South Africa is a long day from our New Zealand home. The most direct route for us is from Auckland via Sydney. This entails leaving home the day prior to departure, a short sleep with 2:30am start for an early flight out of Auckland. Sydney airport is busy and disrupted by building renovations meaning no gate lounge but we eventually board our flight bound for Johannesburg. I have previously travelled this route regularly but not for 9 years. The change from Boeing 747 to Airbus A380 is a big upgrade with more space and a much quieter more comfortable environment in economy class. I watch a few nature documentaries, read a little and manage to sleep a little. We arrive at 4pm of the same day we left Auckland, chasing the sun’s passage across the earth. Our bodies, still on Auckland time, feel it is early morning of the following day.
Immigration goes smoothly, if slowly and we are soon reunited with our baggage and then, more excitedly with my sister and niece who have come to meet us. A short drive later with the dry dustiness once familiar in a past life now foreign, we arrive in the oasis of a Johannesburg garden. My sister has moved home since our last visit and it is lovely to see the shape of her new life. Buoyed by excitement we enjoy a meal before exhaustion overwhelms our consciousness.
Refreshed, I wake early to await the sunrise and the sounds of the day. As always the birdsong precedes the glow of sun in the east and it is a while before I can clearly see the singers. A comfortable chair in the conservatory with folding doors thrown wide has me outside in the cool morning air and inside simultaneously. A mug of coffee and a rusk wakes my present and memories of my past.
My sister caters well for human and avian visitors and has a supply of bird food for me to replenish feeders and is tolerant of me moving hanging baskets in the tree to clear sight lines and backgrounds.
An interesting aside is that I can use my phone to photograph the hanging basket locations to restore their positions later. I remember our father, at my age, kept a notebook and pen in his pocket to write down things he wanted to remember – he would have loved a smartphone.
As the day brightens I begin to see the birds clearly enough to begin to identify and photograph them. This is not s location familiar to my childhood so new species are possible along with old familiars. Red-headed finches were the most exciting new find as I don’t consciously recall ever seeing them before.
Grey Go-away-birds grazing on the pink petals of camels foot trees alway remind me of giant mousebirds so it was nice to see Red-faced and Speckled mousebirds amongst the foliage too.
The ubiquitous laughing and Cape turtle doves are punctuated by episodic Rameron pigeons which I discover are now African Speckled pigeons.
The assumed Olive thrush becomes a Karoo thrush as I pay more attention to it, another first for me although I think that relates to just not having paid enough attention in the past!
Starlings, bulbuls, white-eyes all make their repeated visits offering photo opportunities, as do a small but garrulous population of feral Rosy-faced lovebirds. Photos do more justice than words.
Photos with Nikon Z9 and Nikkor Z 180-600mm f5.6-6.3
