Matt Snider - Letters from South Africa - Part IV

Part I - Part II - Part III - Part IV - Part V - Home

Hello one and all!

Sorry it's been so long since you've heard from me. No, I was not kidnapped by a bush tribe recently discovered by National Geographic, but life has just been a little hectic. I moved back down to my first research base at Karongwe Game Reserve near Hoedspruit, South Africa where I will be the new Research Intern. It has been a little surreal returning to the place it all started, especially since all my pals who I have lived with continuously for the past two and a half months are conspicuously absent. I can honestly say I miss being stepped on by the overexcited Mexican every morning and being woken up by shouted recipe tips when the Brit in the next bunk is dreaming about cooking (hint for Americans: never make fun of tea and crumpets to a Brit, apparently they are a real thing...) The Karongwe base which normally housed eighteen volunteers and seven staff is now on ‘shut down' meaning that staff rotate having time off and there are no volunteers. The only people left at base are the other intern, who is going to be working in the mountains, one staff member at a time, and myself. It has taken some getting used to but the shut down has been nice too. I have gotten to know my fellow intern really well as we only have each other to talk to. She's a lovely, excitable Kiwi named Nicola who was on the expedition that went to the same research bases as me but in the opposite order. We were never in the same place at the same time, however, we did meet each other in the airport some twelve weeks ago and as fate would have it, when we were there we talked to each other the most before being split into opposite groups. We pretty much picked up where we left off which has been great. I know a bunch of you are thinking "ooooh, Matt's living with a 'lovely' Kiwi girl..." and before you start reading between the lines you can forget it. That would be bad business if things went south, and living with a girl if she hates you could lead to a snake in your sleeping bag, or worse, she could drink all your hot chocolate.

Shut down itself has proven to be a good time. The animals have been out in force and our sightings have been spectacular. The third day we were back at Karongwe we saw the three adolescent Lions messing with the resident big male Rhino, Lucky. They had surrounded him as he was wallowing in a mud hole and as one would he was a little agitated that these three punks had interrupted his bath. He got all in a ruffle and ran off. The adolescent lioness even chased him for about 100 yards after the two males decided ‘stuff it, I'm too lazy for this' and stopped. It was kind of absurd watching a two hundred pound lioness chasing a seven thousand pound Rhino. It was like watching the middle school bullies mess around with a college football player. Eventually Lucky thought about it too. He promptly stopped and swung around, horn down as the lioness came skidding to a stop in front of him. Thinking better than to continue the game she scampered into the shrubs. Lucky, now with a little strut, sauntered off but not before peeing in the lion's direction, just to show a little class.

A few days later we were following a mother Cheetah and her full grown male cubs on foot and we had the luck of watching them go down and drink from one of the waterholes. It was like a page out of National Geographic as they elegantly leaned down and lapped up the water. Cheetahs usually are infrequent visitors to waterholes because they tend to be Leopard territory and the mother was constantly vigilant throughout the entire event. Thinking we had reached the end of our luck with drinking felines, we were awe-struck when we were stopped in a shallow river crossing trying to get signal for the pride of lions when the matriarch came walking out of the reeds. She walked up the river for twenty yards and called all the teenagers (the same ones who had chased Lucky the Rhino) who promptly came running to meet her. They all just casually walked over and drank less than ten yards in front of us. It was awesome.

It hasn't been a complete breeze though because we have met a few challenges. For four days we had to push-start our only truck (the other two are in for servicing) on every start because our starter was busted. That was interesting, pushing our truck past all the tour trucks with conversations like "Nope, this is how you're supposed to use trucks... yup we're sure" and "What do you mean you ride in the truck? Haven't you seen Flintstones?!?!" All the while we could practically see the Elephants guffawing at us. The weather is starting to heat up a bit too. A day or two ago one of the African guys said "Well, it's starting to feel a little bit like spring." It was 92 degrees out. The coming months should be interesting.

I hope all of you are doing fantastically. Send me some e-mails to let me know how life is going. I can't guarantee fast replies because internet is slow at best and dodgy the majority of the time but I will get back to you. Until then, take care!

-Matt
P.S. I'm going to send out an e-mail with a few work pictures because I don't know how long it will be before I can post them online.