South Africa is a diverse country.
Here are some images of what I have seen over the last two weeks
Field of Red-hot Pokers in Southern Drakensberg
At the same time, I have explored rock pools, spoken to a certified healer, visited two “big trees”, (yellowwoods, aged somewhere between 600 and 2000 years old, depending on what you’re reading) and been told I was under arrest, (minor problem with a visa).
Learnt about the language of the Xhosa, which has three click sounds:
Ch or S, which sounds like our tsk of disapproval
X, which is a bit more like the sound you make when pretending to be a horse trotting
Q, which is an explosive sound, rather like when a bubble gum bubble breaks.
I saw the endangered Samango monkeys at Hogsback, which claims to be the inspiration for Mirkwood in
Lord of the Rings.
I have a picture of “the worlds rarest plant”- Woods Cycad in Durban Botanic Gardens.
Finally, a little curiosity. While I was being shown round the forest and coast near Knysna by my English guide, Jay, we started talking about those coincidences and serendipity in life that take on a certain significance. I told him about Carl Jung’s theory of the Collective Unconscious and Synchronicity, which he was not familiar with. That afternoon I arrived at Wild Spirit Lodge in The Crags. After I dropped my bag in the dorm, I sat down at the main refectory table on the veranda and on it was Jung’s “Modern Man in Search of a Soul”. I smiled to myself and asked who was reading it, but no-one knew how it got there,
Next stop, Nepal!