kennels update (J1)

Finally another update from us, don't worry we are still here. What have we kept ourselves busy with since our Easter trip. Well first of all there was a car to be fixed, we now have a refurbished fuel pump, four brand new shocks, and clean filters etc. The car is running better then ever before, the bill was a bit of a shock, keeping a 4x4 is certainly not cheap.

Besides the car (which we did not really fix ourselves, we have a great mechanic here) we kept busy with loads of work and study. It has been hectic, but I will not bore anyone with the details. Winter is also coming, this afternoon we have spend chopping some wood with my new chainsaw, this should keep our fireplace going for some time.

What has really kept us busy is our duties on the committee of the local SPCA. There was a newsletter to get ready, which was something J2 was busy with, and there were accounts to be handed over. We have completed our first year on the committee, and at the Annual General Meeting in the end of April we had some lovely new volunteers join. We both stayed on the committee, but I handed the treasurer duties over to a new person. This involved quite some work, first getting it ready for the AGM, and then for handover. This year I want to work a little more on upgrade projects at the kennels, as well as getting an education plan going for the local schools.

There was also the activities, we did a day in one of the local shopping malls with some of our puppies, and managed to re-home quite a few, which is what it is all about. We also hosted the World Woof Tour. A girl called Joanna is travelling from Cape Town all around the world with her adopted dog Oscar, to raise awareness about adoption of dogs in local kennels and SPCAs. All details about their trip is on the website. We were the first stop on the way, and a local 'current events tv-show' was following the first part of the trip, so we might even get on South African tv. We had invited a group of children from the SOS Childrens village, a local orphanage, to be part of this special event, and had a very nice day. Some pictures:

Oscar and his owner Joanna.

The children, Oscar and our team of volunteers on the day.

A nice lunch after a busy day with Oscar and the tv cameras.

We are now busy organizing our annual golf day and raffle, which is usually the biggest fundraiser of the year.

In the meantime Jock, our new dog at home, is really settling in. Unfortunately Billy and Jock seem to have some issues figuring out who the boss is at home, Billy is wearing some of the scars! Some more doggy pictures soon.

I have also found a tennis partner again, and I am very happy to be playing again on a weekly basis.

Greetings from Botswana

J1

Pictures from the Mabuasehube Easter trip (J1)

It has been nearly two weeks since our eventful Easter trip, and I had promised pictures to a few people already, so here it goes...

After nearly 2 years of reliability our good old Pajero 4x4 decided this trip was a little too much, and the terrain was a bit heavy. The trouble caused us to have to change the plan a little, but the holiday was still awesome.

Mabuasuhube is part of the Transkalahari Trans frontier park, a large game reserve at the south west side of Botswana, the park runs across the border into South Africa and Namibia. On our first day we drove from Gaborone to a village called Tsabong, about 100km from the park gate. The village is the last place for supplies, and we stocked up on the last diesel, food and booze. We spend the night at a small lodge, where we also loaded up on firewood, as wood collecting is not allowed within the park.
The track from Tsabong to the park entrance was pretty heavy sand, but the car went through like a trooper, although the temperature was slightly high. During this the roof rack started showing the first symtoms of collapse. The load of wood was slightly more then what it had been designed for.

Our friend A. from South Africa joined us, and in the following picture we were getting close to the gate.

At time of arrival at the gate the roof rack had totally collapsed, and started scratching and denting the roof. Still all fun and part of the trip. Our first night in the park was supposed to be about 70 km into the park. After a scenic drive around some of the pans, we set of towards our campsite. After yet another stop to tie up the roof rack, we discovered the spare tyre had snapped off the car and been lost. We decided to turn around, and as we were on our way back to find the tyre we heard a strange noise from the bottom of the car. Upon inspection we found that part of the rear suspension support had cracked off the frame, making the rear axle very loose. We changed our travel plan as it was already sundown, and set up camp at the nearest pan.

The next morning we inspected the damage closer, and tried to decide what our next plan would be. The original plan was to go to South Africa this day and travel over 120km. We changed the plans and made it back to the park gate to get the damage repaired first.

The views from our campsite onto the Bosobogolo pan were stunning, not a bad place to break down. And we had a few of the local residents check up on us to make sure everything was ok.

With the limited tools and resources we strapped the broken part up, and started to make our trip back to the gate at 5 km per hour speed.

At the gate there was a mechanic who could help us, but unfortunately the welding machine was at another gate, and would only come back the evening of the next day. Luckily there were some nice campsites at the gate, and plenty of time for relaxing and cooking good food.

Of course this also gave us the chance for some very nice pictures.

We had a number of new food inventions during this camping trip, and having new pie irons helped a lot. We even baked a bread in our potjie.

And the end result looked pretty good, and it tasted delicious as well.

We did a very short drive with the broken car during the day, and encountered a snake crossing the track.

And saw a beautiful African sunset, we saw quite a few actually during our trip.

Some sundowners during the trip, of course......

And finally the welder arrived nearly 2 days later, and our friendly mechanic welded everything together as good as he could.

After this we were finally back on the road / track again. Because we had lost so much time we decided to abandon the plan to go the the South African side, and rather just stay around the Mabuasehube part.

This gave us the chance to check out all the pans in the area, and luckily some people who had booked did not show up, so we ended up on some beautiful camp sites. We also had sufficient food and diesel to keep us going (on the South African side we would have had a chance to stock up).

The game viewing was quite spectacular, loads of antelope and some very nice birding. Our campsite was surrounded by tracks of hyena, lion and jackal nearly every night. We did not see them though, but heard them regularly.

Checking out one of the pans in Mabuasehube:

And some more beautiful African sunsets over the pans....

One of our last pictures before our camera died, was of this little friend trying to enjoy our lunch as well.

After these last few very relaxing nights, with lots of beautiful scenery and great food, the car started sputtering a little during the last day. It was worrying me slightly, but it was still running so we were just hoping for the best.

On the way back the sputtering got worse, and the car lost all power. A few kilometers from the gate it got really bad, and the car eventually cut out on us. After waiting for a while checking it out, we restarted it, and it was running again. The fuel filter must have gotten blocked with dirt or something, and we repeated this process on the way back. Eventually it got a little better, and we made it back to the 'living world' and tarred roads. But not before we had a flat tyre to add to the drama. Good thing we made it, because with no cellphone reception and maybe one car per day passing through, we could have been there for a while.

The car is with the mechanic now, getting ready fro the next trip. We are still waiting for his report on the full extend of the damage. The Trans frontier park is amazing though, and we would go back any time.

J1