Blog

In the life of every expedition there comes an evening when the return has to be contemplated; when, at dawn the next day, it has to be taken on. It is a journey in itself, with its own observations and thoughts and emotions. And I will – we all will, at some point in the future, have to contemplate the journey back from this. Early this morning I sat down to write about that. But then, gazing out from the veranda over the lawns, streaked with yellow from the young sun, and hearing the birds and listening to Beethoven’s...

You can listen to the vopice recording below, or read throught the text. Enjoy!   Hoping for a restful night, but prepared – hammock slung low so I can easily reach down for the rifle, sandals ready, bright little LED torch between my legs inside the sleeping bag, a fire through the night – the feint glow in the background towards the top left. One of us will get up from time to time to push the logs deeper into the bed of coals, so that we have the constant lick of a slow flame. On the near side,...

We trudged into fly camp some time after 11pm – Vashtudu, Jantjie, Moosa and me. The pic is Victor’s work. He and Louis were recruited to look after the vehicle; neither was brave enough to stay behind in the bush alone, so I had to take on both. We found them fast asleep in the cab, their fire abandoned. The hyenas had been giving them hell, they explained, with some embarrassment. Sure enough, the next morning we found the area around was covered in hyena tracks. Vashtudu snorted derisively that they should know better than to leave smelly food...

Kalemba had become fascinated with my little idiot box – not always the best subjects, but still, it did leave a record of sorts that would not have been there had I carried the thing. We came across this little compound late one afternoon. I am (through Kalemba) listening to their accounts of what was going on in their stretch of wilderness. As I might have mentioned in earlier postings, such bush dwellers, especially the ones like these, that live their semi-nomadic lives in the remote wilderness, are wonderful to meet up with and spend a bit of time...

Sometimes the Universe smiles at you. Towards late afternoon It lets you find a waterhole. It’s almost clean enough to drink from, if you scoop carefully off the surface. Around the edges you find the signs of many ungulates that came to drink, and even some predators. And you move away a bit and gather a pile of wood for your fire against the night prowlers, and prepare your lair.  Then, as you finally lean back against a log with, perhaps, a little red wine you have left, the sun dies in slow splendour while a black-glad catafalque party...

Lidi de Waal, artist, poetess, muser and oft-savoured Facebook companion carries home little bits and  pieces, and a Sea Bean, from her beach-browse. And some end up in (another) bowl somewhere on a shelf, or on a table, or tucked away in her mind, for later wistful caressing. And some time later, Lidi muses about her browsing, and the Sea Bean, which is really the African Dream Bean, on Facebook and it takes me back to a sweltering hot afternoon on the banks of the Ruvuma River, on the very edge of Mozambique. Back there, in the deep shadows...

The converging game paths have been hinting at a waterhole somewhere ahead all afternoon. It turned out to be an unexpected black basalt basin in the endless sand veldt, about the size of a suburban home. I filled my water containers and moved away a bit and found a generous tree to sleep under, far enough from the pool so that I would not disturb visiting animals. As the sun began to stretch the shadows eastwards, this bull herd came gently swaying out of the thornveld in single file. I was downwind from them so they were unaware of...

A small breeding herd of elephant; six cows, with two sub-adults, one a young bull. We would fairly regularly come across such evidence of their wanderings – breeding herds, single bulls, small bull groups, and usually just take note with a brief flutter of excitement, perhaps a passing remark. But it was the baby tracks that made me pause here – actually of two, one no more than a week old, the other a month, or so. Perhaps it was just a rare frame of mind I was in – a kind of reflective tenderness, for this subtle evidence...

You can listen to voice recordiong, or read through the text below. For days, it was a kind of a destination – “the Ruvuma.” It drew us on, as if it held some reward. But now that we are here, it does not feel like a destination, and there is no reward. It is just part of the bush. We could actually wade through with our packs balanced on our heads and just wander on, through more trackless wilderness. To civilisation and its bureaucrats, it is a border, with Tanzania. But in this remote wilderness it is just a...

You can listen to the narrative below, or read through the text. Enjoy!   The sun played hide-and-seek between drifting clouds. A breeze from the south-east slipped in under the shadows and laid a chill on the skin. John caught me indulging in as much warmth as I could catch, and a bit of Stephen Hawking, while my companions worked on the reedbuck I had shot for the pot. I had taken on John as go-between and translator, but he quickly migrated to tea-maker, cook, general go-for during rests, and snap taker. I always take at least one book...