Drakensberg

This British program has been on the air since the 1960s, and provides viewers with tips on how to maintain their garden, while showing off a variety of unique plant life, which often brought them to remote areas of the globe.

This particular episode was filmed on February 5th, 2020, in the Drakensberg mountain range of Lesotho, Africa, with the host, Nick Bailey, making the long journey to track down one specific flower.

One species which grows wild all over the country and has been a real favorite with British gardeners for generations is the gladiolus.

This delicate flower would have been familiar with many of the show's viewers, as it was quite popular in the UK.

And the different places in South Africa, like...

Where I'm from, St Lucia, the wildlife, or Kayserinq, Zulu Natal, and Zululand, it's all beautiful wildlife, open land, and then the Drakensberg Mountains.

Yeah, it's just, it's so diverse.

How large, I should have, these are basic research points I should have done, but how big a country is it, like, geographically, and what's the population? Your

We've got such beautiful country sides.

We've got the Drakensberg.

And from the time I just went up into the mountains, I just said, I have to keep coming back.

I have to keep coming to see as much of this as possible.

Can I ask you, what made you, I know this is a bit off-tangent, but what made you fall in love with trail running?

I think as a kid, I always enjoyed the outdoors.

And the first time I went into proper mountains, the Drakensberg, up to 3,000 meters above sea level, and... it's incredible yeah and i think that the ability to to spend time in the mountains or on trails is something that i i never take for granted and then linking that to trail running i really think there's something special about being able to put on a pair of shoes and backpack and you can go run 100 kilometers 200 kilometers if you you fit enough and i think that that's something that's No one should take for granted to be able to create a body that's healthy enough to take you out there and go on adventures.

There's so

And again, you know, a South African corm, really, and it loves wet ground.

And if you go to South Africa, to the Drakensberg on the east of the country, you'll see it growing near streams and pools.

So again, in Ireland, it'll grow anywhere.

LAUGHTER full sun in every garden yes indeed yeah

We are located, our head office is located at Sun City Resort.

But we also, yeah, we're also operating at Kingdom Resort, at Decololo, at the Alpine Heath in the Drakensberg.

And we're looking to spread the brand across all South Africa.

So we offer hot air balloons, we do game drives, we do quad biking.

I'd love to do it.

I think it's very, very cool.

But what do you guys do? You mentioned Alpine Heath and the Drakensberg.

So tell me what goes on there.

Yeah, there are.

I mean, we are literally spoiled for choice, whether you're going to the Drakensberg or some of the beautiful beaches of northern KZN, the Lluwian Falozi Game Park, oldest game park in South Africa, or in Africa, sorry.

I mean, we just, we're not spoiled for choice.

But accessibility remains a challenge and investment, you know, it's a lot easier, I think, to invest in Cape Town right now because it is just exploding.

Words by Ben Goldfarb, photographs by Robin Hammond.

Shannon Hoffman's helicopter veered toward the snowy cliffs of the Drakensberg Mountains, the rocky spine that runs along the border of South Africa and Lesotho, as its pilot tried desperately to regain control.

Hoffman and her three companions had flown into the mountains to harvest an egg from the nest of a bearded vulture, one of the Earth's strangest birds of prey.

She braced for impact as a rotor blade clipped the ground, flipping the chopper upside down atop a massive escarpment.