In the beginning of our journey there were three. Two adults and a small boy with blonde hair and blue eyes. After our first steps in the south and watching him make his way into the (then) head-high grass without looking back even once, we knew it was right. We knew that we all belonged here.

From the beginning Connor had a curiosity about the world around him and an affinity for how things work. This didn’t go away as he got older, it simply changed. Watching him grow into a toddler with sand between his toes, a gemsbok in front of him and surrounded by fellow desert dwellers who loved him, was the kind of privilege we take for granted while it is happening.

I still believe that the red sand entered his soul through osmosis and that rolling in the sand became his freedom call. Then, after being the only child to enjoy our attention and adoration, his world was shaken up by a tiny creature – at 2.1kg she was the smallest person any of us had ever seen. She arrived early, in pretty spectacular fashion that didn’t involve any sand or desert, but it did involve some fairly hasty driving on the gravel roads.

The week of Grace’s arrival was the week I will forever refer to as ‘Snake Week’. We saw three different lots of snakes and had two captures. I was 34 weeks pregnant, during the hottest month of the year. February is known to be brutally hot – and humid if it is a good rainfall season. Fortunately for my family, we had a bathroom with the coolest tiles imaginable, but only hot water came out of the shower. That was its own kind of torture. At this stage I was still actively working at a lodge and catering for clients, despite the fact that our doctor had scheduled a final check-up in the coastal town of Swakopmund for the day on which she was born in the (not so coastal) town of Mariental.

The day before she was born we had our final snake sighting of the week. Dealing with the previous ones had been relatively smooth in that they were outdoors and didn’t really require my set of hands. Capture One of that week did involve rearranging the rockery to get to the hole into which the snake slithered. Even from the shelter of our verandah it was extremely sweaty work just watching my husband do this. After much maneuvering of the rocks and sand, and perhaps some swear words, he caught the snake and took our still only child to release it. The catch that I am pretty sure induced labour required less moving of stuff, but more caution as it was indoors and neither small child or I were very quick at that stage.

Murray had gone to our local petrol station down the road (40 or so km) to get fuel and other essentials, which may have included ice cream. Connor was asleep and I had lumbered from the couch to the fridge in search of food that required no effort other than eating it. As I approached the fridge, which had a brightly coloured tea towel under it to catch the leaks, something looked slightly out of place. Enough out of place to stop me in my tracks as my eyes followed the weirdly shaped brown stick coming from the tea towel and leaning against the fridge door. Then I saw a head! The head of a cobra. Needless to say, I was no longer hungry, but I am still deeply impressed by my sudden athletic prowess and ability to move at lightning speed. Connor chose this very moment to wake up from his nap and wander into the kitchen. I tried to call Murray to encourage a hasty return home, no dawdling whatsoever. He encouraged me to keep watching the snake, so that we would know where it was when he got back. So, with nothing else going on, Connor and I climbed onto the kitchen table and chatted. A lot of our conversation was about the snake – there is a video, which to this day remains one of my favorite clips to watch. Murray hurried home and came to our aid. By that time I needed to go to the bathroom and corralling a dog, a two-year-old and watching a snake while doing that was not straightforward.

Murray is an incredible snake handler. He has a calm and patient way which I envy. Eventually he managed to coax this Cape cobra into a box and take it far away. I accompanied him to make sure he took it away far enough.

The morning after this excitement I woke feeling slightly woozy, a little light-headed and generally not so great, which I put down to the fact that it was very hot and humid – we had the biggest downpour the day after Grace was born – and that I was very pregnant and not able to sleep at all. Then I realised that it was “go time”, and things were happening. I remember wondering whether all that snake activity and the excitement had led to early onset of labour. We were so lucky that despite some panic and an earlier arrival than planned, our little girl made it and joined the three of us in the desert. TNN