If you have a temper tantrum because you have to leave your lodge, it’s got to be pretty good right? To be fair, my sulks on leaving Montusi were between me, the grasses and the birds, but I couldn’t help resenting the long drive and the perfectly blameless hire car that were to break me and Montusi apart. Why couldn’t the irritatingly efficient machine break down and leave me stranded, just for a day or two?
My most recent trip to South Africa had got off to something of a rocky start, with unseasonal storms in almost every place I visited. After a long drive through rural KwaZulu Natal Montusi welcomed me with a cosy fire and vast windows that framed the lightening crackling along the top of the Drakensberg.
Opening my eyes the next morning to glorious sunshine and the sort of view you have to photograph (just so you can show off about it later) I headed for the peak of Mount Montusi. Hiking through meadows that smelled of wild mint and listening to the clanking cowbells only cemented my love for Montusi. Sadly, it seemed as if I had just a few brief stolen moments to admire the view and the bushman rock art (in the UK it’d be behind glass and a velvet rope, here it’s on an open cave wall), and then I had to leave.
Au Revoir Montusi, I’ll be back!
EXTRAORDINARY AFRICA 