South Africa Sojourn the battle of Isandlwana 21st Jan 2017

A standout and stand alone day. The 138 year anniversary of the battle (well actually minus one day as they weren't going to do it on a Sunday) and the great battle was to be re-enacted. For those of you who don't know this was a victory for the 20000 Zulu people who were armed with assegai and cow skin shields, great courage and strategic savvy against 2000 Martini-Henry breach loading rifle bearing British troops. Half the British army were lured away from the action and the result was Britain's most punishing defeat since the Napoleonic campaign. They lost over 1300 soldiers and a lot of pride. The Roukes Drift incident (film Zulu) happened later that day about 20kms away. Although that in itself was remarkable with 120+ men resisting 2000 Zulu and the awarding of 11 VCs we perhaps hear so much about it to cover up the bad news. The Roukes Drift defenders were predominantly Welsh.

The local people were walking in their hundreds from miles around to attend the event. Not only were they coming to see a victory but also to support their King.

The lad with the blue shirt on must have been given the wrong directions.

Everybody was, of course very welcoming and we managed to get in with the white dignitaries, so gained very close access to the action and an unfettered view of the royal party. We seemed to be about the only tourists in attendance.

Team photograph

As you can see everybody was friendly. The Zulu outfits were somewhat smarter than the British. A number were original uniforms with leopard skins and ostrich feathers and were prized items worth upto 50,000 Rand. 

I'm afraid the British uniforms looked rather tired and I have never seen a better imitation of the Dad's Army drill when they presented arms to the Royal Party. 

The end is nigh with the colours on the ground. 

The Royal party. At the lectern is one of the long line of speakers then the King's uncle next His Majesty followed by his four wives. 

King Goodwill Zwelethini kaBhekuzulu. He has 6 wives and 27 children and is also exactly a year older than me. 

And finally, who can tell me what brand of watch the King is wearing and the cost?? 

South Africa Sojourn before Kruger Park.

After checking in we headed out to visit Pretoria High School for Boys where Cameron was moulded into the man he is now. It is a prestigious building sitting in several acres of manicured parkland which is dedicated to providing the best sporting facilities that you can imagine. As it was a Friday afternoon the campus was well stocked with students. Whenever we passed any, there was an immediate "Sir, Ma'am". This is clearly the expectation and the greetings seemed to be genuine enough, but to be honest it came over to us as being a bit obsequious. There was both a pervading sense of discipline but equally a huge feeling of pride in the institution.

Any institution with ambition, values past achievements and the museum on the premises illustrates this fact well. We were shown round by the curator Keith Gibbs who gave us a comprehensive history of the school since its foundation in the very early 20 century. Sadly we heard that Keith Gibbs died from cancer almost exactly a year after our visit. The statue of the (naked)  pupil Danny Swart was originally carved in wood by a former Art teacher. A bronze copy now stands above the cupola.

The next day was Cameron's cricket match. A 40 over affair starting at 9-00 am, allowing the facilities to be used again in the afternoon. Cameron's game was one of eight matches involving old boys being played simultaneously. How many other schools around the world could muster 96 old boys to turn up on a Saturday morning from all over the world to play cricket? The standard was consistently high. In case you are wondering, our hero was only 99 off his century, undefeated. Sadly the overs ran out before his fireworks really got lit. His team got the silver. Meanwhile Cameron's brother Mike arrived to join our party. 

After the match Cameron and Mike headed off to collect the fifth member of our group, James. We decided to head into Pretoria to see the Union Buildings and the famous statue of Nelson Mandela. The statue was certainly impressive.

South African Sojourn Kruger Park introduction

We have been out of contact with the rest of the world since last Sunday 15th January. That in itself has been refreshing, but it has also added to the sensation of other worldliness that you feel inside the Kruger Park. This is nature "red in tooth and claw". It is nothing like a zoo or a safari park as you know them in the UK. You are in a place the size of Wales which is completely the animals kingdom. There are a few tarred roads, speed strictly limited to 50 kms/hours and mainly unpaved tracks max speed 40 kms though in practice you travel at 20 or less. We had a bush braai (barbecue) one night which requires an armed guard. You don't get out of your car. The rest camps, of which there are about 8 are surrounded by a high fence, the top third of which is electrified and the entrance gates have electric cattle grids. So when you look at the pictures, remember they could only be taken with the help of people with special skills of reading the bush and many years of experience. Thanks to Cameron, our friend, who helped plan the whole venture, his brother Mike who is a game warden in South Africa and James, Cameron's life long friend and ex-game warden, we had such people. Above all was their enthusiasm to scour the bush from 4-30am until 10.30pm. Some people would call this obsession, they would probably agree. We amassed an incredible total of 34 different large mammals. This included some of the rarest animals in Africa, eg black rhino, cheetah and wild dog. The photos are almost all taken by Helen as I was driving. What a great job she made of them. Our number and variety of game spotted is exceptional and surpassed any previous total logged by our guides.

Night spot of female leopard 

Don't mess with the buffalo 

White Rhino 

Eli

Male Lion 

Hippo 

Two male cheetahs guarding their kill 

Herbivores will graze together for protection 

Hyena with pup suckling 

Wild dogs which are very rare 

So that's your big 5, Lion, buffalo, rhino, leopard and elephant. This refers to the danger to the hunter when hunting and not the size or scarcity of the animals. Add to this list the cheetah and wild dog and you have the magnificent seven.  Just a few more animals for you. 

The right end of a crocodile 



The warthog 

Not a great photo I'm afraid but this chap was moving pretty quickly. This is the very rare Black Rhino 

A South African Sojourn and in search of Charlie's footsteps 12/13 and 15 Jan

For various reasons this first blog is late and therefore a bumper edition. Fatigue, a very full timetable and technical problems have all contributed to this delay. So here goes and see if I can catch up three days in one go. To get fully in the picture you should read the prequel, which has the same title and has been published under As I Like It for some time.
We started at noon on Thursday 12th Jan when Cameron arrived bright and breezey to drive us to Heathrow. Here we are with our driver turning photographer.

Plenty of winter woollies on,  we had just heard the news that told us that Artic weather conditions had resulted in the cancellation of a hundred flights out of Heathrow for that day. As we have not heard anything about our flight we set off. No problems going down except it starts to rain as we hit the M1 and it gets progressively hard the nearer we get to Heathrow.
Again no problems at check-in so maybe we really are going to be on our way. Due no doubt to the cancellations the airport is not busy and security checks a doddle. Have a look at some pictures from the gate, note the large live animal cage being loaded.

Although you can't see it here, it has now started snowing quite hard. We took our seats which were all bulkhead ones which gives you much more legroom but unfortunately Cameron's bulkhead was a different one to ours. The takeoff was delayed by an hour whist the plane was deiced. The journey passed without incident but sadly also without sleep. 

We dropped into J'burg at just after 8am to be greeted by about 25 degrees and not a flake of snow in site.

We picked up the hire cars and set out for Edward House in Pretoria. In the next picture you can see a good shot of my wing mirror, Cameron's Park Ranger bus and the open electric gate of Edward House. 

We were the only guests because a water leak had prevented bookings being accepted until the problem is resolved. This place has superb ratings and you can see why. The property is a large colonial style house built in the 1940s. See for yourself.

We have the Rhodes Suite. I think the pictures tell their own story but you can see our balcony and the views of the pool and garden, our roll top bath (turn left for the toilet and right for the shower) and me unable to choose between the desk or the settee.
We head into town for refreshments and supplies and most importantly to visit Cameron's Alma Mater, Pretoria High School for Boys. I have run out time as we must be up at 6 in the morning to be continued.

A South African Sojourn, looking for Charlie's footprints.

Charles Percival Duce was my paternal grandfather. He was born in Bradford, Yorkshire on 30/11/1881. The family story is that he ran away from home to join the army. I can find no record of military service in the family previous to his action. He was recorded in the 1901 census as being in residence at the Cowley Barracks in Oxford. Although recorded as being 20, he would actually have been 19 on the 31st March. He was now Private C P Duce 6671 of the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry and destined for South Africa to fight in the Second Boer War.

This is the earliest picture I have of Charlie and I guess it was taken on the occasion of his 21st birthday,  that would be after the end of the hostilities (31/5/1902). He has now gained his Lance Corporal stripe and is wearing the Queen's South Africa Medal with 3 clasps indicating the theatres of action he was involved in. His 4th clasp is either not yet presented or as yet not attached. Here is that medal as it appears today. Any medal experts reading this will notice that the clasps are in the wrong order. Cape Colony should be the lowest, then Orange Free State followed by Transvaal with the South Africa 1902 at the top. The fact that he wasn't awarded the King's South Africa as well means that his service must have been confinded to within the period of 1st January and 31st May 1902.

Q

This is the reason for the reference of "looking for Charlie's footprints" in the blog title. I don't suppose for a moment that we will encounter anything personally pertaining to him, but it would be great to be able to gain some empathy and insight into his youthful but formative experience. He was destined to remain a soldier for most of the rest of his working life.

Chasing Charlie is just a small part of our plans for this holiday. Let me show you the complete itinerary which is detailed on the spreadsheet below. Full credit for much of this planning must go to Cameron Roy, who is married to our daughter in law's sister Helen. Cameron is a South African national and former pupil of that most august institution, Pretoria High School. He will be accompanying us on the flight out and up until we part after the Kruger Park visit.  

Sorry that the above is rather fuzzy, but it is a screenshot of the spreadsheet. You can try to expand the picture but I think you'll just get bigger fuzzy. Then again you could just wait and read it as it unfolds day by day. First blog should be published around 13th January next year. 

Copenhagen Saturday 24th September

Another bright and sunny day. We have decided to take the Metro into the city today and guess what happened.

As I was the thousandth passenger that day I won the prize of driver of the day. After two minutes training we were off! It was a great pity that I couldn't carry on all day as we had things to do besides looking at railway tracks. So, with some regret we set off on foot for the Rosenborg Castle. This is a view of the castle from the King's Gardens. 

 Rosenborg Castle was built as a pleasure palace by Christian IV at the start of the C17. It quickly became his favourite residence. From the start of the C18 it became more of a showcase for the monarchy's oldest, richest and rarest treasures. Guests were entertained and no doubt suitabley impressed. The castle opened to the public as a museum in 1838 when the absolute monarcy was dissolved and a constitutional monarchy replaced it.
Have a look at some of the treasures.

Most of the stuff of course comes from the late C17 and through the C18 when Denmark or rather the King and a few merchants became extremely rich through the importation of sugar and the forced migration of slaves. To be fair Denmark was the first country in the world to abolish slavery but only after 100 years of the profits. The whole museum was quite fascinating if a little dusty.
We headed into town for some lunch and enjoyed a lasagne with gorgonzola melted on the top. Delicious.
The Round Tower is another must see. Architectural interesting with a kind of indoor helter skelter ramp running up the inside giving access to first the church then the large hall (once the university library) above and finally the bell loft, before curling on up to the top. This is a view inside the Round Tower.

This is the Trinity Church. No doubt it is the protestant religion that gives rise to the restrained nature of the Rococo decoration.

Next some sites we encountered walking through the smart shopping district. This is of course the Danish open foam tennis championships (seriously).

This is a cheerful demonstration against the civil war in Ethiopia. We questioned the participants who told us, somewhat naively, that the war was bad because people died. They seem to support the incumbent government against the opposition, who I think are being murdered by the said government. The Ethiopian and Danish flags were much in evidence.
We headed back to the railway station where I was most disappointed not to be allowed to drive the train back. Apparently they thought my metro training was inadequate. Ridiculous!
For those of you who don't think I would tell you a barefaced lie on this blog, think again. No, I didn't drive the train. It was in fact driverless but had a dummy set of controls in front of the front seat.