My first blog - wow

Have heard about blogs for some time and have thought of starting one, but have been a bit reluctant to have one that can be read by the whole world. I am inclined to take everyone at face value, because I just cannot see any point in telling lies or pretending to be something. Now I finally have the opportunity to say what is on my mind.

I think I should start off by telling you about the country where I live. The Republic of South Africa is situated at the bottom tip of Africa and is stunninly beautiful in its diversity of landscape, seascape and conglomoration of cultures. We have 11 official languages, English, Afrikaans (a derivative of Dutch, French, German, Malay and a few other bits and pieces thrown in - it is a lovely, earthy, expressive language) mainly spoken by a group of whites and "coloureds" a mixture of white/black/malay/bushmen (please forgive me if I use any terminology which is offensive to anyone, we are not yet quite so politically correct in S.A.!), Xhosa, Zulu, Sotho and another 6 black African languages. The "most official" language is English.

Port Elizabeth is in the Eastern Cape which is the largest Province of South Africa. It lies sort of half-way at the bottom of Africa. If I stand on the beach and look out to sea, the next land is the South Pole. The climate is relatively mild, although the climate change has affected us all. The temperature at night in winter, can drop down to 6 degrees C, but that happens only a few times a year. This last winter has been one of the coldest we have had. Then during the day, in winter, the temperature can go up to as much as 24 degrees or on "bergwind" days up to 28 or 30 degrees. We have sometimes glimpsed a bit of frost on the lawn or on the windscreen, but that dissipates within half an hour. In summer we have recorded temperatures as high as 43 degrees C but usually it does not go up higher than 30 odd. We are much tougher than Europeans or Americans who come from first world countries because we do not (or very few people) central heating or air-conditioners. Our houses do not have double glazing and doors usually have gaps at the bottom, for air circulation? My house is very open plan, so there is no way I can effectively heat it in winter, so last winter when it was quite cold - I measured 10 degrees C inside the house - I just wore 2 pairs of long pants, two pairs of socks and about four of five tops and sweaters layered over one another! It feels a bit bulky and clumsy, but the cold only lasts for a few weeks, so it is bearable.

Port Elizabeth has miles and miles of beaches which are relatively unspoilt and one can walk and not see another person. Unfortunately it is not quite as safe anymore to walk around alone as it was in the past. A good idea to have a few dogs to take for a walk for company. We still have miles of coastline where there is no house in sight. A few years ago I went away for a weekend with a girlfriend and we sometimes drove for an hour without seeing another car on the road.

On our periphery we have a number of game parks and nature reserves. One of the most famous is Shamwari which has already been visited by the likes of Tiger Woods and John Travolta and other international "high society". They have the big five and it is very plush and for us, exhorbitantly expensive. Close by is the Addo Elephant Park. Around Addo is our citrus-growing area and there was a herd of indigenous African elephant who loved to visit the orange groves when the oranges were ripe and gorge themselves on the fruit. This annoyed the farmers, so they started shooting them. Some enterprising and caring people (don't ask me for name, I would have to check up on all that!) decided that this was not on and started the Addo Elephant Park where the elephant were fed on oranges to keep them out of the groves. Over the years, this has been expanded and enlarged and is now a huge conservation area with all kinds of buck, buffalo, hippos, rhinos, giraffe and a few years ago lions were re-intoduced. The elephant herd has grown enourmously and it is so super to watch them at the waterhole. The park has chalets where one can stay and is booked out for years ahead of time.

We have a snake park and a dolphinarium (the dolphins left there have all been bred in captivity, they are no longer allowed to catch wild dolphins), the usual museum and art galleries.

Port Elizabeth is one of the fastest growing cities in South Africa. I am not sure if I like all the progress. To travel to a certain area in town used to take 10 minutes and in peak traffic it now takes nearly an hour. Progress? I somehow don't think so!

I live just on the edge of town on a 1.8 ha property which we call a "smallholding". I have lived here for over 30 years. It is all somewhat wild because it is quite costly to keep it all neat and trim, but the first thig I did when we moved here was to plant trees. There is a great deal of underground water, a river actually, so once the trees have grown large enough, they just keep going. The trees attract a lot of different types of birds and at the moment, as here it is late spring/early summer, they are all nesting and producing young, which is super.

The lady on the property opposite me runs a small riding school. I must share one of my favourite stories. From my bed, I can watch the horsed cavorting in the field. Carol has a beautiful silver Apaloosa gelding called Nomad. He used to be the main stud in South Africa and when he turned sixteen he was gelded and is now used for show jumping. He is an extremely intelligent horse and when the sun shines on his hide he gleams silver. He is really absolutely beautiful. I woke up early one morning, opened my curtains and sat in bed reading. I heard a noise and saw two cars riding down the road, virtually on top of one another and behind them trotted lonely black man. I then realised that a road race was in progress and these were the front cars. I lay comfortably in bed and watched all these "crazy" people running down the road. At the back came the "social" runners. You know, the whole crowd who run together, chat, drink water, there are usually one or two running backwards so they can chat better, and they laugh and joke and have an absolute ball. Nomad was watching the runners too. He stood stock still, head erect, intensly watching the goings on. Once the last one had disappeared down the road, he shook his head in disbelief, turned his back and carried on grazing. It was absolutely sublime. I could read his mind were he was saying, "Are these two legged beings crazy or not?"

That's enough for now.

Have a great weekend

This is the Jacaranda tree in my back garden. It is covered with lilac flowers.