Rain Africa in the Rain

This was the day for the second KZN Rain Africa bloggers meet and I was excited to see all the ladies that I know and the one (only one) lady that I didn’t know (but had chatted to on Twitter) – Cee from Ceece’s Travel. Read here about our first meeting last year. The location for our meet was inside the Education Centre at CROW – Centre for Rehabilitation of Wildlife. CROW is located in Yellowwood Park very near the Kenneth Stainbank Nature Reserve.

 

CROW was founded 35 years ago and is KZN’s only registered wildlife rehabilitation centre dedicated to the rescue, rehabilitation and release of all indigenous wildlife found in KZN. It is run by a small, highly dedicated team of
experienced staff and volunteers. They assist over 3000 orphaned, injured or displaced animals every year. As a registered non-profit organization, they rely on the goodwill and support of the public to ensure that they remain open.

Inside CROW’s Education Centre

 

There are lots of ways to help CROW so take a look at their website or Facebook page. They are currently selling a beautiful 2016 ‘Contrasts of Africa’ wildlife calendar to raise funds to build a baby antelope enclosure. CROW rescues, rehabilitates and releases over 50 injured and orphaned antelope every year. A lot of these animals are left orphaned as a result of poaching and illegal dog hunting. The A2 sized wall calendar is presented in a gift box and costs R170 excluding postage. To order visit www.underanafricansky.co.za  email orders@underanafricansky.co.za
or phone 031 267 9700 and ask to be put through to Under An African Sky.

The beautiful calendar

 

I was a bit late to arrive for the blogger meet as had gotten a bit lost and eventually had to phone CROW to find out where I must go. Yes I was following the GPS but ‘she’ did not take me to my destination properly! We were all warmly welcomed by Yusuf and Ryan who own the Rain Africa shop at the Gateway Theatre of Shopping in Umhlanga. Read my blog post over here when I went to the opening of the shop two years ago.

Claire from CROW gave us a short presentation on their work at the centre and then we all had fun mixing up our own body scrubs from the ingredients in the centre of our tables. Scrubs consist of four parts of ingredients : Oil, Base, Active and Essence. I chose a coarse base, used cold pressed avocado as my oil; rooibos, walnut & rosehip as my active and finally added basil, lime & mint essence. This was not just a special thing for us bloggers to do and you are able to do this yourself when you visit your nearest Rain Africa store. Mix up a scrub for yourself or even for a gift.

Passionfruit lemonade drink, Scrub ingredients and Rain earth eggs

 

After mixing up our own scrubs, Claire took us on a rainy tour of the CROW facilities and we saw a few of the animals that they are currently rehabilitating. We arrived back at the education centre to find a beautiful lunch display of completely vegetarian food which was supplied by Earthmother Organic. Lots of delicious wraps and salad and we also had refreshing drinks from Woolworths. We were all especially impressed with the presentation of dessert which was done by Yusuf. Aren’t the little watering cans so cute! The dessert was delicious! Chocolate
mousse on top and crumbled chocolate brownie at the bottom.

Buck, Raptor enclosure, Egyptian geese, Flight enclosure, Baboons and Wet bloggers

 

Juani from Rain Africa head office showed us a video of how Rain Africa harvests the organic components of their products. They forage far and wide and even travel into other African countries to get the ingredients they need. The ingredients that go into their new perfumes were fascinating and sometimes very surprising and I certainly learnt a lot. After the video we got to smell their brand new perfume range and it is incredible! There are three perfumes – Nectar (my favourite), Twig and Leaf. The perfumes are in store now so you must go and smell them (and buy). The perfumes are R850 and the refills are R475. I loved the way the perfumes were presented to us and the ladies were very brave to dress up on the cold day.

Leaf, Nectar and Twig

 

We were blessed to be the first in South Africa to see Rain Africa’s Christmas range. Lots of lovely items dressed in silver and blue. Elegant slippers, pretty packaged fizz balls, toiletry bags and divine smelling candles were just a few
of the items. Get to your closest Rain Africa store on the 1st of November to buy Christmas gifts. You can also shop online.

 

 

 

 

 

 

What a wonderful event – making scrubs, learning about CROW and Rain Africa’s hand harvested ingredients, seeing and smelling the amazing new perfumes and finally getting a glimpse of the pretty Christmas range. Yusuf and Ryan you did an incredible job for a very memorable event.