diannetippingwoods

Written for and published in AbouTime Magazine

Think about peaches. Fresh peaches filled with the juice of summer, dried peaches, delicious reminders of seasons past. Peach preserves, spiced and sticky. Fiery peach mampoer and warming brandies, peach scented beauty products, peach blossom, canned peaches and fresh farm cream, long days and lots of sunshine…There is something about the peach that epitomises country living, in all its simple abundance. The farmer is alchemist, spinning earth and water and sunshine into orbs of delicious gold. Read the rest of this entry »

The beautiful Kruger landscape is home to an amazing array of fauna, flora, and, on occasion, cricketers! The cricket oval near Skukuza is a hidden gem, carefully maintained in amidst the Kruger bushveld. The players? An assorted bunch of Scientists, Rangers, Field Guides and community members from Skukuza, Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, and the SANParks online forums, who plan to come out in the summer sun to play cricket and raise funds for SANParks! Read the rest of this entry »

In the vastness of the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, a story is being written in the wilds. The authors are the animals, the wind, the trees and the myriad of creatures that live in the park. Very few people can read this story and decode the meaning of the smallest, subtlest signs of the wild.One man who could was Karel Kleinmann, popularly known as “Oom Vet Piet” Read the rest of this entry »

Barbara Mayer, a retired teacher from Hawaii, arrived in South Africa a few weeks ago as part of a programme called Teachers Without Borders.Mayer has come out to South Africa as part a group of 6 maths and science teachers who will lead teacher workshops at 3 different locations within South Africa; Vereeniging, Port Shepstone and Umtata. Read the rest of this entry »

In the words of poet Don Maclennan, ” winter sunlight, clean as a cut orange” shines down on the Karoo landscape and the exuberant display of winter flowers that have temporarily transformed the face of the Tankwa Karoo National Park. The 85 000 hectare park protects one of the most starkly beautiful tracts of the Tankwa Karoo. It teems with life and character, from the dramatic landscapes, wide silences, eccentric richness of plant diversity, rare and prolific birdlife and the sense that time was born here, and with time, life. Read the rest of this entry »

Sibongile Masuku Van Damme is a conservationist, poet, educator, healer, leader, scholar and philosopher. She answers my simple questions with responses that probe, think, listen, expound and explore. I’m not surprised she lists caving as a pastime, intrigued as she is by the language of Foucault, the dynamics of the mind and the strength of tears. Read the rest of this entry »

History is full of stories about epic journeys, literal and metaphoric. Think Marco Polo, think Tenzing Norgay and Sir Ed, think Nelson Mandela. And there are a fair number of epic elephants around too-think Dumbo, Ganesh…the Magnificent 7.There are even stories about epic journeys that involve elephants. Read the rest of this entry »

Vaalbos National Park is on the move from its current location near Barkley West in the Northern Cape, to an area south west of Kimberly, currently known as Wintershoek. Along with the move comes a new name (yet to be announced) and essentially a new national park. The move involves huge logistical operations, including the translocation of about 1200 animals, and the establishment of new facilities. Read the rest of this entry »

The e-commerce division of SANParks decided, as part of the SANParks Week celebrations, to introduce learners from all over the region to the SANParks website. Students, many of them junior honorary rangers, were brought in to see the exhibits at SANParks head office in Groenkloof, and in groups of between 5 and 10 gathered around the laptop set up among the other exhibits, and began to explore… Read the rest of this entry »