#back_up

What a great way to celebrate my final walk

Tuesday 29th July 2014 What a great way to celebrate my final walk of my time backing-up at Makuleke – leading my aunt and uncle with my pal Jomi backing up. This was walk number 106, all of which have been an incredible experience. I don’t want to over play it but I can’t think there are many experiences around that match up to leading bush walks through the African savannah. When you add in that…

I doubt my Mum would be too happy if I got my aunt squashed

Monday 28th July 2014 A few of us headed up to the Sandveld in search of any interesting tracks that we could follow up on. Alas we found nothing of real significance so we settled for a gentle amble and explore. This yielded a spring that none of us had seen before so there were many suggestions for a name, Jame’s Spring didn’t cut it with the rest of the guys and no decision was reached but I…

Five hours after we started we met the rest of the group at the top

Sunday 27th July 2014 Duncan led this mornings walk, another big one, this time we walked from Sand Pit to Mabayen, the big ridge which overlooks Banyini Pan. It was only 12km but hard slog on another hot day. Five hours after we started we met the rest of the group at the top. They had driven out after having a more leisurely get up. The views along the way and at the top made our efforts…

The afternoon was a very laid back affair

Saturday 26th July 2014 Brian led a walk to Houtini Gorge which proved interesting given his anthropological background. Our route took us to places that I’d not visited before, many of them old human dwellings. At one site, known as little Thullamella we found what looked to be an old mill stone. Brian explained that when people left an area they would break the mill stone to release the spirits…

We did a quick sweep of the area to check for more snares

Friday 25th July 2014 Not many takers for this mornings walk, just Duncan and Will along with Brian Kelly who was walking as my Back-up. Brian has joined us for the consolidation few days as well as graduation as the instructor in camp. He was happy for it to be my walk and told me to lead on. I explained that we had some distance to cover so whilst we’ll stop and look at cool things there wasn’t…

Lunch followed by beach cricket, touch rugby, ultimate frisbee and a dip in the river

Wednesday 23rd July 2014 The final day of the birding course finished with the slide and sound test. I wish I’d put in more effort in during the week as I didn’t do as badly as I thought I would. Normally I put 100% into everything I do but on this occasion I psyched myself out before the week even started. It was a tough course but if I’d approached it in bite sized chunks I may have mastered it.…

Following our little jaunt into see the late Stone Age site

Tuesday 22nd July 2014 This morning we headed back to one of my favourite locations on the concession, the rock art site up on the sand veld. I led the walk into the paintings, again with no rifle as Alan and Horst were carrying theirs. I’m starting to enjoy the freedom of walking unimpaired.

Following our little jaunt into see the late Stone Age site we continued our drive up to Lanner Gorge…

Walking up front with no rifle felt so liberating

Monday 21st July 2014 The morning got off to a good start with honey badger tracks in the sand at Makwadzi. We headed to the old western boundary for another session of birding. Rather than a full on morning with eyes glued to the binoculars we took it nice and easy exploring a new area on foot. It was a place that I’ve always wanted to walk so Alan suggested we go for it. I led the walk but with…