Getting stuck in!

I’ve had a week of interesting game drives and walks. It has shown me that some people are interested in nature on the grand scale and some are only interested in the “Big 5.” It’s hard to entertain some guests. You can show them something as rare as a Big Bull Elephant smashing down a mature Marula tree from about 5 metres. The Marula nearly lands on their heads and they still just feign interest and you can tell they want to see something being eaten or caught or killed! They aren’t impressed and then they see a Lion just lying around and their mouths drop. It’s a bit hard to understand. I think the marketers have a lot to answer for with the way wild life is presented. But that’s a debate for another day.

There has been a lot of rain lately and some of the reserves are quite sodden. Not too dissimilar to the bogs at home. I’ve been close to getting bogged down a few times but I guess it was inevitable that I would get stuck at some stage and that’s what happened on the morning drive yesterday morning. We were enjoying a nice drive and seeing lots of cool animals and then just as I was about to stop for coffee I went through an area where I had been the previous day and we get stuck. I mean proper stuck! To make things worse was that I had taken the shovel out of the vehicle the evening before to use when we were repairing a road in the conservancy. It’s always the way!

Anyway the guests were grand about it and we had our coffees and waited for a tow to arrive. I prayed that the rain would hold off! It was funny because the road just sunk in that particular spot. Help arrived within a half an hour and it only took a bit of grunt to get the vehicle out. I was hoping that as a reward for the stress of the incident that we would see some Rhino and then we saw the two Black Rhino. I hadn’t seen them since October and it was a nice penance for my sins! We arrived back at the lodge a little later than planned with a nicely mud spattered group of guests and half of the reserve clinging to the chassis of the Range Rover! I’m sure it won’t be the last time I get stuck in as there is more rain forecast.
I went out with Ulaf for another “Big 5,” drive in the afternoon and we had some great luck. Lion, Ground Hornbill, Rhino, Elephant, Buffalo all beside the road. Leonard the tracker fell asleep at one stage on the tracker seat as he had nothing to do! It was one of those days when everything falls into your lap and the God’s were shining on Ulaf that day.

It's early days....

So far so good on the guest front. There has only been one guy who didn’t want to listen to instructions but I’ve talked about him earlier. We had a group from Dublin over the weekend. They were good craic. So much fun in fact that we closed the bar at a record time. So much for the recession at home. They were from the Donaghmede area and were over for ten days of scoopin as far as I could see. They stayed in Hans Merensky where Paul had bought a house on the golf course before they landed down to see us. They wanted me to join them in the pool at 4 in the morning and this was after getting up at 5 the previous morning and doing a game walk and drive. I wasn’t much up for the skinny dippin in the end and I told Ronny to say nothing as I slinked off to bed. I could hear them calling me after for a few minutes but I was out cold the moment my head hit the pillow so that was a relief.

The next morning as you can imagine was full of sorry for themselves looking faces! It was hilarious but they were heading for Cape town anyway so all I will say is watch out Cape town. The bar bill was massive and it was another record. They were in behind the bar pouring themselves mad concoctions. Things will seem quiet from now on!

I actually went and played golf on the Hans Merensky course yesterday. It was my day off so I was determined to get out of here for a day. It’s a lovely course and not particularly difficult. My golf was shocking though and I’ll put it this way. I wouldn’t be handing in my card! I enjoyed the day though and where else in the World will you have to aim your shot a little right to avoid hitting a Giraffe and where your Kit Kats are robbed by the monkeys!

The walks and game drives are going well and I’m seeing some really cool stuff everyday so that keeps me busy. The boss and his wife are on holidays for a week so people are all more relaxed around the lodge. It’s a nice atmosphere at the moment.

Anyone seen my bumbells?

Cocky Dutch

I had a couple from Rotterdam the other day. I brought them out on a game drive in the morning and then on to Moholoholo in the afternoon. The guy was a pain in the arse from the start. He wouldn’t listen to me about standing up in the vehicle and when I got off the vehicle to see a beautiful female Rhino and calf he started walking towards them with his video camera and scared them off! Meanwhile it started belting down with rain and the enjoyment soon seeped away from the trip. We saw some beautiful birds and antelope but Ronald from Rotterdam only wanted to see the big stuff! This attitude continued for the whole drive and then when I drove them to Moholoholo(a rehabilitation centre for animals) he wouldn’t listen to the guide there and kept holding the guide up at different stages.

I had had enough of him at this stage but I had to drive him back to the lodge and then sit with him for dinner. He also had this hair brained scheme that he brought over a set of soccer jerseys from his son’s team that he wanted to donate to the “orphans,” in the local village. He expected me to organise a photocall with him giving the orphans the jerseys. I told him that the orphans in the village would probably be too small for his gift considering they are all either babies or a couple of years old. I suppose the intention was good but I think he just liked the idea of seeing himself in a picture with some poor black kids.

The next day the same vein continued. I brought him and his wife on a game walk and I decided at that stage after he kept me waiting for 15 minutes for the second morning in a row to play with him a bit. I showed him a couple of insects and then he thought he could go and pick up whatever he saw on the ground. At one stage I saw this caterpillar like insect. I’ve seen plenty of them before and they’re actually a beetle larvae. They look really hairy and not very dangerous looking so next thing I see this guy Ronald picking it up. I started to laugh a bit and told him to drop the leather beetle or he’d regret it. After a while he started whingeing about feeling his skin itching. I know from experience what it feels like and the only thing I can think of to describe something similar at home is when you get the fibre glass from the insulating material in your attic on your skin. It itches like hell and is really irritating. Ironically just like my mate Ronald! We tracked some Zebra and Giraffe and we got to within 5 metres of a baby Giraffe and her mother. Of course that wasn’t close enough for Ronald and he wanted to get closer. He scared them off then and I told him that there were loads of snakes around where he was walking and with that he finally paid attention! He gave me a tip in the end which I was told to share with my tracker Robbie. The tip was 50 Rand which in Euro’s is about 4 quid. Nice one Ronnie!

Tracking

I went out tracking with an Afrikaans guy called Ulaf. He drives in “Big 5,” reserves for a living. We went into Thornybush which borders our reserve and we saw the Lion pride that had taken down the Buffalo beside the fence a couple of days before. It was pretty cool to be sitting within 4 metres of a pride of Lions on the tracker seat. Not to mention exhilarating. The auld heart was pumping when the eyes fix on you! We continued on and we later found a herd of Elephants. This was even better as the Ele’s walked right by me. I could have reached out and touched them if I wanted to! They were nice and relaxed though. I got a couple of cool video’s. I was a little concerned when I saw a big Bull coming swaggering down the road though but he avoided us completely. Apparently the biggest Bull in the reserve had given him a bit of a hiding the day before and he was feeling a little bit sorry for himself. The guy Ulaf is a typical big mountainy Afrikaaner. He’s into his rugby so I was slagging him about the Lions coming out in June and giving the Springboks a bit of a pasting. The poor fella had a dose of the skuts and he had to use the bush toilet a couple of times while we were on the drive! When we got back to the lodge he asked could he use our toilet and I told him of course. I was busy looking after the guests and getting them a few drinks when I ran into Claude(The owner) near the kitchen. He was in hysterics laughing saying that Ulaf was still in the jax! I had the idea of taking off in his game vehicle to see how fast he’d be coming out of the toilet with his pants down around his ankles but I decided on discretion at this early stage of our relationship! It was a funny end to the night though!

Pezulu Lodge

Lions at the fence

I was out for a walk trying to get my bearings for the conservancy that I’m guiding on. It was early morning and it was fresh after a night of prolonged rain. The air was still and the sky was a gloomy sort of Dublin grey. I was watching some Woodland Kingfishers showing off to the females on the telephone wires. I was recounting that old Makem and Clancy song about “all God’s creatures have a place in the choir.” Don’t ask where I heard that song before or how I remembered the chorus but anyway I see something in the corner of my eye. It was just a slight movement but enough to catch the eye. I turned around and there close to the fence is a beautiful big female Lion. What a sight! I just stared as she fixed on me. She was about 100 metres away from me and I could see her clearly through my bino’s. I took a step forward wanting to get a better angle from around a Silver Cluster leaf and in an instant she was gone. I hadn’t had a coffee this morning but this was enough to wake me up!

Bye Bye phone

A couple of guests were at the lodge from Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean. It’s a place that I had never heard of but it’s part of France’s colonies. The couple came with their 12 year old kid and they were really nice. Two PE teachers and the kid Louie was nice and bright. He was very interested in all kinds of wildlife. We went on a walk in the afternoon and I showed them how to track and we got within 5 metres of some Giraffes. It was really cool. We came back after a couple of hours and we headed to the bar for a drink. As it got dark all the frogs and toads started calling and of course the young fella was interested in how they make their noises and all that jazz and I went down to the pool to show him the different frogs and their calls. I was fishing for one at the deep end and forgot that I had left my phone in my breast pocket. I’m there stretching for the frog and next thing the phone hops out of my pocket and starts sinking to the bottom of the pool! I’ve a decision to make so out with everything else out of my pocket and into the pool with me. as I’m trying to grab the f-in thing I see the face light up and I’ve got a message! I rescue the phone but to no avail. Electricity and water unfortunately never mix so bye bye phone number 1! The kid was delighted with his lesson though!

Meet the celeb

Papparazzi

We were pretty flat out for the last week and hadn’t been able to really have any time for ourselves but that’s the guides lifestyle and as long as you’re in the bush it’s ok. I was out for my first game walk. It was great. We kind of stuck to a bit of a trail but I got distracted by Wildebeest and we started to track them. I went on the walk with a father and daughter combination from the good old US of A. We were able to walk to within 15 metres of Giraffe, Wildebeest, Warthog, Zebra and Impala. I’ve gotta say that it was magic.

I thought I’d be more nervous than I was but it felt good to be able to explain about stuff to people who weren’t your regular bush or wild life types.

We did a good bit of tracking and we came across some cool insects and tree’s and plants. The guys didn’t ask me too many difficult questions and it gave me a bit of a confidence boost that I knew the answers to their questions. I’m sure I’m gonna be treading water on some walks but this one at least finished well. It was funny because the guys were over with another brother and a brother in law. The brother in law was from South Africa though and he’s a celebrity here.

They asked me to give them a guided tour of Kruger so I brought them in and everywhere we went people knew him. We actually hadn’t gotten to Kruger before we saw our first Lions. We saw them on the way to the Orpen Gate. It was the first time I had seen any Lions here. A good few people had gotten out of their cars to take pictures and I told them to be careful and not go too close to the fence. They looked at me as if I had two heads! I’m sure they were saying “knowitall,” and then a funny thing happened. The dads son, Daniel went up closer to the fence and one of the Lioness’ charged him. It was funny because he jumped a bit and ran for the car. We made a bit of a song and dance about it to him and we couldn’t let him get away with running from a Lion. We had literally been talking about the thing not to do with Lions and then he goes and does exactly the opposite. We continued on our merry way and we arrived in the first rest camp and loads of girls kept coming up to the celeb asking him to pose for pictures. It was hilarious. He would be the equivalent of Miley in Glenrow although I’d say the girls like him more than poor auld Miley! We ended up having to act as minders and get him out of the park in the end because people were asking him for autographs. I talked to his father in law about it and we both agreed we wouldn’t have the patience for the fame. Mutodi was the chaps name and he was a cool guy. No bullshit and we got on really well. It was good to meet such nice people on my first drive. check the guy out @ www.myspace/mutodi

Guess who's back?

Africa part 2

Well I arrived back in Africa after a horrendous fight stroke lay over stroke flight stroke lay over! This all occurred on New Years Eve to top it off. So after 36 hours I arrived in pratically one piece in Pezulu lodge where I’ll be spending the next 6 months guiding. I would just like to thank Mellon Balls(Willy Aherne) for those last Vodka and Red Bulls the night before my flight at 3.30 in Copper Face Jacks too. They were really great at keeping me up for the long flight the next day!

So zombielike I step off the plane into 45 degrees! Nice! It was New Years Eve so I was expected to work till 2 that night. I started to get a feel for the place from the other side of the stick. I had stayed there with Alex in October. I remembered the faces and where things were so I knew it wasn’t going to take me that long to acclimatize. We finally got to bed at 2 after all the scooped guests went to bed and man did I need a bed! I woke up the next morning at 6 and we went out on a game walk. It was my going to be a test for me to see how much information I had retained. Jeff the other guide was firing questions at me left right and centre. Fortunately for me, I had most of the answers. I was genuinely happy to be back in the bush though. That was the main reason to head out here in the first place.


The next day consisted of an unofficial game drive with one guest who was mad into birds. It was more of an opportunity for me to get to know the game drive reserve. We set off in the arvo and it was hot! I’d say it was around 35 degrees. We drove around for a while and we saw a load of Rhino and Buffalo which was quite cool. Then Jeff spotted this Wildebeest lamb and he jumps off the vehicle. I’m there going “what the fuck,” and he’s off chasing the Wildebeest. I grab a couple of blankets and the guest and we high tail it after him. The young Wildebeest was young and lost and probably sick but I’m thinking to myself that this is not right. The idea was for us to catch it and bring it to Moholohola. Anyway we chased it through thick bush for about ten minutes by which time I was knackered and had no success in catching the lamb. I’m sweating like a Macari in a chip shop and the guest is nearly carking it. It was only then that I noticed he was in Flip Flops! You don’t want to be running around in the bush with Thongs as they call them in Oz. At one stage an adult Giraffe and baby came gunning for me and I had to step out of the way. They weren’t that far away and were going at full tilt. That’s about 55 kmph! I thought I was going to get a kick in the face! We survived it and the lamb evaded capture to face whatever fate had in store. It was good fun but a bit hairy. I don’t’ think I’ll be doing that on my drives!