We had an exam today on advanced rifle handling. It gives us the theoretical background to our practical training on Thursday. The test was reasonably easy but quite technical. Terminal velocity, sectional density and ballistic coefficient. I’m sure the Delta Charlie (Derm and Marty Cahill) and Mike Charlie know what I’m talking about.
It was a strange experience. A few of my colleagues pointed the weapons in our direction as they were walking back towards us. This is one of the golden rules of things that shouldn’t be done. I wasn’t comfortable with the level of “SAFETY,” being adhered to! It certainly gave me more of a respect for the weapons. The recoil when we shot was certainly something I didn’t expect. I can imagine the damage that a high calibre bullet would do to your body on impact. We were put through our paces. We have to be able to load and unload a full magazine in 8 seconds and be able to fire 3 rounds into a target in quick succession. This won’t be as easy as I thought. If it ever happens in reality and we have to stop a charging animal then I think a good few of us would be in trouble. We have a good bit of time to practice though and I intend on visiting the firing range frequently before our practical exam.
The locals didn’t do very well in the shooting stakes either which wasn’t a big surprise. Most of them can’t drive very well as they have “bought,” their licenses over here. I don’t think any of them even hit the target apart from my mate Citi. They couldn’t seem to line up the sights properly so I felt a little bit better. I nailed the target with 11 out of 11 but didn’t hit the bull’s eye. There’s room for improvement there. It’s amazing how sensitive the trigger was on the 303. I didn’t even realize on one of the shots that I had pulled the trigger. Amazingly that was the shot that got closest to the bully!
I headed off to the local Shangaan village after to see where Citi and Ivan are from. I met the Citi’s Granny, various Girlfriends and Brother. The people were very friendly and all smiles. They aren’t in any way affluent but there lifestyle was nice and simple and they seem to be very happy with their lot. It’s a cool little village with a bit of agriculture thrown in. They seem to have a nice community feeling and I guess it’s like village living at home where you know all your neighbours. Lots of goats, cattle and chickens. The animals don’t have it as well over here though. The land is very barren. The goats have resorted to climbing trees to get to the nutrition. Unfortunately I didn’t bring the camera for the pictures of these “spider goats,” but it was quite a sight!
We went on a night drive and did a bit of star gazing when the sun went down. The sky over here is unbelievable. You can see most of the planets at night. We can see Mars, Jupiter and Venus. It’s pretty cool and I guess all these little things add up to a better knowledge of the grand scheme of things. I think it’s the small things that strike you the most. There are a lot of things that you take for granted. Even a simple thing like leaving the tap running when you are washing your teeth. You learn to turn it off when you are here for a while because water is precious. Some days it’s hard to believe I’m really here living in Africa. It’s a great feeling.
Saturday started off with an early game drive. I slept it out and my punishment was washing down the two vehicles. It brought me back to the good old Blanch Renault days of washing cars for Fergus. I even felt the same way when I was doing it. Heavily hungover! We had to celebrate a birthday. Our instructor Sean was 35 today. We made him take a mud bath. It was very funny. All the guys in the course picking up big muck balls and destroying the girls with them. Good fun on a Saturday.
We headed for the Bush Pub again for a bit of dinner. I was the “Dessie,” so that put pay to any drinking. I didn’t mind though because of the two bottles of Stellenbosch I polished off the night before. We met some American hunters in the pub. It was really weird to talk to hunters. I suppose the majority of people I am studying with are very anti hunting. The guys were slagging us calling us “bunny huggers.” I thought it was quite funny as they hit the nail on the head about some of the guys here. I personally wouldn’t be anti hunting. I think that these guys come over here and spend big money to hunt. The money they spend goes into the local economy and the wheels keep on turning.
We were in Kruger for a week last week and when I was in a place called Letaba I read an article in the local newspaper. The article was about a local farmer who had been found gored to death on his property. The farm was very isolated with no running water or electricity. The Police were called out and trackers were sent to the scene. Foul play was ruled out and the conclusion was that a “ Dacha Boy,” or single male Buffalo had killed the farmer. The hunters actually shot this Buffalo on Wednesday. John from Michigan described how the Bull had been shot 5 times before he finally gave up on life. It was quite a story. They had been hunting him for 3 days and finally they got the opportunity to take a shot. The guys didn’t want to take a brain shot as they were looking for a trophy for home so they tried to hit the old Bull with heart shots. It was an amazing story and I suppose just confirmed for me what I’ve heard about how tough these old bachelors are. Sean used a great expression to the describe the look they give you when they see you. He said that they give you a look like “you owe them money!” They are not an animal you want to bump into while out on a walking trail! The hunters offered us some of their Buffalo meat. It was very tastey indeed and I guess when you know the story behind it it makes it more surreal. We were eating meat that came from an animal that killed a man. That’s what makes Africa such a visceral experience for me!
We were driving home and we saw all these flashing lights ahead of us. We thought it was a Police checkpoint but it turns out there was a car crashed into the reserve fence. The car was totaled and the guy was standing outside the car looking pretty dazed. If you could pick a place to crash (not that you’d want to) this would probably be last on my list! It looked to us like he had taken a nice leisurely drunken game drive at night and had written off his car. Not a great place to crash considering the reserve he crashed in has all of the “Big 5.”
The Drakensburg Mountains looked majestic as we drove through the night. There was some fire break burning going on. The whole mountain side was ablaze. It looked eerily beautiful against the black sky.
There is supposed to be a game on tomorrow against Vervetine. (The local village Citi and Ivan are from) That should be fun and I can put some of those skills I learned playing with Caslteknock Celtic into practice!! I’m sure I’m gonna get battered but sometimes that’s half the fun!
Sunday, 17 August 2008
Wednesday, 13 August 2008
Days 38 +39
Day 38
Rifle training!
“Good things happen to those who wait!” I like that quote. I’ve been looking forward to this part of the course. We get to fire rifles. Not small calibre mind! None of those .22 etc, these are proper high calibre rifles. Elephant guns to be precise. We use .458 rounds which I’ve been told will knock a 7 tonne Elly right off its four feet! Mind you, I hope I never get into a situation where I’ll have to use one but we’ll be trained to a high standard regardless. I’m looking forward to actually shooting them this week but first things first. We have to know how to use them safely! We will actually shoot some rounds off this Thursday but we just have to go safety procedures today for the day.
We became pit lane mechanics this morning as well. We had to change a tyre as part of the course. Not that it’s very difficult but when the jack nearly recoils and hits you in the jaw it can warrant respect! Good craic though watching some of the girls trying to push the jack down. It hit nearly 40 degrees today so any amount of effort takes its toll. I can’t remember the last time I changed a tyre in that heat!
Day 39
Myself and King Moses tried to get our Driving licenses sorted out today. The other group went to the driving school and with their bribes paid they will probably get their licenses sorted before us but I’m gonna try and get mine an alternative way. As we left the other group our supervisor Nelie told Moses not to lead me astray into any Shebeen’s or any such like! Moses has a great rep here as you can probably tell!
Unfortunately King Moses’s contact didn’t pull through for us in the end and we had to make alternative plans for the day. Spur of the moment plans are always the best. “Wing it dot com,” is a favourite strategy of mine at this stage and so we went looking for a taxi that could bring us to a car garage. After the week in Kruger and the friction that resulted I decided to err on the side of caution and do my own thing from now on. There will be a more select crew going on any further trips!
Being the only white person in a taxi rank with hundreds of other African’s can be quite unnerving but everything went well and my “fixer,” King Moses organized a taxi for us. If you’ve been to Thailand and have been in a bus or taxi there you will understand how people get rammed into all kinds of transport. Actually if you’ve been on the Maynooth to Connolly train in the morning you’ll know what I mean when I say “Sweatbox.” We had all kinds of wares being transported with us from chairs to at one stage a front door of a house. I think it was number 22! A few of the passengers weren’t in great health as per the constant coughing and spluttering from the back. I had to close my eyes a few times with the mental case driving speeding up when he saw Baboons on the road! Eventually after 4 hours of switching to different cabs I finally told Mossie that I’d had enough. We bailed in Lyndeburg and went looking for a car. We had originally intended going to Phelaborwa but that would have meant another two changes of taxi.
We went in to a few places and were given the stereotypical car salesman’s lines about careful owners, good condition blah blah. Personally having met a number of these types in my time I wasn’t too confident I would end up getting anything decent. We wandered around looking at various models and prices and I eventually settled on a 4 wheel drive in decent nick but a bit beyond what I originally intended to pay. Fingers crossed “fixer,” as she is to be called will treat me well! So I survived the day just about and drove the car back from the garage whilst trying to avoid maniac drivers, Goats, Baboons, Cattle and the odd native. The beer tasted good at the end of a long day!
Rifle training!
“Good things happen to those who wait!” I like that quote. I’ve been looking forward to this part of the course. We get to fire rifles. Not small calibre mind! None of those .22 etc, these are proper high calibre rifles. Elephant guns to be precise. We use .458 rounds which I’ve been told will knock a 7 tonne Elly right off its four feet! Mind you, I hope I never get into a situation where I’ll have to use one but we’ll be trained to a high standard regardless. I’m looking forward to actually shooting them this week but first things first. We have to know how to use them safely! We will actually shoot some rounds off this Thursday but we just have to go safety procedures today for the day.
We became pit lane mechanics this morning as well. We had to change a tyre as part of the course. Not that it’s very difficult but when the jack nearly recoils and hits you in the jaw it can warrant respect! Good craic though watching some of the girls trying to push the jack down. It hit nearly 40 degrees today so any amount of effort takes its toll. I can’t remember the last time I changed a tyre in that heat!
Day 39
Myself and King Moses tried to get our Driving licenses sorted out today. The other group went to the driving school and with their bribes paid they will probably get their licenses sorted before us but I’m gonna try and get mine an alternative way. As we left the other group our supervisor Nelie told Moses not to lead me astray into any Shebeen’s or any such like! Moses has a great rep here as you can probably tell!
Unfortunately King Moses’s contact didn’t pull through for us in the end and we had to make alternative plans for the day. Spur of the moment plans are always the best. “Wing it dot com,” is a favourite strategy of mine at this stage and so we went looking for a taxi that could bring us to a car garage. After the week in Kruger and the friction that resulted I decided to err on the side of caution and do my own thing from now on. There will be a more select crew going on any further trips!
Being the only white person in a taxi rank with hundreds of other African’s can be quite unnerving but everything went well and my “fixer,” King Moses organized a taxi for us. If you’ve been to Thailand and have been in a bus or taxi there you will understand how people get rammed into all kinds of transport. Actually if you’ve been on the Maynooth to Connolly train in the morning you’ll know what I mean when I say “Sweatbox.” We had all kinds of wares being transported with us from chairs to at one stage a front door of a house. I think it was number 22! A few of the passengers weren’t in great health as per the constant coughing and spluttering from the back. I had to close my eyes a few times with the mental case driving speeding up when he saw Baboons on the road! Eventually after 4 hours of switching to different cabs I finally told Mossie that I’d had enough. We bailed in Lyndeburg and went looking for a car. We had originally intended going to Phelaborwa but that would have meant another two changes of taxi.
We went in to a few places and were given the stereotypical car salesman’s lines about careful owners, good condition blah blah. Personally having met a number of these types in my time I wasn’t too confident I would end up getting anything decent. We wandered around looking at various models and prices and I eventually settled on a 4 wheel drive in decent nick but a bit beyond what I originally intended to pay. Fingers crossed “fixer,” as she is to be called will treat me well! So I survived the day just about and drove the car back from the garage whilst trying to avoid maniac drivers, Goats, Baboons, Cattle and the odd native. The beer tasted good at the end of a long day!
Monday, 11 August 2008
Kruger Days
Kruger Days
We have come to the end of the week and looking back it was great to do what we’ve done. We have familiarized ourselves with the KNP and its environs. It’s a fantastic place to be able to visit. The wildlife is spectacular and we’ve had some fun, surreal and downright comical moments over the week. We finished off where we started on Sunday evening with a whistle stop trip back into the KNP for a couple of hours. We had been in town early in the morning and after a great lunch of Ostrich skewers and Strawberry Milkshakes we were all set for a nice evening. We had a local Shangaan lad with us and he sorted the gate administration stuff out in quick fashion and we were on our way.
As luck would have it we stopped close to the gate and saw a lone Cheetah stalking some Impala. Unfortunately the Cheetah had an audience of about 15 cars and she got pissed off with all the noise, engines running etc. It was nice to see my first Cheetah though and she looked really elegant in the setting sun. I’m sure she just waited for us to leave before she headed back in pursuit of her dinner.
The week started off well and we camped in a couple of different camps over the course of the week. I chose to sleep outside for a couple of those as I wanted to really experience the African night. The rest of the guys were in tents. It was cool to be out in the open with just the stars for company. I could hear all the animals during the night and I guess it’s the stereotypical African sounds that I heard but that didn’t diminish it. Picture the scene, being able to see the Milky Way and the Southern Star and all their friends after having a nice T-bone steak cooked on the Braai. All that and having a few tasty beverages to wash it down and then being able to hear Lions roaring and all of Africa’s other animals during the night. SAVAGE!
The next morning we had a great sighting of a Lion kill. I’ve included some cool pictures and hopefully I can work out this uploading thing and I can get some more sorted before long. That was so close to the road that I actually thought I was out in Kepak again with the smell. It was pretty powerful. The Lions in Kruger have started using the tarmac roads to catch their prey. In this case the unlucky victim was an adolescent Giraffe. The Lions just trip the Giraffe up on the roads and they’re not able to get back up! It was pretty awesome to be that close to the whole Pride. We continued on our way and sometimes you take it for granted just how lucky we are to be able to see what we see everyday.
There were lots of fun, slagging, friction and bundles of comical moments. The highlight for me was the Bull Elephant and the Micra incident. We had quite a few more though. I’m gonna try and upload the video at some stage for that though. It’s a classic! No broadband here though so we’ll see! We had the “Pedestrian bird,” incident. “Watch out for the pedestrian behind you,” says the passenger and the retort by the driver is “What kind of a bird is a Pedestrian bird?” We also spotted lots of “Leopard Logs,” and “Granite Rhino’s”! Too many more to be recounted here I’m afraid.
We stayed in a few places that can only be described as the nearest things to a hippy commune. We had Pancakes in the most famous “Pancake Town,” in South Africa. We did some rock climbing. We celebrated the eight of the eight 2008 at 8 minutes past eight and eight seconds. We had some nice drives and walks. Oh and to round things off nicely I did a tandem bungee jump as well! What a buzz and for those who are scared of heights I’ve included a few pictures. I am in the group mentioned by the way and I didn’t exactly like edging along that platform. The guy trying to encourage me to edge back and my partner in the jump, the aptly named “Birdman,” practically pulling me back with him! It was cool though and I think I’ll have another go at it sometime.
We’re back to school tomorrow though but to sum up not a bad week! Not a bad week at all………………
We have come to the end of the week and looking back it was great to do what we’ve done. We have familiarized ourselves with the KNP and its environs. It’s a fantastic place to be able to visit. The wildlife is spectacular and we’ve had some fun, surreal and downright comical moments over the week. We finished off where we started on Sunday evening with a whistle stop trip back into the KNP for a couple of hours. We had been in town early in the morning and after a great lunch of Ostrich skewers and Strawberry Milkshakes we were all set for a nice evening. We had a local Shangaan lad with us and he sorted the gate administration stuff out in quick fashion and we were on our way.
As luck would have it we stopped close to the gate and saw a lone Cheetah stalking some Impala. Unfortunately the Cheetah had an audience of about 15 cars and she got pissed off with all the noise, engines running etc. It was nice to see my first Cheetah though and she looked really elegant in the setting sun. I’m sure she just waited for us to leave before she headed back in pursuit of her dinner.
The week started off well and we camped in a couple of different camps over the course of the week. I chose to sleep outside for a couple of those as I wanted to really experience the African night. The rest of the guys were in tents. It was cool to be out in the open with just the stars for company. I could hear all the animals during the night and I guess it’s the stereotypical African sounds that I heard but that didn’t diminish it. Picture the scene, being able to see the Milky Way and the Southern Star and all their friends after having a nice T-bone steak cooked on the Braai. All that and having a few tasty beverages to wash it down and then being able to hear Lions roaring and all of Africa’s other animals during the night. SAVAGE!
The next morning we had a great sighting of a Lion kill. I’ve included some cool pictures and hopefully I can work out this uploading thing and I can get some more sorted before long. That was so close to the road that I actually thought I was out in Kepak again with the smell. It was pretty powerful. The Lions in Kruger have started using the tarmac roads to catch their prey. In this case the unlucky victim was an adolescent Giraffe. The Lions just trip the Giraffe up on the roads and they’re not able to get back up! It was pretty awesome to be that close to the whole Pride. We continued on our way and sometimes you take it for granted just how lucky we are to be able to see what we see everyday.
There were lots of fun, slagging, friction and bundles of comical moments. The highlight for me was the Bull Elephant and the Micra incident. We had quite a few more though. I’m gonna try and upload the video at some stage for that though. It’s a classic! No broadband here though so we’ll see! We had the “Pedestrian bird,” incident. “Watch out for the pedestrian behind you,” says the passenger and the retort by the driver is “What kind of a bird is a Pedestrian bird?” We also spotted lots of “Leopard Logs,” and “Granite Rhino’s”! Too many more to be recounted here I’m afraid.
We stayed in a few places that can only be described as the nearest things to a hippy commune. We had Pancakes in the most famous “Pancake Town,” in South Africa. We did some rock climbing. We celebrated the eight of the eight 2008 at 8 minutes past eight and eight seconds. We had some nice drives and walks. Oh and to round things off nicely I did a tandem bungee jump as well! What a buzz and for those who are scared of heights I’ve included a few pictures. I am in the group mentioned by the way and I didn’t exactly like edging along that platform. The guy trying to encourage me to edge back and my partner in the jump, the aptly named “Birdman,” practically pulling me back with him! It was cool though and I think I’ll have another go at it sometime.
We’re back to school tomorrow though but to sum up not a bad week! Not a bad week at all………………
Thursday, 7 August 2008
Kruger Days
A week in Kruger is on the agenda. The sparks are already starting to fly. I think the expression cabin fever just about sums up the situation. A lot of different views on things and how they should be done is leading to a lot of tension in the group. I asked Robyn the lady I rented the 2 cars from for a shovel when I was collecting the car. She didn’t know why I needed a shovel and I told her that by the end of the week we’ll probably be so fed up with someone that we’d probably have to bury them out in the park. I didn’t realize how prophetic that statement was going to be.
Enough whingeing, the adventure has begun and we headed up North to a place called Mopani. It is 230 km up North from Orpen gate which is the nearest entry point from the SAWC. We had a few hairy moments with people adjusting to driving the car but that soon passed. The area up North is renowned for its Leopards but as they are the most elusive of the “Big 5,” we didn’t see any early on. We did see plenty of the McDonalds of the bush though. What’s that you ask? Well it’s the Impala. They are considered to be so common that they are a Drive Thru type animal!
We have a competition going not too dissimilar to the one with had on our road trip in Australia. It’s called “dickhead of the day.” We give the award to the person who makes the biggest eijit of themselves on the days travel. I can recall that either Tiernan or Murph got most of the awards in Australia and we have a similar type person on our tour. I have nicknamed him the “Special One,” and he reminds me of “Chernobyl,” the guy myself, Karl and Avril lived with in Sydney. Unfortunately he is also my room mate! I have omitted his comments as they are so frequent I haven’t got the space on this page for them. Some great comments also came from the Yank and the Belgian. These were in no particular order, “Do you think we should drive through the Elephant Sh*t so that it can germinate!” and “ Zer zeem zu be no Dicks around ere!” The last one was in reference to an antelope that is common in the area and is called a Dik Dik. The first I won’t even comment on.
We stopped off for lunch in one of the camping area’s and we were lucky to find a lovely big bull Elephant having a mud bath down by the river. He was really enjoying himself wallowing in the mud and getting himself out of the sun. We got some nice pictures of him and then headed further down south. We were feeling a little bit dejected however because we hadn’t seen much big game. We did stop at a few nice waterholes though and I for one wasn’t too unhappy. The Yank however was not impressed as she still hadn’t seen any big cat’s since she got here. I think she was probably the last person on campus not to have seen any but we had a good feeling for the evening. As we were driving back at dusk the action started to really hot up. We came upon a Hyaena and her 3 cubs literally within a yard of the road. We have some great shots of her and I couldn’t believe how chilled out she was. The cars viewing her didn’t faze her in the slightest. The cubs were obviously not bothered by us either and were following the example set by their mother.
We left her and her cubs in peace to continue with their evening snooze and headed on. We were all buzzing at this stage as that was a great sight and we forgot about our days lack of interesting sightings. As these things tend to do, like Dublin Buses they tend to come in 3’s. No sooner had we left the sighting than we saw a huge grey object up the road in front of us. It could only be an Elephant and we were heading straight towards it. We got up quite close and the Elephant was on one side of the road. We pulled up beside an elderly couple in what had to be the smallest car in Kruger that day. It was a little Micra or something similar. Then the Big Boy decided he wanted to cross the road. He took exception to the little blue car in his way though and walked right up to the couple’s car. It was hilarious. We kind of boxed them in and the guy driving was basically staring down the barrel of a 7 tonne Elephant. All this time the wife was video taping the whole thing! As Reidser would say “Dats Brilliant!” We have a great video of the incident and it’s hilarious. I’m sure the couple’s Grand Kids will love the video! Youtube might be getting a copy! There will be a few bad words on the tape though so those with sensitive hearing might need to turn the sound off!
I couldn’t get over the size of the animal. It was massive. That for me was the best sight so far this trip. We were in stitches in the car after that incident. Partly nervous laughter coupled with some nervous tension. We kept going and then the Yank got her sighting. A big pride of Lions crossing the road. There were at least 12 Lionesses and a couple of Lions. What a sight! You wouldn’t want to be hitching on the roads around here! Everyone had had their appetite sated for the day! It’s not over till the fat lady sings and all that and we were delighted with our pictures stroke video’s of the day. I’m sure we’ll have many more of these kind of things happening in the weeks and months to come and I hope the buzz doesn’t wear off! We ended up being late to the gate in the end. We should have been fined but the ladies used their charm and got us off! Things like “ooh we’re really really sorry but we took a wrong turn,” etc etc etc with a bit of pouting and fluttering of eyelashes. It seems to work over here too!
We got away without having to pay a fine so it was time to have a few beers to celebrate our great day. We stopped into a lodge on the way back to our college by chance and asked do they serve food. The guy came back to us a couple of minutes later saying that we were welcome to come in and join them. We had a lovely dinner and a few beers to wind down the day. Funnily enough I got chatting to a chap at the bar and it turns out he’s from Swords in Dublin and that the owner of the lodge is also Irish. Small World! This guy called Kevin runs his own tours so I might hook up with him for my next week off in September.
We’ll be camping for the next few days which should be fun and I’m looking forward to sleeping under the stars for a few nights………………..
Enough whingeing, the adventure has begun and we headed up North to a place called Mopani. It is 230 km up North from Orpen gate which is the nearest entry point from the SAWC. We had a few hairy moments with people adjusting to driving the car but that soon passed. The area up North is renowned for its Leopards but as they are the most elusive of the “Big 5,” we didn’t see any early on. We did see plenty of the McDonalds of the bush though. What’s that you ask? Well it’s the Impala. They are considered to be so common that they are a Drive Thru type animal!
We have a competition going not too dissimilar to the one with had on our road trip in Australia. It’s called “dickhead of the day.” We give the award to the person who makes the biggest eijit of themselves on the days travel. I can recall that either Tiernan or Murph got most of the awards in Australia and we have a similar type person on our tour. I have nicknamed him the “Special One,” and he reminds me of “Chernobyl,” the guy myself, Karl and Avril lived with in Sydney. Unfortunately he is also my room mate! I have omitted his comments as they are so frequent I haven’t got the space on this page for them. Some great comments also came from the Yank and the Belgian. These were in no particular order, “Do you think we should drive through the Elephant Sh*t so that it can germinate!” and “ Zer zeem zu be no Dicks around ere!” The last one was in reference to an antelope that is common in the area and is called a Dik Dik. The first I won’t even comment on.
We stopped off for lunch in one of the camping area’s and we were lucky to find a lovely big bull Elephant having a mud bath down by the river. He was really enjoying himself wallowing in the mud and getting himself out of the sun. We got some nice pictures of him and then headed further down south. We were feeling a little bit dejected however because we hadn’t seen much big game. We did stop at a few nice waterholes though and I for one wasn’t too unhappy. The Yank however was not impressed as she still hadn’t seen any big cat’s since she got here. I think she was probably the last person on campus not to have seen any but we had a good feeling for the evening. As we were driving back at dusk the action started to really hot up. We came upon a Hyaena and her 3 cubs literally within a yard of the road. We have some great shots of her and I couldn’t believe how chilled out she was. The cars viewing her didn’t faze her in the slightest. The cubs were obviously not bothered by us either and were following the example set by their mother.
We left her and her cubs in peace to continue with their evening snooze and headed on. We were all buzzing at this stage as that was a great sight and we forgot about our days lack of interesting sightings. As these things tend to do, like Dublin Buses they tend to come in 3’s. No sooner had we left the sighting than we saw a huge grey object up the road in front of us. It could only be an Elephant and we were heading straight towards it. We got up quite close and the Elephant was on one side of the road. We pulled up beside an elderly couple in what had to be the smallest car in Kruger that day. It was a little Micra or something similar. Then the Big Boy decided he wanted to cross the road. He took exception to the little blue car in his way though and walked right up to the couple’s car. It was hilarious. We kind of boxed them in and the guy driving was basically staring down the barrel of a 7 tonne Elephant. All this time the wife was video taping the whole thing! As Reidser would say “Dats Brilliant!” We have a great video of the incident and it’s hilarious. I’m sure the couple’s Grand Kids will love the video! Youtube might be getting a copy! There will be a few bad words on the tape though so those with sensitive hearing might need to turn the sound off!
I couldn’t get over the size of the animal. It was massive. That for me was the best sight so far this trip. We were in stitches in the car after that incident. Partly nervous laughter coupled with some nervous tension. We kept going and then the Yank got her sighting. A big pride of Lions crossing the road. There were at least 12 Lionesses and a couple of Lions. What a sight! You wouldn’t want to be hitching on the roads around here! Everyone had had their appetite sated for the day! It’s not over till the fat lady sings and all that and we were delighted with our pictures stroke video’s of the day. I’m sure we’ll have many more of these kind of things happening in the weeks and months to come and I hope the buzz doesn’t wear off! We ended up being late to the gate in the end. We should have been fined but the ladies used their charm and got us off! Things like “ooh we’re really really sorry but we took a wrong turn,” etc etc etc with a bit of pouting and fluttering of eyelashes. It seems to work over here too!
We got away without having to pay a fine so it was time to have a few beers to celebrate our great day. We stopped into a lodge on the way back to our college by chance and asked do they serve food. The guy came back to us a couple of minutes later saying that we were welcome to come in and join them. We had a lovely dinner and a few beers to wind down the day. Funnily enough I got chatting to a chap at the bar and it turns out he’s from Swords in Dublin and that the owner of the lodge is also Irish. Small World! This guy called Kevin runs his own tours so I might hook up with him for my next week off in September.
We’ll be camping for the next few days which should be fun and I’m looking forward to sleeping under the stars for a few nights………………..
Friday, 1 August 2008
Day 25
So picture the scene. I'm sitting typing away on a blog and this big red haired lad walks by me. I'm looking at him and his freckles and thinking to myself, definate Paddy! He then opens his gob and this big thick Galway accent comes out! Pretty weird for a Galway lad to be out in the bush. It turns out he's out here for a dissertation that he's doing for a Masters in Trinity College on Bio Diversity or some such lark. I couldn't quite get a handle on exactly what it is he's doing.
So he asks me is there any news from home and I say I heard a bit about this and that and about Sean Quinn losing his Boll8x and all that on Anglo Irish Bank etc etc and he asks me for the article. He gives me his e-mail address and I'm thinking that I know the name from somewhere. I look at him again and then the penny drops. He was in first year in DIT with myself and Steve Keating over ten years ago. We had many a pint with him and the lads in class in the Cornerstone pub or whatever it was formally called. He failed first year and went on to do an accounting degree. How mad is that? So the old expression rings true about it being a small World!
It was the hottest it's been here today just pushing over the 40 degree mark. I thought my watch was gonna melt at one stage and this is winter! The summer is supposed to be wicked hot and you can fry your brekkie on the bonnets of cars! We'll all have to use blankets on the seats of the game vehicles to keep our bums from melting come September. I was sitting in a hammock earlier on and saw this yoke flying through the air above me. I nearly fell out of the hammock with the fright and it turns out it's a Bushbaby. They're somehow related to Monkeys and it's able to jump between trees with ease. They are quite rare and are supposed to be nocturnal and here's this one floating through the tree's like Tarzan in the middle of the afternoon. Every day over here seems to be full of surprises! Keep them coming is all I can say............
So he asks me is there any news from home and I say I heard a bit about this and that and about Sean Quinn losing his Boll8x and all that on Anglo Irish Bank etc etc and he asks me for the article. He gives me his e-mail address and I'm thinking that I know the name from somewhere. I look at him again and then the penny drops. He was in first year in DIT with myself and Steve Keating over ten years ago. We had many a pint with him and the lads in class in the Cornerstone pub or whatever it was formally called. He failed first year and went on to do an accounting degree. How mad is that? So the old expression rings true about it being a small World!
It was the hottest it's been here today just pushing over the 40 degree mark. I thought my watch was gonna melt at one stage and this is winter! The summer is supposed to be wicked hot and you can fry your brekkie on the bonnets of cars! We'll all have to use blankets on the seats of the game vehicles to keep our bums from melting come September. I was sitting in a hammock earlier on and saw this yoke flying through the air above me. I nearly fell out of the hammock with the fright and it turns out it's a Bushbaby. They're somehow related to Monkeys and it's able to jump between trees with ease. They are quite rare and are supposed to be nocturnal and here's this one floating through the tree's like Tarzan in the middle of the afternoon. Every day over here seems to be full of surprises! Keep them coming is all I can say............
Day 24
Study day today so not much happening. I did have to give the Yank some lessons on geography. Man they are gullible. I told her we all drive horses and carts outside the major cities and that we don’t have electricity in our houses. She doesn’t know what Europe is and doesn’t know that Ireland is part of Europe. I asked her how far Ireland was from Europe and she told me 20,000 miles! Classic! Later on we had to do a presentation on Rhino and we had a good laugh presenting it. Our second exam is coming up as well so everybody is in study mode again.
Day 23
Today started off with a game drive. It was pretty cool to start the day with a sighting of 3 Rhino. A female and her two calves. They are funny looking animals and look like little ballet dancers tip toeing away from us. This is kind of cool considering that the female probably weighed close to 2 tonne. We didn’t see much else during the drive in terms of big game but the other group spotted their first Lion in the Timbavati. It’s funny as Cendry, one of the Shangaan guys kept saying to us that there weren’t any Lion on the property. Well he got a rude awakening when he saw the big male lounging under a tree about a mile from the campus! They also saw a Black Mamba on the road on their way back to college. Pretty cool to see and I think that we’ll see more of them as the weather starts to heat up a bit more.
We came back to college to find a big male Baboon rifling through the rubbish bins beside the rooms. He was going through all the bins looking for food. We came out and scared him away after he made a serious mess of the place. These guys are very dangerous as their canine teeth are bigger in size than that of Lion’s. They can do some serious damage to you if you give them no option but to attack. Lots of tourists have been bitten while in Kruger Park when they’ve stupidly fed them. Anyway one of the Canadian lads told me a great story. One of the girls doing some volunteering work over here was coming back from lunch when she thought she’d watch a bit of TV in the TV room. She walked in to the room and thought nothing of the “person,” she saw watching the TV. She thought from the corner of her eye that his movements were a bit strange and it was only then that she realised that it was the aforementioned Baboon sitting down watching telly with a piece of a sandwich that he had nicked from the Bin earlier! She freaked out because she thought the Baboon was gonna attack her and that freaked the Baboon out. He doesn’t know which one of them ran out of the room first. That’s not even the funny part. Guess what channel the Baboon was watching? National Geographic! I shit you not!!
We went out for a night walk around the fence later on in the evening. It was quite unnerving to be looking out into the darkness with a piece of chain link between you and whatever might be out there. At one stage we think we spotted the Hyaena that we had been hearing whooping earlier on. We could see green eyes in the darkness but couldn’t really see the outline properly. I have a fair idea that they were Hyaena eyes anyway. The first rule we have learned is not to back down so we just kept our pace to see if we were being tracked. It was cool to be getting a bit of an adrenaline rush from it. There wasn’t any noise from the bush and at night all you can really here are the crickets. It’s just you and the stars. It is serene. On our way back to the college I saw my first shooting star. It was amazing. I guess I made a wish too!
We came back to college to find a big male Baboon rifling through the rubbish bins beside the rooms. He was going through all the bins looking for food. We came out and scared him away after he made a serious mess of the place. These guys are very dangerous as their canine teeth are bigger in size than that of Lion’s. They can do some serious damage to you if you give them no option but to attack. Lots of tourists have been bitten while in Kruger Park when they’ve stupidly fed them. Anyway one of the Canadian lads told me a great story. One of the girls doing some volunteering work over here was coming back from lunch when she thought she’d watch a bit of TV in the TV room. She walked in to the room and thought nothing of the “person,” she saw watching the TV. She thought from the corner of her eye that his movements were a bit strange and it was only then that she realised that it was the aforementioned Baboon sitting down watching telly with a piece of a sandwich that he had nicked from the Bin earlier! She freaked out because she thought the Baboon was gonna attack her and that freaked the Baboon out. He doesn’t know which one of them ran out of the room first. That’s not even the funny part. Guess what channel the Baboon was watching? National Geographic! I shit you not!!
We went out for a night walk around the fence later on in the evening. It was quite unnerving to be looking out into the darkness with a piece of chain link between you and whatever might be out there. At one stage we think we spotted the Hyaena that we had been hearing whooping earlier on. We could see green eyes in the darkness but couldn’t really see the outline properly. I have a fair idea that they were Hyaena eyes anyway. The first rule we have learned is not to back down so we just kept our pace to see if we were being tracked. It was cool to be getting a bit of an adrenaline rush from it. There wasn’t any noise from the bush and at night all you can really here are the crickets. It’s just you and the stars. It is serene. On our way back to the college I saw my first shooting star. It was amazing. I guess I made a wish too!
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