'I feel like a rich man.’ Siyabonga Zulu had just landed from a flyover in a tiny antipoaching patrol aircraft on a small strip of grassland savannah in northern KwaZulu-Natal.
It was the first time Siya, a ranger from Thanda Safari’s anti-poaching unit, had been aboard a plane. Grinning from ear to ear, it was this phrase that encapsulated the entire experience of a 100km run through Thanda Safari.
The runners had about 20km left through the reserve and they were exhausted but overjoyed.
They say fortune favours the brave - and you have to be brave to go for a jog through a Big 5 game reserve - but happiness favours the absurd, which you need to be, too, when running 100km through said reserve, or taking a mountain bike on a five-day tour through the wilderness areas of South Africa, Zimbabwe and Botswana. And the proof lay in Siya’s smile.
AN ABSURD PROPOSITION
There has been an onslaught on nature; 69% of the world’s wildlife has been
