Last week was pretty similar to the week before; tests and lectures on Monday and Tuesday, then game drives from Wednesday onwards, which were really good last week. The lectures were pretty good too; weʼre getting towards the end of the theory side of things so only a few little modules left to mop up random stuff like Weather and Climate, or Historical Human Habitation. But yeah it means the lectures arenʼt too long and are sort of little snippets of interesting things. Well actually Biomes is kind of shit; having to learn about the 9 major biological zones of South Africa, characterised by their plant life and determined by climate and altitude… Yeah not really thrilling. Itʼs a sodding big chapter in our workbook and you never know what you might be asked, could be the average annual rainfall in the Nama Karoo, or two amphibians you would find in the Grassland biome, or maybe the range of altitudes in the Savanna biome. So yeah you kind of have to learn everything about everything then only be asked about 2 questions about it. Gerhard, our trainer, told us that we didnʼt need to learn everything, just 2 examples of species in each category (mammals, reptiles, amphibians, insects, birds, plants) in each biome. Not sure he did the math before he said that because thatʼs 108 examples! So pretty sure I did shit in that exam this morning. Think the others were OK though, but weʼll see. I did well on last weekʼs exams though 97% in amphibians, 99% in reptiles and 100% in fish :)

Itʼs been so nice seeing everyone else do their seconds drives; everyone has been so much more confident and relaxed and it shows so clearly in how good the drive is and how they present themselves. From last week the trainers have mixed us "round " bit so that for our second drives we are swapping groups, so being guide for people we havenʼt driven with before. It makes it seem a bit more like it would with guests, even though obviously we still know them well, but itʼs just some new faces and, while theyʼve probably all heard your information before, you know they havenʼt heard it from you yet! Itʼs been quite interesting being guided by the other group too. We all know the styles and interests of the other 8 people in our group, so could predict what they might stop at and what they might say, but itʼs really fun with new guides because they stop at different things and tell different stories. Itʼs also so cool seeing everyone develop their own guiding styles; some people are more fact-based, while others tell more stories and relate things from personal experience. With a couple more drives each before actual assessment I already think everyone Iʼve seen will pass which is an awesome place to be in at this stage.

Gabe did his drive for our group on Thursday and it was awesome. He did the same route that I want to do for my assessment which Iʼm definitely not bitter about… Nah itʼs fine as long as weʼre not scheduled for our assessment drives at the same time! But it was good to be able to do my intended route as a passenger and see more clearly what I might want to stop at, without also worrying about driving and guiding. It was honestly a really cool drive, we saw so much and he was so incredible as a guide; so confident, telling stories and giving really good information. Doing this course Iʼve really come to appreciate the smaller things you might otherwise overlook on a safari, and which I think most guides in the industry do neglect, but which really make it awesome for me. We saw loads of impala, giraffe, zebra etc as usual, and also waterbuck, 3 hyena and nyala, and heard lions roaring, but still, the small stuff was cooler.

There was elephant dung where you could see where termites had created their little tunnels through it to protect themselves from the sun while harvesting the undigested wood from the elephant dung. Then just behind it there was a perfect dung ball which had been made and rolled around, compacted hard and coated in a layer of mud, but the dung beetle responsible was nowhere to be seen, possibly having been eaten while trying to take his dung ball off somewhere to bury it. There was a small thorny tree that had been knocked over by a giraffe that had walked over it, trying to scratch itʼs tummy, maybe to remove ticks or mites or maybe just to have a scratch.

On our drinks stop we found the hole of a baboon spider, huge hairy tarantula-looking spiders which, despite their size, can be bloody quick, trust me! We found an old platform nest of a dove in a tree, and half a broken egg shell on the ground underneath it, plus the cocoon of a moth in the tree. Probably the coolest thing was in the dung midden of some impala and wildebeest. This is a sort of communal toilet area for antelope where they all tend to defecate and is clearly a haven for dung beetles; we found evidence of the three different kinds of dung beetle behaviour. Some dung beetles, the “Rollers”, as mentioned, pack dung into balls and roll them away to lay their eggs in and bury elsewhere and we saw where dung had been removed and a circle depression in the ground where the ball had been made round. Other dung beetles, the “Dwellers” live in the dung, and we saw their tunnels into the dung where they live and lay their eggs. The last group of dung beetles, the “Tunnellers” actually dig tunnels underneath the dung pile and push the dung balls into it, and this we actually got to see! There was a dung beetle who had dug his hole under the pile and was in the process of collecting little pellets to provision his tunnel and my god it was hilarious to see. I know theyʼre not known as the most graceful of animals anyway but the hilarious inelegance of watching him chuck himself backwards into his hole was brilliant. He would disappear into his hole and come back out shovelling some earth out with his face, then go up and grab a little dung pellet and just fall backwards into the hole. But to be fair to him Iʼm sure he knows more about burying dung and the efficiency thereof than I do!

All the other drives have been good too and Iʼm actually getting into birds! For the first few months Iʼve hated them because Iʼve struggled to get good at identifying them, both by appearance and song, and I donʼt like things that Iʼm not good at! But I think Iʼm finally getting it whoop whoop! Last week our new trainer, Ed, gave us a couple of intro to bird ID lectures which were just about practising using our books to ID birds we see, and getting to the stage where at least we learn the families of the birds so we can look up the exact species easier. I was also getting there by myself just from this last few months of learning, but the extra sessions really did help and also helped my confidence which is possibly the main thing for me. But yeah on the last few drives there have been quite a few birds that Iʼve IDʼd correctly myself and once you start doing that it becomes more fun! I still donʼt think Iʼm ever going to be a birder but at least I donʼt hate them anymore.

Because I loved seeing more of the small things on Gabeʼs drive, I spent a few evenings last week doing some research for myself on things like spider hunting wasps, termites, spiders etc because we see them a fair amount but I donʼt really know that much about them. Turns out thatʼs because there isnʼt much known about them! But I still find it really interesting, so on Saturday while everyone else was spending money in town, Gabe and I went for a walk around the property here to look for the little things like spiders and birds nests and stuff, which was really fun. Turning over rocks and logs turns up quite a few baboon spiders, beetles and centipedes, looking in the trees gets you golden orb web spiders and birds nests, and looking in the grass gets you shiny caterpillars and little grass leaves that have been wrapped up with silk by unknown spiders or caterpillars. Once you start looking for it all you see so much it really is mind-boggling how much we just drive past on a normal drive without ever realising it is there. Sadly the little things that we found the most of were pepper ticks, evil little fuckers smaller than a freckle that itch like fuck if youʼre bitten. Luckily I donʼt think we actually got bitten by any and itʼs our own fault for forgetting to put on bug spray! Got home and immediately boiled ourselves alive in hot showers to try and kill any of the little bastards that we might not have found, but that doesnʼt stop you itching just because your brain freaks itself out and tells you that youʼre probably itchy!

This week is going to be similar to last so hopefully weʼll have some more awesome drives. My third drive is on Wednesday afternoon then after that my next will be my mock drive, eek! Weʼve also got astronomy this week, which means some early mornings and late evenings so will be a busy one.