Last night I got carried away reading and playing tile rummy so ended up only going to bed well after 11. I woke up at 5, dozed a bit but at 6:20 I was over the pretend sleep so I got up to make coffee. I had this perfect morning planned: coffee and email followed by core exercises and maybe a bit of extra exercise and then reading on the deck. All before the other 3 woke up. Haha! The one who had partied the hardest woke up before 7!!!! At least I got through the coffee and emails part... Mom was the last to wake up and we all ended up in her room with our coffee. I ducked fairly quickly to continue my planned morning and managed to get half way through my core exercises before I heard "where is Di?". I quickly finished and got busy with getting ready for the day.
I know not everyone is brave enough for our outside shower, but personally that is my daily treat here. There is something so awesome about it.
Anyway, after getting decent for the day, I settled down to a very important task: tile rummy. I am becoming more of an addict than I was all thanks to one of mom's sisters who showed mom and I the iPad app.
Once everyone was ready, it started raining so we had to wait until the irritating light drizzle stopped before I could bring the Landie around and we could head out. Part of everyone's getting ready was the one friend who is a hairdresser giving the other a quick trim - first time ever we have had salon services here!! The drive itself was fairly quiet. We did the river road on both sides of the river then went to try look at a view point but it was overgrown so we found another spot and had a drink (I really need to attach a wine bottle opener to the keys). We then meandered home.
The drive home ended up having some entertainment. At one of the dams we came across 2 elephants. The one kept trying to chase a Black Stork away but he bird kept coming back. Elephant charges, stork backs off, elephant stops, stork comes back.... Eventually the elephant moved off and his friend was left to defend the dam. This guy also tried to chase the stork but this stork was clearly over these 2 and started moving towards the elephant. The poor lumpy got a bit nervous and it looked like he was trying to hide in the bush!!
For lunch, one of moms friends made us a steak starter that was yum!! It's called "mashonshan" (spelling??) which is apparently Sotho or something for "picking". It's basically a rump steak that is scored into cubes without going all the way through. You then rub chilli and garlic salt and the. Just seal the outside on a hot fire the cut it up and serve as a starter. We didn't have chilli or garlic salt so she used my homemade sauce which I think is mild with some mixed salt. It was super yum!!! Only thing I would do differently is use a hotter chilli sauce (normally mine is a lot hotter but that was a bad batch that was too mild). Half of us found it mild, the other half found it a tad hot.
After he starter I made us a quick braai and we had a late but yum lunch which was followed by a siesta. I opted for some tile rummy followed by reading and watching game.
5pm came and only one of the others was awake so I grabbed mom's infamous mask which I had brought with the intention of giving my brother a fright. I then went to her room and told her it was time to go for a drive. I then put the mask on and walked into her room. She got a tiny fright.
Our drive was quiet. We had hoped to see hyaena, leopard or something but only saw general game, elephant and jackal. At Hide Dam we came across 2 hippo which were out and we had to wait quite some time before they moved out of the road. We then slowly headed home. As we were going down this one steep, concreted road we were all talking a bout what we would do if we came across an elephant on this road. This has always been something I have been nervous of and considering one elephant was near there when we headed out, I knew he was somewhere close so I knew the odds were good it could happen. As I saw the end of the concrete I felt relieved that it was not there. But then, I heard someone say "elephant", then a trumpet that was so loud I knew it was right by us! I did not know if it was just a trumpet or a charge cause no one was talking, so I accelerated and got over he next 2 bumps so fast that I know that had my brother been on the landie, I would have been told my fortune in 20 different choice words!! As I accelerated we all packed out laughing at the humor of it all - we had just been talking about finding an elephant on that road!! I turned the next corner and stopped cause someone had wine on them. Turns out that she had been taking a sip of her drink when the elephant trumpeted and she got a fright which resulted in her having red wine all over her face! As I pulled out my phone to take a photo, I was asked by someone to please go as we needed to get home. I obliged and we made it home safely.
Dinner was a simple meal of cheese and biscuits which we enjoyed whilst watching the genet below the house.
I cannot believe tomorrow is our last day here. It really has been a special trip and although it took a while for my body to wind down, I am finally relaxed.
Tomorrow we have some packing up admin as well as some serious lion finding that we have to do. Until then, I am off to dream of elephants....
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