DRIVE! The Rhino's charging...

Hello!

Sorry for not blogging yesterday, it was a relatively quiet day so i thought i would wait and give you two days in one...

Yesterday was a stinking hot day,  the temperature is rising day by day and you can really see the effect it is having on the cats,  they hide and sleep a lot of the day,  fortunately yesterday was also a quiet day for tours!

We got through our usual morning chores of poop scooping and cleaning fairly quick,  but due to the red meat feed the night before there were a lot more bones to pick up,  amazing to see how the cats had got every last morsel of meat off them!

Just after lunch (thankfully) the weekly chicken delivery arrived. We get bags and bags of chickens donated every week from a local battery farm.   They're all ones that died naturally (if naturally is appropriate for a battery farm) we had to empty every bag and sort them all,  we only kept the large meaty ones,  our cats are fussy and wont eat the small birds! Also,  a few of them were 'ugly'  which translates to rotten and/or maggot infested, they stank... I've never smelt anything quite like it in my life.

We were also lucky enough to see the new arrivals at camp.. Albeit via cctv... The whole aim of the farm is to breed the cheetahs and hopefully be able to release them into a controlled park and to try and save them from extinction.   Despite being very fast powerful runners they're actually quite low down the chain in surviving! Anyway,  Jesse successfully mated with a cheetah called Ashika, and produced two lovely little babies... Hope and Horizon.  They were born 3 weeks ago and are doing really well.   No one can go in with them but we can see them via the cameras,  even that was pretty cool.

The evening was spent relaxing and laughing,  some of the volunteers that have been here for a while went out to meet and old friend,  the few left behind just sat chatting and drinking and trying to play a game called Innuendo which we failed at miserably due to laughing so much it hurt.

Today turned out to be an even hotter day,  hitting 34c. Again,  morning tasks complete and then most of us just hid in the shade at any opportunity,  i went round with my camera to get a few shots but the cats where hiding.  I went to visit buttercup, the pygmy goat,  she is so adorable and funny.   I lied down and she instantly climbed on me but kept falling off,  you could see she was getting really frustrated,  she gave up and then just kept headbutting my shoes.

Every day at lunch we come back to the house where Cecillia, who does all our cooking and laundry,  makes a massive feast.  Sunday is her day off so we stayed at the farm and one of the guys,  Keal,  made Potjie (pronounced pikey)  which is basically a South African pasta bake made with heaps of biltong... It was amazing!

At 4, we were all treated to a game drive! The farm we're on is part of the Emoya estate,  we rent the land from them,  in turn any of their guests get free entry to the farm,  and volunteers on the farm can go on a game drive. It was incredible,  seeing all manner of Antelope and springboks, ostrich, warthog, wildebeest, zebra,  giraffe and 2 huge rhinos! These beasts where massive,  weighing a scary 2 ton each and able to run 40km/h! We got within about 7 or 8 metres and then one of them charged,  the vehicle we were in would only just be able to out run them,  luckily the rhino gave up pretty quick!

We're back at the house now chilling for a few hours but tonight,  I'm so excited,  I'm heading back to the farm and I'm sleeping in the baby room with Gabriel! Yes,  tonight I'm sharing a bed with a 4 month old VERY playful cheetah cub... I'm not sure I can quite top being able to say I did that! I'll update you all in the morning... Although I might be sleepy... Every night a volunteer can sleep with him,  also you can sleep out under the stars with Eden and Faith (who are about 14months old)  or we can sleep in the lion house... A wooden shed in the goat enclosure which looks out over the lions so we can get to experience the sounds of the lions roaring and the wolves howling at sunrise! I'm doing that next week at full moon!

So,  time to go see Gabriel! Night night!