I'm super behind on blogs so maybe I'll try and do this from a couple of weeks ago then a separate one for trails? Or maybe squish them both in one blog because let's be honest I've probably forgotten what happened a couple of weeks ago... we'll just have to see how this goes!

Have I even talked about off week? We came home for off week in May which was lovely. By that point we had both done and passed our FGASA Field Guide exam and practical assessment, and our ARH assessments so were qualified field guides and could relax on holiday! Sure, we did technically still have an exam left and sure, we should probably have done some work but yeah, we just didn't. So nice to come home and see family and friends and my dog! Originally mum and dad were thinking about coming out to SA but a) they can't afford it, b) it's a bit too long of a flight for my grandad so wouldn't have been able to see him and c) they don't sell plane tickets to deerhounds so the dog wouldn't have been able to come either... it's a long ass flight home but I'm so glad we went, otherwise wouldn't have seen anyone until December. Bit of an overwhelming first day in the UK for Gabe; arrived in at 6.30am on the Sunday then had 14 family round for lunch! It was a perfect day though, beautiful May weather and it was awesome to be able to have some of Gabe's family over as well. Completely crashed at about 5pm though. Basically the whole week was great, just so nice to be home, the weather behaved itself and got to see James's new flat. Just an extra few days would have been perfect!

The week after we got back we were carrying on with bush walks, during which I still had no sightings! And we had the company marketing manager on campus so look out for a horrible cheesy video of me potentially coming out. On the Friday we had our trails exam, which is basically the theory exam for if you want to take guests out on foot rather than in a vehicle, and that all went well! Friday evening was our "Prize Giving" ceremony which was pretty much just an excuse to get drunk without having to feel guilty for not revising the next day! It was such a fun evening, everyone got all dressed up, or at least as dressed up as we could be having lived in the bush in khakis for the last 5 months; I'm pretty sure I've forgotten how to look decent! We had a little certificate giving ceremony for our various Bushwise, Birding and Social Media certificates, and I somehow managed to win the prize for Best All Rounder! Then we did a lot of drinking and a lot of dancing and ate a lot of buffet food. Obviously I'll miss the other students but I'll also really miss the trainers. It's easy to keep in touch with your classmates but it feels a bit more awkward to keep in contact with trainers; it sort of feels like because you've had only them as trainers they're really important to you, but they've taught so many students that you're inevitably more forgettable! But no, we'll definitely keep in touch with them whether they want us to or not.

Luckily I wasn't too hungover the next day cos then we had to spend the weekend packing up all our shit that's been strewn around campus for the last 5 months: a hard drive in one person's room, a towel in the bathroom, a pair of knickers on the washing line... It's amazing how easily stuff spreads around the place. Slightly awkward to pack given that we had to pack all of our stuff, but also separately pack everything we might need for our 12 day Trails Course, and then within that stuff separately pack everything we needed for the 4-day primitive trails part of the course. And this then also removed 3 bags that we could otherwise have stuffed the rest of our crap into! I'm so grateful I brought back a suitcase from home because otherwise we'd have been packing bin bags. Even as it was most stuff was in a random ass selection of suitcases, cardboard boxes and carrier bags. On Monday evening we had a final all-over body scrub and hair wash, then Tuesday morning we all piled into the minivan and the land cruiser with all our various trails bags and rucksacks, and headed off for our 12-day adventure. But I'll write about that in another blog because you've probably all gotten bored and stopped reading by now anyway, I can't keep blabbering on, you'll just have to read the next one, lucky you!