Naughty warthogs and happy guests

We are doing fine. We had guests in January and February and luckily everybody loves the place. People are especially content about the location and the service . We try our best to keep up the good work :). At Kurhula you do not have a set time for breakfast or dinner, you eat whenever you are ready. Guests can decide if they want to dine in private or as one big family and so far everybody chooses the “one big family” setting. When we organize a braai we bring the tables and chairs to the lower part of the garden and use paraffin lanterns to light up the area. Guests love it! They say it is cosy, romantic and ideal to spot some wildlife in the evening hours. You hear the sounds of tree frogs, crickets, hippo’s and the river. Sometimes you hear a twig break and everybody gets silent and tries to capture some wildlife in the view of their torches.

We had 2 major rainfalls and thunderstorms at the end of January. The water washed away parts of the road and it was very difficult to gain access to the reserve. We have a dry river bed on our property with a road over it that gives access to the neighbour lodge and ours. The dry bedding filled with water and on one side the flood knocked over some trees. Now there is a huge gap and we have to find a way to fill it up and restore it. Otherwise one day, with another heavy rainfall it will wash away that part of the road completely. Now that is something we never had to deal with before, so it takes some research to find out how to solve this problem. Luckily Holland will help ;-). My dad works at Rijkswaterstaat and he offered to have a look at some pictures that I made. Hopefully he has some ideas how to restore the damage, thanx dad!!!

We employed a new gardener this week. He will work 7 days straight and than he has 7 days off. It is a part-time job, because we do not need a full time gardener at the moment. It is a young man (19) but he is willing to learn and works hard. He passed his matric last year and would love to study law, but he does not have the money to attend law school. I hope one day he can fulfil his dream. He likes reading so I am going to give him some books to read. Maybe in the future, when we are getting a steady income and he proves to be a good employee, we can support him to make his dream come true.

The wildlife is still around. Yesterday we saw plenty of giraffe and wildebeest. Hippo’s are in the river regularly at the moment and entertain us many times. The young warthogs grow and get naughtier by the day. They destroyed a new plant, because they like to take the twigs in their mouth and pull them and rub there little tusks against the bark to damage it. They even decided to dig a hole in the soil with their snout and role over the plant for a nice scrub. That day I did not like them very much!!!

Until the 5th of March we are busy with guests. Then we have full lodge on the 13th and the next day we will leave for a short holiday to Mozambique. We are invited to Patrick his big birthday party of 3 days in a beach lodge in Ponto Malongane. We travel with 1 other couple we have not met before. Patrick gave us their e-mail address, because it is better to travel with more vehicles through Mozambique. Most of the roads near the coast are made of loose sand, so if not careful you can get stuck. We will travel via the Kruger Park and meet them at Komatipoort. We are looking forward to this trip. Finally after 2 years we can do some diving again!!!

Love from the quiet bush, Sander and Kim