The home itself was well built and had a elevated spectacular view of the mountains, and, came as a package with another piece of land about half a kilometre away.
It was quite rural and had its fair share of wild life.
We did a few minor alterations, one was building a hearth around the existing fireplace and there was left over rubble on the side of the house.
One evening our live in maid was on her way to bed, she had a separate little house down a path leading from our kitchen door and was going to bed.
The next minute she came running back in shouting “makulu inyorga” the Zulu term for big snake.
After investigation this led to be true, it was a puff adder and about a metre and a half long, one bite from this and you could end up in serious trouble.
I slowly started taking some slate bricks apart from the light of a torch held at a distance by Jasmine, I heard this loud hissing noise, and narrowly missed being struck by the lunging snake.
Armed with a spade I took its head off with a strike so fast that even I was impressed.
I don’t as a rule like to terminate any wild life, but the children always played out side even in the dark.
Buy now we were quite used to the odd snake, giant spiders and scorpions.
That next weekend I had planned a barbeque, and, wait for it !! after lighting the fire the storm clouds rolled in. lucky it was a quick cooking meal but I still spent the last 10 minutes with an umbrella in a thunder storm getting slightly wet, this was captured by a laughing family from the lounge window by a photograph.
The barbeque was as follows –
Monk fish kebabs
Alternate pieces of monk fish, apricots, green pepper and red onion
On skewers
Basted while grilling with blend of lemon, olive oil, herbs
Salt and black pepper to taste
Served with curried peach rice salad
Gently fry green & red peppers, onion and a little curry powder
remove from heat and add one can of chopped peaches
And cooked rice and serve
The following month school holidays were upon us and we headed for a weeks break in the famous Drakensberg mountain range.
We chose a resort called Dragon Peaks and had a cabin overlooking the lake with a river flowing behind us.
We hiked up the river and to the foot hills of one of the mountains, it was a beautiful place and very relaxing until I decided to swing across the river on a rope someone had left there, much to the protests of my concerned wife.
After a couple of swings the branch broke and I hit the river bank with my back and slid into the water. It was a bit of a drawback and I had a uncomfortable back for a few days after – “live and learn I say”.
In the early mornings tame Zebra would pass our cabin looking for hand outs, they ate almost anything, even our hot cross buns we left on the picnic table.
Our final night I decided to do a whole fillet of beef on the Barbie, this I did as follows –