Hi, gang. I want to thank everyone who helped me plan my trip to South Africa last September. I've been holding off on posting about the trip because I didn't want to upstage my article about it in the latest issue of The Bulb Garden. The issue is out now, so I can uncloak. Summary: We had a great time and saw a lot of interesting stuff. If you've been thinking of going to South Africa, it's easy and surprisingly cheap (for an American anyway), and the people are very friendly. It's also reasonably safe as long as you use common sense. A couple of highlights for us were Chris Whitehouse's Phillipskop Mountain Reserve near the Klein River Mountains, and the Elandsberg Nature Reserve (Bartholomeus Klip) near Hermon. Near Chris's place we saw the elusive Moraea insolens (and a lot of other beautiful things), and at Elandsberg we saw the rare tangerine-colored Moraea villosa ssp. elandsmontana and the unusual red form of Moraea tulbaghensis (which is guarded by huge swarms of gnats and flies). I'm a Moraea nut, so it was a lot of fun to see these plants despite the bugs, and I'm told we were very lucky to see all of them. And oh yeah we also saw a ton of animals and scenery and stuff, which my wife really liked. I put a bit of info about Phillipskop in the Overberg article on the wiki here: http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/index.php/… And a bit about Elandsberg here: http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/index.php/… In the Bulb Garden article I write more about the places we saw, with photos and notes on what we learned from the trip. I don't pretend to be an expert on South Africa at all, but it'll give you an idea of what two newcomers in a rental car can see. You need to be a paying PBS member to get the newsletter, so this is a good time to sign up if you haven't already. I'm not going to be able to remember all of the people who gave me advice, but I'll try: Mary Sue, Cameron & Rhoda, Gail, Rachel, Lee, Evan, Gordon, John, Bracey, Terri, and Diane. Plus others I probably missed. Thank you so much! And special thanks to Roy Herold, who sent me a huge amount of very practical advice, plus photos and videos from a trip he did there. A highlight was the video of his drive over one of the more remote dirt road mountain passes in South Africa. Fun stuff, Roy! Thanks, Mike San Jose, CA PS: If anyone's planning a trip there and has questions, I'd be happy to help.