The countdown has begun...

3 days… 19 hours… 11 minutes

And so time has gone by, matric exams are finished, Jacobus joined the veldskool with the grade 6 and 7's of Gereformeerde Laerskool Bellville in the Cederberg, and from today till 13 January 2018 everything in the Van der Linden-household is about Footsteps to Good Hope.

Sorting the day packs!

Salomien not afraid to get her hands dirty while helping...

Can you survive on this for a day... and for 40 days?

Last minute changes in gear, a few items still to be bought, a couple of finishing touches to other lists and arrangements... We are gearing up and almost ready to go. 

Fine-tuning packing to an art

Nothing would have come from the novel idea and dream of Jacobus to do an eco-hike for conservation awareness, if it were not for the following businesses and individuals:


A Rocha
Continental Cobbles
Sealand
Ben Groot Attorneys
Dried Fruit for Africa
Plastic SA
Tracks4Africa
Supa Oils
Ekcon
Starcivils
Cape Town Environmental Education Trust
Gert Klapwijk
Roelof Hoving
Frans Douma
Andre van den Berg
Henk Boesenkool
Paul Verhagen
Alex van der Linden
Kokkie Kooijman
Elizma de Kock
Erik Raimond
Hanu Conradie 
Hanlie Smuts
Tannie Ella Mileham
Ouma Salma Loots
John Fincham
Dave McDonald

A mere thank you sounds almost inappropriate. But this thank you comes from the bottom of our hearts... It comes from the sandy beaches, the wetlands and the sharp rocks...  It comes from the fish, the lobsters and seals, the Black Oystercatchers and the little birds and ocean creatures suffering from the nurdle pollution... To use the beautiful words in Scripture: Romans 8: 20-22: 

"For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time."

May Jacobus' eco-hike be the start of a new era in South Africa and around the world, where the new generation see their duty and the opportunities to do good (and do better) to the environment they live in - the creation that God has given them (us!) to reign over but also to take care of and to conserve.

Happy hiking Jacobus!