Lowveld news

Hello everybody,

Another message from the Lowveld! While Holland is experiencing a heat wave, we are sitting here with our coats on. Since 2 days the weather is colder, but we expect that temperatures will rise again in the next couple of days. We are still busy sanding and painting the windows. We hired a 6 m ladder to remove the plaster from the ceiling beams and to paint the walls in rooms 1 and 2. The swimming pool is empty because it needs a new layer of paint.

Karen and Narda arrived last Friday and it is very good to see them again. We are spending our days at the lodge, talking, reading, making fire and sleeping! Since Monday the lodge is filled with people. No guests but builders so there is a lot of activity going on at the moment. Six men are working on the roof. They brush, comb, and repair the thatch. Trees are cut, to prevent leaves from falling on the thatch. So our beautiful Bougainville lost many of it’s flowers, but all for a good cause. Five other men are renovating rooms 3 and 4. Our gardener has the time of his life, he really likes having so many people around and is talking his way trough the day. All men are sleeping in and around the staff quarters, so it is quite cosy up there, hihi. Although it is very cold during the night, they sleep in tents and underneath thin blankets. We offered them matrasses, pillows etc, but they refused. They are used to this circumstances and can survive. Unlike us who need many blankets to keep warm, we are such softies!

The animal life in and around the lodge is still great! We heard a lion roar in the garden and the next day we saw it’s footprints in the sand. Narda and I were sitting next to the fire on Monday, when we saw an animal passing by the Figtree. We could not see clearly what it was, but it had short legs and a big fluffy tail with a white tip. The next day we took the little bush book and searched for it’s footprints. It turned out that a civet visited us, which is quite rare.

Yesterday was Karen her birthday and she got a nice surprise. First we did a game drive and just after we left the parking area we saw 2 giraffes on our property. Other animals we saw, were: kudus waterbucks, impalas, wildebeests, guinea fowls and many more giraffes. After the drive we had a braai and sat around a nice fire, when all of a sudden we heard twigs break and something sniffing. It turned out to be a hippo, walking through the garden, eating the grass. We turned of the big garden light and watched it for several minutes :).

Very good news about two other species (we have not seen them yet) but people have spotted wild dogs and black rhino in Parsons this week!