Battlefields

Sunday 21st November 2010
Time to leave the game parks and take on a bit of history, but we went via the St Lucia Wetlands to show Helena Samango monkeys.  These are rarer than  the vervets but are fun!  We watched them, and stopped them, from stealing food out of a cool box.  There was a family of banded mongoose near the shop with tiny little babies who entertained us, until a very stupid woman decided to try to photograph them at point blank range so that was the end of the show.

So time to do the Battlefields.  We stopped at the Garden Court Hotel in Hampton and treated ourselves to a bath (bliss) and a proper meal.  Helena and Carole tried out the swimming pool but it was filthy so they sat in the fountain instead to cool down.

Monday, 22nd November 2010
From Hampton, we travelled down to Isandlwana, the site of a great military defeat for the British at the hands of the Zulu.  Britain had decided to invade the Zulu territories after breakdown of a treaty to curb their age army.  All boys of age were required to train in the army and were not permitted to marry until they were 30.  Natal was under British protection and the neighbouring zulus were raiding into Natal taking cattle, grain and slaves.  There was also an issue over gold.  Lord Chelmsord was in command but underestimated the power of the Zulus and did not expect them to come into Natal to attack the British army.  The result was the wipeout of the army with only lord Chelmsford and the regiments he had taken out to investigate a decoy of Zulus survived.  White cairns litter the hillside, under which are buried between 2 and 60 bodies of British soldiers.  It is a very sombre place to visit and really hammers home how terrifying it must have been.  We would like to research Lord Chelmsford and find out what happened to him after the event as hindsite perhaps reveals that he made strategic errors such as not reinforcing the camp before he left. Some of the officers survived because they wore blue jackets and the Zulus were instructed not to kill civilians.
The roads around Isandlwana are dreadful and slow to negotiate.  We drove through linear village settlements and saw the women carrying water on their heads from the communal wells.  We stayed the night at a lovely, B&B, called Chez Nous, run, not surprisingly, by a French lady.

Tuesday 23rd November 2010
Back down the bumpy dirt tracks for about 45km to Rourkes Drift. Iwas well worth the discomfort and travel time to visit the site.  The film 'Zulu' was actually very historically accurate, except that the Zulus just gave up and went away - they didnt salute the British as at the end of the film.
The Swedish mission was being used as a store depot for the main body of the British army, based at Isandlwana.  They heard the news from one of the few survivors who escaped from Isandlwana via Fugitives Drift.  4000 zulus descended on the mission which was defended by 105 soldiers with 35 wounded in the hospital.  The engineer in charge ordered baracades of mealie bags to be erected immediately with an inner defence of biscuit tins.  The baracades were not completed when the zulus attacked from an advantageous elevated position at the rear of the building.  Courage, discipline and sheer fortitude on the part of the British (mostly Welsh Guards) who fought for 12 hours, some of it hand to hand, caused the zulus to finally give up.  The story in the museum which is slightly biased states the zulus were tired from a 5 day journey over 100km before the battle so were not at their best.  The British troops had taken stores over difficult terrain, had to build barricades and were outnumbered 40-1 with 35 injured to defend.

Visiting the two sites gave us mixed emotions. Initially, after Isandlwana, we wondered if the British troops should have taken the action they did.  After visiting Rourkes Drift and reading the displays in the Museum, we realized that the power of the Zulus had to be broken for the sake of Africa.

So, back on the bumpy roads, we aimed for the Drakensburgh, but at Bergville a tremendous storm struck.  The rain was torrential and forced us off the road.  Lightning crashed down around us and streams of water rain down the roads.  When it was finally safe to travel, we were too late to journey to the Drakensberg so pulled into a local Caravan Park.  The telephone lines were down, a tree had crashed onto the path narrowly missing the Restaurant roof and everywhere was flooded.  We paddled across to the last chalet free and then paddled back to the bar.  What a fun place it was!  Everyone seemed to be in the bar and we really enjoyed the camarderie, and of course, the cocktails helped!