Easter weekend has been and gone. It was a success with us having 14 houses occupied. According to the fisherman, the fishing was good and many were caught, BUT, when we went to retrieve the fishing forms from the gate, we only found one!
Please, folks, fill in the forms and return them to the gate when you leave. It is very important for our records and the management of the hatchery.
At Rob Verseput's suggestion, we offered a Brewery Hike. This old Finsbury tradition starts off at Lone Tree Cottage on the Kliprots and traverses the mountain grasslands until the Hops Hollow Brewery on the Long Tom Pass road from Lydenburg to Sabie. With a duration of over five hours and a distance of fifteen kilometers, we were surprised that eighteen people arrived at the meeting point on Saturday morning to embark on the hike, and EVEN MORE SURPRISED that the youngest in the group was seven years old and the oldest was seventy six years old
We got to see Grey Duiker, Mountain Reedbuck, Grey Rhebok, a Berg Adder, many flowers, beautiful scenery and, at the end, some fat, healthy COWS!
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| Hiking straight up from Lone Tree Cottage, the hardest part. |
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| Resting after the first hurdle. Check the beautiful clouds in the backround... |
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| Mmmm. Those clouds kept getting less beautiful and a lot closer... |
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| We were gaining good altitude by this time. |
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| Don, the new manager, admiring one of the massive Escarpment Tree Ferns, Cyathea dregei, at our first water stop at Tree Fern Crossing. |
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| Eighteen people is a lot of people. Stretched out for long. |
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| We had to concentrate not to lose anyone as the clouds just got thicker! |
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| Some really healthy looking cows just before the brewery. |
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| A welcome sight, our destination, Hops Hollow! |
As you can see, the weather was not all blue skies and sun! In fact we had a total of 31mm over the weekend and, as you can expect, it was rather chilly at times. But it sure seems that fun was had by all! Below is a gallery of some other interesting things...
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| The extremely abundant fruits of the Quilted Blue Bush. You must try them, they taste great! |
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| Even though it was rather cold, we still encountered this Berg Adder on our hike. |
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| A late blooming Ecklon's Gladiolus. |
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| A sloughing Transvaal Dwarf Chameleon found at the brewery. |
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| The tasty fruit of the Climbing Num Num, found in the afro-temperate forests. |
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| A Mason Wasp resting on the flowers of a Wild Raspberry, Rubus rigidula. |
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| I managed to get within a foot of this huge male Porcupine! |
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| A colourful caterpillar resembling a Mopane Worm found right beside the office. |
There is still one more long weekend left this month, at the end of the month, and we hope to have another entertaining weekend. Hope to see you here!!!
