Week 9 at Ulovane (second last week)

No theory exams this week, but we're all pretty stressed about our first and second round mock practical drive assessments (with real guests) and one-on-one interviews afterwards with our facilitator - all in preparation of the final FGASA Level 1 exam next Friday. I had an amazing 2nd round practical drive with wonderful engaged guests who wanted to know everything and was so enthusiastic about the natural environment! I had such a great time showing them around - they wanted to climb out and touch and feel and discuss everything; and definitely want to come again next time there is an opportunity - all of which meant of course that I passed the practicals with flying colours - whooohoooooo! Such a relief! :)

 

 

I woke up this morning and my first thought was that next week this time I will be on a plane back to Jo'burg! I can't believe how quick the time has gone! I made up my mind then to make the absolute most of this last week - with the scary practicals out of the way, I feel a lot more relaxed and just want to soak up this gorgeous natural environment, experiences and most of all the wonderful people I have met over these last few weeks. I feel like I have gained a bush family and hope we will all keep in contact. And talking about family I had a call from my (real) mum this morning who landed in Jo'burg last night and which I'll join next week - very excited about seeing everyone again! I should probably just remember to also study for the final FGASA exams on Friday (which is really what all of this is about in the first place!). With a level 1 qualification, lots of opportunities will hopefully be available to me in the new year :)

 

 

Week 8 at Ulovane

Our last Ulovane exam on mammals, animal behaviour and ecology is moved to the Wednesday due to our 2 days away last week. The last few days before that is a bit of a rush unfortunately as we felt we would've liked a bit more time to learn and research the incredibly interesting information about mammals and how to interpret their behaviour - it's amazing how much more you see and understand now that we've learnt why for instance you always see oxpeckers sitting on zebras (see below) and also why elephants touch each other with their trunks in a "greeting ceremony" - very moving to see it and understand what they're doing :)

 

 

 

After the test we were all told to wear old clothes and sent down the road to the dam (on the farm). We were very apprehensive and were promptly told we had to put our full head and hair in a massive bucket with elephant dung mixed with water to "rid us of our civilionship"! We couldn't believe that they were actually serious and only when the first victim actually went through with it did it start to sink in...! I never thought I would do something like that until Guy said it's just cereal mixed with water and then I remembered that Ellie dung is literally just branches, leaves and grass so I went ahead and did it! We also had to do a territorial animal cry and paint our faces with mud - I know it's hard to imagine, but it was really fun in the end, a bit like being back in University ;o)

 

On Friday, I was in the very first one of 2 to do our mock practical drives (with real guests!). We emailed our guests a few days before the drive to finalise times, find out about things like medical conditions, allergies, time limits ect. and then 7am Friday morning 14 of them arrived! It was very nerve wrecking and everyone looked at us with nervous faces when we returned (as they knew they would have to do it soon!). In the end I actually really enjoyed being out there and telling all the guests about all the things that we've learned in the past 8 weeks. We were lucky to get a lovely sunshine day and everyone had so much fun just being out there. Afterwards I had a 3 hour interview to start preparing us for the final FGASA exam in 2 weeks - I can't believe that this will all be over in 2 weeks!! We are also starting to find out about volunteering opportunities, placements and follow-on courses to do next year. I am hoping to do the Marine Guiding course in July next year and before that some volunteering :)

 

Week 7 at Ulovane

After yet another 8am exam (on reptiles and birds) we start focussing on our practical drives this week. The first mock exam drives are in just over a week (starting with me!) and we all want to at least another 1 or 2 drives in with the students here before we have to do a "full guided experience" with the public and of course our assessors. In addition, this week we have the monster of theory week covering ecology, ethology (animal behaviour) and mammals which is huge! We have a wonderful informative drive with Schalk in the afternoon and are rewarded by seeing some wonderful mammals: 2 gemsbok and their baby, a rhino with her baby, a lioness and 2 elephants playing in the river (I was able to capture 5 minutes on video!)

 

 

By mid week people are feeling a little overwhelmed with all the work that has to be done before finals and we are surprised with a 2 day break in Port Alfred! In true Ulovane style we are given 30 mins to pack, bundled into a game viewer and after a few hectic minutes of push starting Heidi's car we are speeding down the highway with the wind blowing a gale through the open game viewer! We arrive safely (and partly frozen) in Port Alfred and settle into awesome beachfront cabanas before heading to the local pub/Italian/steakhouse for a few beers and some wood fired pizza - heavenly! Dessert of Dom Pedro's finish off the night and a bit more drinking and dancing on the sofas back home makes for a good night :) The rest of our time consists of lots of beach walking and 2 hours of glorious beach galloping at Beachcombers Horse trails with Johno - best horse riding I've ever done! We arrive back at camp armed with shopping bags full of goodies from Pick & Pay and we have to hunker down for 2 days of stormy weather, lots of practical driving sessions and lots & lots of very interesting information about animals and their behaviour!

 

 

Week 6 at Ulovane

We are allowed an 8am exam this morning - written as well as practical identification of grasses, trees and flowers. Afterwards a quick shower and then we get packing for our next sleep out on the Reserve. I'm driving us there and on the way we stumble across a gorgeous male lion (see picture below). We're camping at boat side and have to gather wood as we arrive that will last us the whole night - it's hot and humid work and we all go for a dip in the river afterwards. As we sit there a herd of elephants that we passed earlier starts wondering through our campsite one by one! Kyle (our instructor) handles them very well as they can be dangerous and destructive - they even shake the land rover at one stage and one of them grabs a blanket and throws it over his head and walks off! Very exciting and nerve-wrecking at the same time! We don't sleep very much during the night as it starts raining and we can still hear the elephants are close by. On our drive back we see "duggaboy" - the big old Cape Buffalo and then due to taking an alternative route to see him closer (I was able to take a video of him crossing the road), we unfortunately get stuck in the mud and "break" the landie (starter motor) - oops! (p.s. it wasn't me!)

 

This week we're doing reptiles and birds and have to also identify all the local birds by vision as well as sound. We do many wonderful birding drives and walks in addition to the hours of power point slides and on one of our walks Kyle's eagle eyes spot a Jackal buzzard nest (above) on a cliff side with one chick in it! Due to the fact that we can start identifying birds by their sound we are now able to see the smaller birds more easily and get much closer to them i.e. this greater double collared sunbird doing a mating display - see the little yellow feathers protruding out of it's neck!

Week five in Ulovane

Another 7am exam and we are ready to start the next week! This week is our biggest yet in terms of learning as we are covering trees, grasses and flowers including latin names, medicinal uses, traditional beliefs and animals associated with all of them. Very full-on and most of us feel completely overwhelmed especially with all the latin names and having to recognise all the trees in the area as well! On top of that one of our land rovers (Theodore) had broken down so we can't do too many game drives this week which is probably a good thing due to all the information we have to take in! In any case, mid week called for a sundowner so we all walked out to the remembrance garden with our beers and had a great sunset as a reward and a beautiful waxing crescent moon on the way back!

On Thursday we got the "reptiles and raptors" guy called Darren around for a full day on snakes, spiders, scorpions, owls and other raptor birds. Fascinating stuff, especially when he starts opening the boxes and those who dare can play around with them. We only play with the non-venomous ones i.e. milk snakes and garden snakes and some pythons, and he handled the bigger guns i.e. puffadder (picture below) and a beautiful and verrrrry aggressive cape cobra! After that we were all able to handle a gorgeous barn owl (picture below) and a majestic black eagle called Maggie. Fantastic day!

On Saturday 4 of us got told that we have been selected to guide some UK and SA kids that are visiting Amakhala Game Reserve through a local exchange program - great opportunity! Kerim and I made up one team and we had a fantastic morning walking for about 3 hours on Carnaervon Dale (part of the Reserve), chatting to teachers, kids and mums about the local animals and trees and birds. We got everyone involved in helping to ID a fork tailed bou bou, saw some giraffes, walked as close as probably 125 metres from an eland bull and watched a herd of black wildebeests and red hartebeests kick up dust over the plains. Now... back to those latin names ;)