Dispatch Africa 2012:

Well, we went from stranded on the roadside and overnight in a dumpy hostel to living the high life at Trophy Game Safaris hunting ranch outside Polokwane, where the wild game gourmet food is fabulous and the African plains vistas, dotted with gigantic termite mounds and leggy acacia trees, are breathtaking.  Our hosts are the proprietors, Tino and Amanda Erastus; a lovely couple managing 4,000 acres loaded with wild game including cape buffaloes, impalas, monkeys, ostriches, giraffes, wart hogs, jackals, several other critters which I won’t try to spell, the occasional cheetah, and the odd cobra or puff adder.  It really is something to behold.  Words fail to describe it; pictures can do it no justice.  It must be experienced – the light cool breeze on your face, the warm sunny sky, the animals darting to and fro, or staring suspiciously, the smells of the savannah, the happy faces of the locals who work the ranch, and the sounds of strangely familiar yet incomprehensible languages.

Stuart and I had a blast as we blasted upland game from the back of a speeding hunt truck, guided by Tino and his able assistant, Annes (“on us”). The hunting is brisk, but challenging. We are shooting from the back of a moving truck and only using a dog, a large lunking female Rhodesian Ridgeback named Sasha, to help locate the dead birds.  We picked up 7 birds in the morning hunt before returning to the lodge for a brilliant brunch, meticulously prepared by Miss Amanda and her crack kitchen staff of local African women.  We hope to add significantly to the bird count in the afternoon hunt. In the meantime, enjoy the picture.  More of our exploits later.  Ministry is heck.

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