Exams, Birthdays, unbearable heat, oh and 2 leopard sightings in one morning!

It has been a full on few weeks since my last blog and it is almost impossible to write down everything that has happened but i will try my best.

We are now 6 weeks in to the course and spent week 5 writing our final Eco training exams which involved a 2 hour theory paper on everything we had learnt in the first 5 weeks and a 1 hour practical assessment out in the bush. My exam went really well and i managed 88% which was awesome. But my practical was a little difficult as i was 2nd to go in our rotation which meant i started the drive in an unknown location and one which was full of mopane trees and little else. Unbelievably i didn't see a single animal and only heard 4 birds call in the hour. As you can imagine this made talking about everything in the bush pretty difficult! I managed to link as much in from vegetation to birds and from poo to mammals as i could. I was pretty thankful to come to the end of it and passed all the exams and assessments with a final score of 80% which is pretty good and in the upper end of the group. Huge relief that it is all over and now we can all relax a bit!

We rounded off our time in Selati with an awards ceremony, written and produced by sarah and myself. Everyone received an award for what they had become best known for. I was lucky enough to receive the worst volleyball player award! As we have a volley ball court on the dried up river bank outside camp! very well deserved i must say!

The final weeks at Selati provided us with some awesome game viewing (although not when i really needed it!). And we had 5 rhino (white and black) encounters, including mother and calf, as well as lions, elephant, genet and bush babies. Mainly the Leopard that continued to escape our grasp and much to our frustration we had one in our camp several nights running!

A week ago we moved to a new camp - Karongwe. Which is just an hour west of Selati and the transfer was in our open top landy's so it was a little wind swept to say the least! Karongwe is a commercial reserve with about 7 different game lodges on it. There are all of the big 5 here although the Buffalo are in a breeding pen right in the north so we are unlikely to see them. The camp is awesome and our tents are pretty big, none of this hitting your head on the roof of your tent anymore which is a nice. We even have 2 shelves each to unpack! What a luxury!! I am still sharing with Sarah, who is really nice. Also english, also went to oxford brookes to study business and also went to harnas 3 years ago where i met her there! small world! 

It was my birthday on the day we arrived and so we went out for the obligatory sundowner where we watched the sun set over the Drakensburg Escarpment  with the hippos playing in the waterhole in front of us! Savannah in one hand and very happy days!

Karongwe has already been full of surprises and we are only 1 week in. The focus of the next 3 weeks here is to recap on everything we have learnt and enhance our tracking skills. Day 2 has been the highlight were we went out on a drive and by listening to the radio (which the guides from the lodges use) we heard about lions and cheetahs. We raced over to the lion sighting and waited our turn to view. After crashing through the bush we came across a pride of 7 lions including a mating pair. The lions were very relaxed and didn't seem to mind us being there, we sat with them for about 20 minutes and it was awesome to see them. Next on the radio was cheetah so off we went again and found 2 male cheetah just off the road in the bush, so we walked into the sighting (guide with rifle of course!) and managed to get within just a few meters of these 2 wild but very habituated cheetahs.They were two males in a coalition and looked like they had just had a good feed. Another awesome sighting and to see lion and cheetah in the same day is almost un heard of.

Karongwe is very different to the wild selati where little roams there and no tourists exist. Karongwe does have many tourists although we don't see them too often. But due to that and the use of the radio the animals are pretty used to people and easy to find. This does take some of the thrill and excitement away but it also provides us with fantastic viewings. 

Last weekend was a scorcher and we hit 45 degrees in the sun. I think the only time i have come close to that is in dubai where we could escape to the air conditioned car, house, building!! Not our here in the wilds of africa. We had to sweat it out and carry on learning and going out on activites in the heat! Luckily the instructors took pity on us and drove us 20 mins down the road to a lodge where we could watch the rugby world cup final (very average game) and take a dip in their pool! It was a bit of light relief before heading back to the sweats of camp! The next couple of days were similar and people have started to feel the effects. Water intake is at an all time high and rehydration salts are in well use! Finally the heat has cooled to a balmy 36 degrees!  at least there is cloud cover now so that provides some escape!

Just yesterday we were very lucky indeed as we headed out on our morning game drive as usual. We headed to the northern end of the reserve, it was a cold and damp morning which was a refreshing change from the crazy heat. We drove down one particular road and came across a beautiful female leopard lying in the tree like all perfect leopard sightings should be. Sadly she got up and jumped down before we had a chance to take photos. But we felt very lucky to catch her, it was our first sighting of leopard in the 6 weeks we had been on the course. So we were happy with our sighting and headed back south towards camp. Chris (our instructor) out of no where shouts Leopard! of course we thought he was joking, there is no way we could see 2 leopards on one morning! But there he was a beautiful big male just strolling through the bush! He was really relaxed and so we could spend about 10 minutes watching him. Highlight of the course!!

Leopard, Lion, Cheetah, Rhino (black and white) so its just buffalo to go to complete the big 5!

The group are all in good spirits despite a couple of tifs here and there which is normal when 17 people spend 6 solid weeks together in each others company!

Life is still good in the bush, off out leading a game drive this afternoon so hopefully we come across something good.

Huge thanks for all my birthday messages, i managed to get into my Facebook to read well over 100 messages which was lovely to receive.

Love and hugs to all. I should be in more contact on the 10th november as we have our 5 days leave then!

xx

Eco training - bush life at its best

So its week 4 of the bush life and all is going very well.

I met up with the Ecotraining group 5D at nelspruit over 3 weeks ago now and I can't quite believe how much we have achieved and more than that how much we have learnt in such a short space of time. Our first 3 days were spent in nelspruit filling in forms, registering with DEAT and FGASA (the governing bodies for field guiding) and also taking our rifle competency test which to pass we had to fire 10 rounds (bullets) into a square target on an A5 piece of paper 15 meters away with a .22 rifle. Easy some of you may say, well not when you haven't handled a rifle for a few years!! Luckily I and several others passed first time.

After the first 3 days we drove 4 hours north of nelspruit and entered Selati Game Reserve, which is a 33,000 hectare private game reserve in which no other lodges are present other than the Eco training camp and some lion researchers. The Eco training camp consists of 15 dome tents and an open air lecture/dining room. No electricity and hot water is sporadic, but this would be our home for the next 5 weeks and it was more than adequate. The biggest bonus is the cell phone reception which is only available at the top of a 5 meter termite mound!

Selati is home to the big 4 (Lion, Leopard, Elephant and Rhino, just missing the Buffalo from the big 5). It is a beautiful area full of undulating hills and flat open areas as well, although bush is pretty dense throughout the reserve. We have seen more giraffe than impala, which for those of you who know africa is pretty crazy! The Selati river runs through the reserve and right in front of our camp. Although it is dry at the moment so it is proving to be an excellent volleyball court on soft beachy sand. In just a few months it will be a free flowing river in which we can swim in. We return to selati at the end of november and hope it will be ready for us to cool off from the 40 + degrees it is going to get.

The last 3 weeks have been pretty hectic, on arrival we were told we had 5 days to learn 50 birds by sight and by call. Now I will openly admit that i was not the biggest birder (or more commonly known out here as a twitcher!) just over 3 weeks ago. I am now however pretty hot on the birds of southern africa! So we had 5 days of nothing but bird watching and listening, which when you have arrived straight off a plane from new york can be a little challenging for some people, but we all did very well and surprised ourselves. 5 days after starting the birds almost all of us past. I managed to get 49 out of 50 so pretty pleased with that!

So week 1 was 50 birds, and after we were sick of the sight of the fork tailed drongo, the orange breasted bush shrike and the african fish eagles we were told to crack on and learn 45 trees!! Its no rest for the wicked here!! week 2 We started our fgasa (field guides association of south africa) level 1 training which is the basic level you have to achieve to be able to operate as a guide in south africa. In 28 days we have to learn everything from geology, mammals, fish, arthropods, climate, insects, oh and of course how to be a guide itself!! Our daily structure is up at 5.30am every day quick coffee/hot chocolate and off out for a 3 hour walk or 3 hour drive. THe group is split into two so one group walks and one group drives. Then back for a huge breakfast at 10am before a lecture starts at 11 for a couple of hours, then lunch and back out for a 3 hour walk or 3 hour drive (opposite for what you did in the morning). Back for dinner at 7ish and study time if you have the energy. Most of us sit round the fire before going to bed at 8.30ish. so its a start early and finish early kinda day!

We have a test and presentation every week, so far i am averaging about 84% which is fine as pass mark is 75% lets hope i can keep it up!

Some of the best sightings we have had have been a male lion almost walking through camp in the night, naturally we all jumped on the landy to go find it! A heard of 70 elephants we came across and just sat for over an hour whilst they walked past us! Just 2 days ago i was leading a safari drive and we came across about 10 elephants, luckily i had byron (our assistant instructor) in the car with me so he could tell me where and how to drive around them!

The weather has been really mixed couple of scorching days when it has been 38% in the shade but also a couple of stormy days with hectic thunderstorms. The other night we had 17mm of rain in a couple of hours.

The people are awesome and one of the most diverse groups eco training have ever had. We range in age from 18 - 61 and are split 50:50 guys and girls. There is 17 of us here at the moment with one girl leaving in a cuple of weeks as she is just here for the 28 day course. We also have all nationalities from canadians, americans, aussies, french, south africans and of course the brits (6 in total!)

Today is our first day off in 22 days and a much needed day of not studying and a little bit of civilisation as we have headed in to hoedspruit to use internet, have a boozy lunch and buy the much needed essentials.

Apologies for any birthdays I have forgotten so far and also for the ones i am likely to forget in the coming weeks!!

Hope everyone is well, missing you all heaps

xx

second leg of southern africa - botswana to Nelspruit

From the border crossing at Rietfontain we drove north to the Kgalagadi National Park, a game reserve that borders both South Africa and Botswana. This is the only park in Africa that contains two countries. We spent the night at Twee Rivieren  campsite and started the two day drive through the park the next day. We had such a huge distance to  travel that we had to drive faster than we would have liked and couldn't spend as much time at water holes to see the animals. We were lucky enough to see lions though which was a big bonus! We also saw heaps of birds and the binoculars and bird book came into full swing (mum you will be pleased to hear!). We also saw meerkats, mongoose, puff adders, black mambas, oryx, springbok, red haartebeast, jackals and a honey badger. Beautiful landscapes driving right through the middle of the kalahari desert. 

The second day was an eventful one as we drove north to exit through the Kaa gate on the botswanan side, this time no such border troubles. We knew the road would be bad as it was rarely travelled but what we encountered was something of a different kind!! it was deep sand, heavily rutted and more up and downs than a yo-yo!! we thought the drive out of the park and to Ghanzi would take about 6-7 hours. But 11 hours later and we had only arrived in Kang, it was a pretty tough day of driving, I only drove 3 of the 11 hours with Pattrick driving the large majority. The road was so bad that most of the time we could only drive 15kms an hour! there were points on the road/sandy track where we were so remote no one would have ever found us! It was kind of scary but exciting at the same time, that we had to be completely self sufficient and no one would come pull us out if we got stuck! We reckoned only about 5 cars a week travel that road! We stopped for a quick homemade ham and cheese sandwich freshly made from the kitchen in our trailer!  whilst consuming such sandwich we spotted what looked remarkably like lion poo!! And quickly got back in the car! Even though we were now outside of the park there were no fences on the northern end so Lions could quite possibly be roaming in the area we were driving!.

We gave up on trying to make it to Ghanzi and found a motel type place at a service station that luckily had a room spare. Turns out the Harnas phrase of "Expect the Un Expected" can be applied across Africa!!

We spent the next two days in the Okavango Delta (but based in Maun), camping right on the river which was beautiful but we shared our campsite with plenty of mosquitos!! We spent a day on a Mokoro (a wooden boat pushed along by a local guide with a long wooden pole, much like they do in venice but a little less glamorous!). We travelled for about 7 hours through the delta seeing elephants, zebra, antelopes, lots of birds (still need to learn the names!!) and the odd croc as well, just the small ones though! It was a lovely day out but maybe if we had researched more we would have spent the day in the Moremi game reserve on safari as we might have seen a little more animals. But the delta is about being on the water so it was great to experience that.

Then we travelled to Nata, about 4 hour drive from Maun and stayed in a lovely lodge on the edge of the Maghadihadi pans, a huge salt pan which attracts heaps of birds but mainly flamingos in their thousands. We had a beautiful sunset here and enjoyed the luxuries of staying in a lodge for a night rather than camping.

The next day we drove 300km to Serowe where there is the Kharma Rhino Sanctuary. We decided not to take the main road to Serowe and just and have a bit of an adventure, as if we weren't already! so we took what is marked on the map as "secondary roads"! As you can imagine this is little more than a dirt track and took substantially longer than planned, but we did see a bit more of the country and the back roads took us through some interesting and very remote villages. the locals waved madly at us and then ran towards the car, i can imagine that they have probably only ever seen white people on the tv!

Kharma Rhino sanctuary is actually more of a rhino game reserve with the aim to breed rhinos in a safe environment to then re locate around botswana to the wild. It is a 5000 hectare area with 30 rhinos in it. We camped within the park and could self drive around which was really fantastic. it only took about 40 minutes before we spotted our first rhino in the distance. You are not allowed out of your cars and you have to stay 50 meters away at all times, but when we could only see the bum of the rhino and thinking this could be our only sighting we took our chances and headed out on foot!! We got within about 20 meters and made sure the wind direction was right so they couldn't smell us! Rhino's actually have very poor eyesight so as long as they couldn't hear or smell us we were pretty safe. Right until we realised it was a mother and calf!! this swiftly brought back memories of a walking safari i was on with my family in zimbabwe when we came across a mother and calf and got a little too close for comfort! The mother charged us and came within just a few meters of us! Luckily this encounter was not so heart stopping but a little nerve wracking so we headed back to the safety of the car!

We then spent the rest of the afternoon spotting many rhinos all over the park, on one particular road we turned the corner and were faced with no less than 7 rhinos including 2 babies!! we switched the engine off and just let them graze around us and wonder pass in their own sweet time!! we must have been there for close to 45 minutes and it was really magical to be so close to them and for them to be so relaxed. Another beautiful sunset and a great campsite, braai and bed. In the night i heard the noises of what i instantly assumed was leopard as there are some in the park. Slightly nervous i peeked out of the tent gauze to try and see but to no avail. Next morning looking at the tracks we deciphered it was a huge hyena and he had walked all the way around our tent! Definitely in the middle of all the action!

Next day we drove to South Africa across the border, which i assumed would cause hassle with my visa etc but it was very smooth and quick. Spent the day driving as far south as we could and made it all the way to the Blyde River Canyon arriving in the dark with no campsite booked we took the first one we found which was adequate!! Following day was a short drive to Nelspruit through a very beautiful and mountainous area. Sadly the cloud was low and the mist was hiding the beauty of it so we saw very little. 

Finally arrived in Nelspuit after 14 days, 6000kms and 3 countries of driving through the most beautiful parts of Southern Africa. I feel very lucky to have had the opportunity to see so much of the area and travel it with such an awesome person! The only arguments revolved around map reading in the cities!!! I was always right!! But huge thanks goes to Pattrick for doing 90% of the driving and putting the tent up and down every night and every morning!

Next step: Eco Training. 1 year living and working in the bush..........bring it on!