The Hard Rock of Times

This rock formation is on the Nqabara river, inland from Dwesa Nature Reserve on the South African Wild Coast, in the vicinity of Mpume.

Metallic in appearance, Nqabara River, approximately 10km inland from the coast. What's happening? Everybody's hard at work cracking Macadamia nuts after a horse ride!

Small beauty

Lichens, fungi and insects thrive with wild abandon (and all the rapid predation of a humid sub-tropical climate) in the forests where I play, study, draw my inspiration and ultimately seek new plant elements of aesthetic abandon to introduce into landscaping.

Let me holler, majita, so politely, Voetsek...

Obviously - and oblivious to mundane mediocrity - this is a wicked blog. The writer was given the name Dre Anthrax Ghoul by a respectable acid head called Grumblings that went to work for the Beast in Seattle. Yes, he sold his soul for family, money and fear. Call it the Selfish Gene ad nausea.

It was further popularised by an archaeologist called Mad Van that works for a most obscure bunch of people whose once illustrious history inspired the hip-hop icon called Zulu Nation.
Joining them as Chief Psycho warrior and Propagandist was the Steege, who has become a modern Strandloper. That all happened countless decades ago.

This globblog will grow from within a very trippy garden, inspired by some very trippy friends, all more-or-less midway between (and an hour's drive from) that astonishingly beautiful, very contradictory natural space called the Wild Coast, and the escarpment that gives rise to Lesotho. Its a place where I'll dump many a party tale (hazy and wired), some imagery of the beautiful environment that captivated me long ago, and the occasional angry tweet about some power-crazed ape that thinks politics is the modern breeding ground for reproduction.

You'd be foolish to ever take anything too seriously. Its all a bit tongue in cheek, really. Besides, I'm still growing up. Hola majita.

And its an Up Yours to Fakebook.

Image taken from eviltongue2.blogspot.com

Metal - structure in beauty

Taken at Mtentu, Wild Coast, South Africa. An Australian company won the right to extract heavy minerals (for example titanium) from this area, but strong community opposition is ensuring that the only extracted minerals remain the rusty artwork which was long ago shipwrecked here. Mtentu is located within the Mpondoland Centre of Endemism, a botanical wonderland.

Where ships die horses wander

The community-owned and managed Amadiba Horse & Hiking trail traverses the coast from Mzamba to Mtentu.

Plants for spiritual and physical well-being

Dlamini (see accompanying picture, at his home in Mtambalala) is a traditional Healer specialising in plant medicine. Not all traditional Healers focus intently on the medicinal qualities of plants (although all are trained in the medicinal use of plants). Some concentrate more on the spiritual, psychological, ancestral or magical realms. Dlamini vociferously identifies and cultivates plants in which he sees potential. Any plant grower drawing from the rich indigenous stock of the Wild Coast (or South Africa in general) cannot help but notice the intense variation of plants, from trees to ground covers and bulbs, with a medicinal (or sometimes spiritual) application in rural society. Urban specialists have increasingly turned to these plants for mainstream researching of potential modern applications in curative and preventative medicine.