Daisy gets a fright on the way to school:

The children who lived outside of the village of Port St Johns had to use inventive ways to get to school every day.  This tale involves a donkey cart pulled by a nervous mule, a brave cart driver, and three boys who had the ride of their lives!  It is told by Howard Daniel.

“My uncle Willie built a donkey cart with two disselbooms.  It was pulled by a mule, Daisy.  I think Daisy originally belonged to my dad (Sam), who either gave it or sold it to Uncle Willie, who built the cart.  The idea was that they would leave Isinuka in the morning with Baainet driving the cart.  My cousins, Reg and Keith, would be sitting on a seat lower down behind the driver who had the reins.  They would pick me up at the gate of my house in Undercliff and we would all go to school together. 

            One morning, when we were between Undercliff and town, close to the area called ‘White Rocks’, a grader started up and it backfired, letting off a sudden loud noise just as the donkey cart passed.  Well …. Daisy, being a very skittish mule, took off! 

            Baainet tried to control her, but she was bolting hell for leather, and wouldn’t be slowed down. The three of us in the back of the cart thought that this was great fun!  The wheels were whirring, the dust was flying.  The road into town wasn’t tarred at that stage, so there was dust everywhere.

Eventually Baainet had to try to stop the mule somehow, so next thing, he jumped off the cart onto Daisy’s back, cowboy-style, just like you see them doing in the movies, and held her round her neck, trying to cover her eyes or turn her head so that she would stop.  He managed to get her to slow down by the time we got into town, but we made it to school in record time that day with a panting mule and a Baainet with his eyes as wide as saucers.  Poor old Baainet:  he had been threatened that if anything happened to us on the way to school, he would be held responsible, but we didn’t see any danger in it.

            I mentioned this incident about Daisy the mule bolting us to school to Reg not too long ago, and he remembered it too.  I vividly remember it, even though it happened in 1947 or 1948.”