The Prickly Pear

This afternoon while everything was quiet, I sat on our outside verandah, remembering a holiday we had in the foothills of the Drakensburg mountains. Its usually a pretty setting - quiet and lonely. However, this particular holiday occurred soon after a bush fire had swept through the dry winter veld. You can see from this photograph, that some plants had amazingly survived and were indeed sending out their spring shoots.

The prickly pear in the foreground is a common site in the more arid areas of South Africa. The fruit is nothing like a normal pear in either appearance or taste. You can see some green ones on the tips of the large succulent leaves on the left of the picture. When they’re ripe they’re yellowish and covered with small spines. Peeling them to get to the delicious edible part is tricky but worth it.

My children’s stories are set in South Africa and some of the characters enjoy this kind of countryside. Many of the artworks that accompany the stories will show the flora in which the stories are set.