First of all, everyone here at Sabi Sabi would like to wish you a very happy new year filled with love, adventure and your ultimate wishes coming true.

Nature, like us, has been busy this festive season. Celebrations in all shapes and forms are taking place and we are lucky to be the spectators of these astonishing miracles.

Christmas and the New Year is a time of birth, rebirth, change and beauty in the bush. The rains have already transformed the once dull and dry landscape into a perfect paradise.

Just like in our homes over the festive season - there is food for all! Lush, green grasses breach the soil, fresh leaves push out from the branches and flowers show off their marvelous colors from the ground to decorating the trees. A great example of this is the Sickle Bush flowering at the moment. These trees are armed with hardy spines but the pink and yellow “Christmas lantern” flowers make the tree look very attractive.

There’s not only an abundance of food for the herbivores, but for the carnivores as well! Impalas have given birth to a numerous number of youngsters which are hunted by all sorts of predators. The calves of the Blue Wildebeest have also recently been introduced to the world - together with many other animals. It’s a feast for all in the perfect balance of nature.

Christmas lights have filled the evenings in the form of fireflies. These spectacular insects are seen mostly in December and January adding to the festive spirit. You need only to look up and see the stars shine to enhance the festive atmosphere. Game reserves are among the best places to do star gazing as there is minimal light pollution. It’s Christmas all around!

The sounds of Christmas are emitted by the “Christmas beetles” which are in fact not beetles at all. They are cicadas. Cicadas call when temperatures are high and have always been associated with Christmas which is the peak of our summer. The beautiful (and not so beautiful) calls of many species of frogs can be heard as Christmas carols. Now that the rains are prominent, frogs are breeding and with that comes calling for a mate. Now is the time where the evenings are more alive than ever with the sounds of so many animals.

Some animals have travelled far to get home for Christmas. Many migrant birds have arrived back from their epic journeys across the globe to breed in the summer time. Sabi Sabi has fantastic bird life and it’s always exciting to welcome back birds like the Woodland Kingfisher as well as the cuckoos.

Nature sure knows how to put on a show over the festive season! We can’t wait to see what it has in store for us in 2018.