Friday 30th May 2014

There was no game drive this morning, instead we made ourselves busy by preparing the cool boxes for the drive, when that was due to depart we weren’t yet sure.

Sarah came into the office and said, “I’m off for a walk”. Whenever somebody says this it sounds as if they’re nipping out for a bit of fresh air, but in this case it’s actually their job. I forget that we get paid to walk, this has to be the best job in the world.

Cara made a run to the airstrip to pick up another four guests that were flying in.

On her way Cara reported a mopane tree across the road which the eles had felled. I made short work of it with a panga a well as a tow rope attached to the Landy. I was happy of the manual work as with no walking and no exercise I’m already beginning to feel restless.

We eventually headed out for a bumble around the reserve. It was very much a case of going from scenic point to scenic point. There wasn’t too much game, but we did have eles and buffalo in the fever tree forest.

We headed back from the bridg once the sun had gone down. I had a lot of multi tasking to do on the way back. Driving along Pafuri Main at about 40kph talking to guests, operating the spotlight whilst something was crawling up my leg. I actually can’t multi task, instead I was simply waving my spotlight around to give the appearance I was searching for nocturnal animals.

Rather than going up to the lodge I turned right onto a smaller dirt road to the Mutali wear where a bush Braai had been set up. It was a beautiful setting, a lovely experience for the guests. The staff at The Outpost had done a brilliant job, from the little I saw of the set up and get up it’s no mean feat to do such a thing.

Once back we had a couple of drinks at the bar. It must sound strange to people not living in this environment but it really was a novelty to be standing at a bar with a drink, having some banter whilst listening to some good but cheesie music. We just don’t get to bars often. I really enjoyed it got the twenty minutes or so before I ducked behind the scenes and left the guests to it.

I never thought I’d see the day that I’d be setting my alarm for 06.30 and thinking, phew… a sleep in.