A Second Trip Into The Bush

Our dining companions each night at camp.
I always tried to get a seat at the table with my
back to our little animal friends.
With a little more imagination, I could write
one excellent Goosebumps book!

It is hard to believe that March is almost over! As I pulled up my blog this afternoon to update it I saw my last post was two months ago. I’ve got some catching up to do.

After our family (Jon, Jody, Jonathan) trip to Mauritius for Christmas, we all returned to our jobs and school, a little more tanned and a lot more relaxed. You may remember last year's post about my middle school's trip to the bush for a 3-night team building adventure. We went again this year to the same camp, which the kids really enjoyed last year.  However, last year we went in March with just 27 students and 3 teachers. This year we went in February with 42 students and 6 teachers.  I mention the months because last year we were entering the fall season – very warm days but cool nights.  This year we went a month earlier and it was unbearably hot.

The bush is dotted with acacia trees which, while not big, offer the only shade on the veld. We would take turns huddling together under their small canopy waiting for instructions for the next activity, hoping to get just a moment to cool off. The photo at the top is exactly the landscape, not only at the camp but all over northern South Africa. This led to time spent with the first aid kit, cleaning scratches and punctures, as acacia trees are also covered in giant thorns.  Also because of the heat, we spent more time at the dammed pond using the zip-line and the rope swing, which the students absolutely loved.  But this resulted in slipping and falling, leech removal, an injured shoulder and on our last full day there, a trip into the closest town (45 minutes away) for a student who received seven stitches in the bottom of a foot. 

One of the workers at the camp loaded my student in the back seat of his car and drove us to, literally, the town doctor.  The doctor was a gray-haired Afrikaner who was so wonderful with Francesco.  When Francesco asked the doctor if he had done stitches before, he chuckled and reminded us that he was a country doctor in a farming community and had sewn up lots of people over the years.  Francesco was worried he would have to go home that day. He didn’t want to leave early because that night, our last night at camp, we were actually sleeping out in the bush.  Earlier in our trip our instructor Dirk had told us all to be very careful walking off the paths because of snakes and animals lurking in the bush.  He especially warned all of us to watch out for the Black Mamba, the most venomous snake in Africa.  Dirk’s advice if any of us got bit out there? “Drag yourself under the closest acacia tree, settle in the shade, light a cigarette, and enjoy the last ten minutes of your life.” One of my students actually asked Dirk, “what if you don’t smoke?” Dirk rolled his eyes and muttered something in Afrikans. Your guess is as good as mine as to what he said. But I bet we could all figure it out.

 After my return from the doctor, Dirk found me to tell me that a black mamba had been sighted by another instructor earlier that day, right in the area where we had planned to camp out. He felt we should not camp outside that night just to be safe.  The kids whined a bit. The adults were just fine with it. Instead, we did a night walk. The students were divided into small groups and set off on a very dark trail, no torches (flashlights) allowed. The teachers are bigger kids than the kids much of the time so you can probably guess that we hid just off the trail, scaring the kids as they each passed by us.  Each student fell into a category: the runner, the screamer, the statue, the disbeliever. 

We made it home the next day where Francesco debuted his badge of courage in the form of seven stitches, to all the younger students. And I went home and took a nap.