North camp

Two days, 11 volunteers, half a tank of water

We left for north camp with G on Tuesday morning looking forward to being some of the first to stay there. As soon as we got there we began to get settled in I took a group off to collect firewood whilst Alex organised the unpacking of supplies, quickly finding out we were quite under-supplied with no fruit, no rusks and only one pot. However we did not let this lower our spirits and carried on to get settled in. G then went off to turn on the pump as the water tower was only half full from the previous group at north camp. However due to a faulty control box we were unable to get the pump to start, so G contacted Mieke and organised for her to bring another control box while taking the other group on long-loop. While we were waiting for Mieke, G took us on a recce of the surrounding area and then on to the Bushmen paintings and hollow rock whilst we were up there Mieke arrived with the other group and another control panel (which incidentally didn’t work either) so she brought the other group of volunteers up to see the painting. After the other group had gone we headed back to camp to eat. That night some of us stayed up late to listen for leopard or hyena, but not hearing anything, we had a short discussion on the meaning of life, and went to bed. The next morning, it being mine and Ben’s last day on Legodimo, we got up early to watch the sun rise, it was beautiful. After breakfast we heard kudu distress calls not too far away so, guessing it was a leopard we headed towards them, it was not long before we came across tracks so fresh they were still warm heading along the river. We headed trough the bush to get to where the riverbed flows to however when we got there we found that we had missed the leopard by what must have been barely a few minutes. After that it was still only eight so we headed to Kolobe dam, a watering hole where we had to move a large pile of clay, a hard task when you have no tools and no gloves, so we formed a chain-gang and proceeded to move the larger blocks after the majority had been moved Ben and G had a rematch of bok drol spug, a game which involves spitting antelope faeces which G won this time with the help of a strong gust of wind. After this we went back to camp where everyone caught up on a few hours sleep, then when everyone had woken up we started cooking lunch, which Mieke joined us for before taking us back to base camp.

Despite some difficulties north camp was great, thank you everyone for an amazing time.