This gets infinitely better in you have a Grapetiser in your hand. Especially if it’s free.

Hey hey!

Another day, another blog. Not many more though, mind! So read up while you can.

We've had some pretty rainy and miserable days this week, but in between the storms we've managed to get a whole lot done. We spent 3 days working in the neighbouring community, Sankoyo, where we were surrounded by inquisitive kids & mums, goats, donkeys, and lots of Mopane. The drive out there is pretty long (anywhere between 2 and 3 hours, depending on the stability of your wheels and the wetness of the road), so you really have to think of it more as a game drive than anything else. Which it is – we’ve seen hyena, jackal, elephant, giraffe, buffalo, kudu, impala, zebra, warthog, a ton of birds, and I’m sure plenty more that I’ve forgotten for now. Of course I’ve forgotten – my brain is fried. It was my day off, remember? I spent it watching 2 movies, drinking WAY too much coffee, and stomping around in my gumboots in the constant drip drip of rain. The kind used for torture. Anyways.

On one of our trips into Sankoyo we saw the most amazing beautiful thing – ginormous flocks of Red Queleas all over the road and in the trees alongside. And when I say ginormous, I really mean it. There must have been hundreds of thousands of them. Teeny weeny little birds all flying together in waves, pausing just long enough on a branch for you to make out their shape, and then in flight again. It’s difficult to think of them as individual creatures – they just move as a whole. Like that school of fish in Finding Nemo. You know what I mean. I have pictures, but you can’t get a good idea of what it was really like from the pictures. Maybe I’ll show you the videos when I get home :)

Well, the excitement continues…on our 2nd day of work in Sankoyo, we saw some zebra on our way back to camp. Wait! There’s more! One of these zebees was collared. This means that somebody, being Hattie, was working on zebees in the past and needs to get all collars off. They’re expensive, plus they’re not super comfy for the animal, so the practice is to radio fellow researchers when you see a collared animal like this, so that they can organize a vet to come out and dart it. And that is precisely what we did. We needed to stay with the zebra until everyone got to us, to make sure we didn’t lose it. This was made difficult for a few reasons. One – zebra move while they eat. A lot. Two – these ones get freaked easily. Three – Maun is hours away, and the vet was performing operations. Four – it was crazy hot on the back of the TDI, and I was on the back. Well, the next 2 ½ hours of life were not all that great, but finally everyone arrived. They brought cokes and Easter eggs. :) Rob the Vet was super efficient in darting the zebra, but the poor things got such a fright that they ran like MAD the moment they heard that POP! Well, it got dark, and we spent a good 3 hours in 3 cars with lots of spotlights and torches and people searching everywhere possible for a mommy zebra lying unconscious in the grass and her little foul standing nearby, looking forlorn. Well, every pair of eyes belonged to a silly impala, and we never saw the zebra again. Don’t worry, it’ll be fine – a pretty unsuccessful time altogether, but lots of fun anyway :)

Whew, I can think of lots of funny and strange animal stories to tell.  But I think I’ll save some instead of getting them all out here. You’ll just have to wait. On Friday we officially finished all of our field work, and on Saturday we finished sorting out all of Mich’s soil, packing it all into boxes ready to be sent to Maritburg. What a feeling! Very satisfying! It was fitting that we should have a celebration, and we did it with style.

Emily planned a most marvelous quiz, and last night we went over to Dog Camp for our quiz night and a braai. We had great fun teasing each other for our silly answers, some getting pretty competitive, and just enjoying everyone’s company. Musi was in charge of the braai fire (and what a good job he did), while Face and Olf entertained us with some dancing. They just couldn’t stop. The rhythm got them. Emily made us a delicious cake, Rob grated some carrots, Femca mashed some sweet potatoes, and we had a feast on our hands.

I'm not sure when I’ll get a chance to write another blog - we leave this camp (HQ) on Thursday, to stay with the guys at Dog Camp for a few nights, before I fly home on the 4th! It’s very exciting – as I was excited to come here, and have loved it here, so am I excited to go home and move on to a new part of my life.

By the way, one of my new favourite things to do – sit on the back of a bakkie, looking out at the world as it moves on, listening to only the best of tunes on my wonderful kPod, with the breeze in my hair. This gets infinitely better in you have a Grapetiser in your hand. Especially if it’s free.