By Catherine Kühn

Our first Cape Leopard Trust/Thrive eco-club for the year started off well with a visit to the Baviaanskloof river in Hout Bay. We had a full bus consisting of 15 children and 6 adults. Children from Kronendal, International school of Hout Bay and Disa Primary all joined for an afternoon's walk up the hill.

The environmental theme for Thrive this year is water and so the outing was focused around conserving water and the different ways we can help to save water. The children hiked all the way up what looked like a dried up river but when we reached the waterfall, we could see that there was still a small amount of flowing water. It was great for the children who have been up to the waterfall before to note the difference in the amount of water from winter last year to now (middle of summer). The children learned about perennial and non-perennial rivers, they learned about the cycle of water and were given the opportunity to sketch their own interpretation of a water cycle.

I also gave the children some questions to answer and a pledge which read:

"I (FULL NAME) _________________________________ make a pledge today (DATE) ________________to save more water. I will do all that I can at home, at school and wherever I go to save water and to the best of my abilities I will make sure others are doing the same.

Signed: (YOUR SIGNATURE) _______________"

Our current water situation in South Africa urges us to save as much water as we can and what better way to start off 2016 by making a pledge and promise to do exactly this.

Water is precious and we need it to survive, we need it for all our plants and animals to survive.

We do not ever want to have to pay for fresh flowing water and I expressed this fact and asked the children and adults to imagine hiking to somewhere as beautiful as the Baviaanskloof waterfall and there are people who charge for the water. It is definitely not what we would like to see happen in our future's so let's keep up our work and continue to be eco-heroes!