OH, NO, IT’S COMING TO AN END! We’re so sad our time here is almost over — what a wonderful time we’ve had hanging out with Marita, Noekie (definitely not enough time with her as she kept having to travel all around the country training revenue folks about economics), Matty, Johan, Norman and Juanita (pronounced You-a-nita). This last week is a blur of activity — going over the Outeniqua mountains (glorious!) to Oudtshoorn to Canga wildlife ranch, where Kate and Sean volunteered for some months a few years back. It was terrific and we got to pet a cheetah and listen to her purr like a medium sized engine — how swell!
We had a GREAT time at Garden Route game lodge — our game drive was magnificent, in large part because our game driver was so wonderful. Wessel (Vessel) taught us — or should I say old us — all sorts of survival tips. Like getting Bushman’s bedding, a fynbos plant, to sleep on so the ants and other insects wouldn’t bother us; how to catch guinea fowl by putting out brandy or whisky, getting them drunk; how to catch a pheaasant (? Marita says that was the name; I’m not remembering that) by digging a tunnel and putting corn or something edible for them on the trail into it — they get stuck and can’t turn around — and did you know that birds can’t walk backwards? He also told us survival traits and tricks of the animals we saw. We saw lots of game: sprngbok (black racing stripe on side), impala, gemsbok (remember, g is h), eland, gnu, kudu (the ones with the gorgeous spiral horns), waterbuck (the ones with the target on their asses), buffalo, elephant, rhino, giraffe, ostrich (god, they’re everywhere!), golden mongoose, lion, burchell’s zebra, beautiful birds and NO SNAKES. Yea on that last one! We saw lots of bokmakieries, little green and yellow birds that sing so lovely — we had a most magnificent concert from them 2 years ago when we were in Addo elephant park, outside our cabin. We told that to Wessel and he said no, bokmakieries can sound like any other birds as a survival mechanism and in all likelihood they were singing swear words to say, “We are big and tough and not good to eat, this is my branch and you get the hell away, and don’t even try to get any closer or I’ll knock your block off!”. After a moment, Marita and I looked at each other and said, “Nah, they were singing sweetly to us!”
Laird had another load of pictures put on canvas — we ended up giving away all the others. Unfortunately, we couldn’t hear the guy about sizes as we were looking at them on the selector — we thought he was saying the size of the one we picked for Noekie’s picture. OH, NO. We were agreeing to a LARGE size. When he got home with them, we were all gobsmacked at how dramatic they were in that size. There were 8 of them, so after a couple of gifts, there will be pictures for the four flats where we are staying. I also painted a picture for somewhere. Two more canvases, but not enough time. Marita will have them and all the paints, so she can make those.
Today is medical day. I went to Carina at 7:30 this morning, going to Dr. Jacobs (Ya-cops) for an injection. I am certainly hoping it will make the trip home much easier.
Tomorrow we take everyone out for one last lunch — to the Albertinia hotel, where if you’re hungry, you can have everything on the special menu for about R195. That’s about a 16 course meal! At least I will be opting for something less than everything. Who knew I had limits?!?
We hate that it’s basically over. We start for home Sunday morning. Looong wait in the Joburg airport (yes! one more chance to buy!). Another looong wait in the Paris airport, but not long enough to go into Paris. Stupid, but I didn’t even see that we were going through Paris — if so, I might have tried for longer layover. Oh, but Laird has to be on the mountain with a bunch of teenagers on Tuesday, teaching them how to maintain forest trails. So back home, back to regular life.
Other than we won’t be here, we’ll be happy to see everyone! Happy day, as Marita always toasts.
lairdandjonelle 
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