Moholoholo Activities

Hand-carved and decorated bowls

As part of the South Africa Expedition, Coyote Trails wants to introduce students  to the Shangan culture, so on August 7 we climbed into the rental car and traveled to the Shangan Cultural Village.  On our way we stopped at several points to view the scenery, and to do a little bit of shopping for lovely things to bring home. I was much taken with these handsome bowls we found at one stop. 

The Three Rondevels

Moholoholo Reserve is under the eastern edge of the Drakensburg Escarpment (a steep uprising along a fault), and the village is up over the top and to the west.  The scenery was awesome, including this view overlooking The Three Rondevels (a rondevel being a small round, thatch-roofed African house).   

A eucalyptus plantation

Along the way we saw eucalyptus plantations, from which are logged the slim poles used in building houses and other structures. The poles are the trunks of the spindly trees, 2"-5" in diameter.

We also stopped at a place called The Potholes, if I remember correctly, a magnificently carved stretch of stone carved by the Blyde River (that's pronounced Blee-deh) into swirly shapes. Be sure to click on the image to enlarge it.

The Shangan Cultural Village

Arriving at the Shangan Cultural Village, we were given a tour of the village, including a talk on the family structure of the village, which consists of a chief, his many wives and their children.  

The Shangan shaman

The photo shows the communal cook house and one of the lesser wives' houses, I believe.  I could envision a swarm of children playing amongst wives pounding maize to make "pap", a sort of stiff polenta porridge). 

But there were no children there ~ only our guide, the chief, and the shaman, whom we were taken to visit.  After our tour, we were served a traditional meal, which we were advised to eat with our fingers. I  enjoyed scooping up the pap (it's pretty bland, but not bad) cooked vegetables, and other food, then licking my fingers ~ it does create much more of a connection with the food, somehow.

House with a rondevel in the rear

On our drive back, I noticed that many of the small houses, many of them built square with wood and with metal roofs, had small round rondevels in the back yard as a connection with their old village roots.  You can see one in this suburb of Klaserie (I think that's where I took it).

I examine the dung beetle for sketching

Sandy studies tracks on her laptop

That night, tired but driven by our respective agendas, Sandy studied tracks which she had uploaded to her computer, and I sketched the dung beetle Joe had found earlier. This picture was taken by Sandy, as I examined the beetle under magnification with my botanical loupe. Both of us were snuggled down into the covers on our beds. By the way, if you want to see more of Sandy's photos, look here:  Sandy's Photos 

The boat down the Blyde

Another suggested activity for the Expedition  was tubing down the Blyde River.

The Three Rondevels from the river

Johann, Alessandra and I weren't into tubing, (well, Johann might have been), and we decided to check out the river via a boat trip. The water was a luminous green and the scenery was spectacular. 

Cormorant nestlings

 I particularly enjoyed the colony of nesting cormorants at the far end of the trip under the cliffs.  Even though it was winter, they were raising their young in nests perched on the limbs of dead trees.  The water was warm enough for tubing, I think, although cool and bracing, for sure!

Nyala buck and doe at waterhole

 Our time was almost over at Moholoholo Mountain View. Joe and Sandy had earned their tracking certificates; Johann and Alessandra were scheduled to return to the States; and I was booked at Marc's Treehouse for my 11th day in South Africa. 

Giant millipede sketch

I spent my last morning frantically sketching whatever I could, including this giant millipede Sandy had found in several pieces out in the bush. 

Grey Duiker at the rehab center

 And then, I was driven down to the Moholoholo Rehab Center, where I had some time to photograph this sweet little grey duiker (DIE-kur) female and draw the beautiful Serval cat while I waited for my ride to Marc's Treehouse to arrive.   

And that's the end of today's entry!  Next time you can come along with me to dwell in a charming treehouse high above the Klaserie River.

South Africa ~ Moholoholo Mountain View

Dan'l came by this morning to see my sketchbook. He spent an appreciative three hours with it, asking questions and puzzling out conundrums with me (why do Africa's shrubs have such prevalent thorns while American shrubs seldom have them?  What technique do millipedes use to keep from tangling up their many legs? How did the Voortrekker women (South African Dutch pioneers) use termite mounds for bake-ovens without getting bit by the mound defenders?). We always have fun with this kind of stuff, even if we can only speculate.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

DAY 1 at Moholoholo

Can you see the twig snake?

Our program, at Moholoholo started on August 3, with a warthog dissection.  Actually, the day started out with the amazing sight of a Twig Snake in a tree, waiting for some sunshine so it could warm up and start moving.  Our ranger/guide Pickett pointed it out to us. It was hard to see, even only two feet above our heads, since it was the same size as the twigs it rested on and its scales almost exactly mimicked the tree bark. You can spot it in the photo because it's head is a bit bigger.  Resting on a branch, its head would blend and you probably wouldn't see it at all.

Pickett trains us in anatomy

Now, as I was saying: warthog dissection.  The Coyote Trails course we're contemplating for next year is a practical one with many survival techniques covered. The female  warthog provided not only an amazing anatomy lesson from Pickett, including parts you could eat raw (the kidney was sweet, slightly chewy) and parts you probably wouldn't want to eat. It's good to know how to survive in the bush, and this was inherent in the course, so we had been expecting it.

We all took part in skinning and preparing it to use as bait later, when we would hang it in a weeping bushwillow tree to lure a leopard to to the wildlife cam. When the dissection was finished, I sketched the head, adding notes (taken from Pickett's comments) about how the curling mustache on a tuskless female resembles the tusks on an adult boar, so that a predator might mistake a defenseless female for a wicked-toothed boar if it got only a glance, and not try to catch it. Not having a toothy boar head to draw, I sketched a nearby warthog boar skull, which tells the tale nicely.

These aren't to scale ~ the boar would be twice that size!

Then we piled onto a game drive truck to go out into Moholoholo Reserve to put the warthog bait in place. We were all eager to see if we could lure the leopard in, and to do that we all took turns dragging bits of warthog along the trails to the tree so the leopard would know it was there.  Since there were leopard tracks right in the road, we figured we had a good chance of success, and the tracks added a thrill to the proceedings.

Sandy records her track notes

We got a chance to study tracks this morning and every day of the course, with comparisons between species, discussion about what the animal was doing to create that particular track, and a great many other things, such as when the track was made, why, how, and even what direction the animal was looking as it stepped along.  My roommate, Sandy, was studying diligently for her tracking certification, and  I was busily sketching every free moment, and well into the night, so we made perfect roommates (each involved in our own pursuits) and became good friends in our free moments.

The female is chewing bones as the dark male watches

The Reserve harbors a wonderful array of wildlife, from white rhinos and kudus to elands, pythons (we smelled one but never saw it) baboons and hippos and MANY other native wildlife.One of my favorite sightings was this giraffe pair. The female, on the left, was busily chewing bones with deep, hollow crunches (they do this regularly ~ to get enough calcium to support all those neck bones, I guess), while the male on the right watches. The male is unusually dark, and I understand that giraffes continue to darken as they age, so perhaps it is very old. 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 

I have run out of time today.  More tomorrow or the next day.

South Africa (after a wood-gathering glitch)

I had every intention of blogging about South Africa yesterday, but summer is almost over and I needed to start pulling in wood out of my forest to burn in my woodstove this winter.  Years ago a reforestation crew cut the hillside's dead trees and shrubs into 6' (2 meter) lengths and stacked them in piles out in the woods. I can handle the pieces smaller than about 7" in girth. 

Last year by now I was half done

 "Pulling in wood" consists of putting on gloves and looping one end of a sturdy nylon strap around one end of a piece (or several small pieces) of firewood. Then, laying the other end of the strap over my shoulder, I pull the log/s up, down or across my bumpy hillsides covered with poison oak, wild honeysuckle trip-vines and fallen logs, like a donkey in harness.  I stack them beside my road, where I can later heave them into Dan'l's truck to bring up to the house to cut into stove lengths.

I'm six weeks late getting started this year because of preparing to go ~ then going ~ to South Africa. So I started working yesterday morning before it could get hot. 

I sketched this nest last summer

Trouble is, I was far down the hill when I realized I had forgotten my gloves. It was a nuisance to go back for them, so I decided to work without them. That was a bad idea for two reasons. Poison oak grows tall and luxuriant in my woods, and there was another little problem I encountered when I lifted a log and uncovered the entrance of a yellowjacket nest.  

Wasps came roaring out quite angrily (I can't say I blame them) and one of them stung me on my little finger as I gallumphed speedily away through the trees. My finger was so swollen and sore I couldn't type yesterday. (Excuses, excuses! But it sounds pretty convincing to me....) 

At least I escaped a poison oak rash (so far). My good luck! So here goes, once again:

Beginning the tale of my South Africa Sojourn.  

The plane alit in Johannesburg after an epic transoceanic flight of some fourteen hours, and I was picked up at the airport by MoAfrika Lodge, southeast of Johannesburg (the inhabitants call it Joburg), to meet up with Sandy and Joe of Coyote Trails School of Nature, later that day.  

A Blacksmith Lapwing Plover

Eager to get started on my journal, I launched out the door to the edge of the lodge yard and managed a quick sketch of a Blacksmith Lapwing.  Then I made the mistake of patting the three Rottweiler dogs which live there.  

this is George

Immediately, I was adopted as a fellow romper, and everywhere I turned there was a super-friendly dog waiting to gnaw on me.  Using a good bit of stealth, I sneaked out again and again, sometimes getting a few minutes to sketch, and sometimes not.

Imagine my delight at spotting two ibises that first day!  The first was a Hadeda (pronounce as in LA-di-DAH) Ibis, found anywhere there is water of any sort, and a Sacred Ibis, a big white bird that reminds me of our Wood Stork in the US.  

Sitting down to sketch the Sacred Ibis, I was overtowered by three dogs licking my face and chewing on my hand, my sketchbook, my knee, whatever! 

I finally figured out that sketches would have to be roughed out quickly then finished from my digital camera screen in my room, so that's how this ibis sketch happened. BTW, the three dogs were named (I kid you NOT) George, Double-U, and Bush. 

Sandy and Joe arrived in time for dinner, and the next morning we started out in our rental car for Moholoholo Mountain View Camp, some 200 miles to the northeast.  

the landscape east of Joburg

Here is some of the landscape directly east of Joburg.  As you drive, the rolling hills gently give way to higher hills, then you come out on the lip of the Drakensburg Escarpment, which drops down into the Blyde (BLEE-deh) River Canyon.  And that's where I'm going to drop this blog today.  

Tomorrow, I'll get started on our ten day tracking/trailing/survival adventure at Moholoholo. Be sure to come back for the next installment of photos, sketches, and whatever strikes my fancy.  I'd love comments, if you have the time and will try to answer any questions you might have. 

Stay tuned!

Back from South Africa

A giraffe at Moholoholo

South AFRICA?  Okay, so you didn't even realize I was making a trip to South Africa?  Actually it was one of those things that had been in the planning stages for a year and a half. Since you can't think about something like that for a whole eighteen months, I put it completely out of my mind until, WHOA! Better get movin'!  And then, involved with preparations, I didn't leave time to blog about it before I left.  Duh. 

It was an absolutely terrific three week journey, separated into three distinct parts, with the expectation of recording the entire event in one of my travel sketch journals within the next few months, like the ones here.

Laying track for a leopard photo shoot

Part 1 ~ Ten days with Joe and Sandy, Coyote Trails School of Nature staff, plus student Johann and his mom, Alessandra at Moholoholo Mountain View Camp to scope out a course in tracking and bush survival Coyote Trails is scheduling for high school kids next year. I did lots of sketching and journaling during the ten days. We also took a drive through Kruger National Park in our rental car to check out the wildlife.  

At Marc's Treehouse Lodg

Part 2 ~ Then I took off on my own for five days at Marc's Treehouse, living in a tree house above the Klaserie River with sketching a high priority, but also making a couple of trips into Kruger National Park on game drives  undertaken in a vehicle with a top for shade but open on all sides, perfect for viewing wildlife in any direction.

Sketching frog behind the bar

Part 3 ~ Then I spent four days at Panzi Bush Camp, with time for more sketching and journaling, plus lots of laid-back enjoyment of the thorny African bushveld. Panzi Bush Camp has a waterhole and a viewing deck,  located right next to my cabin, so a lot of time was spent on the deck sketching and soaking up the atmosphere. Exploratory walks with the naturalist, Glynn, were an added enjoyment, and I was able to get many of my questions about wildlife, tracks, and the African environment and vegetation answered. And the great food ~ oh, my!

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

And now ~ I'm going to blog this over the course of the next several days, as I'm still sorting the dross from the 2500 photos I took.  The photos were in addition to sketch/journaling 43 pages in my sketchbook, with a number of additional pages partly begun and in line for finishing before I can put it up online. 

Drawing by flashlight

I was pretty focused, I guess.  Many nights found me coloring sketches by flashlight and booklight, using my photos for reference. That's what I'm doing in this photo at right (gotta find a better way!)

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Before I left, I spent a LOT of time tweaking my gear. If you recall, in December while in Belize I had a sticky problem with my vitamins getting moist and gumming up in the container.

Keeping the Vitamins Dry

I resolved that problem this time (although not technically necessary because the bushveld of South Africa isn't humid) by dropping one day's supply into a plastic bag, tying it off, then dropping in the next day's supply, etc. I got two week's worth in one plastic bread bag.  It worked perfectly, plus I later used the little strings for page markers in my field guides, a happy surprise use.

Baboons can glare like real hoodlums

Next blog I will tell about some of the fascinating things that happened during the first ten days at Moholoholo.  I helped bait a camera set-up for leopard (see the image above, under Part 1), tracked a wild white rhino and her calf through thornbush veld, and learned to identify tracks and sign of giraffe, wildebeest, leopard, rhino, kudu, impala, baboon and other African wildlife.

baboon tracks

I  also pursued my artistic investigations of acacia thorns, geckos, bushwillow fruits, bone-chewing giraffes, porcupine quills, and many other interesting subjects. 

And oh! the incredible birds!  I identified 101 species in my 21 days, a very satisfying number for this part-time birder.  

Lilac-breasted Roller

So! Stay tuned for the next installment!