O'er moorland and brae: Slowly in Africa

A wee South African safari came prior to our moorland and brae rambles in Britain this year, and as our plane descended to our first stop, Johannesburg, early morning lights pricked the darkness, but the city stayed shrouded in the night: mysterious and quite magical from above.

We took time at the airport for a wake-up coffee, bottomless filter, which looked and tasted like any Denny's in any city in America. We chatted to a student serving us who gave us good insight into the trials of being a Zimbabwean attempting to live and work in South Africa.

'There is, she said metaphorically, a river between Zimbabwe and South Africa, full of crocodiles ready to snap at you as you cross. Even once you cross crocodiles still snap at your every move. She sold coffee and breakfast pancakes on commission -- not a regular salary. For every thousand rand of food and drink she served, she received a small percentage commission, plus tips. A tenuous way for a girl to earn her board and rent and pay for an education.

As we took off a little later for Nelspruit (Nels prate) it was full morning revealing suburbs of good-sized homes below, many with backyard swimming pools, with newly minted brick and tiled-roofed subdivisions cropping up on the edge of town. From above, Johannesburg looks to be going ahead since last we were this way.

Our plane was small and light and smooth. From Johannesburg it angled over an extensive landscape of well-ploughed fields, many of them circular, the four quadrants tilled. It changed from flat to hilly approaching Nelspruit where large sections have been given over to massive coal mining works that chomp out the sides of many low hills; and reforestation work looks as if it is trying to repair that damage. It all seems well tended and prosperous as we set down at the neat and attractive regional airport of Nelspruit to check out our hire car.

All scratches and nicks reported, we head north to the Numbi Gate entrance to Kruger National Park. The Corolla we hire is no 4x4; it hits every harsh pothole and raw road edge enroute from the airport and, now that we are on the ground, we can see there are many, exacerbated by the constant stream of heavy-tonned coal trucks eating up what is left of the pavement on the roads around here. Some of that coal money really needs to be pumped back into the road infrastructure, and soon.

There are people sitting or wandering everywhere. Sellers in the markets in town, and along our route, offer string bags of citrus fruit and root vegetables for sale, endlessly sitting and swatting flies in the noon day heat hoping for someone to buy their fare. Walkers are ambling between places on the dusty edges of the road, in lieu of a footpath. Occasionally, one of the mini-taxis which monopolise the route pulls up to drop off or pick up a passenger. In town, when we stop for supplies, there are groups of well-heeled youngsters with their iPods, iPhones and hip trendy jeans. There are basic stores, there are expensive-looking stores, so there is quite a variety of choice.

The housing is just as varied. Much of it is basic and functional and built of unfinished rectangular concrete blocks, while some of it is newly minted of concrete and glass. All with a rather scruffy air, as everything is dry and parched-looking: red dirt road edges, grass tufted verges, dehydrated long grass in front yards and ragged fields. A few council workers try to clean up the sides of the road with tongs and large litter bags, but it is a long long road, and the going is slow, and it is mid-day and hot, even in winter.

Slow, slow-moving. By the time we check in to Kruger at Numbi we can feel the slowness that is Africa seeping into our very bones. The warden slowly motions to us from beneath his thatched lanai. Go there. Slowly. Check in at that office. Slowly. The receptionist's movements are economical, minimal, balletically slow: it is all quite mesmerising.

We are in Kruger. In Africa. Where even the animals still first, before they startle. The very air seems stilled, and our senses with it. We are slowed to the speed of Africa. It is incredibly peaceful.