the trees close by. He takes huge branches in his trunk and breaks them off with his tusk. What power!
The ellie walks off and Ross, Josh and I follow him. We are close now. 

I take a picture and Ross takes one too. His flash is on and the ellie does not really like that. He rushes towards us to check us out. We are only three meters away from him. Ross whispers: ‘don’t move’. I don’t get the message straight away, but Josh tells me quickly. We freeze and I remember the power with which he removed thick branches from the tree…. Luckily there is a bush between us.. After standing there still for a while, the ellie wanders off. We quietly back off, back to the safety of the deck.

Ross tells us that we handled correctly: if we had moved, the ellie could have come for us in a split second.

 
We follow the ellie towards the pool where he drinks. Soon after that, a breeding herd enters the open patch in front of the pool. Wow, we quickly follow the herd! We hear them pushing over whole trees. We make sure we stay downwind and have an amazing view of a big herd of ellies eating.
Wednesday 8 September
I phone Gaia Waldorf School to hear about the outcome of the interview I had on the 13th of August. I speak to Iman, one of the teachers, who is just looking for my number to phone me. Wow, is this meant to be?! I know it is! I say yes to the offer of taking Class 1 in January.
I am very happy, this feels right!
In the evening Josh and I make a braai in the garden. While we are preparing the boerewors, a giraffe walks into the open area just outside the garden. The closest encounter Josh has ever had with a giraffe on foot. Nightjars start their song and the red sun sinks behind the mountains in the distance.

Thursday 9 September
I sleep in this morning for the first time. A striped kingfisher sits in the tree next to me when I eat my breakfast. I play guitar and sing while the monkeys play in the Albizia tree and on our roof.
When Josh comes home, we see a male and female blue headed lizard. 


We head of to fetch Debora, Ross’ girlfriend. I will call her Nomkhosi from now on, this is her Zulu name. She explains what her name means: when you get a nice surprise, that’s Nomkhosi. Almost all the Zulu-people have got an English name as well. I like it much more to use their real names!
We drive to Bayete to catch up properly with Mduduze. We saw him briefly yesterday. Josh knows Mduduze from his time working for Africa Foundation. He used to be the cook but is now managing Bayete.
During the cooking, Josh asks Mduduze and Nomkhosi a lot of questions about Zulu words. A lot of them can’t be found in the dictionary easily. I enjoy the laughter and learn quite a few more words.  

There is thunder and lightning. It starts to rain. The first real rain I have experienced here. I try to say in Zulu: ‘it rains hard’. ‘Liyana kakhulu’. I don’t understand why Nomkhosi answers my question with ‘no’/‘cha’. Then she explains: for Phinda this is not hard rain at all. I wonder what the rain will be like in the coming rainy season. Later Ross tells us that it can rain up to 150 mm at once. That is the real rain!

The food is delicious. No wonder because Mduduze used to be the chef. We have a nice chat and Mduduze invites us for Sunday again. We will definitely have more of these evenings together!






No comments:

Post a Comment