Hi there

Greetings again from SA. I finally got round to putting some photos onto my PC which prompted me to write this post. To avoid another weekend knocking around the guesthouse I decided to get down to the northern Drakensberg, in Kwa Zulu Natal. The Drakensberg are a mountain range that are around 900 km long. I was coming from Jo'burg after work so headed for the most northern access point. The Drakensberg mountains cover parts of Free State, KZN and Lesotho.

I got caught in horrendous traffic around Jo'burg so, despite leaving work early, was driving in darkness the last 2 hours which in SA is not really a good idea. It passed without event though, and I arrived at the backpackers in total darkness to find they didn't have a dorm bed for me. This ended up working in my favour as I was given the TV room to myself complete with (surprisingly) TV, DVD player and en suite bath.

Anyway, I fell asleep by about 9.30 despite the party going on in the bar. Imagine my happiness when I awoke the next morning to this....A pool, abut 30kms of grassland, and the Drakensberg in the distance.

Despite having my own car I decided to sign up for the backpacker tour. Turned out to be an incredible rip-off, but at least I had some company, didn't need to jump straight back into the car after a long drive, and a guide to tell us about stuff along the way.

The Drakenberg are stunning - very identifiable - long escarpment, flat on top. When we got to the top we saw the 2nd highest waterfall in the world. Not the most stunning, but satisfying after a long hike!


Anyway, haven't worked out what interesting thing I'll find to do this weekend, but will keep you posted.

Take care - keep in touch
x

Hi there!

Greetings from South Africa. Things have been good. Hectic few days at work. My job seems to involve a lot of deflecting angry people. Luckily I can (contrary to popular belief) be quite good at eating humble pie.

Anyway for those of you who wanted to see what my new 'home' looks like it looks like this...not so bad eh? It hasn't really been hot enough, except the first few days when I arrived, to try out the 'pool' and it's not exactly big enough for lengths.

And if anyone wanted to see what my first two rhino looked like...

There are two there, back to back. Kinda sweet. I know all safari photos are pretty lame so I'll save you the trauma of lots of grassland photos with the vague outline of something that COULD resemble an ostrich / giraffe / tree / telegraph pole in the distance. But I was kinda chuffed to see these two as every time I've been to a nature reserve with rhinos I've been pretty out of luck.




Also, I know I mentioned, I went out to a school last week which was really interesting. It was the link of a school I knew of in the UK. It had the appearance of a really well resourced school, in Soshanguve Township, just north of Pretoria. Actually turned out their budget is miniscule but there is a very wily headteacher there who seems to be incredibly resourceful. Of course the cameras generated the usual chaos..

Anyway - I hope this all finds you well. Please all keep in touch, it's kinda slow socially out here so all contact gratefully received.