Desert Blooms

In African nature, the circle of life has fangs: mosquito bites man, fish eats mosquito, crocodile eats fish, man shoots crocodile, man dies of malaria. But for a few weeks a year, South Africa witnesses the climax of a somewhat gentler natural cycle. Most of the time, Namaqualand is a featureless swath of scrub desert running from just north of Cape Town up the coast to Namibia. From August to October, however, these plains explode in a display of wild flowers. What was once brown, dusty and flat is transformed into a sea of pinks, oranges, yellows, whites, purples and reds....

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