My Leave: Part 2

After a pretty chilled out week I was then booked to come go to the Limpopo region, near where I was in 2011. So I got a shuttle from Lydenburg to Hoedspruit eager to see if it the area was as I remembered it to be. Is it ever!? It is amazing driving down roads splitting the private game reserves which litter this area; it’s like a free game drive, but at 70km/h instead of 10!! In less than 10 minutes I counted 24 different species. The landscape is incredible, with seemingly endless savannah bush land opened out under the Drakensberg Mountains, which form a breath-taking backdrop. I’ve missed this place, and as much as I love Thabo Tholo, I love this area even more.

The first three nights of this past week I stayed in a place called the Cheetah Inn, near the town of Hoedspruit. The first thing I noticed while walking through the reception area was a huge bat colony roosting in the ceiling. At one point they got spooked, so suddenly hundreds of bats took off above my head and made a giant move of about 20m to a different part of the same ceiling...despite the pathetic distance they traveled it was very cool experience to see/hear so many animals move at the same time.

Cheetah Inn

Just hanging around

It's a nice little place in the bush, surrounded by amazing private game reserves and lots of places you can go on excursions. Unfortunately while I was there there were huge thunderstorms every single day/night, so unfortunately all excursions were off!! Bugger!! Saying that, it was a nice place to chill out and study, and we could go and walk around the small plot, which did contain some nice wildlife, although unfortunately nothing dangerous!!

Southern Red-billed Hornbill

Tiny lizard that I spotted in the grass.

European Roller

At dinner on my first night there I was busy buttering half of my bread roll when I felt something clawing at my leg. They had quite a few cats so I just assumed it was one of them so ignored it. It then quick as a flash climbed up my leg and leapt onto my plate and began to lick butter of the other half of my bread roll. It did take me a few seconds to realise it wasn't actually a cat, but a Genet that the family who owned the place had rescued!! Since I spend so much time looking at pictures of Genet on camera traps it was awesome to see one at such close quarters. He even joined me for a beer after dinner :) 

My uninvited dinner guest.

Pushing his luck!!

He's only a baby, so still needs bottle feeding. 

     The next morning I went for breakfast not expecting any more exotic pets, only to see a Caracal they had rescued a few years previously waiting to welcome me for breakfast. These are beautiful, beautiful cats and was a lot of fun to play with:

     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE-3WCvGbII

                          

     One of the big attractions of the Cheetah Inn are a sing/dance group called Big Sound who have been hired to work there about 7 weeks ago. All the groups members are from local townships, so this is a great opportunity for them to actually earn a decent living. They are planning on releasing a CD, so I was invited by the owners to go and watch them perform some songs. They were absolutely fantastic!! They put so much energy into their singing, and there were some truly fantastic voices in there and it made it a very special evening. 
  
     After leaving the Cheetah Inn I stayed at a small B&B in the middle of Hoedspruit, which was in a very nice, secluded spot and allowed me to do some shopping and chill out a bit more before getting back to work this week. While I was in Hoedspruit I was able to revisit one of my absolute favourite restaurants, Sleepers. I'd been there a few times the last time I was in South Africa and I took great pleasure in treating myself to one of their awesome Ostrich Burgers. 

     Overall it was great to go on leave, but I'm now raring to get back into work because we've an exciting period coming up which I'll write about soon!!

     Until the next time, have a good week. There will be another blog posted on the 13th.