Hi everyone,

Ha! That title made you look didn`t it?! Well you`ll just have to read on.....

I can`t believe that months have passed since I last updated the blog - time is flying by. We`ve been frantically busy over the last few months and are making progress on all fronts. FINALLY we actually managed to take a holiday of our own (see below) and now we are off to a tourism show for a week so I have a chance to catch up with you all. Anyway, here`s the latest from Wild Mountain Country.

WILD MOUNTAIN ADVENTURES - FIRST TRAIL
We`ve had our first adventure trail groups though and generally they`ve been a huge success, although our 100% safety record lasted all of 2 hours! Yup, wouldn’t you know that by 11am on the first morning we were in Barkly hospital watching our guest receiving 17 stitches in her arm. Fortunately not our fault - poor Robyn did all the hard part of a mountain biking trail, stopped at the top of a hill to admire the view and wobbled off straight through a barbed wire fence (whilst stationary). On the up side the incident gave our first aid and contingency plans a proper testing and we passed with flying colours. We always carry a full first aid kit and two-way radio so within 5 minutes Robyn was cleaned, bandaged and on her way to hospital. Brave lady still carried on with the remaining 5 days of the trail. You can see all the photos and the full adventure on our website www.wildmountainadventures.co.za.

Since this first trail we have had quite a few guests through, most notably a lovely group of 10 who came paddling on the Kraai with us for 3 days. The logistics of moving 10 people and 5 boats around on a daily basis on the worst possible roads is quite `interesting` to say the least, but we made it happen and the guests were really impressed with the whole trail.

We`re having to do much of the work ourselves at the moment as there is a lot of interest, but bookings are very seasonal therefore we can`t justify hiring a full time employee. Luckily there are a lot of University students back home with their families during our busiest times, so hopefully we`ll be able to call on them during Easter & the busy Ski Season.

In general, bookings are looking pretty healthy and across a very board mix of activities. People have already booked this year for skiing, fly-fishing, horse trails, hiking, paddling and birding. We`re already getting enquiries for 2010!

RESTAURANT OPENING
I`m not sure if we`re brave, stupid or just crap at planning but one way and another the restaurant opening coincided with our first multi-day adventure trail. Given the logistics associated with the trail and the fact that the barn was nowhere near complete the day before, this made for one of the longest and most stressful days of our lives. Here`s a snapshot:

11.00pm - Phil still laying concrete floor in restaurant. Kate packing bar
2am - Hmmmm, better get some sleep (on sofa - house fully booked)
4am - Time to get up and carry on finishing the restaurant
6am - Pack breakfast stuff and lunches to take to guests at Avoca
8am - Make breakfast for guests and hike for 6 hours to the top of a mountain
4.49pm - Arrive back at Rosstrevor very tired and muddy. No time to shower/change because…..
5pm - First restaurant guests arrive. Here starts a 10 hour bar shift on already tired feet.
7pm - Party is huge - we expected 40 people, there are now 120! Help!! Chaos, but everyone happy.
4am - Guests finally sloping off to bed, but Kate forgot to reserve a room for the DJ, so Phil and I end up donating our sofa and sleeping on straw bales in the barn to guard his equipment
6am - Time to get up again coz today we`re taking the trail group out horse riding. And clearing up after the party. And looking after the other 10 guests in the house. And running the restaurant. Aaaaaagh!

Thankfully, since those first hectic days things have calmed down and now the restaurant is ticking over nicely. We`ve decided to open just at weekends and on a bookings only basis - there`s nothing worse than hanging around all day just in case someone turns up. Phil`s new menu and his fabulous cooking are going down a storm with the locals - my role is to play hostess, bar lady and waitress. All in all it works pretty well and the barn is looking fab! The locals here are seriously starved of entertainment and good places to eat which helps - we had 130 people turn up for an Easter Egg hunt!!

TIPPY`S WEDDING
Just as we thought we were getting to the end of the endless building work it all starts again. Our landlord (Tippy) was so impressed with the renovations that we did to the barn that decided to have his wedding reception there. The building and décor plans for the place were extremely ambitious and timescales were tight, so of course we got roped into a whole load more work again. :-( The Big Day was 25th April and in the end it all went really well. A lot of frayed nerves and tension though which nearly broke our relationship with Tippy, but fortunately I think we`ve managed to come out the other side. there The upside for us is that now we have a wedding/conference venue to add to our portfolio - though I have to say dealing with stressy brides is not my idea of fun - I`d rather concentrate on the adventure trails any day!!

PAIN IN THE NECK!
We got a scrambler motorbike in December and Phil is like a boy with a new toy. BUT after just a couple of weeks he took a major tumble and we were seriously worried about a neck fracture or spinal damage as he was paralysed for a few minutes and then had excruciating shooting pains and loss of feeling in his arms/hands. I made him a neck collar from a rolled up magazine and a scarf and we set off for the local hospital. It turns out that my First Aid training was better than anything the SA public health service could offer. Our usual (very good) doctor was away and the locum was useless - she didn`t even bother to examine him, said there was nothing much she could do as it was a Saturday afternoon. She generously prescribed two paracetamol before telling him to go home and lie down! After a tortous 24 hours of phone calls I spoke to a doctor friend up here who firmly told me not to waste a second longer but to get him to a decent hospital asap. We managed to get a neurosurgeon and MRI scanner on standby and left at 3am to travel the 350kms to the nearest private hospital equipped to deal with such a problem. Thank heavens after X-Rays and a consultation it turns out that the pain was caused by an old Rugby injury, aggravated by the fall. Phil may still need a neck op at some stage in the future, but for now all is OK. The only lasting damage at this stage is a hugely bruised ego - which for Phil is probably more painful than a broken neck!!


IT NEVER RAINS BUT IT POURS!
After inflicting the worst drought for over 50 years on this area the big man finally decided to do some catching up and for two weeks we had torrential rain. Some farmers measured more rainfall in those few days than they had in the whole of last year. Crazy! The Kraai River where we do our `gentle and scenic paddling` looked like the Zambezi and burst its banks for the first time in 5 years - sadly causing 4 fatalities in our neighbouring town. We were supposed to be taking a rafting group that week but with the debris (i.e. whole trees) coming by at about 40kms/hour, it would have been asking for trouble.
The road bridges over the rivers were impassable as the water pumped over and a whole new river appeared at the bottom of our driveway (waterfall and all!). Finally the dam at the back of the house is full and surrounded by green mountains.

On Valentines night the farmhouse was hit by lightning twice. Luckily no damage and it gave our romantic couples a good excuse to jump into each other’s arms. At least they can say that the earth moved for them!!

A few weeks later my friends Dave and Ali came to see me from the UK - Sure enough they brought more of the British weather with them and it was grim for the duration of their stay. We packed them off to the coast…… where it then proceeded to rain for them as well. South Africa is normally a sunny place I promise!!

Now the weather finally seems to have got back to some kind of normality. We`ve just had our first snowfall of the year and it is starting to get very chilly at night, but gloriously sunny and warm in the daytime. The combination of snow and autumnal trees means that Wild Mountain Country is looking very splendid. I`m so that the sun is out again and my good humour has returned. I know the farmers need rain, but when we get English weather I get VERY grumpy - heaven knows I came halfway across the world to escape grey skies.

`FAMILY` HOLIDAY BY THE SEA
So finally we managed to get away ourselves on holiday to a little seaside resort on the Wild Coast. We took Tinker with us as she adores playing in our river and we couldn`t wait to see what she made of the waves and rock pools. After initially being very scared and confused by the waves she didn`t disappoint us and was as entertaining as ever. She`s so used to drinking from the river and was highly upset by the salty water when she went diving in after fish. It was lovely to get away, but even better to be back home and to the cool clear mountain air after the heat and humidity of the coast.

OUR NEW BABIES
We`ve got another two additions to the Rosstrevor family - the tinest, cutest week old minature goat called Boesman (Bushman) and an orphan lamb called Trompie. Boesman is about the size of a Yorkshire terrier at the moment - even smaller than a lamb. I am chief nanny goat, bottle feeding 3 times a day, which is fun apart from the fact that I small of `Eau de Goat` on a permanent basis, now with the addition of `Hint of Sheep`. Tinker assists with the feeding although she`s bit confused as to whether she is supposed to mother them, lick their smelly bits or have them for dinner! The new additions have already earned us our first booking - an undecided Easter visitor to the area couldn`t resist bringing his 10 year old daughter to stay so that she can help with the feeding, so they`re earning his weight in milk. They’re seriously cute and follow me everywhere, so I look like the Pied Piper going for walks with my little herd and Tinker following behind me. The lambs hop, skip and jump like baby Springboks and the kids staying with us are adoring helping with the feeding. It’s what living on a farm should be about! We want to set up a whole minature farmyard/petting zoo on the farm, so hopefully there will be more babies to tell you about in due course.

We are set to have a frantically busy winter ski season, with all guest houses full to the max so it`ll probably be a while before I get the chance of another update. In the meantime big hugs to you all and keep me posted with the news back home.

Lots of love to you all

Kate xx