Author: Peter

Brussels – Take 2

Posted on by Peter

Now that I have spent a full day in Brussels I feel adequately informed enough to express some views on Brussels. Excuse me for not doing that yesterday.

The conference officially started last night.  It is only a 5 minute walk from the hotel. The ladies were complaining about the cobbled streets and high heels. Wasn’t an issue for me though. Crossing the road was especially when I thought it was a one-way road and only looked the one direction before crossing. Fortunately wasn’t a problem because clearly Brussels must be a very unsafe city at night because there was only one car driving on the road and it came from the direction I was looking in. (This morning they were about 10 cars during the rush hour so I had to remember to look both ways.)  Still wandering where all the people are in Brussels. At lunch time today I went back to my hotel to do some emails/phone calls and 2/3rds of the shops were closed. In fact I have yet to see a shop open except the Belgium Beer shop next to the hotel (we would call that a bottle store in SA).

The start of the conference was quite good except that there was no where to sit for dinner.  They had tables out but those could only accommodate about a third of the people present.  The key note speaker was a journalist (Paul Mason) and I was surprised at how nervous he was for someone who is on television regularly. He stuttered and stammered his way through the talk. Good content though. For those technologically advanced people reading the blog, I am now on Twitter and so if you want to follow the exciting developments at the conference then you can follow me.  My Twitter name is @ptactuary (go on Marcus I know you will).

After the keynote there was a ‘Taste of Belgium’ which was actually a chocolate fountain which you could dip cheese under. And Belgium beer on tap. I was tired after having been woken up for breakfast at 4:30am on the plane so I went to bed.

The Belgians know how to do breakfast though. Pancakes and Waffles for breakfast.  What more could you ask for?! My kids would have loved it.  I did. Definitely having those again tomorrow.

Full day conference today. Paul will be proud of me as I only missed one session and that was on Solvency II (and who really cares as that is now postponed until 2016). If you don’t know what that is, don’t worry, it isn’t important unless you’re an actuary and then I consider it unimportant anyway. The sessions have been very good in general except one of our competitors marketed themselves in their presentation which I thought was very poor taste for an industry conference. I also spoke today so that is out of the way.  Good turnout for my session (more people attended than had signed up) and seemed to get a good response (sorry you weren’t there Jules I don’t think I did justice to your slides).

Belgians are clearly not good engineers or planners though.  The conference centre is the worst I have ever been two. The venues are miles apart (no really miles is correct). It can take you at least 15 minutes to walk from the one venue to the next. Worse than walking between lectures at UCT. And only 1 escalator between floors. Ever seen 1 escalator and 1000 people trying to go up simultaneously. You would have thought that by now they would have figured out how poorly laid out the conference centre is. And then to get to the upper floors (because the exhibition hall is on floor -1 and the other venues are on floor 3 or 4) you have to walk up stairs.  No escalator. There are some lifts but they are so small they can take about 4 people at once and there are only 3 of them. Similar logistics problems at lunch today when the queue for lunch was about 100 people long.  Fortunately I got there early so I managed to finish eating before most people even had their food.  You would swear that they would have figured that out already.

Weather was overcast and raining most of the day. Still around 7-10 degrees C. Gala dinner upcoming. Go to go and put my suit on.

PS: Was trying to add some photos but couldn’t because of software upgrade issues. Will try to again tomorrow.

Brussels

Posted on by Peter

I never planned to blog this trip but there is so much to say that I thought I would anyway.  I am in Brussels for a few days for a conference (another exciting actuarial one). I usually don’t blog my business trips as they tend to be to London and back and I now consider London my second home. But a trip to Brussels is a little unique.  I am actually here for the UK Life Conference. Go figure – a UK conference held in Brussels. Probably especially arranged for the Euro skeptics. I believe the real reason is that it is much cheaper to host here than in the UK. I guess that says something about the attractiveness of Brussels.

I flew over from CT last night and I got a major fright when the guy facing me (business class seats  on BA alternate front and back so the passenger next to you looks directly at you) introduced himself by name to me. I was so stunned that my first thought was I know the guy but once I got over that thought (I didn’t), I realised he was expecting my name in return. Didn’t he know that I don’t want to speak to a stranger for the next 12 hours? I want to eat dinner, watch my movie and go to sleep. Fortunately there is a screen between the seats and I purposed to ensure it went up immediately I could do it. That did cut him off from talking to me the whole night (fortunately). For those of you who think I am anti-social, I promise to leave it down during my next trip and also to talk to the person looking at me.

I transferred through Heathrow airport to Brussels which was relatively painless as these things go. As we got onto the flight to Brussels a mother with 2 youngish (younger than Chloe) children realised that the one daughter had left her backpack in the terminal. Snot and trane (sorry foreigners – use Google translator if you need to). Fortunately the cabin crew went back and found it for her. Then the lady sitting next to me gets on and starts rummaging through her bag in desperation. The more she rummaged, the more desperate she became. I thought she must have lost her cellphone, passport or something like that. But no.  She finds it and a big sigh of relief she pulls out a box of snacks to eat and promptly starts nibbling away. Then out comes a shoe box (yes out of same bag) and I am thinking what now? She opens it up with a flourish and inside is her knitting.  A kid walks past and loudly points it out to his parents that there is ‘a weird woman knitting out of a shoebox’. My thought exactly but I just didn’t articulate it well (or not at all). Then she suddenly curls herself up on the seat and goes to sleep and snores most of the way to Brussels.  It takes all types to make the World go around (in fact it doesn’t). In case you were wondering she wasn’t old (read into old whatever suits you).

Landed in Brussels to what the captain described a ‘lovely day’. By that he clearly meant 7 degrees C outside with low level cloud but not raining yet (because it did rain about an hour later).  The airport looks like it is just being built. When you exit into the terminal building it seems as if the place is deserted. Not a sign of a person until you hit passport control (and that took about 15 minutes to walk to that).  Had my first run in with a Belgian official at customs. I exited through EU channel (because I came from London).  Only to be stopped and told that since I actually came from Cape Town I had to go through the other channel. This resulted in me walking backwards to where I started, selecting the channel right next to the one I had just walked through and then walking right past the officious lady and through the exit. What was the point of that? Probably an EU regulation and seeing as Brussels is the seat of power they had to enforce it.

When I exited I found all the other people in Brussels outside the terminal that were missing from inside it. And then I wondered whether I had in fact arrived in Brussels because it could have been Mecca actually given the demographics of the people in front of me in their thousands (yes I am not exaggerating). Then I remembered seeing an Ethiad plane and realised that these people were indeed meeting the Pilgrim’s on their return.  That and the fact that I saw a bar selling Stella Artois jolted me back into believing I was indeed in Brussels.

I took a taxi becuase trying to work out which train to take when everything is in 4 languages just seemed like too much hard work for a Sunday. The people in front of me didn’t want to take the driver that was first in line. I thought they preferred the Mercedes Taxi to the VW he was driving. I took him and off we sped. Then I realised that they were probably locals and this guys reputation proceeded him. Before we left the airport road system he was driving at 110 km/h and I swear the sign I saw said 60 km/h. We had to use all 3 lanes on one bend. Was the Formula 1 Grand Prix in Brussels? Had I gotten on board with a retired Thierry Boutsen (if you’re old enough to know who he is)? After 4 times peeling my face off the front seat (at least his breaks worked) and twice off the side window (due to G-force on the cornering), we made it to the hotel ‘Royal Windsor Hotel’.

I attempted to check in only to be told that check in was 2pm. I wanted to ‘freshen up’ as the ladies would say (by that I mean change my shirt and put on some deodorant). I asked if there was no way I could get the room before 2pm and she said no. I said not even 1 minute to 2pm and she smiled and said no. Probably another EU regulation. I went to have some lunch in the bar instead. As I was in Brussels I thought I better go for the Mussels only to be told that they had run out. What? In Brussels, run out of Mussels? (There’s a limerick in there somewhere). Finished lunch at 1:50pm and thought I would try my luck and see if I could get a room and incredibly even though EU regulations say check-in time is 2pm I got my room at 1:50pm. Someone from the UK probably has to pay a fine now (no one else ever pays fines in the EU).

The hotel is meant to be 5-star (http://www.royalwindsorbrussels.com/).  I think to get 5-stars in Europe it is just based on having a large fluffy towel in the bathroom and a bathrobe behind the door. The guys who do these hotel websites need serious commendation. How to do take a room that is 3m x 3m (yes I measured) and make it look big? I took a few minutes to find the TV because that was even tucked away in the corner cupboard. And the bed is so soft I can feel the floor through it. The plumbing has not been re-done since the war (first WW that is). The pressure is so poor that a shower is useless unless you’re into trickling water over your body. The bath took 20 minutes to fill. Probably another EU regulation about water pressure in hotel rooms.

All this to write and the conference hasn’t even started yet.  Sorry there aren’t any photos. I was scared I might breach an EU regulation.  I haven’t been to Brussels for about 26 years. Now I remember why I haven’t rushed back.

Kruger Park – Day 6

Posted on by Peter

Today is a bit of a shock to the system. We are back in CT but the temperature on landing was 12 degrees versus the 36 degrees when we left. There is synergy in there somewhere but just not sure what it is.

We left this morning at 6am as we had to drive from Letaba out of the Park and then down to the Kruger International Airport. The GPS said it would take 4.5 hours but I know what the roads and traffic are like so we gave ourselves a little more time. We didn’t see much on the road out of the Park (we exited at the Phalaborwa gate). However after driving for an hour Chloe exclaimed that she had left her cellphone under the pillow of the bed! Heart sinking moment. Quick decision needed as well – turn back and risk missing the flight or carry straight on and hope we could get it back some other way. Initially I did a U-turn to head back but Michael & Helen pointed out that adding 2 hours to the journey would mean we would risk missing the flight. So another U-turn and back on the original route.

Helen managed to find the Letaba Camp number and as we had cellphone signal we called them. They put her through to lost property who said they would check and we should call again in an hour. That was just after we exited the park and Helen called back and they said they had found the cellphone and would return it to us.  The logistics of how we get it back still need to be sorted out but at least we can get it back (it is not a cheap one so definitely worth getting it back). We were REALLY impressed with the staff at KNP and how they handled this. It is SO pleasing to get service like this and for the honesty of the cleaning staff to return it to us as well. If only more South African’s didn’t conduct themselves like that.

We did stop at Hoedspruit for a quick Wimpy breakfast.  Fortunately they have re-tarred most of the road now from Phalaborwa to White River. No more swallow-your-car potholes. There are still the usual hazards of pedestrians and cows though. At one stage we had to stop in a 120 km/h zone as a few cows we just standing in the road. It didn’t seem like they were going anywhere until a truck hooted (honked for the Americans) and drove right at them and that did the trick. Helen said “Only in Africa”.  We also did see another “Only in Africa” thing – the Mpumulanga Premier racing past with police escort, flashing lights etc. He has a bigger escort than the Prime Minister of the UK has. I wonder how much is necessity and how much is ego?!

We got to the airport about 2 hours ahead of our flight. It would have made it VERY tight if we had turned around to retrieve Chloe’s phone so it was probably the right decision to leave it and hope that we get it back via post. The flight was uneventful. We are back to the reality of daily life again. Our thoughts will drift back to the bush, animals, birds and hot weather. Africa is in our blood – all of us agree.

PS: Next trip … Bahama’s business trip. Helen coming along for the pleasure. Upcoming in November.

 

Kruger Park – Day 5

Posted on by Peter

I was wrong about yesterday. It wasn’t at all hot. Quite a mild day actually. Especially if you consider it was 39 degrees today at 4:20pm! Not kidding. Michael and I went out for an early morning drive this morning (everyone else was too lazy and slept in) when we left at 6am it was 11.5 degrees. By the time we returned at 7:15am it was 23.5 degrees. Now I studied geography and science at school and I am still puzzled how it can be possible that the temperature can rise that quickly in an hour and a quarter. Surely that is not possible?! By the time we were on the road heading south it was 27 degrees (at 8am) and it hit 30 degrees at 9am.

We had a drive from Bateleur down to Letaba for our last night stop before heading home tomorrow. It was about a 110 km drive. First 20 km on gravel to the main road. Would be ideally suited to allow someone like Michael to drive if he had a license.  As it was already very hot the game life was sparse and really only around the waterholes. There was quite a lot of game around the waterholes though including Elephant, Buffalo, Zebra, Impala & Warthog. We did add Tssebee to our trip list as well today (also seen at a waterhole). And after all the drives today we are at 105 birds for the trip and we still haven’t seen some common ones we ought to have seen (like sunbirds). It isn’t that we haven’t seen a variety of bird life, we have, the problem has been that as soon as it gets too hot you see nothing as everything is sheltering from the sun.

We did have one highlight from today and that was just outside Mopani camp. About a km outside of the camp we saw a number of cars parked. Sure sign of something big going on. As we got closer we saw a dead Impala but nothing else. After asking a grumpy continental European, it turned out that a cheetah had killed it 4 hours earlier (at 6:15am) but then had been frightened off by the cars and had not been seen again.  We searched for a while and didn’t see anything so headed into Mopani Camp for a pitstop and ice creams. After we were finished we went back to see if anything was happening and sure enough in the 15 minutes we had been away the cheetah and come and taken the impala and now we couldn’t see either. We drove up and down, reversed a few times and finally Helen spotted the cheetah under/behind a tree & bush eating. We all got to see her/him (not sure which but I will call it a she) and then she lay down not to be see again. I remember reading/hearing that when a cheetah kills she is so tired that she can’t eat for some time afterwards and that is probably what happened.  She was exhausted for 4 hours and then finally got her strength back to start eating. It did make a good highlight for the day.

We got to Letaba just after midday and fortunately we could get our rondavels immediately as we needed to be indoors with the aircon on! That wasn’t even enough for the boys who decided the freezer was the only way to resolve their heat problem! We have two rondavels (one 2 bed and one 3 bed). The boys are in the 2 bed and a reasonable distance away from us. The joys of having teenagers – they don’t care at all that we aren’t close by anymore. We did have supper together which was slightly challenging as there were only 4 chairs, a small table and 4 knives/forks but we still managed to make it work. And we were able to compare our fire with everyone else’s and of course ours was the best (though some guy did have an impressive bonfire happening!). As we had run out of foil we pretty much ate meat for supper but as it was so hot no one seemed to care.

As we have to be up early tomorrow to ensure we get back for our flight in time we are all in bed already. Until tomorrow (and the last blog for this trip).

PS: @Sharon – Stephen says he wasn’t looking at the cleavage. Not sure what he was looking at but I suggest you or Lara ask him when we get back.

Kruger Park – Day 4

Posted on by Peter

Today could only be described using one of my father-in-laws choice words – Bl..s.m HOT.  By 8am it was 25 degrees and by 11am it was 30 degrees. We went out for a drive at 4pm and it was 36 degrees. Even now at 10pm it must still be 25 degrees outside. The boys and I went for an early morning drive to the two dams. I think they came to humor me or in the hope that they might get to drive (which I would never allow of course). The one dam was completely dry and so we went back to the other dam. Incredibly it was 13 degrees when we left (at 5:45am). We had to let ourselves out of the camp as the gate was closed still with no one to be seen. We didn’t see much new – 2 new birds for the trip (one a vulture) but otherwise everything else we had already seen.

It is incredibly dry up here. Have a look at our the cover photo of the blog and you will see what I mean. Dusty and dry. And so the game tends only to be seen at the water. We went to Shingwedzi today but even the river there was empty. There is also a dam there called Kanniedood – well I am afraid to say it was dood. I have never seen it so dry. The ranger here at Bateleur said it hasn’t rained for a very long time. I think a very long time must be at least 6 months given how little water there is.

The drive to Shingwedzi and back is about an hour and half and we needed bread for lunch (Helen managed to burn 4 pieces in a row yesterday in the toaster so we needed to replenish that). Nothing like a 3 hour round trip to buy some bread. We also were cellphone signal starved and so everyone was quickly downloading emails when we got there as well. As the majority of the way is on gravel road it would have been the perfect time for the boys to practice their driving skills of a manual car (though I would never allow that of course). If I had, I would have let Michael drive there and Stephen back. Certainly no game to see and hardly any cars so it would never have been an issue but as you all know I am very law abiding.

The only thing you could do this afternoon was lie on the bed and watch the ceiling fan go round and round. Or in my case listen to the ceiling fan go round and round. We did go out late afternoon though it seemed that we were the only idiots to do that. The dam did have the same wildlife we had seen previously. Nothing new. A pair of fish eagles doing some fishing; hippo’s frolicking and lots of ducks; geese; storks; herons etc all feeding.

We have enjoyed the exclusive and quiet nature of the bush camp and will definitely try to stay at them again in future. Only having 7 huts does make it seem exclusive even though you pay exactly the same for this as other camps. The only downside is that it is very dry and hardly any game to be seen but that is hardly a fault of the camp. The open WiFi connection makes up for it. The ranger must wonder why I kept having around the reception area pretending to read those boring wildlife posters. He even asked me at one stage if I got a signal on my cell as he heard it beep from a downloaded email. I told him we didn’t have any signal. He did seem puzzled that I was managing to get emails though. Fortunately he has not figured it out.

Sorry about the lack of photos – will try tomorrow when we are at the next (and last camp). Until then …

Kruger Park – Day 3

Posted on by Peter

This morning was a repeat of yesterday in that we woke up at 6am, had breakfast and then left for our drive from Olifants to Bateleur Bush Camp. You might be wondering (or at least you should be) how I have managed to post a blog from a Bush Camp. The reality is that we have no cellphone signal and that was a loss to everyone. We all reckon we could manage for a day or so but anything longer than that would be a tragedy.  Incredibly though the reception her has WiFi (why on earth we don’t know) and even more incredibly it is unlocked. We are the nearest possible hut to reception and I have 2 bars of WiFi on my laptop (none on my iPhone though) so just strong enough to connect and send.

The drive from Olifants to Bateleur is about 120 km.  It was pretty uneventful in that we did not see anything major at all (unless you classify Elephants as major). We stopped for morning coffee at Letaba, Ice Creams and a few other purchases at Mopani and then onto to Bateleur. When we left at 7am this morning it was already 20 degrees and by 11am it was up to 28 degrees. Animals were scarce and even the birding wasn’t great. There were times when the bushveld was just quite – not a thing was heard at all.

By after Mopani the car inhabitants were dropping like flies and soon I could not even see Helen as she has become horizontal on the very back seat. Michael was examining the insides of his eyelids and Stephen was either nodding in agreement with me or nodding right off to sleep. Only Chloe was awake though she didn’t spot anything, but to be fair neither did I.  Under these circumstances you would think it appropriate to let Chloe try her hand with driving on my lap but I would never allow such a thing in a hired car of course. Neither would it be appropriate for Stephen later to have a go with driving a manual and trying a hill start.

We got to Bateleur Bush Camp at just after 1pm. When I walked into reception the ranger on duty greeted me by name. I was very surprised but he said we were the biggest group arriving today so he knew immediately it was us. There are only 7 huts at the camp. We have hut number 1 which is also nearest the bird hide. While we were having a late lunch a herd of elephant came down to drink at the waterhole which you can see from the hide and from our veranda. About 30 elephants including a number of very small baby elephants as well. I ventured to the bird hide and saw them up close (about 10 meters away) with only a flimsy fence between me and them. About the closest I have been to elephants and not in a vehicle.

Late afternoon we headed for one of the local dams. Only residents of the camp have access to these dams and as there are only 7 huts that means traffic is pretty limited. As it is very dry up North we were hoping to see some game there and we weren’t disappointed. There were elephant, impala, hippo and crocs. In addition there were lots of birds and we managed to add a whole lot of new ones to our trip list. Still no lifers for the trip even though we are up to 87 birds so far in 3 days. Our target for 5 days is usually 100 birds and so I would now be disappointed if we don’t reach that at least by tomorrow and hopefully pass it even. We did see at least 2 birds were could not identify and need some professional help with them (we have photos of at least one) so they might be the lifers we are hoping for.

On the way to the dam everyone was searching for a cell signal and Helen said if we get it everyone would be happy stopping there rather than at the dam! As it turned out, on the way back we did get a signal and did stop for a minute or so until another car started to approach and we knew we had to move off (the roads are pretty narrow and really only single lane). We also needed to get back to the camp as the gates close at 6pm (we got in at 5:57pm).

Braai, reminiscing, Michael mimicking the Spar announcer again (and his school teachers as well) and we all went to our respective rooms. 10:42pm. At 10:30pm I had finished the blog and tried to publish it and as I did it gave me a can’t find signal and I had to re-type most of it. It had fortunately automatically saved about 25% of it. I think the 2nd version is better than the first. Sorry – no pictures as connection too slow and camera in car.  Will try to upload some tomorrow assuming they don’t block the WiFi!

Until then!

Kruger Park – Day 2

Posted on by Peter

We woke up at 6am this morning so that we could have breakfast and get on the road by 7am. We had to drive from Skukuza to Olifants which is about 150 km. While that might not seem a lot when you are traveling at an average speed of 30 km/h then it does take about 5 hours. We also didn’t want to lose the best part of the day (which is early morning) because we knew that it was going to get very hot later. And that is what it happened – the temperature got to 32 degrees at about 2pm today. It is still about 26 degrees outside and it is now 8:30pm.

We were on the road at 7am and whole day turned out to be a good game & bird viewing day. There was plenty of game almost from the outset of leaving Skukuza.  We added zebra, wildebeest, giraffe and waterbuck before we had crossed the Sabie River. We stopped even more times for birds and had added about 20 to the list by the time we stopped for earning morning coffee.  After our early morning coffee we has a quick glimpse of a female lioness. The sighting was not great but we all got to see her before she vanished. We also just before that had seen buffalo so that made it 3 out of the Big Five.

We drove to Satara for and got there just around lunch time. We made the mistake of ordering lunch at the Cafeteria and waited for 45 minutes to get our toasted sandwiches. We could have made them ourselves in a fraction of that time. Not sure what they were doing – maybe slaughtering the pig for the ham and cheese sandwiches? We are on holiday and not really in a rush so we didn’t really mind. On the way out we saw what is reputed to the be the most photographed Scops Owl in the world. It resides in a tree outside the ladies toilet.

After Satara when continued North towards Olifants. It was VERY hot and as we felt it was unlikely that we would see much game due to the heat I decided to drive a little faster. It turned out that we saw a huge amount of game especially around the watering holes. The first waterhole yield 4 lions drinking; about 50 vultures and 2 back blacked jackals (amongst other things). The next waterhole yielded buffalo, zebra and warthog (and lots of bird life). And at the next one we saw Rhino, Elephant and Giraffe. And incredible amount of game for the worst viewing time of the day especially given the temperature. I don’t believe I have ever seen so much game at that time of the day in the Kruger Park.

We did also stop again on one of the bridges coming into Olifants. You are allowed to get out of your car (and we did).  The bird viewing was ridiculously good and we spent about 20 minutes on the bridge just looking over the river in one direction. It was slightly spoilt by a drunk Afrikaner who was shouting at the top of his voice, hooting and just generally making a nuisance of himself. Why do people feel it is necessary to come to the Kruger if they are going to behave like that? What is the point?

We did eventually move on because it seemed that 3 of the family were getting bored while Stephen and I birded! In fact it was like that most of the day. Helen gave up the front seat after about 30 minutes of driving and the rest of the day Stephen was in the front with me and we just ticked off one bird after the next (and that’s ignoring the animals we saw). At one stage only Stephen and I were awake I think. They did all wake up at least when we saw the lions!

We got to Olifants at about 3:30pm and checked and offloaded. We have accommodation overlooking the river. It is a beautiful view and with the temperature at 30 degrees, sitting outside with the binocs and perusing the river was the thing to do. Stephen and I headed out for a quick 40 minute end of evening drive and when we got back we found 3 people all sleeping. They only missed an Elephant crossing the river (he went right under except his trunk sticking up) and we had one more bird sighting to the list. The bird list now stands at 69 – yes you read that correctly. That would be 51 new species just today. I reckon that is a record for us in one day (especially since it was Stephen and me for most of the day only). And we only have 3 raptors so far on the list and we are missing a lot of obvious birds that we should really see like Sunbirds; Kingsfishers etc. I am hoping that if it continues like this we will get close to 100 by the end of tomorrow (though that is probably ambitious). Unfortunately no lifers yet.

We had the mandatory braai tonight again and everyone is now already in bed. I am the only one left up at 9:20pm. I am going to send this and then head to bed myself. I was hoping to most more photos but the connection is very slow – it took about 5 minutes just to upload the Owl picture. Tomorrow we are heading to Bateleur Bush Camp. We have no idea whether we will have any cellphone signal. If you don’t hear from us you know why. It isn’t that we have been eaten by Lions.

The wind has picked up and is whipping around the house we are staying in. As Chloe would say ‘Quite Freeky’. Sleep tight, hope the bed bugs don’t bite (and in our case the Mozzies don’t bite).

 

 

Kruger Park – Day 1

Posted on by Peter

We are back! This morning we were up at 4am for a collection at 4:30 am to get to the airport. We had a 5:45am flight to Johannesburg and then a connecting flight to the Kruger International Airport (KIA). We got to the airport just before 5am and the check-in process went smoothly.  Two family members didn’t remember much of the first flight. Helen woke on landing and asked “Did they serve breakfast?” and Michael – well that is best illustrated by the photo! All the flights were bang on time and we arrived at KIA earlier than expected but only to get to the baggage belt and find one piece of our luggage MIA.  We always take a car fridge with us which we use while traveling around the Kruger and of course that was the item that was missing. Even more importantly it contained our flasks (for coffee) and my wine for the 5 days we are here. Fortunately the baggage lady was very pleasant and helpful and we discovered the missing item was on the next plane arriving about an hour later.

We went off to do a quick shop in White River. Shopping at Spar in White River is another whole experience. Just getting there means evading potholes which are strew across road and some of them are so big you could lose a Mini in them. We did through the shop in relatively quick time but not before they announced the daily specials. The accent was just so typical of English being spoken by an African gentlemen that Michael & Helen could hardly keep from wetting themselves. What made it even funnier was that he was standing right behind Helen was doing the announcements. And then when we got back into the car Michael copied him perfectly and we were in stitches.  And then Stephen told us that he noticed that all the women store their cellphones in their cleavage. He said they must have Nokia’s because only a Nokia would work after being kept there.

We got back to the airport and picked up the fridge, re-packed the VW Minibus and headed for the Hazyview and then into the Kruger.  We had a quick stop for lunch at the Wimpy in Hazyview and then to the Numbi gate.  The roads are in a terrible condition. I know I have said this before but I can’t understand why they don’t fix them in such a tourist area. I have very little doubt that a whole lot of money that was meant for roads in the province has ended up in someone else’s house or back-pocket.  The other thing that strikes me is that there aren’t shacks. Everyone has some form of permanent house (from mansions for some to basic 4 walls, roof and a door for others). Everyone has a permanent dwelling on a plot of land though. Not like in CT or Jhb where there are squatter camps. So at least they have gotten that right.

We entered at the Numbi gate and headed for Skukuza.  It is about a 50 km drive from the gate to Skukuza and it took us just under 2 hours to do it. As it was after 1pm when we entered we didn’t really expect to see much as it was middle of the day and already quite warm (27 degrees). Animals don’t have aircon like we did in the VW Combi so they tend to lie down at that time of the day. However, we did see quite a lot of game on the whole route. We have already seen one of the Big Five (Elephant) and a whole host of buck (antelope for the foreign readers!).  We have seen Impala (as you would expect as there are more of them that ants in the Kruger); Kudu (we almost saw as many of them as we did Impala); Steenbok; Common Duiker; Klipspringer (on a rock in the traditional pose – we upload the photo tomorrow) and most importantly Roan Antelope. Roan Antelope are incredibly rare in the Kruger.  There are only about 70 in the Kruger Park and we saw two of them. There are 50 times more Lion in the Kruger which hopefully illustrates how rare they are and how fortunate we were to see them.  We did also see Zebra and Warthog and Elephant (mother and her baby). It was a slow start to the Birding but by the end of the day I had ticked off 18 species seen so far (at least a third of which I saw in the Skukuza).  We didn’t really consider today a game viewing day and really will start in all seriousness tomorrow am.

We got to Skukuza at about 3:30pm and after checking in and settling in it was time to watch the Springboks demolish the Wallabies. My only question is why they don’t play like that every week! The mandatory braai for supper (chops & wors) followed by marshmallows on the braai and a family chat; a quick episode of Leverage (DVD series watched on the laptop) and then everyone abandoned me for their beds while i completed the post. It is now 9:30pm and I feel like I have been up since 4am (oh that’s right I have been up since 4am!).  And so I apologize for the lack of photos – I will upload them tomorrow.

Sleep well – I certainly will!

Olympic Football

Posted on by Peter

Some of you have asked why I have been so quiet over this week. Well that is because I was actually working (and pretty hard at that too for a change). London might be quiet but that hasn’t stopped my UK staff keeping me busy this last week. I did make sure I got home to watch the evening athletics though generally.

Yesterday was the football final and I had a ticket (and was entertaining clients) for Wembley. The game was between Brazil and Mexico for the gold medal. It started at 3pm but we had hospitality included in our tickets and so we met at 12pm for lunch at the stadium. As you can see from the picture, the weather in London has been really good the last few days. It was 26 degrees yesterday and today it is around 28 degrees.

First time I have been to Wembley Stadium and it is quite an impressive stadium. We had superb seats just to the right of the half way line about 20 rows up (directly behind where the Mexican coach was positioned). Fortunately we were in our seats as the game started because Mexico scored in 32 seconds from the kick off. Brazil actually kicked off so you can tell from that they made an absolute mess of the start and basically gifted Mexico the goal.

Mexico dominated the possession and game during the first half and fully deserved their 1-0 lead at half time. It wasn’t great football though but fortunately the 2nd half was much improved with a more open game which created opportunities for both teams. Mexico scored again and at 2-0 with only a few minutes left there was pretty much no hope for Brazil. They did have a few chances in those minutes and eventually did net one but at that point there was only 3 minutes to go and Mexico just hoofed everything down field and so they won (in what was somewhat of an upset) 2-1. The Mexican supporters in the ground went crazy and by the time I got on the train about 2 hours after the finish they still were going for it. Big party night for them.

One of our clients managed to get sick and throw up at half time. He left immediately the match left (understandably) but I would have preferred if he hadn’t shook my hand! Kept that hand apart of the rest of me and didn’t touch anything until I could get to the bathroom and it is a good scrub with soap and hot water.

The crowds leaving the stadium were just ridiculous. By the far the worst I have experienced at any Olympic event. This was after I waited for about an hour after the finish to avoid the crowds! That clearly did not work. It took me an hour to get on the train and home. Can’t really complain too much because generally there were no or only few delays.

After having been to 5 Olympic events, the football was my least favourite one. It didn’t really feel like an Olympic event. The clients seemed to enjoy it though.

So that is my Olympic experience over as I head home tonight. I did get a last minute experience today as the men’s marathon finished around 1pm very close to the flat so I “experienced” some of the crowd waiting for the runners to come through. I did think though that given I am pretty experienced now in Olympic matters I could conclude my Olympic blogging with some (random) thoughts about the Olympics so here they are:

1. The Olympic Oath is “In the name of all the competitors I promise that we shall take part in these Olympic Games, respecting and abiding by the rules which govern them, committing ourselves to a sport without doping and without drugs, in the true spirit of sportsmanship, for the glory of sport and the honor of our teams.” Right. Sure. Say those words and then the competitors pretty much break each part of those. The 1500m was won by an athlete just back from a doping ban (wonder what he was during his ban?); bronze medal in the 100m to an Athlete who has twice been bust for doping and our own Cameron vd Bergh wins gold by cheating in tbe Breaststroke by using a butterfly kick and even admits it but says it is ok because he couldn’t win otherwise. He then proceeded to say that it is important for him for the ethics of the sport to admit he did it. Umm, I think that is confused ethics. How about not cheating to win the gold?! I know he is from SA but I would rather have him give the medal back.

2. 82 men have run under 10 seconds in the 100m – 81 of those are black. And just before the race the BBC runs a segment on whether running (and speed) is nature or nurture. Let me answer that one, if you’re black you could be nurtured to run in under 10 seconds. If you’re white, don’t bother trying it ain’t in your nature.

3. Who invented some of these sports and what were they smoking at the time? Dressage for instance. I understood that the Olympics was for people and not for animals. I didn’t see any of the horses parading around during the opening ceremony. So why how does a horse doing tricks get you a gold medal at the Olympics? And who would ever not use their hands to stop someone kicking you in the head like in Taekwondo? And how does that scoring work – kick the guy in the head you get 3 points, kick the guy in the chest and you get 1 point. And their are style points for how you kick the guy? Really?! Style for kicking?!! All I would do is kick the guy between the legs and move on to the next competitor. I could win a medal in Taekwondo. Rather bring back some of the sports they ditched from the Olympics where there was no dispute who the winner is. Like ‘Duelling pistols’ which was stopped in 1906 (I guess the problem was that the silver medallist couldn’t collect their medal and they couldn’t decide who gets bronze). Or maybe ‘Live Pigeon Shooting’ (stopped in 1900) – whoever killed the most pigeons got the gold (they could have held that event at Trafalgar Square this year).

4. Someone said to me this week any sport that requires judges to give you points should not be at the Olympics. How does one person doing three turns and jumping in the pool get less points than one person who only does one flip but makes less of a splash? I am in agreement with this thought. I suspect we might be headed for Ballroom dancing becoming an Olympic sport otherwise.

5. Beach Volleyball is my new favourite sport.

6. What happened to all the unfriendly Londoners? Someone actually spoke to my on the tube this week (in fact it happened more than once). And 3 people stopped me to ask for help. I was afraid I was about to get mugged. Held on tight to my wallet during those exchanges but it turned out they really were in need of help. The only question is now whether they will stay this way or whether on Monday they go back to being grumpy again.

7. The Brits do know how to organise things. The organisation has been extremely well done. They really can take a bow. I don’t believe you could improve much on how things have worked. The IOC should just make a decision to allow London to host all Olympic games.

8. Why on earth do they give posies to the winners? I can understand giving flowers to the women but the men, really?! I know this the first Olympic games to have gender equality but really, I don’t know a man that wants a posy. I bet they just get thrown away or handed to the nearest good looking female they see. They could have saved a lot of money.

9. Who says arrogance doesn’t get you places? Anyone watch and/or listen to Usain Bolt over the last few days. His arrogance is so extreme it is actually funny. The guy can run though (but then he is black so we shouldn’t be surprised – see point 2).

10. And my last thought, are we reaching the end to improvement in times and distances. Only three world records in the athletics and two of those in relays. There is an interesting link if you’re interested in this type of thing. You can see the improvement in the 100m here:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/08/05/sports/olympics/the-100-meter-dash-one-race-every-medalist-ever.html?smid=tw-share

Those are my thoughts exhausted. Thanks for your comments (for those of you who did comment).

Olympic Tennis Finals

Posted on by Peter

I have to say that I am disappointed that only one person was honest enough to put their height & weight into that website and admit which athlete they came out as. Not even my sons … really disappointed. I am wondering whether anyone is even reading these blogs? Feel like I am talking to myself. I will put my disappointment behind me and write this blog anyway.

Sunday am I was off at 8:45am to ensure that I got to Wimbledon by 9:30am when they opened the gates. The tennis was only starting at 12pm but the hospitality started at 9:30am and so I had to get there at the start to ensure that I could entertain the clients. I was lazy and didn’t want to take the tube so I got a car to pick me up and take me there. Turned out to be a good decision because it was raining and as I went through security it started to rain really hard. I am pleased that they put a roof on Centre Court!

The hospitality included pastries & coffee at 9:30; champagne and canapes at 10:30 and then a 4-course lunch at 11:30. At 12pm they started with the ladies doubles final. The betting around the table was that the Williams sisters would win 6-1 6-2 or 6-1 6-0 or something similar. We finished lunch by about 12:45 and the Williams sisters had already won the first set and were well on the way to the second.We had great seats (on the service line about 12 rows up). I was amazed at how close we were to the court and how small the stadium really is. On TV you get the feeling that it is much bigger than it really is. It was like standing at the top of the stairs of our tennis court and watching someone play. The Williams sisters did win 6-4 6-4 and the match anticipated final of Federer v Murray was next up.

As it has stopped raining they opened the roof and it became quite hot sitting in the sun. Don’t worry – I had a hat to protect my bald spot and I cleverly had put on sunscreen before I left. As you all know the match turned out to be a major anti-climax as Federer played the worst I have ever seen him play and Murray played extremely well. He was hitting winners from all over the court and he had about 5 net touches which just dropped over the net (versus Federer who had none). The atmosphere in the stadium was incredible. In between points people were chanting “Andy, Andy, Andy” and when he won the place just went beserk. It was spine chilling. They did the medal ceremony immediately afterwards and I almost joined in with the singing of ‘God save the queen’ I was so moved. The crowd cheered them all around the stadium as they came around for their medal lap.

It was then time for afternoon tea. It was Wimbledon was that would be scones & clotted cream and strawberries. They offered tea – I went for a beer! Only Heineken is served as they are the official sponsors.

It was then back to the court to watch the mixed doubles with Andy Murray featuring again. He and his partner (Robson) got off to a cracking start and ran away with the first set. It looked like it would be another gold for Team GB. The atmosphere was almost more electric than the Murray v Federer game with the crowd chanting “Team GB; Team GB” to drown out the occasional “Belarus, Belarus” chant.  But the Belarus pair came back superbly and spoilt the party by taking the 2nd set and then winning the 3rd super-set as well and getting the silver medal. Murray still got Gold & Silver and would surely have taken that at the beginning of the day.

The medal ceremony for the ladies doubles was then done. I would not normally blog about this as it would have been pretty boring had it not been for the Czech pair’s footwear. Blue Boots! Or more precisely ‘Wellies’! Are you kidding me? What were the designers thinking?! The only thing I can think is that there were expecting a lot of rain in London and hence the choice of footwear.  Or maybe the Czechs do have a sense of humour and fun? Either way, if I was a Czech athlete I would rather refuse to wear those things and go bear foot.

Full day. Got back to the flat at after 8pm. Almost 12 hours entertaining clients. Tough day. The extent I go to for clients. One more event to go next Saturday for me. I probably will post a mid-week blog of items of interest and some more Olympic comments.