Shingwedzi

. . is beautiful. The sandy rivers have huge fig, jackalberry, apple-leaf, marula, nyala and thorn trees along their banks. Lots of shade.

shingwedzi camp KNP

The surrounding area is dominated by mopani woodland and mopani scrub. Little shade.

When Jess chooses to loaf in camp, I go on slow short drives consisting mainly of parking and letting the birds come to me. When she comes along there’s more searching for furry creatures.

On one of those I left early to the sound of a booming duet: 
There aren't, There aren't, There arent any earthworms! 
There are There are, Dig Deeper, Dig Deeper!
of a pair of Ground Hornbills.

Later, when watching a pair of Jacobin Cuckoos chasing each other round and round my parked car, the distant sound of a lion giving his best constipated rendition: Ooom, ooom, ooh, uh uh uh

– Jess finds the third leopard of our trip in a faraway tree –
– me n Jess’ travels in the park in pink –

After three nights in Shingwedzi I said Punda Maria next, Jess? But she said, Whoa! Dad. Three weeks is enough. I need some DSTV and aircon. So we left the park thru the Phalaborwa gate and Jess found a chalet with her essential necessities. There was good birding there, and a great outdoor shower. Phalaborwa Safari Park.

Chuffed to have spent my longest spell in Kruger yet. More to come, I hope!

~~oo0oo~~

Evicting a Mocambican

No sooner do I manage to evict an unwanted Congolese from my apartment than I’m busy trying to evict an unwanted Mocambican! This time from my bakkie – my new home.

I went to see what the glossy starlings were shriekingly unhappy about, as we were packing the bakkie to leave the camp – and leave the park. And it was this Mocambique Spitting Cobra at our hut steps, about a metre long. In Shingwedzi camp, Kruger national park.

When I approached the Mfezi, he turned left into my mag wheel and climbed up into the engine bay; and so I phoned the rangers who soon arrived – many of them, one with long handling tongs.

But all of them agreed rather to wait for Shadrack. ‘He’s a qualified field ranger who handles snakes. He’s been trained,’ they said, standing way back. The gang of capable-looking, officially-dressed, but caution-is-the-better-part-of-valour rangers (who were mostly ‘in admin’) grew, as word got around camp; Then a Zim couple from a caravan across the road approached. ‘What’s up? A spitting cobra? Oh we know that snake. He has visited us a few times the last couple weeks.’ Turns out they have camped on that spot for a full year this month! And I thought our three weeks in the park was lengthy! They also had a coupla pythons visit their caravan and watched them until they were back in the bush outside the camp fence, telling them shoo.

Once Shadrack the braver ranger arrived, he took the tongs. We tried to grip the Mfezi from the front (him) and flush from behind (me) but he spat at us and coiled around things, so in the end we thought whoa! Also, the Zim camper said, Rather wait till he emerges vanself. So we moved off about ten metres away till Jess spotted him emerging at the front right wheel. Shadrack then got him, but he was wedged and not budging, so I fetched a mop handle to prize his rear end out so Shadrack could draw him out. After a while, Shadrack said, ‘I’m gonna have to let him go so he can breathe.’ I imagined him turning round and saying, So YOU’RE the oke pulling my tail! and spitting-cobra at me, so I said, Wait, Shadrack! Give me One More Try, and out he came like Abednigo, to be bundled into a big black rubbish bin and driven off to be released – the poor terrified and no doubt exhausted Mfezi – far from camp. What an ordeal for him.

I had ignored the glossy birds at first as they had been shouting the previous two days at two yellow-billed hornbills who were wanting to raid their nest hole. But that was just a pair of them. Today about eight of them were joined by a Crested Barbet and they were using really rude starlingese to tell the Mfezi he was unwelcome. One brave one flew at him a few times and slapped him in the face with her wing! Old Mfezi was stoic, like, ‘I know you ous don’t like me, but I’m just doing my job.’

~~oo0oo~~

bakkie – pickup; truck; ute; utility vehicle

Mfezi – Naja mossambica Mocambican Spitting Cobra

vanself – of his own volition; the Zim didn’t actually use that Afrikaans word tho

Zim – Zimbo; Zimbabwean

Shadrack, Meshack and Abednigo – 1960s Sunday school; Stella Euthimiou told me

Kruger Park fun pics

So Jess and I have been in the park for over two weeks now. We’ve stayed in Pretoriuskop, Berg n Dal, Skukuza, Satara and Olifants camps so far. I’m hoping to keep heading north – Shingwedzi next, but will have to negotiate. I’m aware that three weeks in nowhere with an old toppie might not be every 25yr-old’s idea of heaven. Can’t understand them, huh?

Negotiations opened with (and ended with), ‘First let’s get to a town so I can get all I need, then we’ll come back into the park.’ Fair enough Jess, so tonight we’re in a chalet just outside the Phalaborwa gate. Tomorrow hopefully camping in Shingwedzi.

– Found an Aitch tree – Sterculia – the African Star Chestnut –

~~oo0oo~~

Clothing the Homeless

A big black ‘garbage’ bag on my driveway. That’s strange, methought. I opened it up. Very nice clothes. Not new, but very good condition. Khaki safari shorts, Jeep branded shorts, lekker shirts, great T-shirts. Hmm.

Maybe they were taken off a clothesline and then, if the taker was feeling guilty and someone was approaching, he threw them over my gate so as to be empty-handed? I conjectured.
I was on whatasap back then so I broadcast to the neighbourhood group – Found some clothes. Anyone lost any clothes lately? No reply. I asked again. One guy asked, What kind of clothes? I gave a neutral ‘male adult shorts n shirts’ answer. I wasn’t going to say Perfect safari shorts! Great T-shirts! Nah! Anyway, they weren’t his. Hmm.

I told my friends of the mystery. Oh we forgot to tell you! Those are for you. You need to wear some different, and better clothes for a change. So Louis Galop gooi’d those over your gate when he was out on a run, galop’ing in the ‘hood, as he does.

Mystery solved. I was now a well-dressed soon-to-be-homeless gentleman. Really lekker clothes, my new favourites!

Turns out their preacherman from America thought the 2021 insurrection and looting was a good reason to return home, maybe a sign from on high, and had left in a hurry. In God We Trust, but hey, discretion . .

My good Samaritan friends tidied up for him, and I benefited from that strategic retreat! I got, like, a makeover.
Two years later, they’re still my best clothes.

~~oo0oo~~

I do miss my old fashionably ripped shorts, must say. I think they’da been worth a lot now. I know I pay extra for pre-ripped jeans for the kids.

Galop – gallop; jog; run

Kruger Park

En route to the park we stopped off in Harrismith for the 100th running of the well-known Mountain Race, where fools run out of town and up to the top of the mountain, only to run back to town again. This fool has done the pointless exercise myself a time or three. Back when I was fitter, lighter and naive. So this year I gave others a chance to do it.

On to Kruger where of course I’d made no arrangements or advance booking. We stayed in a very comfortable, clean well-equipped container here, outside the gate:

– Sleepover quick stay accommodation –

At the gate we were given one night in Pretoriuskop. At Pretoriuskop we got two nights at Berg en Dal camp, and there we got four nights in Skukuza, so all sorted.

Now we’ve run out of Jessie-luck. No more chalets available, so I have to save money. We’re camping, yay! Four more nights in Skukuza.

Jess is delighted (eyeroll)
https://videopress.com/v/6tegJSuG?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&muted=true&persistVolume=false&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true

~~oo0oo~~

Just a little Smoke . .

. . emanated from under the bonnet.

Dad! There’s smoke coming out from under the bonnet! Jess n Tom shouted in unison. It’s nothing, I said reassuringly, A lot of cars smoke like that.

No they don’t! Jess n Tom shouted in unison, ganging up on me. What? Suddenly you okes are automotive engineers? I asked defensively.

So I had to break one of my rules of touring and advanced automotive engineering and open up that bonnet – something I try and avoid, and advise against. Every time I do, it costs me money. A pint of oil here, a new head gasket there.

This time a smoking fanbelt, one that ‘drives the aircon.’ That ‘had seized.’ Who knew an aircon machine under your bonnet needs driving? Who knew the aircon machine under your bonnet has a clutch? Who knew it could seize? Whatever next?

The clutch. That’s what was next. The actual big clutch for gears n things, attached to the pedal for your left foot. So now the bakkie is up on blocks like an SA Navy submarine and we await spare parts from Pretoria, wherever that is. Come to think of it, when I was in the army, we were told that the SA Navy headquarters was in Pretoria, safe from any salty water n stuff. We were. Swear. Make this make sense.

So here we are, stuck on the South Coast in a comfortable cottage having to watch humpback whales breaching beyond the breakers and dolphins porpoising in the waves, and birds in the shrubbery.

And at night, Come Dine With Me, on OpenView satellite TV, with Jess giving stern advice and criticism to the participants. And saying ‘Sis’ and ‘Yuck’ about some of their dishes and some of their habits.

My next bakkie is going to be automatic, so the clutch won’t hlupa me.

~~oo0oo~~

hlupa – hassle

YOU are so lucky . .

. . you don’t live in a cardboard box. I just found out I do.

I’ve weathered rainstorms here and high winds. I thought I was safe and snug in this cottage, but this morning I get this message after I’d suggested where Bruce the wicked landlord mount his second luxury TV screen:

“The wall behind the door is cardboard”

Imagine! I’ve been living on the edge!

https://genius.com/Monty-python-four-yorkshiremen-live-annotated

– Cardboard Cottage –

I Suffered, I Suffer

So Jimmy Buffet died yesterday. This reminded me that I met Aitch in 1985.

Being polite and needing to make small talk I suppose I did tell her about the time we rented a Lincoln Continental in Atlanta. I’m sure I only told her once, or anyway less than a dozen times, but you know how she was. I also told her once that I was not fond of country music, having had my fill in the year I spent in Oklahoma.

So of course, the next trip we go on to a game reserve in Zululand, she’s playing this song full blast on the stereo in my white 1981 Ford Cortina 2.0GL sedan:

– Jimmy Buffet Brand New Country Star –

Just cos the oke drives a Lincoln Continental!

She played it so often and so loud we both learnt the words and the choon and would belt it out on many a road trip.

he's a cheeseburger eatin', abandoned Sunday meetin'
Brand new country star
He rides around in a Lincoln Continental
No steer horns on his car

I also introduced her to my Mom’s cousin Dapper Dudley Bain who would unfailingly tell you he was born in Harrismith (ca. 1923 I guess) and the sound of turtle doves reminded him of his youth in his Scottish oupa Stewart Bain’s Royal Hotel. He had a pencil-thin moustache, so Aitch would also play:

– Jimmy Buffet Pencil Thin Mustache –

I better not let Jess see this. She did some line dancing in her day and is prone to playing loud country music on the stereo in my white 2007 Ford Ranger 3l turbodiesel 2WD bakkie on our road trips. Her mother’s genes, I spose. The suffering continues.

~~oo0oo~~

Nselweni Bush Camp

We loved Nselweni Bush Camp on the right bank of the Black Mfolosi river in Mfolosi Game Reserve. Kinda artistic/rustic, but with everything you need; solid walls with canvas ceilings above and a canvas roof over that; a good kitchen good bathroom en-suite. Windows and doors that open WIDE.

Nice and quiet; and full of birdlife while we were there. Some bush pigs visited us nightly, giving us a good closeup look by torchlight. And – we didn’t take pics!

On the riverbed, we watched an ele having a moment . .

  • Birds seen & heard (53 species): Crowned Hornbill; Ground Hornbill; Emerald-spotted Dove; Cape Turtle Dove; Red-eyed Dove; Oriole Black-headed; Nightjar Fiery-necked; Orange-breasted Bush shrike; Gorgeous Bush shrike; White Helmet shrike; Drongo Fork-tailed; Black Flycatcher; Cardinal Woodpecker; Chinspot Batis; Scrub-robin White-browed; Boubou Southern; Water Thick-knee; Greater Honeyguide; Tchagra Black-crowned; Tchagra Brown-crowned; Golden-breasted Bunting; Pied wagtail; Puffback; Crested Francolin; Barbet Black-collared; Red-breasted Swallow; Dideric Cuckoo; Hadeda; Striped Kingfisher; Dark-crowned Bulbul; Thrush Kurrichane; Fiscal Shrike; Cape Glossy Starling; White-backed Vulture; Grey Heron; African Hoopoe; Paradise Flycatcher; Ashy Flycatcher; Pied Crow; White-bellied Sunbird; Little Bee-eater; Lesser-striped Swallow; Guineafowl Helmeted; Guineafowl Crested; African Goshawk; Red-capped Robin-chat; Striped Pipit; Three-banded Plover; Grey-headed Bush shrike; Neddicky; Wire-tailed Swallow; Stonechat;
  • Elephant; Zebra; Impala; Bush pig; Nyala; Giraffe; Buffalo; Wildebeast; Warthog; Rhino square-lip; Waterbuck; Bushbuck; Baboon
  • Heard at night: Lion; Hyena; Bushbaby thicktail; Hippo

~~oo0oo~~

An early adoption of solar energy with batteries is now derelict – lead acid batteries short shelflife! Godd to see the thinking, and hopefully new renewable energy sources are being investigated in all our parks?

Think of this and be optimistic:

Fighting Fit


Original Message Sent: Monday, July 22, 2013 Subject: Doctors!

I should get my money back! My doc told me the same thing today he’s told me for the last fifteen / twenty years:

  1. Your ‘annual’ checkup? Good, cos your last visit was three years ago.
  2. You’re fat and unfit.

And for this I must pay him?

Also, the thing is, he's wrong! Fat compared to who? and Unfit for what?

Doesn't trust me, either, the skinny endurance athlete bugger. He asked for my weight and I said 80kg, and my waist and I said 88cm. So he stared at me and insisted on measuring, wasting my time and his; then announced triumphantly: "92kg and 112cm!"

What kind of doc does that? Hurt my feelings, sort-of. And also, I wonder when he last had his tape measure re-calibrated?
'Friend' Bruce wrote: 
The older you get, 
The tougher it is to lose weight, 
Because by then,
Your body and your fat 
Have become really good friends.

What? Is he trying to make me feel better? Or older?

~~oo0oo~~

Progress! Today, eight years later, I measured again with my Stanley metal measuring tape in the garage. Only 108cm. That’s actually 107 cos the metal kinks.

No need for a checkup! Think of the money I saved.

Update 2023: Just been yet again. The verdict, a clean bill of health. Immaculate. Never seen anything better in all my years of practice, said skinny Dr Steve. I paraphrase.

Meeting our Waterloo

TomTom and Ziggy and Mbono had a housewarming braai at their new home in Waterloo, north of Durbs. Jess and I were there along with Mbono’s parents, Ziggy’s Mom, sisters, brothers, nieces and star of the show: Melokuhle, Ziggy and Mbono’s baby, my grandson. Their little 2-bedroom house with its own garden is so much nicer than their last place, a flat in a high-rise building downtown.

One niece buzzed around taking lots of pics and videos, so I’ll post some of those when I get them. Meantime, I took too few:

Ziggy organised a lovely meal under the watchful eyes of her Mom and Mom-in-law – daunting, that! Luckily my Zig is a qualified chef! The young men – Mbono and two brothers did the braai for her. Tom had marinaded the meat overnight in his special sauce.

Suddenly it was decided there were too few bowls for dessert! Mbono, his older bra and Tom hopped into his Dad’s car and roared off to Spar; Later, another crisis: Older brother’s new girlfriend wanted sparkling water! Mbono, his older bra and Tom hopped into his Dad’s car and roared off to Spar. I remember those days. Any excuse to drive Dad’s car!

After lunch the large punch bowl was just about empty and the party was getting started! I thought I’d leave the dancing to the younger crowd. So Jess and I left early to get home to Mtwalume, about 100km south, before dark. We dropped off Ziggy’s Mom and a cousin along the way.

~~oo0oo~~

  • Waterloo
    Promise to love you for ever more
    Waterloo
    Couldn’t escape if I wanted to
    Waterloo
    Knowing my fate is to be with you
    Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa
    Waterloo
    Finally facing my Waterloo

Highest Waterfall

Angel Falls in Venezuela

Unfortunately the National Geographic journalist, the first journalist to reach the falls, fell prey to the temptation of sensationalism. None was needed: Angel Falls is sensational enough as it is! She should have said: Angel Falls has the highest single drop of any known waterfall, and has the MOST amazing setting, plunging from a free-standing mountain rising above a green tropical landscape, making it way more spectacular than most high falls which are often hard to photograph.

Instead, she decided to measure the height from the lip of the falls to the river two kilometres away downstream, after cataracts and even some flowing river, including all those in her overall height. This meant the ‘drop’ was over a horizontal stretch of three km, not vertical. Hardly what we think of as a ‘waterfall.’

Silly to do that, as if you measured the Tugela Falls in the Drakensberg that way, it’s actually higher! It has a tremendous single drop and five distinct free-leaping falls.

Both these magnificent falls have great vantage points from which to see their main drops, but let’s compare what really counts:

  • Biggest single drop of Tugela Falls: 411m
  • Biggest single drop of Angel Falls: 738m
– we peer over the escarpment edge to see the Tugela Falls on a climb ca.1999 –

~~oo0oo~~

Hillbilly Oogtoets

Seventeen year-old lass comes in for a check. She’s with Dad and older sister in advanced state of pregnancy. This is some long years ago – remember BBM’s?

Kom maar deur, I say to the one whose appointment it is.

Pa and sis push ahead and squeeze in, with Pa standing right next to the chair, sis BBM’ing away, and much “ky’daar” and questions. Throughout the exam they talk away, sis BBM’ing or MXit’ing non-stop while geselsing with Pa about anything under the sun. I have to repeat everything so kleinsis understands, as she’s also listening to them. She “haai“‘s about everything I tell as though it’s the first time she’s ever heard somefing like vat – meantime it’s the third time she’s had her eyes tested by me! Pushes the phoropter away every now & then to look at me and say, “Rȇrig oom?”

Pa, by the way, is kaalvoet in black shorts with black sleeveless tanktop. The two lasses are dressed well. Good-looking girls too. Pa’s the odd one out.

Fascinating. They live in Durban, but in a parallel universe. And dof? Not so much: As we end, he asks for a driver’s screening and sis asks about her coming baby: “Doctor, I jis wanna arse: When mah baby arrahves how will I know if her arse is perfick?”

Mission accomplished! – they got their three-for-the-price-of-one.

–oo0oo~~

From Aussie, Steve chimes in: Sounds like one of my regulars when I used to work at Redbank, one of the outer suburbs of Ipswich, to the west. One of my Aussie friends, when he heard I was working there, said, “Oh no, you’re working in six finger country.” The additional digit was apparently quite commonplace out that way, though I think I only saw it once myself. Handy for BBM’ing I would imagine.

Still, quite nice. LOTS of no-shows, and arrivals when THEY thought the appointment was.

Love it when the accompanying persons shoulder through. Especially when it’s just a mate who is there for the entertainment. They get bored after three minutes though, and ask how long it’s gonna take. After that, immersed in their iPhone but then perk up when the trial frame goes on the nose and want to take a picture . . .

–oo0oo~~

oogtoets – eye exam

kom maar deur – come in

ky’daar – look at that! and that! and that!

geselsing – chatting

kleinsis kleinsus – lil sister

haai – gosh

Rȇrig oom? – really, uncle?

kaalvoet – barefoot

dof – thick

arse – ask

arse – eyes

Teenage Tenants

. . in a block of old farts

Finally heaving the fat ass of my Congolese squatter out onto the pavement of once-toney Musgrave road and throwing his double bed after him so it landed on his bald head* led me to reflect on the 29-odd years I have been privileged to own this lovely flat I bought from my now-Kiwi partner Pete.

*The truth about my only bad apple tenant is that he skived his own shady self off by disappearing quietly in the dead of night one step ahead of the sheriff, having squatted unwanted for about eighteen months – the last eight months unpaid. His long and tedious occupation of my lovely maybe-one-day home is OVER! He’s history, so let’s look back on happier memories.

All my tenants loved the flat and paid their rent. A few asked to buy it; a few phoned to say they were sad they had to leave, but life had taken them elsewhere.

One year was memorable: One year when a tenant left I took my flat off the market for a while and spruced it up. We sanded and gleamed the wooden floors, re-did the kitchen cupboards, fitted a new shower and painted the place. It looked great. The couple who renovated it for me brought in their nineteen year-old daughter to help clean at the end. She worked like a trojan and she loved the space and begged to rent it with a fellow student friend. Sure, I said, and no regrets. They were lovely. Her name was Sierra and she and her flatmate paid on time every month. Oh yes, and they drove the oldies in the building crazy with their parties!

When the moans hit a crescendo I went and spoke to the old-gentlemen-only gang on the body corporate. Moan Moan. Your tenants are loud. They have friends staying overnight. They squeal their car tyres on the road outside at midnight. Moan. Moan.

I asked, ‘What are their names?’ What? ‘What are their names?’ I repeated. No idea. ‘Oh, Did you meet and greet them when they first arrived? Did you welcome them and explain you’re mostly rather old and would like some quiet after 9pm?’ Um no, well that’s not our job! ‘Ah. How many of you have said ‘The youth of today have no manners?’ I asked, prodding hard. Then I let them out of their deserved misery. ‘Relax, they’re leaving at the end of this month.’

So now, years later, we’re renovating again. I’m hoping to get those beautiful old Oregon Pine floors (the old guy who’s gonna fix them says, ‘They’re Douglas Fir, actually’) smooth and gleaming again. Fingers crossed.

Then I’ll work on the garden.