We left Germany 12th August for Johannesburg and arrived at SABI RIVER RESORT the next day.
There we met up with only 10 members of my med school class and caught up on events and news.
My last meeting with the class was 2010 in Auckland. We spent 4 nights at the resort and took lovely walks on the property, including watching the hippos crossing the golf course in the twilight. We heard the amazing story of Elayne´s brother who lost a leg to a crocodile in the Sabi river, and almost lost his life.
Graham Chadd's sister Anthea and husband Mark providedthe group with the chance to take a helicopter ride over the Drakensburg mountains. What a splendid outing!
Michael and I visited the Elephant Whisperers close to Hazy View and learnt lots about elephants. It was a very special experience.
The whole group took an outing to Kruger National Park (at 6 a.m. !!) on our last day to-gether.
It was very special, and of course one wonders how many of us will be around to join the next reunion in Bermuda.
After the reunion we carried on to Kruger National Park but actually stayed at a private game park bordering on Kruger National, called Shindzela. That actually means honey badger in the local language.
We flew home on 20th August.
Our class finished Med School in 1977 and since our first reunion in 2007 8 which I organized) we have been organizing reunions and treasuring the experience.
In the first photo, Liz Arnold is posing next to the sign warning us about crocodiles, hippos and bilharzia. Having all grown up in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) we all understood the dangers of all items on the sign!!
The second photo is Graham Chadd, Elayne Knottenbelt with her brother Peter (who lost his leg to a crocodile), Maureen Duffeld and Mat Arnold all playing bowles.
The next photo shows the hippos leaving the dam at night to graze on shore.
The next photo is still breakfast with Jane Hampton, Peter Knottenbelt, Mat Arnold sitting, Maureen Duffeld, Liz Arnold, Wade Hampton, Elayne Knottenbelt.
While the others of our reunion group played bowles or went shopping, Michael and I visited the elephants.
The elephants come from Zimbabwe, and so do their carers.
The carers change places every day so that no one elephant becomes so attached to one person that it will not allow another carer to take over.
The fascinating thing was to actually touch an elephant (an African elephants are supposed to be so wild that you cannot train them).
All these years I have only looked at them from a safe distance.
We were able to touch the elephants, feel the rough skin and the agile trunk, and look at their teeth. In the wild, they die when their teeth can no longer grind the foliage that they eat ( 70 kilos per day).
The tail whisps are hard, consisting of keratin (like nails) The elephants cool their bodies through the veins on the back of their ears.
The circumference of a foot is half the shoulder height (we measured!)
What great experiences and memories
We took a helicopter ride with Mike Pingo. He runs and owns Sunrise Aviation. His wife Anthea Pingo did all the organizing (Graham's sister). Mike took good care of us, showing us the majestic Drakensberg, which are all part of a geological range of mountains starting in Cape Town and going right up to north eat Africa.
Mike showed us the three sisters rock formation and lovely waterfalls.
All good things come to an end and so here are the photos
A photo of Elayne's head, Jane and Wade Hampton (they impressed me by running around bare foot)Mat Arnold and standing Barbie Jay (who organized everything)
The next photo is Peter Knottenbelt, Maureen, Sheryl Chad, Martin Hale, and still standing Barbie Jay next to Michael and Martin Hale.
The next photo is Mat Arnold presenting Barbie with a present from all of us. Then the photo of the last coffee before our farewells and separate trips.
After Sabi River Lodge, Graham, Chad and large family drove up to a tented camp outside Timbavati.
We drove in convoy until the gate where they turned off to the right, and we carried on. The others from the reunion mostly flew home to Johannesburg or Cape Town.
We drove through the Timbavati main gate and if you look at the map you can see it wasn't far to Shindzela tented camp, BUT we missed the tiny sign written on a boulder and landed up at Simbavati River Lodge. So our drive took 4 hours!
However, we were in time to join the evening game drive at Shindzela. Did you know that lions are scared of elephants!
I had to photograph the African sunsets a lot and feel the hiraeth that it caused. The rhinos were a special impressive treat and our leopard looked very photogenic.
I took photos of the lovely camp ,perfectly cared for.