INTRODUCTION TO LAMBS LOVE AND LAUGHTER

The book came about, largely thanks to my parents who had kept the letters that I sent regularly, describing the new life that I had made on this isolated farm in the southern Free State of South Africa.

When it was first written it appeared in "Country Life" magazine in South Africa who serialised it over the course of a year. Emboldened by its success, I enlarged the original and as memories came back to me, I added to the chapters.

In 2001, I was invited to lecture on several tours aboard the Cunard ship the QE2 and in order to have material to back up my talks, I had the book published in the UK. A power point presentation was shown as I described our lives on the farm, and to my delight, a long queue formed at the end of each lecture and my stock of books disappeared.

It has never been re-printed, but thanks to computer technology, I have been able to present it in blog form for friends who have asked for copies which I no longer have.

It was written to be read with ease and to give the reader an armchair visit to Africa. I hope that you will enjoy it too.

Kate Fagalde
Languedoc Roussillon - France 2011

Chapter 1 I'll Be Back Soon - November 1998

Bulklip Farm with the lone tree on the hillside

It’s June 1968 in the Home Counties of England, and I can still see myself, just nineteen years old and desperately pleading with my parents as I hold out a consent form for them to sign.

‘It’ll only be for a couple of years; I’ll be back before you’ve had time to miss me’.
‘But it’s so far away dear and the political conditions are not at all ideal’.
‘I don’t care about politics, the sun shines all the time and South African men are so good looking’.

Needless to say I didn’t voice this part of my argument out loud, but probably went on about the environment and how much the experience would broaden my horizons. I was determined to go to South Africa, and all it needed was the consent of my parents, and I could pack my suitcase, collect my brand new passport and head for Heathrow.

‘I don’t know. What do you think dear?’ My mother turned hopefully to my father, but to his credit, he mentioned that his recent trip to Cape Town had been a terrific success and it was obviously the land of opportunity. Mind you, he also used to say that if I could have been put in a deep freeze at thirteen and removed when I was eighteen, life would have been a far more relaxing thing, so perhaps he could see a chance for regaining a bit of peace and quiet with both of his teenage children flying the nest, what with my older brother heading off to Canada.

I could feel them weakening, and I brought in the big guns.
‘David was only eighteen, and you let him go and join the Voluntary Service Overseas in some place you’d never even heard of’ (‘and he had a ball’ – I added mentally).

My older brother had gone out to work in what was then the ex British Protectorate of Basutoland in southern Africa and had embarked on a programme of building irrigation dams and furrows and generally improving the lot of the downtrodden. At least this was the impression that my parents got. Meantime, I knew he had been learning how to fly, flirting with the beautiful daughters of the local trader and dangling his toes in the Indian Ocean whenever he got the chance. Now it was my turn; I wanted adventure, the feeling of being completely cut off from all those people who had witnessed my slow but steady metamorphosis from a gangly teenager into an independent woman. I wanted to go where no-body knew my name and I could carve out a life for myself on my own terms.

‘I promise to write every second week and join a private medical scheme’.

They couldn’t come up with any other arguments strong enough to keep me close to home and hearth, and four months later I waved them goodbye at Heathrow. I had never set foot on an aircraft before and the furthest I had travelled had been a well-chaperoned trip to Paris when I was fifteen. A nineteen year old, struggling with a large blue suitcase, wearing a smart two-piece dress and coat and sporting a new hair do. I was ready to face whatever Africa could throw at me.

In 1968, the route to South Africa was a lot more arduous than it is nowadays. Flying from London to Frankfurt, on to Lisbon and then Las Palmas, we worked our way down to Luanda, then to Windhoek, finally landing in Johannesburg. En route, fear of the unknown became reality but I did battle with the gimlet eyed German woman who ran the ladies loo in Frankfurt. She was one of those people who, had she been employed at an abattoir, would have felt that a humane killer should be considered an optional extra. But I braved it out and refused to be parted from my hard earned Deutschmarks. Scattering a few coins in the saucer, I made a run for it, followed by some fairly voluble Germanic cursing, but for the time being, I was ahead of the game. In Frankfurt, the plane filled up with tanned super-fit Germans who were headed for South West Africa, and I started to feel increasingly out of place in my smart London clothes while all around me were desert boots, slouch hats and foreign accents.

Having sweated in the sodden night-time heat of Las Palmas, we slept and ate our way on down the coast of the great continent to land at Luanda. As the door of the plane opened, Africa rushed in to meet us. Sounds and smells, voices and black faces were suddenly all around and I could see the old Africa hands scenting the air like animals returning home. We circled Windhoek in a whirling dust storm and on the third white-knuckled attempt, we crunched down onto the tarmac. The newspaper hording in the airport building did nothing to instil me with confidence , announcing as it did the recent death toll in an air disaster at the Windhoek airport.

“Is it possible to get a taxi from here to Johannesburg?” I asked some equally shaken co-passenger, but she led me to a map of Southern Africa on the nearest wall and pointed out the distance between the two places.
‘Sorry my dear, we’ll have to grit our teeth and carry on” and after a stiff, and what seemed ridiculously cheap gin and tonic, we tottered back out to the waiting plane.
‘If the plane hasn’t lifted clear within the first thirty seconds after they start rolling, you’ve had it’ came the cheerful comment from the row behind me. I have never counted to thirty so slowly in my life.

Another couple of hours and we began to see the mine dumps of the Transvaal below us and suddenly rising out of the endless veldt, there were the gleaming sky scrapers of Johannesburg.

Here I changed planes yet again and continued on to Durban, and in those days, the South African Government was so ready to welcome settlers, that my only expense was the Johannesburg to Durban leg.

Arriving in November from the grip of an early English winter, the heat took me and squeezed me. Safari-suited Europeans, coal black Zulus, colourfully dressed Indians and endless blue-rinsed matrons filled the canyon-like streets of the city. Durban was airless, humid, burning and exhausting and I quickly learned to avoid the beach and enjoy a midday siesta in the shade. Temporary jobs here and there brought in enough to pay the rent at the little English boarding house up on the Berea, and I quickly made friends and began to spread my wings. I soon realised that Natal was painfully colonial in many respects, and invitations to the Point Yacht Club and the Royal Durban Golf Club failed to show me anything new that couldn’t be found in the Home Counties of England.

My first real adventure came in the form of a skin-diving trip to Inhaca off the coast of MoVambique. Driving through the rolling hills and endless sugar plantations of Natal and Swaziland, for the first time I began to sense some of the incredible variety and beauty of the country to which I had come. The further we drove towards Maputo which was still known as LourenVo Marques, the more marked the comparison became between the civilisation of Durban and the down-at-heel towns and villages through which we passed. Pausing only at the squalor of the border gates of Goba and Golel, we pressed on into the fading light until at last we were rewarded with the lights of “LM” glowing on the horizon. A night spent in the capital was enough for us to see the faded splendour of the grand hotels and boulevards that had once made LourenVo Marques a jewel in the colonial crown of Africa, but the next day would bring us face to face with the realities of Africa.

“Man is like a flea on the back of the dog of Africa” goes the old saying, and it only takes one good shake of the dog to send you flying.

The ferry ride across to Inhaca Island was uneventful. The rickety boat was laden with a mixture of European tourists headed for the only hotel on the island, local African workers who played endless games of cards and dice, Indian traders who bartered and argued their way across the water, and our own intrepid bunch. It seemed that the whole colourful melting pot of Africa was on that boat and my senses of smell, hearing and vision were at full stretch, and for the first time, I was aware of the easy mingling of the races now that we were out of the shadows thrown by the apartheid system.

Once we landed on the island, stage two of the journey began. We arranged the hire of a felucca - the small Arab dhow that nudged its way through the sheltered waters of the island. However, our destination was the far side of the island where the diving was the best, and this would take us out of the lee of the island and dangerously close to what is known as “The Rip”. This current of water sucks out between the mainland and the island, and those who get caught up in it can be carried far out into the Indian Ocean without any chance of reaching landfall. Already it was late and the light was fading but our guides were greedy and eager to be paid.

‘We get there quick quick’ they assured us, throwing our gear into the little boat and bundling us aboard, and not having the funds between us to spend the night at the pricey hotel, nor keen to waste any time camping on the quayside, we agreed.

Sailing eastwards with the setting sun warming our backs, we dangled our fingers in the silken water and downed a bottle of Portuguese beer, and all the while, Africa was a tame beautiful creature, slumbering gently beneath us.

It was the sound of the Rip that began to strike terror into our hearts. As the light faded, we could hear the steady roaring pulsating noise and could see the distant cream of waves breaking where there were no rocks.

‘We’ve got to keep away from it; steer more to port but watch out for the rocks at the headland’. A stiff evening breeze had picked, blowing out of thunderstorms on the mainland, and the tiny sail strained under its burden and pushed us further offshore.

Mercifully our group was made up of at least four who had some sailing experience. As night fell, the locals who owned the boat had given up the fight and were prostrate on the floor of the little craft gibbering in fear. Praying to their gods, as we prayed to ours, we fought to keep the little boat from the grip of the tidal current. The darkness became complete and the taste of fear was in everybody’s’ mouth. Baling out the water that constantly splashed in over the bow, we rowed with whatever came to hand. The sandy beach lay within our reach but we were being steadily pulled out towards that white line of breaking water.

‘It’s no good’ gasped the team leader, ‘We’ll have to swim the boat in. Not you Eddy, that cut on your hand will have the sharks here in two ticks’.

With these comforting words ringing in our ears, we slid over the side and dragged the boat through the breakwaters fighting the suck and thrust of the waves that tried to take us back out again. I can still feel the taste of that wet sand as I laid my lips on it and sobbed out my fear and relief and never had the words ‘Terra Firma’ sounded more appealing.

For five days we lived on the beach, making shelters out of the great banana leaves and turning the colour of bronze. Exotic fruit grew wild and we had brought maize meal and staples with us. Combined with daily catches of fresh fish, and with bottles of local beer, wine and cheap African cigarettes to satisfy our baser cravings, we swam, sunbathed, and explored our own desert island. I learned to dive with just a snorkel, and discovered that it was almost possible to walk on water when I came face to face with a grouper and thought it was a fat idle shark. One of our number was bitten by a scorpion and was saved by a Dutch doctor who just happened to have walked across from the hotel to visit our side of the island. Africa takes no prisoners. Either luck is with you or you leave the party early For the first time, I felt the pulse of that mighty continent beating beneath me, and drifting naked in the shallows of the reef in the velvet warmth of the night under an endless canopy of stars, I began to surrender myself to the irresistible but formidable master that is Africa.

In order to return to the ferry, we unanimously voted against the felucca, and chose to walk back across the island. Bypassing swamps filled with stately pink flamingos that lifted above our heads in a silky whirr of plumage, we slapped at the eternal insects and fought with the long grasses that cut our legs. The heat was intense and the water bottles emptied far too quickly, and we dared not refill them from the swampy mosquito filled pools that we waded through. By the time we reached the other side of the island, we were exhausted, sunburnt, filthy and desperately dehydrated. The ferry wasn’t due for another couple of hours, and to his eternal credit, the owner of the hotel took pity on us. In return for our promise to remain under a large tree on the edge of the grounds and stay away from his smart guests and his pristine swimming pool, he sent out a waiter with a tray of cold beers. I’m not a beer drinker, but that was truly nectar of the Gods.

So this was to be just the beginning of what I had vaguely planned as a two year stay that eventually turned into thirty. I had enjoyed a brief taste of the real Africa and I was hungry for more. Returning to Durban, I found it impossibly English and staid. Too many of the old school had filtered down through Africa, and with the country in the grip of Apartheid, I found the chasm that existed between black and white distasteful, especially when it was being enforced by fierce policemen who shouted in guttural Afrikaans and who used sharp toothed dogs to assist them. Leaving Durban, I took up an unexpected offer of a three month secretarial contract in Basutoland which now gloried in its new name Lesotho and fascinated at the prospect of walking in my brothers’ footsteps and perhaps discovering a few of his old haunts, I packed my blue suitcase and headed for the hills.

I loved the place from the moment I arrived. Steep mountain sides cradled the village of Mohales Hoek on three sides and the valleys and hidden places stretched away endlessly, inviting me to explore. There were only twenty Europeans living in town, eight of them bachelors, a few seconded from Banks in the Republic, some representing old trading families who had been there for the past eighty years, and the usual mix of missionaries and teachers. The country had only recently been granted its’ independence by Great Britain and the road towards a politically stable future was proving to be a bit rocky. That wasn’t the only road that was a bit rocky, and I was soon to discover that all the little towns – or camps as they were called, were linked by atrocious potholed corrugated dirt roads that shook the hardiest vehicle to pieces. Light aircraft ruled here and what had hitherto seemed like a very elite form of travel became an everyday occurrence. Whoever said that pigs can’t fly never sat patiently in the back seat of a Piper Tripacer with a snuffling little pink pig in a box next to him. Pigs, chickens, dogs were all regular passengers, and the villagers in the high mountains of the interior relied totally on visits from the flying doctor and deliveries of desperately needed goods when the winter snows closed the passes.

A little social club formed the nucleus of the town, and here the European population gathered each evening, and from the single storey building incorporating a pub, a hall and a snooker room, operated the golf, tennis, bowls, shooting and fishing clubs, along with any other form of peculiar entertainment that we thought up.

Within the year, surrounded by incredible scenery and enjoying a great social life, I became engaged to one of the European traders, and shortly after I settled happily into married life with my handsome husband, security, a large comfortable home complete with household staff, an aircraft, swimming pool, cars, horses and dogs. A year later, I become pregnant with my daughter, and barely a year after that, she was joined by her brother. Faced with the prospect of a happily married daughter and two grandchildren, my parents gave up all hope of me returning to life in the Home Counties, and began saving for air tickets to come and visit.

It is at this point in the narrative where I must be forgiven for taking a huge leap forward to 1990. The intervening years are filled with a wild and wide variety of episodes, some hilarious, some agonisingly sad and some downright dangerous, but they will make an appearance in another book. Somewhere along the line, we coined the phrase “Never look back over your shoulder unless you enjoy the view”. An Irish friend was planning to go back to the old country and have this printed on thousands of tea-towels in the hope that she could retire on the profits, but for the time being, I am letting the view settle into some sort of order before I judge which bits I enjoy looking back at. (The book "Cannibals to Croissants" is finally finished)

Sadly, my extraordinary way of life was to take its toll and the handsome husband along with all the trimmings didn’t last and twenty five year later, it was time to move on. Although it wasn’t a long journey in terms of miles, it was light years away from the lifestyle that I had enjoyed. Turning my back on the little mountain kingdom, I moved across the border with my old blue suitcase, three dogs, one horse, and a new partner in life. We had found a hiding place from the world, and its’ name was Bulklip Farm.

Chapter 2 An Accidental Discovery

The Bulklip Farm garden when we first saw it

We hadn’t been on the farm all that long when I had to crank the handle on the old wall mounted telephone and ask the operator to put me through to the technician.
‘What seems to be the problem?’ she asked, fascinated as always by the doings of the strange couple who had arrived in the district.
There was nothing for it but to confess and tell her that there was a lamb on the line.
‘Do you wish to phone Mr. Lamb?’ asked our ever-helpful operator.
‘No’ I replied, ‘I have to report a lamb on the line, could you send the technician’.
‘Is this some sort of interference that you are experiencing on the line Madam?’
‘Well yes, I suppose so. We have a dead animal draped over the telephone wires’.
A somewhat heavy silence followed this and she ventured

‘Are you telling me that you have a real lamb on the 38 line?’

‘Well, yes, as a matter of fact we do’.

The latest addition to the Free State farming fraternity had struck again. We had a newborn, sickly lamb and rather than take a risk on any chance he had of survival, John and I tenderly scooped up the little scrap and raced off to our nearest farming neighbour to get his advice. Unhappily, the little fellow did not survive the trip and died before we got there. There was no point in bringing the carcass back for the dogs to get hold of, and we felt that the best plan was to hurl it into the thick undergrowth and let Mother Nature gather it to her bosom once more. However, the gentle hurl became something of a windmill action, and before I knew it, the corpse was sailing through the air and coming to land across the party line.
How come, you may ask, that instead of running a clothing agency and operating the accounting side of a large foreign construction company respectively, we were standing here, unwed, unsure of each other and of ourselves, and poking at a dead sheep on a live telephone line?

There is a tree that grows on the very pinnacle of a conical hill near to the road that runs from Zastron to Sterkspruit. For years it has been a landmark and from a distance we had often remarked on how and why it would grow there with little or no access to water apart from very intermittent rainfall. Stories about the tree abounded. There was a much embroidered tale told of how the tree was planted to protect two young lovers; real Romeo and Juliet stuff. Their families farmed neighbouring properties, but over the course of time, enmity had sprung up and the son and daughter of the opposing factions were forbidden to have anything to do with each other. However, life being what it is, they fell in love, and discovered that the safest place to meet was on the boundary fence of the two farms, which was marked by this high lonely peak.

Whether they planted the seed of the tree or nourished a sapling that they found growing there, I know not, but the tree flourished in these strange circumstances and the story goes that only love could make a tree grow under such harsh conditions. Be that as it may, I think the real story is that an old dear who used to travel from one farm to the other to meet her distant relations, planted the tree as a shady respite from the days' journey, but personally I prefer the first story. The only sad postscript is that the tree failed to survive the cruel drought of recent years, and having reached its' 99th year, it is now left standing with its dead arms reaching up waiting for the next large bolt of lightening to strike it. But when the piece of bark where we carved our initials fell off, we saved it among our collection of strange feathers, dried flowers and grasses, in memory of those who had gone before us, and who, like us, had loved each other beneath its dappled shade.

‘But what has the tree got to do with anything?’ you may ask.
We hoped that it would prove to be the secret of lasting happiness and not a day went by when I wouldn’t look up at the hillside with affection.

One Sunday, while sitting at a nearby lake where we would spend delightful weekends water skiing and windsurfing, we were speculating about what type of tree was perched on that distant hilltop, and finally curiosity got the better of us, and we went to explore. A difficult drive up an old track found us at the base of the hill, and a hot scramble in the early summer sun gave us access to the summit. The tree turned out to be an old gnarled gum tree, its limbs twisted and turned in the prevailing winds, its roots forcing their way down amid piles of loose boulders. The view from the top of the hill was spectacular; the Maluti mountains of Lesotho lay spread out to the North, the peaks of the North Eastern Cape mountains rose along the skyline to the East and the great Free State plains spread away to the South and West.

Having enjoyed the view, we noticed that nestling down in the immediate valley which spread away from the hilltop, there lay a seemingly deserted homestead. Corrugated iron roofs no longer glinted in the sun, but lay heavy under the tarnish of rust. Large trees obscured what appeared to be a rock and rubble filled garden, and the gates at the entrance hung drunkenly on their hinges. It was time for another spot of exploration and we found a track that led to the farm. We were unsurprised to find that there was no sign of habitation and windows and doors stood open in order to admit a procession of pigeons, sheep and cattle who obviously wintered in the shelter of the old houses. Evidence of their occupation was great both inside and outside the dwellings where a carpet of dried manure lay a foot thick. Two buildings made up the living area of the homestead, one a small cottage with what had been large glass windows facing north and the other, an elongated house full of broken floorboards and spiders. The soft humming of bees from the back room told us that we were the interlopers, and having given the place the once over, we withdrew.

But the magic of the place caught at our sleeves and made us pause at the front gate and look back. The afternoon sun slanted across the garden softening the lines of the house and throwing the worst of the dirty paint and piles of rubbish into shadow so that they became less predominant. It was as though we were looking at an elderly woman who, once beautiful in her youth, was suddenly caught in the soft light of evening, her beauty so long hidden becoming evident under the lines and ravages of time. We closed the gate behind us feeling somewhat proprietary about our find and drove away in deep thought. It was only as he closed the last of the farm gates leading to the property that, in shutting the gate, John realised that he had closed himself in on the farm side - almost unthinkingly creating an image of ownership.

As we drove back across the border to Lesotho, we wove dreams of how life could be if we were to live in such a place. Was it feasible that we could give up everything that had gone before and which represented a secure lifestyle, and leave it to come to this ramshackle unknown destination. Our relationship was in its early stages and we both faced the collapse of our previous marriages. John’s project in Lesotho was drawing to a close and it was being suggested that his Company planned to offer him further work in Nigeria. He had already spent seven years there and was loath to return, but the prospect of returning to France was not filling him with delight either. It was becoming increasingly clear to me that my time in Lesotho was coming to an end, and with my children reaching adulthood, the day was fast approaching when I would have to strike out on my own once more and create a new life.

All that week, the farm reached out its tentacles to us and we were unwilling to let the dream go. The following weekend, we returned to see if the image had been merely in our imagination or was in fact a reality. There lay the farm, nestling in the hollow where it had been carefully built to avoid the brunt of the fierce biting cold of the south winds. The great monolith of rock that swelled out of the nearby hillside cast its morning shadow down towards the garden as if standing over it in some kind of protective blessing, and the day lay ahead of us, leaving us free to explore and to dream once again of living here.

This time we turned our backs on the layers of sheep manure that piled up in what had been the living room, ignored the rotting planks in the dining room, the frenetic buzz of bees from the back bedroom and the army of spiders that inhabited the old blackened storeroom. It was time to visit the great rock and to see what treasures lay under its overhanging sides. We were rewarded with the discovery of small but beautiful Bushmen paintings, and found pieces of flint obviously used by roaming tribes in years gone by. The deep dew ponds held cool clear water which reflected the blue of the sky above, and once again, the view amazed us.

From here we could look down on the farm buildings knowing that should we venture into this undertaking, the work load would be enormous but the rewards as great. For what seemed hours, we lay with our backs against the sun warmed rocks, ate our bread and cheese, drank our wine and daydreamed. The two or three hectares of arable land lay below us, aching for the feel of the plough and the planting of seed. The long grasses of the grazing camps rippled in the light breeze, and we imagined our herds of cattle and sheep contentedly filling their bellies. It was there for the taking, but where to begin; how to find out whether it was abandoned, owned or just left to lie fallow.

Chapter 3 The Milagro Beanfield

Bulklip's answer to a tractor and plough

As the idea took hold in our minds, we were only vaguely supposing that any of this could have real meaning, but enquiries in the local town led us to a lawyer who knew all the ins and outs.

Yes, the farm was owned but not farmed. He doubted that the owner would sell, and if he did it would be for a high price, the property being a compact unit of only 300 hectares and therefore in demand by people such as us who wished to farm but did not want vast acreage.

Once again John and I travelled out to inspect our find and this time, there were signs of activity. A room had been cleared out near the sheds and a small dog was tethered by the door. The sheep manure had been scraped off the veranda and an effort made to prop open the front door. Mysterious but interesting! The lawyer was being evasive and it was time to take matters into our own hands and track down the owner. From a chance enquiry we found that in fact he lived on the neighbouring farm and had been watching our comings and goings with amusement. In that tight-knit farming community, I imagine that he had already been notified by the lawyer that our interests lay in the direction of possibly purchasing the farm, and a date for further discussions was made. I knew that not only would the nuts and bolts of the actual sale come under the spotlight, but also whether or not John and I were deemed to be suitable neighbours.

‘Whatever they offer you to drink, accept it with good grace’ I said, tweaking his collar straight and brushing some crumbs off his shirt front.
‘But what if it’s tea?’ he queried in worried tones. ‘I don’t think I could ever drink tea’
‘Look, this is no time to be French and difficult. If tea is what’s on offer, then that’s what you have to drink’.

And so it was that John sat poised on the edge of a large armchair coping with a cup of tea and a plate of home made sponge cake trying hard to hide the grimace on his face. At least I managed to get our hostess to pour it black, weak and without sugar, or I doubt that the deal would ever have gone through. We must have passed inspection however, and the farmer said he was prepared sell to us and to come within range of our price and on the understanding that he grazed his sheep on the property until we had paid in full, we could take possession as soon as the papers were signed.

So, here we were at a crossroads in our lives, deciding whether to cease our safe and gainful employment as an Accountant, and a Sales Rep, in order to become what we would laughingly call "Farmers". But the seed of the idea had been planted as surely as if we had thrust it deep into the moist soil of the lands, and we signed on the dotted line, formed ourselves into a Company and took possession of "Our Farm". Oh the joy, the elation, the fear of the unknown but the deep determination that the road on which we had set our feet was the way ahead. It would take much untangling to free ourselves of the lives that we had led. Decisions had to be made, resignations handed in from jobs that had provided the security of large and regular pay checks, and finally we each made the difficult but firm decision to turn our backs on what had constituted our lives previously.

Bit by bit, we carved out a corner where we could set up camp, and began to spend wonderful weekends sloshing around with paint, and scraping and digging out infrastructures that emerged from their coating of manure and dirt. Once the rooms had been cleared and the paintwork freshened in the cottage, it was possible to lay our heads down on camping mattresses and to start to spend the occasional night despite the chilly wind blown conditions. We even managed to gather sufficient damp wood to start a smoky fire over which we cooked a warming mutton poitjie stew, As we settled down to devour it by the light of one flickering hurricane lamp, we planned future meals to be eaten "al fresco" under the shade of the weeping willows whilst looking out over our immaculate gardens. A blanket hung over the empty window frame keeping out the worst of the wind and rain and we slept the sleep of the exhausted, filled with dreams of life on the farm.

Up until this time we had needed a four-wheel drive vehicle to enter and leave the farm which was based in a hollow of surrounding hills. Wonderful falls of rain soaked into the ground and filled the farm dam to overflowing, and we started to eye the section of arable land situated below the old orchard.

‘Beans’ was a suggestion; ‘sheep don’t eat beans’.

And so began the Milagro Beanfield War which was in time to give its name to that section of the farm. The thick wet earth of the land clung to our boots, to our spades, and to the feet of my Weimeraner dog called Mr. Dumpy who plodded about like a skittish cart horse with great clods of earth stuck to his paws. Differing views abounded on how to get the seed into the ground without the back breaking business of bending down to insert each one, and in no time, we had devised a method whereby a length of towel rail was held in one hand and a fistful of seeds in the other.

Having enrolled the help of a couple of staunch friends, one walked ahead with a spiked stick creating a hole in the ground, while the next one followed, placing the open ended piping on top of the hole, and dropped the seed down the tube. The hole was then closed by the third member of the team doing a sort of inverted duck walk up and down the line, and bit by bit we managed to get ten rows of beans into the ground. Great was our joy when a week or so later, we were rewarded with signs of green shoots appearing. Still the rains blessed us and in no time we had a respectable stand of bean plants; but then the sheep struck and disproved the theory about not eating beans. They not only devoured the leaves, but dragged the roots out of the ground and gobbled them too. So much for bean farming while still acting as host to our neighbours' sheep. In a way it was good because it spurred us on to make the final payment to the previous owner, and true to his word he removed his bean filled sheep and we could settle down to planning our next crop.

For ever in search of ways to finance our venture, we decided that potatoes were always in great demand and reckoned that if we could just drag open a furrow, we could drop the seed potatoes in and have a wonderful crop both in time for Christmas, and for delivery to the local supermarket. In our minds eye, we sat down to steaming bowls of new baby potatoes, glistening with butter and sprinkled with the fresh parsley that would be growing in our vegetable garden (as yet unplanned and unplanted). We had no plough, we had no tractor, but we had determination, and after a visit to our local friendly wholesaler who provided us with a single blade plough which we hitched behind the four-wheel drive vehicle, we were ready for action. Slowly the truck moved off, towing the plough behind it, but we soon discovered that care had to be taken not to drive too fast or the operator guiding the implement would be hurled around corners with the plough share clear of the earth which in turn would result in a spate of colourful language of a non-agricultural type.

The team was then formed up and, line abreast like some biblical scene of old, “we ploughed the fields and scattered" dropping our seed potatoes into the furrows. Once our crop was safely in, we called on the assistance of my son who by this time was fast becoming a water-skier of note. Manfully balancing his weight across the top of the three cornered rake on which we had mounted a concrete lintel, and hanging onto a ski rope attached to the back of the truck, we dragged both him and his implement up and down the field closing the furrows over, leaving the potatoes to settle in to the warm moist earth.

The first official harvest from Bulklip was honey. We had tried all sorts of methods to cope with the bee infestation under the boards in the back bedroom but in the absence of a skilled apiarist, we finally gave up the unequal struggle and blasted them out with spray. Once the mounds of carcasses had been shovelled out, we lifted the boards and found rack after rack of dripping combs which we enjoyed enormously with our breakfast toast.

At about this time, the old orchard decided to show us what it was capable of. Having spent the past ten years without the benefit of either pruning or spraying, a vast harvest of peaches, pears, plums, nectarines, apricots, quinces and apples was forthcoming. We invested in a ladder and engaged a couple of young lads from the neighbouring farm to give us a hand, and I imagine that they ate their own weight in fruit, but it was better than seeing it go to waste. The harvest was gathered and having been carefully graded, the fruit was laid out in empty beer boxes begged from the “bottle store” as the off-licence was called, and from there, it was transported to town to be sold in return for funds that would help with the purchasing of such necessities as petrol to keep the trucks going and wine to keep us going.

Each trip to civilisation became something of an exploration. Having lived relatively close to the little border town of Zastron for many years, but only ever having used it for trips to the doctor and dentist, and to produce my two children in the little cottage hospital, John and I began to discover hitherto untapped delights such as the farmers Co-operative, the Silos and Grain Store, and the Country Shop which rendered up all sorts of goodies. Once we learned where to look, we could purchase seeds, tools, fresh cream, eggs, gallons of milk and pots of jam. There were remedies for everyone and everything from sore feet to sore udders, and most of the time, service was given along with a cup of tea and a dissertation on how and when to plant, reap, shear and calve. I soon learned to drink the tea and hold my peace, whilst absorbing as much of the information as possible.

On passing by our neighbouring farm, we were more often than not hailed in to drink yet more tea and to be laden down with boxes of fresh vegetables and fruit. By now they had grasped the idea that the French only drank coffee and a special brew was always prepared for John, and the teenage children would sit spellbound while they listened to his accent. I was already something of a rarity coming from England, but to have someone as exotic as a Frenchman sitting in their home must have been like having a Dalek dropping in. The hospitality and kindness of the Afrikaner which up until then had been a totally unknown quality, was making itself evident and we were blessed with neighbours with open hearts and minds.

It quickly became apparent that one of my first priorities should be to embark on a swift course of basic Afrikaans, and casting aside my French language books which were making very little impact on my broken school girl efforts, I changed my "Oui's and Non's" for "Ja's and Nee's". I limped along doing irrevocable damage to the language, and on one occasion while watching the neighbour’s children fill a large basket with fresh green beans for me, realised that instead of getting them to stop, I was urging them on to greater efforts. It was like the sorcerers apprentice who wouldn't stop filling the buckets! I was forever offering to buy things instead of sell them, and to spend money instead of save it, but the patience of my neighbours and the townsfolk, and the ability of my staff to converse using very short simple words gave me a certain shaky confidence.

Chapter 4 In Vino Veritas

My mother with Bokkie - a not altogether welcome addition to her daily walk

There was only so much fruit that we could sell during the annual glut, and I realised that the baskets of produce that were not only being plucked from our trees but also delivered to our door by the neighbours, were going to be sadly wasted unless I took action. The gift of a wine making kit at Christmas had me all fired up to experiment, and into the bubbling buckets went mulches of peaches, pears and nectarines, combined with such chemicals as would hopefully turn the contents into vintage wines of such fineness and clarity and bouquet as to solve our farm Co-operative account problems in one go. Weeks past as I thrust the hydrometer into the seething mass and tried to translate the readings. The gasses escaping from the tubes and bubblers led me to believe that I had my feet on the right path, but "in vino veritas".

In time, the mysterious racking off began. The day that we attempted this happened to coincide with the first country-wide referendum to be taken during the dismantling of apartheid. As each vote came in reflecting the willingness of yet another region of South Africa to take the brave step into the unknown and put the sad bad days behind them, we felt it necessary to raise our glasses in a toast, and between us we felt as though we were floating on the winds of political change. There was always a bit extra that wouldn't fit into the bottle and which found its way into a glass and John and I found increasingly that one glass tasted like two and the third had us snoring gently out on the stoep as we learned to call the deep shady veranda. Strict instructions in the manual told us to let it mature for at least a year. Like some of the early Rhodesian wines, "Not a drop was drunk until it was four hours old" and I have to confess that the bulk of it was drunk before the corks even had a chance to soak and swell. For a while our trips to the loo increased and visits to the bottle store decreased and there were times when we farmed with a somewhat glazed expression and eventually it was decreed that home made wine should only be drunk at lunchtime on Sunday when the rest of the day could be spent supine sleeping off the effects.

By now we were ready to receive our first official guests. The front wall of the old kitchen store had been knocked out and new French Windows installed, creating what we call "The Breakfast Room". To start the day here savouring freshly baked bread rolls, home made marmalade and steaming hot coffee while the sunshine filtered in through the ivy which draped the veranda was very pleasant. The dogs lay outside soaking up the early warmth, waiting in hope for the last crust to be tossed out of the open doorway, while plans were laid for the day's duties. A large window had been installed in the kitchen as I felt it my right to have a decent view while washing up, and there were great plans afoot for a rose garden and bird table outside that particular window which would considerably enhance the prospect of scouring greasy frying pans and pots. The bathroom was now useable with running water both hot and cold and we were even the proud possessors of a six foot long bath tub . A shower had been installed and judging by the dirt attached to the noble fellow who had spent a hot day up in the roof installing the electrical systems it was high on the list of jobs requiring urgent attention.

We had managed to move out of the small cottage where we had camped while the main house took shape and became habitable, and we were ready to show the farm in its new light. Invitations were issued and guests arrived bearing gifts ranging from kitchen utensils to a farm truck loaded with canna cuttings. Surprise and praise greeted our efforts and a happy time was spent enjoying the warmth of a summer's evening out on the stoep, while overhead the canopy of stars glistenened and the full moon appeared from behind the great rock to throw its silvered light over the garden.

Supper that evening consisted of four large legs of mutton that had been cut into pieces, and a assortment of fresh vegetables, French herbs and thick wine stock. All this had been placed in an enormous black cooking pot which stood like some great black-bellied toad crouching over a bed of coals, and the steam that escaped told of the delectable promises within. The meal was rounded out by great wheels of "Pot Bread" baked by our neighbour, and large slices of milk tart provided by the local farm stall. Why does everything taste so much better out of doors? The dogs eyed the cooking pot the following morning somewhat dolefully but there was hardly enough left to pour over their pellets for breakfast.

One thing that we became increasingly aware of was that the absence of rain. High temperatures and hot dry winds scoured at the garden and we soldiered on bearing buckets of water to try and keep our new plants going. There was a reservoir up behind the house and this was fed from the windmill some way off. We seemed to spend an awful lot of time digging up lengths of pipe and fixing endless leaks, and the most worrying job was lifting the hefty manhole cover on top of the tank and peering into the depths to see what reserves we still had.

John was not to be beaten however, and set about installing a slow drip irrigation system in the newly established vegetable garden and to our delight, a crop of beans and peas turned out to be record breaking. Packets of them disappeared into the deep freeze and our pride in our efforts knew no bounds. It was the beginning of the dream to be self sufficient here on the farm. Would there come a day when we could produce our own meat, milk, bread and vegetables? If only we had the recipe for gin! The coffee table in the lounge groaned under the weight of what became known as "R.T.F.M's" Whenever there was a problem ranging from electricity, plumbing, repairing the roof, installing the new fireplace, destroying the greenfly, mulching the roses and generally keeping the systems going, the answer was to be found somewhere on the coffee table. When the cry went up "How on earth do you.….?" the reply would come back
"R.T.F.M." (Read the flipping manual")!

It was around this time that "Bokkie" made her first appearance. Driving back from town, I realised that tripping along behind the truck was a delicate hornless and apparently homeless roe-buck. Thinking that it would lose interest and turn off into the veldt, I ignored it, but to my surprise, there it was when I drew into the garden. That day just happened to be Johns' birthday, and I proudly announced that I had brought him a gift. Bokkie had found a new home and a few local enquiries established that she had been orphaned at birth, dehorned, and then banished from the farm where she grew up, due to her rather unpleasant habit of buffeting small children. Since we had none of the latter, we decided that if she found us acceptable hosts, we would do nothing to deter her. And so it was that we could look out through the open doors of the Breakfast Room on a fine summers morning to see four dogs, two horses and now Bokkie enjoying the shade of the large trees in the garden, and on occasions, her head would be poking around the corner of the door with as much enthusiasm as her canine companions.

For a few years she was a great conversation piece but was the scourge of ladies who visited wearing voluminous skirts. She just loved to get her head entangled in all that flapping cloth much to the concern of the wearer, and when she couldn't find anyone to entertain her with their own apparel, she would stand next to the washing line with a look of ecstasy on her face while the sheets blew around her ears. She proved to be handy for anyone in training for the local rugby team as her great delight was to engage in head to head shoving sessions like some four legged scrumming machine, and her affection for Klippie the sheep dog was boundless. The two of them would race across the open veldt, first dog chasing buck, and then buck chasing dog . But Bokkie came to a mysterious and sudden end, A search of local farm huts rendered up a suspicious amount of fresh biltong - (dried strips of meat), and I hope that she gave them indigestion and blunted their teeth for she was a delight to have around and was sadly missed.

Throughout the years I had lived in Lesotho, I was never without a horse, but following a severe fall while engaging in the unlikely sport of tent-pegging, my riding career had come to an end. However having all that land meant that horses were going to be a natural addition to the menagerie that was slowly building up. At one stage there were eight of them, all belonging to our neighbouring farmer, but eventually we settled down to having just the two. Of these two, only one was truly ours and she represented the end of my love affair with Lesotho.

Lady Grey had been found by the stock theft control unit just inside the border of the country whilst I was still resident there. Stolen from a farm in the Free State, she had been beaten and abused and her injuries were so great that she had been left on the street to die. She no longer had the strength even to nibble at the grass verges or stumble to the water trough, and it was evident that she was going to be hit by a passing taxi before long. Having been cruelly hobbled with wire for several days while she was driven cross-country, her lower legs were now devoid of flesh, but our marvellous Vet from Zastron was not to be deterred. Packing the wounds with granulated sugar, he then bandaged them and having given her a massive injection of antibiotics, told us not to remove the dressings for at least two weeks. Once the maggot infested stinking bandages were taken off and replaced, we had to continue this pattern for the next few months as slowly and miraculously, the tissue began to reform and the skin covered the wounds. The itching and irritation must have been dreadful for her, and occasionally she would bite the bandages off and destroy weeks of healing as she removed the scabs, but we soldiered on, determined that she would regain her health. Slowly but surely she became more confident and she learned to associate the medical kit with its accompanying bag of carrots and apples, and would stand patiently as we re-dressed her wounds and salved her scars.

As evidence in a stock theft case, she had to remain at the behest of the Magistrate but in the meantime, a year of consistent care and medication had transformed her from a skeletal mass of sores and scabs into a fine well fed horse. At the moment when she was sufficiently recovered to have been of use, the Magistrate called for her to be presented at the courtroom as evidence, and on enquiring as to what her fate would be following her appearance, I was informed that she would be shot and eaten.

Time was of the essence, and a few swift phone calls and the usual greasing of palms had her into a horsebox and out of the country to the safety of Bulklip which we had recently purchased. As I unloaded her, I promised that she would never leave the safety of the farm and never again would she feel the weight of either a man or a whip across her back.

She settled in under the willow trees and was shortly joined by Charlie who was a retired pure-bred Arab horse who had been kindly donated by our neighbour. Such was the friendship that grew between these two that on the rare occasions when they were separated, Lady would stand by the gate with her head hanging down and a look of unbearable sadness in her eyes. On his return, Charlie would be met with much whickering and whinnying, as she rubbed her neck against his and whiffled in his ears in an expression of pure love.

All the time we were there, they come to the fence each morning and Lady would call out for her carrots, bread and apples. The scars will always encircle her legs where the wire cut into her and she will be forever wary of men, but she slowly learned that on Bulklip she was safe and loved and our reward was the sight of her and Charlie galloping side by side across the high fields like two teenagers let out of school for the day.

We had a variety of dogs on the farm. There was Mr Dumpy, my large grey Weimeraner who sported a pair of bright yellow eyes and who definitely instilled fear into the local farm workers. Quite honestly he was a bit of a wimp, but he had a heart of gold and would stand between me and any stranger and rumble deep in his throat. Word must have gone out because we never experienced a break-in or uninvited guest the whole time we were there. Then there was Klippie the sheep dog. He was actually an Australian Cattle Dog and would tend to push the sheep rather than round them up, but he was brilliant at ducking in between the cows and avoiding the horns and heels of the nastier ones. Klippie lived in awe of Mr Dumpy and would prostrate himself at his feet, and even put up with a severe roughing up if Dumpy thought he had overstepped some imaginary line.

Muffy was a little snowball of a dog. Being a Maltese Poodle, she was forever in need of a haircut to avoid the thistles and sticky grass becoming embedded in her fur and she often bore witness to my appalling hairdressing skills. We had rescued her from the rather over-enthusiastic attentions of the children who belonged to our African staff, and once shampooed and de-wormed, she was a most attractive and intelligent little character. In addition to this menagerie, there were also a selection of ducks, a turkey and a few geese that came and went, (usually via the oven I am sorry to add), and the two hundred or so chickens that gave us a bit of cash flow, but they certainly couldn’t be regarded in the same bracket as pets.

Chapter 5 Noodle and Friends

Becoming self sufficient - except we never learned how to make gin!

It was time for the serious side of farming to be approached and this we undertook with the purchase of some twenty head of young newly weaned heifer calves. John had travelled back to France to tie up the final loose ends and I was the one elected to go to the famous Green Weaner Sale over at New England in the Barkly East district.
Cattle breeding, especially of the Hereford strain, was first rate in this area, and with friends in the farming world to turn to for advice, I thought it a good place to find the youngsters that would form our breeding herd, Once again, it was the kindness and freely given knowledge of the farmers present that decided my selection, and in time our chosen weaners were duly delivered to the farm and I spent what seemed to be hours leaning on the gate gazing at them. The following morning found me leaning on the gate straining my eyes in the hopes of catching a glimpse of just one of our newly acquired cattle. Not a sign of a single animal was to be seen and I knew that stock theft had struck and our as yet unpaid for cattle were all gone. A frantic phone call to my long-suffering neighbour had him in fits of laughter.

‘Not gone’ he chuckled, ‘merely grazing on the hillside above my farm’.
With great relief I and two assistants rounded them up and bought them home and then spent the next few days strengthening fences and gates. John re-appeared from France with a marvellous pair of binoculars to help me in my search for missing stock and in time, these diminutive calves were to grow into beautiful adult cows, each one presenting us with healthy offspring every Spring.

We soon learned that if we were going to run a herd of cattle, there were a certain number of precautions that must be taken if we were to avoid such horrendous things as Contagious Abortion and the dreaded Black Quarter Disease. John was incredible when it came to fixing the windmill and keeping the generator running, but when it came to needles, he would turn a grey/green colour and sweat profusely. It soon fell to me to learn how to inoculate cattle and with the welcome addition of a head clamp to hold them steady while I aimed and fired, we could get through the whole herd in pretty quick time.

However, feeling ones way in the dark is not always the easiest thing, and we lost one cow through our own complete stupidity. "Learner fees" the Vet told us and tried to offer consolation by informing us that a distant neighbour had lost no less than ten cows that week. September we discovered is known as the killing month. The new shoots of green growth are up after the brown dry grass of winter, and the cattle rush headlong from outcrop to outcrop, using up valuable energy and not gaining enough in food to maintain their already somewhat weakened winter condition. If not checked and fed extra nutritives, the cow will sicken and die very quickly unless one is aware of what is happening. John and I paid our dues very sadly and went on to become wiser and more observant farmers.

We then decided to spread our wings and embarked on sheep farming on a very small scale. A friend had been getting rid of a group of elderly rams that had finished work and four of them found their way to the farm. One by one they continued their journey into the deep freeze, but one likely looking character was given a stay of execution and allowed to run with the eight ewes that had also been bought for slaughter. Possibly in the interests of avoiding the drive down to the town abattoir, he would insist on taking his newly acquired harem and disappearing for days at a time giving us much cause for concern in case the jackals that roamed the area had attacked them.

Having held off for nearly eight months and having seen no sign of lambs and very little of the ram and his ewes, we decided to send him on his way to join his brothers. The deed being done, we released the ewes back into the veldt where, two weeks later, they all began to give birth to a series of fine strong lambs, several of whom appeared as twins. The ram was firmly in the deep freeze and his progeny were leaping about the farm, a sharp lesson to us to invest in pregnancy testing!
His off-spring lived on Bulklip for many years and his successor was a fine ram called Nelson, having been purchased at the time of the first Elections. Nelson proved to be every bit as fertile as his predecessor and almost all of the ewes produced twins. In fact on his famous namesake's birthday, our only black ewe named Winnie, produced one black and one white lamb. A truly democratic birth!

It was during the early stages of our sheep experiences that we found an orphan lamb who had got itself tangled up in a wire fence while its mother lay dead a few metres away. Instead of wisely consigning him to the shed outside, I sat in the warm kitchen picking the scraps of dried after birth from the little woolly coat of this pathetic scrawny baby who curled up on my lap and bleated pitifully as I tried to get it to suck on a milk moistened rag. Once you have let a hansie (orphan) lamb into your home and your heart, you are doomed. The floor is continually covered in puddles or chocolate drops, milk purchases increase drastically, waking hours are filled with cries of "merm, merm" and all this time, the lamb no longer knows that it is supposed to be a sheep but has joined forces with the dogs and begins to behave just like one.

The first thing to do was to fix him up with some form of nappy. This problem was solved with a plastic shopping bag with the bottom two corners cut off for his back legs. Under his tum would go a thickly padded towel and the bag handles would be tied neatly around his neck with a piece of baling string. This meant that he could spend more time inside the house on my lap and less time out in the cold night air.

We soon discovered that he loved watching television, and although he would fall asleep during party political broadcasts, he was on the edge of his chair during any sort of “skop, skeet and donner” (a shouting, shooting and hitting) movie . “Noodle” as he became know, would race down to the gate along with our ferocious guard dogs and stand sentinel while they barked at any interloper, and would jump onto the back of the truck and let the wind blow his ears around with Klippie the sheep dog on one side of him and Mr. Dumpy on the other.

As he grew into a teenager, he became particularly enamoured of Klippie and one farming neighbour who watched him in amazement as he repeatedly mounted the sheep dog was heard to say "I think you’d better put me down for one of the pups".
On one occasion, we had trouble with a young calf and it was necessary to rush it down to our local Vet for an injection. Whilst loading the calf, the two dogs and Noodle also jumped into the back of the truck, and not having time to spend arguing the toss, we left the entire bunch of them on the back and headed for town. Once the vet had done his job, we proceeded to the Post Office where we parked and went in to collect the mail, and on returning to the truck, we found a bemused friend standing staring at the vehicle.

‘Now folks’ she said ‘we all know you have started farming and we appreciate that it must be great fun, but the basic idea is that when you come to town, you leave the animals on the farm’. There, leaning out of the back windows of the canopy, was the calf, two dogs and a sheep all eyeing the passing population. I chuckled and wondered what she would say when she saw us going for a walk on the farm, accompanied by four dogs, two horses, one sheep and a buck and, in time, the addition of a couple of ducks and a turkey.

Chapter 6 Hellfire and Brimstone

Bulklip Rock after which the farm was named

We progressed slowly for some considerable time undertaking most of the heavy work ourselves with assistance from two labourers who came to work on a casual basis. However, there came a time when it was just no longer possible to manage and we employed a married couple to give a hand. The standard of Jacob’s work was fairly good, but his ability to lay into his wife was too much to cope with, and after having seen her departing in a huff twice in one week, we decided that the best thing would be for her to set up home closer to her mother who seemed to have some control over the situation.


This couple were replaced some months later by Stephen and Angelina, and their three small sons, Joseph, Kolani and Patrick. They arrived in a truck that appeared to be held together with rope, laden with the contents of their previous home, and in no time they had rebuilt and enlarged the staff house allotted to them and they settled in for the foreseeable future.

Kolani aged six had obvious plans of earning his keep as the mechanic around the farm, and it became essential to remove the keys from all the vehicles lest he decided to either drive it or strip the engine. Patrick endeared himself to John by asking for "Pom Pom" which had originally derived from the French “Bon Bon”. He dearly loved to drive the wheelbarrow and was a cheerful little soul with an ever-ready grin that would light his face. Poor Angelina laboured endlessly for her household of menfolk, sorely missing a daughter with whom she could share the tasks, but at the end of a busy week, she must have had an excellent home brewed beer recipe, judging from the laughter and singing that could be heard coming from the staff quarters. They had a large plot of garden allocated to them and produced a steady supply of fresh vegetables, and their collection of broody hens kept them well supplied with both eggs and meat. Sadly their sojourn on the farm came to an end after nearly three years as the distance from the local farm school became too much for the stubby little legs of Patrick and Kolani, and they found employment nearer family and schooling. I missed the bright appearance of Angelina who wielded the Basotho grass broom and a duster with great effect and could bring a gleam to the old English silver that it never saw in its' previous history, and probably has not seen since!

It never occurred to me how conscious one becomes of the weather conditions when you farm. If the wind is blowing, there will be water lifted by the windmill; if it is a still calm day, you must check that the troughs haven’t run dry. If the sun burns down too strongly, young plants will perish and if the rain beats down too hard, seedlings are washed away and dongas (erosion furrows) created.

Farming seemed to revolve around the weather forecast, and this often came, not in weighty words from the Met Office reports on the TV but in creaking knees, the opinions of wise old men down in the town and wisps of cloud which appear over the ridge. People would tell me of flowers in their gardens which had not bloomed since the last big rains. I heard of birds that only sang prior to a downpour; I learned about cakes flopping because of falling barometric pressure and mostly I learned about drought.

Years before when growing up as a child in England, drought was a word that occurred in exciting books about far away places. In England it rained at least twice a week and normally spoiled something you had planned to do or soaked you on your bicycle on the way back from school. Now drought had become a very real enemy and it was tightening its grip not only on us, but on the whole of Southern Africa. We began to see the farm dam slowly ebbing away and the grass staying crisp and brown far longer at the end of winter. The fountains in the farm did not rise as strongly, trees shed their leaves sooner and day after day we awoke to clear blue skies and the promise of yet another hot dry day.

With no build-up of storm clouds to break the heat of a summers day and no grey winter rainfalls, month after month went by with no sign of rain. The water reserves on the farm became dangerously low and bathing was something that you did in a shallow puddle of water which was then carted out and thrown on the shrivelling rose bushes. A cleansing shower was anxiously timed by those awaiting their turn for a "spit and polish", and the idea of leaving a tap running while you cleaned your teeth was completely foreign.

In time, it became apparent that we were no longer going to be able to survive on the water lifted by the windmill, and so, hitching up a borrowed trailer which was loaded with a large empty tank and a pump, John and I would head for the Municipal dam some ten kilometres away. Here we would stand up to our thighs in brown muddy water and pray that this time the pump would work, the tanks wouldn't leak, the bungs had not been lost and that the vehicle would have the strength to drag the load back up the hill to the farm. On one heart-breaking occasion, we got the three thousand litres of precious water to the front gate of the farm whereupon one of the tanks burst and its contents spilled uselessly down the driveway. That evening, we sat with our heads in our hands and wondered what had ever made us think we could farm. But on we went, day after day, hauling sometimes three loads up for thirsty cattle, trying to keep man and animal alive on the dwindling supplies.

It was at the height of this battle that the very real danger of veldt (grass) fires arose. By now, the grazing on all the surrounding farms was tinder-dry and it only took a bolt of lightening from an errant cloud, or the casual stupidity of a farm worker who threw out a pan of hot ash into the long grass, to do untold damage. Great plumes of smoke rising from behind the hills of the farm and the urgent ringing of the party line, would tell us that once again it was time to load what little water we had, take as many wet sacks and branches as we could lay hands on, and set out to help with the large contingent of fire fighters that seemed to meet three times a week on varying farms.

It was comforting to see how, without the slightest hesitation, farmers would leave their beds in the middle of the night, or abandon their work during the day, and appear at any given time with a full compliment of staff and fire fighting equipment. Such was the ongoing danger that increasing numbers of farmers purchased state of the art fire fighting gear and water tankers mounted on trucks became a common sight. It was not uncommon to find that town-dwellers had also appeared to give a hand. More often than not, they were connected to the farms by family, or in the case of the Bank Managers, by large debt.

One night, the phone rang as we had been watching a distant blaze and we were informed that the wind had shifted and it was headed our way. One only knows true fear when everything that you have worked for is threatened by something over which you have no control. Taking the farm truck, John and I drove out into the smoky black wind blasted night and in desperation blew the hooter repeatedly, and called to our cattle somewhere out in the dark hillsides. On the advice of friends, we had performed this action since they were youngsters, always rewarding them with a few sheaves of lucerne but we had never tried it under these conditions. To our complete amazement, out of the smoke and the wind came our entire herd and we led them to safety on the previously burnt half of the farm.

It then remained to pack up what little there was of real value and place it in the concrete block cool room which had been hosed down to give it maximum protection and then we waited and watched as the flames came closer and the smoke billowed around the house. Whatever great power there is, decreed that we should be spared that night and the fire rampaged past the buildings and continued its deadly path on down the valley, killing at least one farm worker from a neighbouring farm, and burning terrified stock trapped in its path. We awoke the next morning, having slept fully clothed and ready to run, and looked at each others blackened faces and reddened eyes and went to inspect our scorched veldt wondering yet again why we ever thought we could cope with this new life.