Best to start at the beginning, where a message to some friends enquiring about possible gap year employment in south Africa yielded the number of one Willem K (being a Dutchman this is ludicrously pronounced Vill-em). No more than seven texts later and all was set for two weeks after school ended, with an address and a name, but little else. Fast forward a couple of months and I landed in South Africa, arriving at the Steyn family home who (having met briefly through at Karoo Ridge Conservancy) had kindly offered to have me to stay for a couple of days as they had with my sister on her gap year. Here I picked up the truck kindly leant to me by my friends at Karoo Ridge for a few months. After a couple of test drives to ballet lessons so I could acclimatise to South African rules of the road (or lack thereof) I headed North to Limpopo province. Getting lost almost immediately, I had a brief tour of some of the less well known neighbourhoods of Joburg. However, with the realisation that red lights in South Africa are taken as more of a casual suggestion than law and that the common misconception that South Africans drive on the left is false (they appear to drive on whichever side takes their fancy) I eventually left civilisation behind and made it to the conservancy.
A Marshall Eagle hunts above the plains.
The reserve itself was 20km down the worst road yet seen in the country. The corrugated dirt track pressed rock solid in some places and blown into deep sand drifts in others meant the truck would leap and slide across the full width of the road, all whilst your vision was vibrating like a 70's home movie. Many an egg never made it back to the kitchen. After being met at the gate I was escorted to my temporary accommodation by some armed rangers (more on them later) and left to my own devices for my first night in the bush. The only parting words of advice being: Ranger 1: “Don’t worry, the lions rarely come into this area of the farm” Ranger 2: “But the Black Rhino do” Ranger 2 (whilst laughing as though greatly humoured by this) “Oh... yeah.”
My soon to become standard 5:00am alarm was a shock to the system those first few mornings, but once up and out the brisk cold soon sorted out any heavy eyelids. Being the middle of winter temperatures would sometimes drop as low as 2 degrees at night and only rise to around 5 in the day with added wind chill. Whilst dark at this hour, the sky began to lighten around 6:30, and soon without fail a burning crimson red giant that is an African sunrise would sear its way through the tree line, such was the dust that at this low angle that its light was so dim it could be directly admired.
It's near impossible to capture the true effect of such a sunrise on camera, simply not doing the sight justice.
Whilst cold, the winter months are by far the best for viewing game as the vegetation is far less dense. This is particularly essential for seeing some of the more illusive wildlife, like this male Kudu.
It was one of these occasions which greeted me that first Monday morning where, upon meeting outside the main offices, all 120 staff and managers gathered for the weekly bible verse and prayer led by the CEO (pictured right). Whilst possibly an odd conjuncture of beliefs where an individual may simultaneously insist the world was created 4000 years ago as stated in Genesis and still rest ones livelihood on the genetic selection and breeding of animals, it was clear that this is where the CEO lay. Whilst an unimposing man to the eyes, he certainly new how to hold the crowd and any time he appeared around the farm the effort of those around would immediately intensify. It never became clear to what extent this was from admiration or fear, but by the universality of the response I suspect a large amount of both. It would later become clear that he has also been possibly one of the most influential and important individuals in conservation and game breeding over the last 50 years, so he has clearly been getting something right.
The CEO preached in the standard Afrikaans of the white members of the management team, but it was then translated into both Swana, the language of the majority of the black members of staff, both managers and workers, and English, for me, and me alone. I began to feel slightly conspicuous.
It is also worth noting at this point that whilst Afrikaans and Swana were the most widely spoken languages, with English as the most popular second language of both, there were 19 different languages spoken amongst the 120 staff, mainly denoting to different tribal origins. One member of the team, Tobogo (Toh-boh-hoe) even spoke all of them. However what neither he or anyone else would naturally do is speak in English. This made understanding instructions fairly difficult, and since I was a man in need of rather a lot of instructions those first few weeks, the priority soon became to learn, and learn fast.
Fun Fact: Google Translate can translate 103 different languages. Swana is not one of them.
Three of the farm staff return home after a days work. Left: Lucas, Centre: Kenneth, Right: Finnias.
The 'cruiser' Toyota Land Cruiser is the only accepted vehicle on the farm, to such a degree than no-one is allowed to drive their own vehicle on the main reserve. So versatile is the vehicle, that here it can be seen operating as an aircraft control tower at ta a makeshift airstrip. (no this is not Joburg international, although the resemblance can be seen)
With the meeting over, the days work begun. Accompanying Willem and a few rangers in his cruiser we headed into the bush. Being dedicated to the genetic development of species, and the business model being based almost entirely on animal sales, animal numbers are kept extremely high on the reserve. Resultantly, within just a few minuets i had seen more Giraffe, Zebra, Gemsbok, Kudu, Impala, Sable, Wildebeest and countless other species than most would see in a week on a Safari trip, all passing in and out of the thick bush.
Shortly we encountered a new born Roan antelope calf, and since these are bread intensively for sale, we grabbed it (the process is exactly as it sounds, one man chases the calf, whilst others cut of its escape, the closest diving and rugby tackling it to the ground, it was a skill in which I was to become quite proficient) and took it back to the camps (large fenced areas for the animals being selectively bred to go on sale, or for added protection). Upon inspection by Willem it was noticed that the calf had a problem with its jaw, which it was later explained would make it impossible to feed. Willem therefore declared it must be “put out” which in my naivety I assumed meant put out of the camps as it was not suitable for breeding. The resulting .40 Glock shot therefore came as a surprise to me but presumably not as much as it did to the calf. Whilst unpleasant, such occurrences are a fact of life on the reserve, as a well placed bullet or knife is always preferable to a slow death by starvation which is the grim alternative for most of the sick or injured animals in reserves, without high levels of predators to naturally "put them out".
A similar age calf, although this one thankfully healthy, that we picked up on the way to work one morning. Soon named 'Clarabella' she didn't seem too fussed about being squeezed onto the back of a cruiser with twelve men.
The rest of day 1 passed largely without incident, however that evening Willem, my only connection to the farm and pretty much the only person whose name i could remember, informed me he would be leaving for a week’s holiday the next day, and that I was to house sit for him to look after his dogs, Buddy and Paks. I was therefore told to join the intensive breeding section of the farm for the rest of the week. Thus abandoned, I returned to my temporary accommodation and promptly passed out at 6:00pm, ignorant and by that stage largely apathetic as to what tomorrow had in store, instead enjoying the longest night's sleep i would get in quite some time.