Oh Africa!

You have to love living in Africa. For anyone who has never been here come and visit it is truly amazing. From City living to Bushveld wilderness there is nothing quite like it! For about 5 years of my life we as a family would head off to the Kruger park and surrounding areas for a short holiday. These holidays would always be highlighted with the inevitable fight that happened with my parents as my mother would lash out at all who dared to question both the slow pace of driving and the endless staring at nothing more than a bird or a flower - never very attention grabbing for 3 young children.

The one year we stayed at a family resort just outside of Kruger called Sanibonani. It was great for 2 simple reasons one it had a private miniature golf club and 2: it had a river that ran right outside our chalet. It was beautiful and I loved it! Everyday we would spend time in the pool  - where I lost a tooth in an unfortunate 'headbutting the fountain in the middle of the pool' incident, and time on the golf course - perfecting my swing and my brother would spend time doing a 'sport' that only a man can love. Fishing. One afternoon Ant went down to the river and sat next to an old security guard who had also taken up the opportunity to sample Africa's great rivers. Yes there were notices up about watching for wildlife but they continued regardless. Now Ant was a young 'athletically challenged' boy at that time. I think he must have been around 11 years old then, but this was all about to change. Ant was about to break all land speed records for fastest moving fat kid.

You see after a magnificent cast Ant immediately felt the tell tale signs of a ginormous bite. With reflexs of a cat he proceeded to reel the catch in. Unfortunately Ant had not caught himself any form of fish, or in fact any form of cold blooded animal. No, only Ant could manage to snare himself a brand new hippopotamus calf. This would have been a fantastic catch for anyone looking to get themselves there own pet hippo but unfortunately for Ant: he A; didnt particularly want one and B; the mother of the poor hooked creature was firmly against the illegal capture of her precious baby. And then it all happened.

Momma Hippo burst through the water like only a ton of hippo could, bellowing at the offending intruder. The old security guard (possibly realising how close to near death he was) reinvented himself as a tree surgeon and deftly scaled the nearby tree and Ant broke the land speed record. Til my death I will never forget the look on Ants face as his legs worked overtime to get him into the relative safety of one of our chalets. his legs pumps and his arms flailed as he raced over a series of small walls (not even 2 feet high) without ever looking back. The role of the walls quickly came to the fore as we soon found out while hippos can run at speeds greater than 40km they cannot scale anything over a foot high.

Now what happened to the calf you might ask. Well after the ordeal we were instructed to stay far away from the water but the old security guard bought back the fishing rode - completely intact.