News
Update from August 2003
This course went very well again and 6 out of the 7 students passed.
Yet again Antares continues to have an extremely good record with FGASA.
6 of them went on to write the FGASA exam and 4 of them passed and we
wish them well.
This course was made up of 2 South Africans, and the rest were from
UK, Australia and New Zealand. Their reasons for doing the course were,
as always, varied but some of them would like to consider continuing
with guiding as a career. Their ages varied also from 22 to 65, which
goes to prove that you don't have to be young attend the course.
One of the favourite activities during the course was our visit to the Swadini Reptile Park followed by a trip to Moholoholo Rehab. Centre. This gave the students a fantastic opportunity to get close up and personal with some of the birds and other animals they had been learning about. Its only when you stand there with a vulture on your arm do you really appreciate just how big these birds are!
The students were treated to a number of elephant sightings particularly in the early part of the course. On one day we were visited by an lone bull elephant who spent the next 5 hours pulling down trees just outside the classroom window. Needless to say the distraction levels were very high and not too much was taught that day. However it was a great experience for the students to be able to sit on the steps to the centre and have an elephant feeding on a Marula tree only 6 metres from them. This was a greater learning lesson than anything a book can offer.
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| One large distraction for the day! | I think that's close enough now! |
A few days later the students were treated to another fantastic experience when 3 cheetah walked past the buildings at daybreak. Some of the students were lucky enough to be able to witness them at close quarters whilst others got to see them half an hour later, a bit further off into the bush as they walked back in the other direction.
As always the highlight of the course was the sleep out under the stars. Yet again we were extremely lucky with our sightings. We had two days sleeping out under the stars and went on a long walk each morning. On the first day we were fortunate enough to view hippo, buffalo and rhino. The second morning walk was not quite as productive but we did have a fantastic viewing of 7 giraffe in the open, and to make it even more memorable, one of the babies was suckling from its mother.
The sleep
out unfortunately was cut short by a day as the one student wasn't feeling
too well. It would appear that he was suffering from Tambotie poisoning,
having placed a piece of wood on the fire the night before during their
shift of keeping watch. In the end he put it down to a learning experience,
as did all the other students and apart from feeling weak for a couple
of days due to an upset stomach he suffered no other ill effects.
As always the students had frequent sightings of zebra and wildebeest
coming to drink at night as well as warthogs on a daily basis. All in
all this was a successful and memorable course.
We look forward to the next course starting in November and pray that by then we will have had some much needed rain. The temperatures in the early part of October are averaging around 35°C and there is not a sign of rain yet. The bush is looking very dry and the animals can be seen at midday trying to make the most of what little shade there is available.