Tuesday 18th March 2014

I chose to do the “field observation” test with the students which went ok, I aced the trees but came unstuck on some of the bird calls. I then resumed my chores, today it was wood work and repaired some of the safari chairs, it’s always good fun to play with power tools.

I hadn’t done a decent run for a while so I sneaked in (a not quick) 10k before lunch. I do enjoy running, especially here as it’s time on your own as well as time to let your mind wander. The outer fire break is quite bushy at the moment so I did have to reserve a certain element of my mind for “situational awareness”.

Jomi and I dropped the “Trails Guide” students at the quarry as they were walking from there to their first camp site on their two night wilderness sleep out. Jomi and I then went to Rhino Boma and walked for encounters. This was the first time we’d been allowed to go solo so to speak. There was no one there to stop us from making a bad decision, the responsibility was all ours. I must admit I’ve never been so conscious of escape routes before, mentally noting termite mounds, big trees and ridges.

Jomi led and I backed up, we started by heading up the hill to look out over the plain to see where the buffalo were. There were two herds in the general area so we went down and approached the first before picking up the second on our way back to the truck. Very happy with our afternoons work, two more encounters for the tally.

We were diverted on our way home to tow the rangers out from Sand Pad which we managed to do without too much of a struggle, this was another win for the Landy over the LandCruiser.