Copyright: Jurgen Brauer, Augusta, Georgia, USA

A grant from South Africa's National Research Foundation enabled me to visit the country on a lecture tour. I traveled for three and a half weeks, speaking at the University of Cape Town, the University of the Western Cape, Stellenbosch University, the University of Port Elizabeth, and the University of South Africa in Pretoria. I was also to speak at the University of Natal in Durban, but instead ended up in the Entabeni Hospital emergency room (but that's another story). Hereunder some decidedly non-academic pictures.

I visited the Two Oceans Aquarium in Cape Town. Above, a picture of a sea anemone. Note the beautifully colored tentacles and its wide-open mouth in the center. Anemones usually cover their mouth part with their tentacles, but this species' tentacles do not seem long enough to ever do that. 

The aptly named potbelly seahorse.

An "inside look" at a harmless spotted moray eel.

I had a chance to dive solo in the aquarium's kelp tank and take photographs. I like this picture because it gives you a rather good impression. On the upper right, note the windows through which visitors peek into the tank. There is a good bit of open space in the tank, sand and gravel cover the bottom, a few fish swim about, the long kelp stalks and leaves are clearly visible, and the entire atmosphere (hydrosphere, really) is permeated by sunlight streaming in through the open tank top.

I guess this is how horseshoe crabs do it. But perhaps they were only romping about.

An unusual peek at a sea star's underside.

The shark tank contains four female and one male tiger shark (or Ragged Tooth Shark). I am happy enough with this picture, the shark "sailing" through the water, struck by the gleaming midday sunlight. Note the school of fish in the background. I spent about half an hour in tank with the sharks, various stingrays, and a hawsbill turtle (below).

A close-up picture of the hawsbill.

Quite a pet. Unfortunately, all seven species of sea turtle are endangered species.

One of the female ragged tooth sharks photographed from underneath. It was Sunday, about noon time, three hours before the weekly feeding session. Still, the sharks were very calm, as was the feeding which I observed later on (from outside). No feeding frenzy at all. To the contrary, the handlers had to prod the sharks to take a bite, almost "stuffing" freshly caught, frozen fish into them.

A view of Cape Town's famous Table Mountain. I suppose you can guess why I didn't climb up (the view would have been rather foggy) .

Afternoon sunlight bounces off barges at Albert and Victoria waterfront.

A postcard-perfect picture of the Atlantic Ocean, alongside the Cape Peninsula.

On a free afternoon, I chanced upon something called the World of Birds.  Above and below numerous bird shots.

A secretary bird.

For the first time in my life, I realized exactly what a predator bird is. When you take a close-up photograph from a foot of distance away, you are awfully aware of the beak and the talons. No fooling around with these guys.

A one-legged creature (the other one is tugged away), with a needle-pointed beak. 

A couple days of rest near Gansbaii where I went diving. I wanted to do seal diving, but locals said it was too dangerous this time of year. Too few seals and too many Great White Sharks. So I went diving nearer the shore, among the kelp. A few seals were around but all were sunning themselves up on the rocks. The swell and surge was pretty bad which made underwater photography difficult.

In Port Elizabeth, I was introduced to a very welcoming and hospitable group of professors and spouses. One pair took me on a hiking tour one Saturday afternoon, not quite an hour's drive from town. Mid-June is of course deep winter in the southern hemisphere. Still, the sun was brilliant, and the views and colors wonderful. This nature reserve is unpopulated, the only humans those who hike its trails.

An aloe plant of overwhelming vibrancy .

Next day, a Sunday, I made my way to Addo Elephant Park, also about an hour's drive from Port Elizabeth. Two massive skulls meet the visitor at the entrance gate. They are a sight to behold, surely, but I couldn't quite fathom why the park rangers would display the skulls.

Warthogs at play on the road.

Ironically, this is the ONLY elephant I saw at Addo Elephant Park. I was driving along, muttering why I hadn't seen a single elephant in two hours of driving around the dirt roads when this fellow literally stepped out of the bush onto the road right in front of the car. I pressed the clutch but missed the brake, hitting the gas petal instead, sending the engine howling. Before I found the brake, the car (and I) got one mighty close look at the elephant's backside. He turned around and gave me an annoyed look, and I quickly backed up a bit, fumbling for my camera. By the time I got it ready, he had turned and all I saw was three feet square of you-know-what. So, I followed the fellow for awhile, but how close am I willing to get? I don't want to harass him, I don't want to annoy him ... and I don't want my shiny rental car dented either.

Vervet monkeys by the road side.

The park contains an enclosed area that keeps the animals, especially the elephants out, and keeps you in. The bush is incredibly dense and virtually impenetrable, as the elephants don't tear up and clear the vegetation, except for a single man-made and maintained path. The entire ecosystem is completely different. Above, a close-up shot of some seed pod.

At high-noon, a succulent plant extrudes droplets of precious water. Note the strand of spider web on the plant.

I saw plenty of animals, zebra, warthogs, ostriches, kudus, monkeys ...

The South African national flag. At another game park, below, right in Port Elizabeth, more opportunities to gawk at and photograph wildlife.

This ostrich very nearly climbed into my car. (Another fell in love with me or, at any rate, performed a mating dance, twice, for me. Must be my attractive, unkempt beard!) These flightless, fleet birds are huge, easily topping six feet. They are, somehow, sweet but not exactly cuddly.

A kudu calmly sitting in the sun by the road side.

A lion cub, six month old, photographed from half a foot distance.

More lion cubs, about a dozen of them, including a couple albinos. Cuddly, cuddly. They look like my cats, but they played like my dogs. 

The ever-present acacia tree and its mighty thorns.

Color, color, color.

A close-up of an aloe.

Also in Port Elizabeth, a marine biopreserve park. I found the combination of Indian Ocean swell, rocky beack, and completely calm grassy wetland irresistable.

More wetland, just behind the rocky shore.

Color, color, color.

From Port Elizabeth to Durban and to the northern Drakensberg Mountains (between Durban and Johannesburg, and bordering on Lesotho). A group of friends got together, renting a couple cottages for the weekend. 

Next, I went to Pretoria. After my lecture, I was off to the zoo.

A Green Mamba, one of the most poisonous snakes in the world.

Is your eye sight keener than my wife's? How long does it take you to figure out what this is?

... followed by a tiger shark (these seem to be "popular" aquarium sharks).

Green on green, I have no idea what this critter is called, but the picture came out nice.

Anyone else interested in hitching a ride?

So, I had to come to the Pretoria Zoo to see an elephant from up front. This one, however, put on a little feeding show for me. He took a bundle of grass (see where the other elephants are feeding in the background?), brought it over to me, plunked it down, and proceeded to use his trunk to reach across the barrier to search for fallen leaves (it was winter in Pretoria) and dead twigs and branches. These he munched with gusto, spiced up with the grass. I'd like to have an elephant for a friend.

A leopard, above, and various other critters below.

A black rhino, with horn intact.