Three Beautiful Things

1. Packing up a parcel for a school we visited in Tanzania . The contents and the postage are a birthday present to me from Rosey. I hope it arrives safely, and that the paints, coloured paper and musical instruments are enjoyed. I'm sure it's not even a fraction of what they need in their bare classrooms -- but I hope the kind thoughts of someone far away will be welcomed. 2. Finding that between us, we have just enough money for the fish and chips we want. 3. Writing thank you cards brings back all sorts of wonderful memories from my birthday.

1. It’s the start of the South African Easter holidays, so the plane was full of children and babies. But none of them was sitting anywhere near us, and we hardly heard a squeak out of them. 2. Spotting Daddy in the arrivals hall before Rosey did. 3. The Mother has got involved with a patient support group and is very enthusiastic about it -- she’s been having her experiences recorded for the benefit of other people. 4. Coming back to my flat and finding it cleaner than when I left it. The wonderful PaulV has also left me some heart-shaped helium balloons, and a selection business cards for Las Vegas prostitutes. Classy.

1. Anne and Wayne are wandering round the hotel with a pile of incoherent postcards. Apparently ‘someone’ posted them under their door of their room at half past midnight. The cards are mostly along the lines of ‘We love you’, although there are some confessions from Rob (‘I’m American so I can do what I like’), a collection of Bond autographs, a picture of Bob’s leg ulcers and a note allegedly from George the truck. We had been sitting in a cafe next to a rack of free postcards, and you know how it is... We must have run out, because my arms are covered with scrawl, too. Anyway, what I meant to say in mine was: ‘Thank you so much for being the best leaders ever in the whole world -- lending Rosey bikini bottoms, taking me to the medical centre to get my face mended at 2am and bringing Rosey back to visit at 7am, contributing to Three Beautiful Things and occasionally being Beautiful Things yourselves, finding our leopard, taking us on our first game drive, untangling the mysteries of ...

1. Fynbos. This is the sixth and smallest floral kingdom. Plants grow on the Cape of Good Hope that don’t grow anywhere else. From a distance it looks like a bit of British moorland with springy, heatherish vegetation. But get close in and a whole lot more variety shows up. There are 2,250 species (this is more than in the whole of the British Isles). One day I am coming back on a special looking-at-plants holiday, and it's going to be in the spring when the peninsula flowers. 2. Standing on the Cape of Good Hope. This is the southernmost point of South Africa. It was strange looking across the thundering sea and thinking, next stop Antarctica. At school I learnt to mark it on the map, along with Cape Horn and the Equator and the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. At home we were told that you could put your elbows on the table once you had been to both capes -- now I’m halfway there. The cape is, I suppose, my journey’s end -- I have come as far as I can, and now I must really accep...

1.We toured Robben Island. This is the prison where they held Nelson Mandela. Our guide had spent seven years on the island for sabotage during the 1980s. He wasn’t exactly bitter about what had happened -- more puzzled, I think, that the authorities could think that black prisoners didn’t need underwear, and that they should be given a different diet to white prisoners. 2. Seeing Debbie. She is our designer at work. We e-mail nearly every day, but I’ve only met her once. It’s good to catch up and talk about how we work (very briefly) before going on to more serious matters like what we are going to eat and where we are going to watch the fireworks. 3. Darren liked ‘fireworks like shooting stars. They would die, and then bang, went off again over the water.’ Cape Town, South Africa

1. Seeing Table Mountain. It’s such an iconic image of the city. The other place I’ve seen it is in engravings illustrating books about early explorers. 2. Iris chasing a singer round the restaurant. Poor man. He thought he was on to a good thing. Get the big table going and the entire restaurant will follow, he must have thought. ‘Come on then, what will it take to get the big table dancing?’ he asked. So we released Iris. She chased him round the restaurant, in and out of the tables, cackling wildly. At first the other tables tried to pretend it wasn’t happening, but gradually, people got into it and soon everyone was dancing. 3. It’s time for goodbyes. I like the way people suddenly open up and tell you all sorts of things. I like all the promises to stay in touch that may or may not be kept. Cape Town, South Africa

1. Rosey and Wayne turning up first thing. They were there when the surgeon came round, which was reassuring. I was really glad Wayne brought Rosey, though, because I didn’t like the thought of her wandering round town by herself. Later, when I came out of theatre, Rosey and Gill and Darren were waiting for me. And Claire had sent over a little jade goddess of wisdom to help me along. 2. As they took me into theatre, a nurse said in a thick Afrikaans accent: ‘Do not be afraid. It is not necessary.’ 3. The surgeon talked to me as he worked, so I didn’t really notice much pain or strangeness. He told me about the music we were listening to, and about a drive I should take round Cape Point. I got to do this tour -- see Floral kingdom, south of south, penguins and farewell. 4. The cuts fall along a natural line of my face, so they are not as noticeable as they could be. And micropore tape conceals the true horror of the stitches (see them at whereiamworking ) -- which are very neat when al...

1. The shattered mountains and jaggy ridges on the way from Citrusdal to Stellenbosh. 2. The owner of Citrusdal saying goodbye to us. He told Anne that we were a lovely group. 3. Darren’s county faces. You can name an English county and he will have a face for it. Pictured are Cornwall and Buckinghamshire. 4. For our first farewell dinner, Elaine had the idea of going round the table with each person saying what their beautiful thing for the trip was. 5. Cream soda in Stellenbosh is bright green. We drank it with cane -- the local rum. This is called a green mamba. 6. I have broken my face. Rosey says I toppled forward and didn’t even put my hands out to stop myself, so the edge of the pool terrace did for me. It didn’t hurt a bit, and it made me giggle. My first inkling that something serious had happened was when Claire said she had been cut ‘just as badly and now you can’t even see my scar’ but refusing to let me see -- or touch -- my face. It was that and the blood on Darren and Cr...

1. Our guide was called Skokie -- Afrikaans for ‘Fright’. He had a fine set of dreads under his woolly hat. He told us about the time he was bitten by a scorpion and by a snake. He showed us bushman rock art and bushes that cure coughs and dandruff. We saw where a leopard had killed a porcupine and a dassie toilet. I’ve often seen the white stains on cliffs where their wee runs down, but he made us climb up and look inside to see a 4ft high mass of a substance like hard black tar. ‘Dassie period,’ he explained. ‘My grandfather tell me that it is urine, but at school me and some other boys found out more. Dassie is the only animal I know that have period like a woman.’ He said that his people chip bits off the mass and use it to make a tea (which looks like Coke and smells bad) for treating kidney problems. 2. The heat on the mountain was incredible and by 1pm we’d all had enough. The relief of getting back to the lodge was marvellous. We sat in the lounge gulping down iced roibos and e...

1. Francis our cook getting up to supervise his last ever breakfast despite drinking 14 bottles of beer the night before and falling on his back while doing a headstand. We left him at the campsite to catch a bus back to Windhoek, then to Livingstone where he will either get some more work or continue back to Nairobi. We will miss him and considered wearing black armbands and having a minute's silence at lunchtime. But in the end we were too busy eating, so contented ourselves with a few mournful cries of 'Francis? Francis? Where's the salt?' 2. Getting away from the campsite without being hurt by the psychotic stroke man. 3. A man in the town of Springbok tried to sell me and Claire M some drugs -- the first time on the trip. Go Cla(i)res. 4. The taste of a cup of tea when you are hungover. Last night I announced that I was going for a hangover, and I suceeded very satisfactorily. As a result, I have been murmuring 'Oh my head' and then smiling to myself smugly...

1. It was Robert's birthday, but he was too busy being in Scotland to speak to his travelling sisters when they phoned. But it was good to hear The Mother's voice for the first time in almost nine weeks, and she told me that PaulV has won a prize -- he is photographer of the year for his newspaper group. 2. My feelings towards the barman who served me a gin and tonic made with Gordon's, a slice of lemon and some real ice. 3. As if that wasn't enough, he showed me a gecko that was just about to snaffle a moth. 4. Then his friend told me that sometimes tourists refuse to believe in things -- such as communal weaverbird nests, which look like a haystack up a tree. 'They go "that's not a birds nest." So I go "Yeah, you're right. It's a giraffe's food store."' 5. An evening of drinking that included a marriage proposal (no, but it was my first one ever, so naturally it set my girlish heart a-flutter) and a psychotic stroke victim d...

1. We have been illustrating further scenes from truck life. A lot of people have joined in unexpectedly. I like Craig’s rendition of an elephant treading on Elaine and Julie’s tent, Rob’s picture of Bob getting a red card and Rosey’s picture of Rob getting into the wrong tent. Since time of writing, Craig contributed again -- the elephant stealing our supper at Ngorongoro. Louise illustrated the joys of skydiving and Francis drew The ‘movement of jah people’ leaving him behind at the South African border. See them all at Scenes from Truck Life . 2.Driving down a long narrowish valley with a flat floor. I can’t say why this sort of road is pleasing -- perhaps it’s the slightly closed in feeling; or the thought that there is no doubt about where we are supposed to be going. 3. Wayne, Anne and Francis dropped us off at the far viewpoint of Fish River Canyon and suggested firmly that we might life to walk back to the next viewpoint where they would be waiting with the truck. When we got t...

1. The excesses of Kolmanskopf. It’s a German diamond mining town that was abandoned in the 1950s. Now you can pay to go in and see a genuine ghost town that inspires mutters of ‘I’d have gotten away with it if it hadn’t been for you pesky kids’. When the desert outpost of Kolmanskopf was built, they imported all the building materials from Germany. This included sand. Yes, sand, the same stuff that is blowing across the main street and filling houses to this day. And water was brought round the coast by ship from Cape Town. 2. Leaving the dust scoured Kolmanskopf and coming into Ludervitz, which isn’t a ghost town. We sat on a pub balcony looking out at the harbour while the sun (and the beer) warmed our windchilled bones. 3. There is a dog that comes say hallo to Luderitz visitors. He is friendly and intelligent and ready for a game. He runs where he wants -- his collar is his passport. No-one particular owns him, but he we were told that a lady has looked after him since he appeared...

1. Climbing up Dune 45 to see the sun rise. We tramped up the spine of the dune, following the trail of footprints, and then ran all the way down the flank to breakfast. 2. Walking with Boesman. He is an expert on the San people and he shows walkers the wonders of Sossusvlei. He can find a lizard that has buried itself in the sand, and open up a trapdoor spider nest. He can show you that the black sand sticks to a magnet, and tell you why it doesn’t get all mixed in with the red sand; and explain how vleis form. He tells San stories; and explains why the things that the San do that make them appear savages are actually very sensible: they eat 10kg of meat at a sitting because if you’ve eaten the meat, no-one can take it from you; it doesn’t go off; and it’s easier to carry. He told us that the first thing a San child learns is its mother’s footprint: ‘See my footprint, see my face.’ They could tell if a footprint was made by a sick man or a healthy man; and it was said that one day a y...

1. Driving down long valleys full of feathery grass. And seeing the sun catch floating seeds. 2. Eating Eva’s fish. Eva and Kev went fishing yesterday, and Eva caught a fish that was half as tall as her. Francis cooked it and we all ate it for dinner. 3. Rosey and I draw further scenes from truck life -- a stick Francis with a stick hangover fails to fill a supermarket trolley with stick vegetables, while a stick Rob goes into the wrong tent and confuses a stick couple -- and bully Claire (bottoms in the bush) and Louise (skydiving) into doing it too. Swakopmund to Sesriem, Namibia

1. Touching a seal. I was rather taken by the seals at Cape Cross and now I get to meet one in person. We were on a dolphin cruise. We saw dolphins and obviously, it was a deeply moving and spiritual experience. Wow. Dolphins, they’re great. Whereas the seals... they jump on to the boat and bully the passengers. Of the 1.8million seals in Walvis Bay, about six jump into boats. While we were boarding, a huge male leapt on and tried to steal fish. The skipper, Arche, told us to ignore him ‘That’s Flipper. He’s bad.’ They had to encourage him to jump overboard by throwing fish into the water, and eventually he left us alone. Later we met a female who had learnt some tricks. She swam alongside the boat and for the usual reward (a fish) would cover her face, roll over and jump. Then we met Bushman. He is about seven feet long and I couldn’t get my arms around him at his widest. He jumped on to the boat and we all jumped to the other end of the boat. ‘Sit down next to him,’ said Arche encou...

1. Drinking coffee -- real coffee -- in a street cafe. The cups are real china, and we have our own cafetiere to plunge. 2. The yellowness of sulphur crystals -- they're like sherbert lemons. We saw these at the Crystal Gallery, where they also have on display the largest rock crystal in the world. It's about the size of a largish garden shed. The shop is very good, with any amount of pretty sparkly things. It was lovely to spend time looking without being hassled by anyone. 3. We went on a girls' night out -- and walked into one of the most popular restaurants in town. They had just had a party of 13 cancel at the last minute, so we got their table. Thanks, whoever you were -- hope nothing bad happened to punish you for trying to sit down to dine with 13 at the table.

1. Watching the sunrise turn the clouds gold. Sunrise can be tricky. You wake up all groggy and cross at being pulled from your sleeping bag too early. Then you scramble up to a convenient spot and you wait and you wait and you wait. The sky goes a bit pink, or at least you think it does. And you realise you are cold and your bottom has gone numb. You think affectionately of beds you have known and yawn fit to split your head. After a bit more sitting, the stars have gone dim and the air is lighter, definitely lighter. You wait some more, maybe shut your eyes for a moment. Suddenly: ‘There you are! We thought you’d fallen down a hole’ and it’s much lighter and your fellow happy campers are wondering if you enjoyed the sunrise. ‘We were right up there. It was a deeply moving and spiritual experience.’ Rosey and Elaine strode manfully up the bouldertumbled slope of Spitzkopf while I pulled the sleeping bag over my head and pretended I didn’t care for sunrises. But soon the zips from the ...

1. Driving down the Skeleton Coast. I mean just the name is wonderful... it is like something out of H. Rider Haggard . It's cold Atlantic surf on one side and scorched salt desert on the other. The skeletons are shipwrecks. It would be a bummer to be wrecked there: 'Land! Land, we're saved.' Oh. One zillion miles from anywhere or anything but dust and rocks. We stopped for lunch at a wreck from 1976. There were a few sad ribs left and a bit of rusted solid winching gear. 2. Building a maze. Sand is lovely to draw on with a piece of bleached driftwood. And the shore is littered with things to line out the edges: kelp strands, flat stones, big mussel shells and, strangely, an awful lot of dead butterflies in every colour and shape. I made this maze to acknowledge all the things I have lost and found on this trip. 3. We got within feet -- actual feet -- of the seals at Cape Cross. If seals had whites in their eyes, you would have been able to see them. We saw them playing...

1. The organ pipes. They are basalt fractured into geometric shape in a dry riverbed. Rosey and I find some that have split so they clonk like bells when you hit them. 2. Rock art at Twfelfontein. It was used to teach San children how to recognise animals -- including the seals down on the skeleton coast. (Picture by Rosey Grant) 3. We haven’t eaten much fish -- Zanzibar was the last place -- but Francis has managed to find some frozen haddock in a supermarket. While we are lounging in the bar of a posh hotel drinking cocktails he cooks it with a crust of tomatoes and herbs. It is so delicious that even Louise, who doesn’t normally eat fish, enjoys it. Twyfelfontein, Namibia