On a sparkling winters day last week, Mallorie and I headed off to the office, to do some navigation excercises and discuss upcoming projects. Hiking off path in a magical place down near Cape Point we came across this tortoise shell, nestling amongst restios as if it had been there for hundreds of years. Perhaps it had. I have never seen a live Leopard Tortoise that size. Regular fires here probably keep them small. We peeped through a large hole in the top of the carapice-it was completely hollow but obviously a home for many creatures. For some reason the tortoise shell kept us crouched there silently for some time- our hands on the curved dome, last nights rain rushing past us in the nearby stream, two Klipspringers frozen on the ridge in front of us, the sun on our backs.