So it's really getting serious now. We're really starting to realised how little time we have left 😬 we're only in our 3rd semester but actually we've only got a couple more weeks - two more practice drives each - before we start doing mock drives and then our final assessment... it wasn't like I was expecting this course to be easy, but I think the pace has caught me a bit by surprise. You sort of think "well the course is 6 months so I have 6 months to learn it all" but in reality, and kind of obviously in hindsight, you have to be fully prepared well before the actual 6 month end date!

Our last off week the other week was so nice and chilled, all us internationals passed our driving tests on Monday then we had the week to relax a bit and try and do a bit of work! On the Thursday we helped our neighbours dart and transport some nyala from their property to ours. Well, I say "helped".. we thought we were going there to be helpful but I think we sort of got in the way more than anything! But it was really cool to see, especially watching them be administered the reversal to the tranquilizer drug and seeing them wake up and totter off into the grass. We moved 4 females and a male but unfortunately one of the females has since died in childbirth. You can't help but wonder if the stress of the darting and the move contributed but I guess we'll never know :(

The third semester started with a nice round of 3 lectures; fish, amphibians and reptiles, then we were straight back in to full practice drives. When someone else is driving it's pretty relaxed, you just sit and get driven around and hear some info, a lot of which you already know! You still have to get up at 5am, but at least you're not the one who has to get up even earlier to prepare the vehicle and the food and drinks for the drive. I was a bit worried that these drives would be tedious because we'd all be regurgitating the same information as each other and we'd hear about the knob thorn 20 times this semester and, inevitably, there has been a bit of that. Obviously if you hear something on someone's else's drive, you're more likely to remember it on your own and so it's easy for stuff to get repeated and we just have to accept that. But luckily it's not been as bad as I thought- yeah, there's a bit of stuff being repeated but we all also have different interests and strengths, and so choose to stop at different things. At the end of the day we're all still learning so there's still a whole host of things we don't know perfectly or even know absolutely nothing about. The thing with field guiding is that you never stop learning!

Last Thursday afternoon I was the first one to do my second full drive. I was pretty nervous about it; on the first drive it's OK to not do too well because it's all still new and there's a million things to remember, but by the second time around you've seen what everyone else has done (both good and bad), you should know your route and have a pretty good grasp of everything you're talking about. Maybe it's just me putting undue pressure on myself but I felt like this was much more high stakes in a way, and I didn't want to fuck it up! Luckily my drive group is also awesome so I had no need to be nervous of shitty questions or awkward guests! I think it went pretty well, didn't see many animals but in a way that can almost be better for assessment purposes- hard to make sure you're talking enough about trees and geology to tick the box on the assessor's list if you have to talk about the animals you're seeing! Also far better to be able to do a full drive not seeing any animals; if you can make it interesting and fun just talking about birds and plants, then any drive where you do see animals is a bonus! I think my main problem is just confidence with what I'm saying. When I know that I'm right and that I have good and interesting information, then I'm happy and speak animatedly. When I'm a bit unsure of what I'm saying then it obviously comes across in how you're speaking and presenting yourself. I ended up asking more questions than I answered, but that's how you learn I guess. But at least I know that I can get there, and I know my next drive will be even better! I improved for sure, which is the main thing :)

 Photo by G Hall

Actually we did see a hyena near the end of the drive! Towards the end we go past a dam and I stopped to look at the beautiful colours of the sunset reflecting on the water, when the hyena came walking from the opposite side of the pool down to drink. It drank noisily for a bit then plonked itself down in the muddy shallows to cool down while the sun went down. We carried on watching and eventually it got up, walked towards us and looked like it might walk right past, when seemingly the noise of a camera on the vehicle made it start and it ran off back the way it came! Pretty cool sighting :)

The weekend was lovely. For G's birthday on Saturday 16 of us went up into the mountains to hike down to a beautiful set of pools and spend the day drinking and lounging around and jumping into the water from the rocks. It was such a lovely day, I think it may have helped that the morning was cloudy and looked like it was threatening to rain, which may have kept a lot of other hikers away as we didn't see too many people and we pretty much had the pool to ourselves all day. The hike down was absolutely beautiful and felt almost prehistoric. It was mostly down a river bed, clambering over huge tree roots and crossing the stream on slippery rocks and logs. The trees were gigantic and because it was shady in the canyon it was quite cool and humid, if it had been a bit muggier I swear we could have seen a dinosaur around any corner. Gabe and I went a bit later than the others and while we were mid way down, clambering over slippy boulders and roots, it started absolutely chucking it down! We sheltered in the side of the cliff and I climbed up a bit to sit in a little crevice to wait for it to stop raining. It probably only rained for like 5 minutes but we didn't realise it had stopped because the noise of the river sounded like rain! But I think the rain did the job of keeping other people away and then the sun came out for us all day, such a beautiful place!

Photo by Megan Smith 

On the way home we stopped at the top of a viewpoint to look over the canyon down to the Blyde Dam and past the Three Rondavels, such a stunning view but slightly worrying that there are absolutely no fences stopping you from dropping over the edge! It was such a nice day and so wonderful to get away from campus for a bit as a group. Sunday was just revision for Monday tests and then we're onto this week! Which maybe I'll get round to writing soon...