Conservation Project at Mbuluzi

Mbuluzi Game Reserve is a delightful reserve in Swaziland where Sense Africa often helps out with conservation projects and this year we had a couple of great projects lined up. The first was constructing a bridge across a river for a biking trail and the second was mammal game counts in the reserve.

The bridge was set upon with gusto and enthusiasm, we were used to mixing cement and manual labour so off we all set. Lucky, who was one of the rangers in Mbuluzi, was very surprised at how hard we all worked and I think was concerned that we would finish it all in one day!  This was far from likely although we made great head way on the first day.

Meanwhile, the second team was working hard at spotting the game, the grass was still quite high so we had to keep our eyes peeled for any movement. It is surprising how easy it is to miss a giraffe! We did four game drives, morning and evenings, counting every mammal that we saw. The record was 82 in one drive and and this included 34 nyala, pretty impressive.

The most challenging part of the conservation project was the camping; it is a beautiful and secluded campsite, pretty remote, no electricity and water that is tractored in. In order to get hot water, a donkey boiler has to be lit, this means making a fire under an oil drum.

It didn't take long for us all to get used to cooking in the dark, making our own fires, getting up with the sun and having giraffe walk through the campsite whilst we had breakfast!

Something never to forget.

End of Project Ceremony

We were sad to end our work at Mayenjane though our hands and backs were glad of the break from manual labour! Our last day of work ended with the gables of the roof going up and the foundations of a stage dug. The Skills centre that we have helped build will also double up as a church on Sundays and there are plans to extend it over the years to incorporate offices and further rooms such as libraries.

The following day we had a small end of project ceremony, well we had organised to be small, however we got a bit more fame than we were expecting. The Swaziland Tourism Authority came sling a brought the media with them, two national newspapers, one radio and multi media guru and a tv crew! Not quite what we were prepared for but the girls from St Helens and St Katharine School took it in their stride. We had a few speeches, songs from the local children and thanks from the local community. This was followed by a photo shoot by the paparazzi, interviews for Swazi tv and questions to the girls. Some of them had a minute of fame on national tv!

It was also a reality check, a chance to realise the importance of the work we have achieved, of the money donated by the girls and the fact that this will make a difference to the local community. Everyone was so impressed and grateful for the support we had given, it was all very humbling and to recognise the impact that we were having.

This was all reaffirmed yesterday when we saw our pictures in the Swazi Observer, one of the national newspapers. There was a full page (page 20) about our project work, pictures of all of us, quotes from myself and the girls and publicity for all. We all wanted a newspaper each so consequently the town if Simunye ran out of the Swazi Observer!

Now just waiting to see the write up in The Times of Swaziland...

Mayanjane Project and an African Church Service.

We are now half way through the project stage and i have to say it is beginning to look really impressive. Myself and the St Helen and St Katharine girls are building a Skills Centre for women in Mayanjane community. When we arrived at the project site 5 days ago the foundations had been dug and there was a huge pile of earth in the middle. So there was a challenge to complete it in 9 days. And to add to the mix, the Skills Centre was larger than we thought.

La'Salette, who we are working with, has been donated two industrial sewing machines by a company in South Africa, and the original plans were too small to incorporate these machines into the original building plans. The building is now 40m x 25m, and on day 6 we have one wall completed, two walls up to the window frames and three quarters of the floor flattened. Our aim is now to have all the walls completed, the windows and doors in, the floor laid and the roof on. A tall order but achievable. All the girls are working very hard mixing cement, grouting, moving bricks and shifting dirt, manual labour to the extreme! Happy yet exhausted people at the end of every day.

We did have half a day off yesterday although it was an early start. Up at 5.30am to get to the project site for sunrise, followed by some hard grafting until 9.30 before the local church service at 10.00. The girls loved the service saying that it was a true and unique African experience. The singing was vibrant and we all stood and clapped with the congregation, despite the fact that some of the hymns were in SiSwati! The local pastor was really delighted that we attended and couldn't stop thanking us for coming along. The whole service was rather humbling and will certainly be remembered.

The opening ceremony of the Skills Centre is planned for Friday, I think the national paper will be attending along with some government officials. Better get back to mixing cement then.....

Swaziland, My Second Home.

As I arrived in Swaziland I felt as if I had never left, despite the fact that is has been over a year since I was last here. I got met at the airport to get my hire car, I was welcomed like a  long lost friend at Mlilwane and was constantly asked where I had been and why it had taken me so long to come back. Everyone is so friendly here and they have an amazing memory for faces. The man at the petrol station even seemed to know me, although this is highly unlikely as it was a new garage, but that is the nature of Swaziland.

I have arrived a week before an expedition of 19 motivated girls from a school in Oxfordshire. Although I have organised most things, there are always things to finalise, check up on and change, so I was really ensuring that all is ready for the girls arrival, which is tomorrow.

The first thing was to check out the project. I met up with La'Salette, my contact for the project, down in the lowveld of Swaziland, in a community called Mayenjane. This is near the Siteki turn off, set away from the main road. La'Salette works with communities identifying areas that need help with AIDS orphans and vulnerable children and she assists with feeding needy children, educating them and also identifying other development projects that are required.

I met La'Salette at the Mayenjane NCP - not a car park as I initially thought when I first came to Swaziland but a National Care Point where children are fed during the week. She had funded this building and there were about 100 children lined up for lunch. They were all very shy yet smiley with it.

La'Salette has big plans. She has been given a substantial amount of land by the community and wants to develop it for orphan homes, mini retirement homes and also a skills centre for women. And that is where this expedition comes in.

The girls have raised enough money to fund the skills centre and we are going to build it in 9 days, from foundations to roof. Despite the fact that we have not started, there are already people lined up for the opening ceremony including Bongani Dlamini from the Swaziland Tourism Authority. Bongani has given the project some press coverage as I heard the project mentioned on the radio last week, so we have a lot to live up to!

I am back to the project site this afternoon, to chat further with Sandile, our local builder, and to meet local community elders. What we are doing is new to this community, they have never had foreigners come and physically build alongside them, especially a group of teenage girls! It's pioneering stuff.

I am so looking forward to showing Swaziland to the girls, wishing them all a safe flight today and cannot wait to see them tomorrow.

Salinekahle - stay well.

Road Runners

A few nights ago I was camping by myself in the South Downs at a place called Linkenholt – not many people stay there and I only go there for Duke of Edinburgh. I was there the night before the start of a three day qualifying expedition, which I was assessing, and had the place to myself. There is no phone reception and it has that feeling of remoteness as there are no houses to be seen for miles around.

It is also a natures paradise; as I turned in to the entrance of Linkenholt there was a hare sitting about 10m away from me, busy washing its ears, then further along the track I spied a female pheasant, her camouflage blending her into the hedgerow and then a buzzard swooped out over the bonnet of my car. All this wildlife made me smile and also reminded me of how I feel when I am out in Africa. I am flying out to Swaziland today and my night at Linkenholt took me to Africa so that I could reminisce about past experiences.

The best reminder were the partridges in the middle of the track that I was driving along, they reminded me of guinea fowl, just as stupid and just as frustrating to watch whilst driving behind them. There were five partridges and as I am approached them they ran along the track in front of the car. There was a perfectly adequate grassy areas to the left and a lovely hedgerow decked with flowers on the right, but no, they continued to run along the road in front of my car. The fact that they could fly away was not an option to be considered. After 200m I pulled back and the partridges slowed down, milling around aimlessly on the track. Maybe they will choose a different route? As I moved forward again, they stayed onto the road, stressing themselves even more, until I revved the car right on their tails and this made them leap into the air with fright and simultaneously remind them of their ability to fly.

Guinea fowl also do this in Africa, except there are normally a large flock of about twenty of more. Sometimes a sensible one flies into the Africa scrub, but most of them are idiot road runners and stick to the open road until their bird brains come up with a different idea, which often takes some time. But I won't get frustrated with them when I see them tomorrow, I will relish the experience. Although this can be testing, I have been stuck behind a flock of helmeted guinea fowl for 10 minutes, watching them making every wrong decision possible whilst willing them to fly into the bush or to take the next turning on the right.

As I lay in my tent at night, I listed to the plaintive call of a lark and the rustle of some small animal outside my tent. In two days time this will swapped with the distant roar of a lion, the gentle honk of a hippo and the lull of cicadas, I can not wait.

Now, where did I leave my tent pegs?

Handling Poo - The Art of Tracking

I always find it quite amusing when I'm with a new group and they watch me, for the first time, bend down and pick up some animal poo. The reactions are quite mixed. There are those that look in utter amazement and then crowd forward to see what I'm holding in my hands, and why, there are those that turn their nose up at the thought of handling faeces but still have that inkling of curiosity to see why I am doing it in the first place and there are those that recoil in horror, take a few backward steps and tell me how disgusting I am. Whichever group you are in, I can guarantee that by the end of your trip to Africa you will have held, in your unprotected hands, a slice of poo.

It's not that I do this for the shock value, although my inner self is having a little bit of a giggle, it is part of the all encompassing educational nature of being in Africa, the art of tracking wildlife in the African bush. You can learn an awful lot by simply picking up animal faeces and examining it.

I would say, however, that picking up the dryer form of animal faeces is much more agreeable than the 'wet' kind! The wetter the faeces the nearer you are to the animal, pretty self-explanatory really. But you can also tell from the shape of the faeces as to which animal it belongs to, or at least which group of animals it belongs to. Large melon-sized balls are probably from rhino, elephant or maybe even hippo, smaller raisin sized droppings (often found in a pile) are likely to be from social antelopes, elongated twisted faeces about the size of your thumb, are more likely to be carnivores and large kidney beans shapes are probably zebra. Just having an idea of the shape can help you out.

There is so much you can learn from looking at faeces – you just need to know what you are looking for.

But to get the real nitty-gritty you will have to pick up the faeces, look at it closely, carefully tear it apart and look at what is inside. The classic example is discerning the difference between elephant, white rhino, black rhino and hippo. Hippo are pretty easy because although they eat grass, the same as white rhino, they often use their tail to spread the dung around, and so consequently most of it is found suspended in bushes and trees. Hippo faeces will also be found near water sources, whereas white rhino will be found out in the open bush. It will also be made up of entirely dried bits of grass.

The real test comes to rhino and eles. Black rhino and elephant feed off similar vegetation – they are both browsers meaning that they eat leaves and twigs although at times elephants will also consume grass. Elephants are prone to stripping bark and so you may see long strands of undigested bark in their faeces, look carefully. But the main thing to look out for are the ways more twigs are cut up in the faeces. Elephants will rip and tear at twigs and small branches, leaving a rough and jagged end to the twigs, whereas black rhino will cut the twigs at a 45° angle with their back teeth. So when you are teasing apart the faeces, keep an eye out for cleanly cut small twigs, with a 45° angle, as this will help you identify the faeces from being that of the black rhino.

If that is the case, keep an eye out for a suitable tree to climb! Black rhinos are renowned for being rather feisty.

Swaziland? Don't you mean Switzerland?

I have recently spent an exhausting 6 days working on an exhibition stand at the Adventure Travel Show and the Destinations Show in London, promoting the Kingdom of Swaziland and Sense Africa. After only 1 day it dawned on me how limited the general public's knowledge is about the Kingdom of Swaziland. I had all sorts of questions thrown at me, and a lot of people avoiding me because they didn't want to admit that they had no idea where the Kingdom of Swaziland was in the world. The fact that they were standing in the Africa section might have given the continent away.

However, there was one person who really tested by patience. The gentleman in question approached me on the third day.

'So, tell me about Switzerland.'
'Well, Switzerland is a country in Europe, it is very mountainous, often has a lot of snow and people enjoy their skiing there. Swaziland,' I continued in a jovial yet sarcastic manner, 'has plenty of mountains but doesn't often have snow for skiing because it's so warm in Africa.'
'So this isn't Switzerland then?'
'No, This is Swaziland, you are in the African section,' I said through gritted teeth and a wonderful smile, while standing in front of a 2m high picture of an elephant and an African boy in traditional dress dancing.
'I don't want to go to Africa', was the gentleman's response. I said nothing, but I suspect my look of exasperation said it all, the gentleman in question ambled off towards the Middle East.

After six days, I like to think that I've got my Swaziland promotional speech down to a fine art. So here it is…

"Swaziland is a Kingdom about the size of Wales, located in Southern Africa, bordering South Africa and Mozambique. It is easy to get around Swaziland, travelling distances are small and the country is relatively stable (in an African sense) because it is an absolute monarchy and all the people are from one tribe. It is a wonderful place to visit and gives you that up close and personal experience in Africa.

"It has three main things to offer: stunning scenery, captivating culture and wonderful wildlife viewing.

"The scenery ranges from mountainous regions to low land bushveld, where you can walk in wildlife reserves (where the larger animals do not reside), unaccompanied and at your own pace, discovering Swaziland for yourself. If you are into your walking this is one of the few places in Africa where you can follow marked trails in game reserves, enjoying Africa to the full. The scenery has also created an adventurous aspect to the Kingdom and you can mountain bike, whitewater raft, zip wire, trek and horse ride to your hearts content.

"Swaziland is also steeped in its culture, and you will see Swazis in their local dress practically every day and there is always the opportunity to see traditional dancing and singing. You can experience the 'real' Africa by letting locals show you around their own homestead and have a traditional healer throw the bones for you. The Swazis are an exceptionally friendly nation and are always happy to have a conversation about their heritage, welcome you into their homes or even play a game of football with you.

"And as for the wildlife, there is the opportunity to see the Big 5 in Swaziland, but there are only 12 leopard in the kingdom, and I have never seen one there. However, you can see elephants, rhino, buffalo and lion in Swaziland. Swaziland is reputedly meant to be the best place in the world (said in a Carlsberg accent) to see white rhino. If you go to both Hlane Royal National Park and Mkhaya Game Reserve, and you don't see rhino, you will probably have had your eyes closed for the duration!

"Swaziland is a safe place to travelling, whether it be with family or as a self drive. But if you really want to have that personalised up close experience, then I would recommend going with a reputable and knowledgeable tour operator. And of course that is with me."

I found the days challenging, but I love a challenge, and I hope that I have made a few more people interested in Swaziland. And of course that they would use Sense Africa to organise their holiday for them.

Fingers crossed.