Their belongings were sent ahead on donkeywagons from Umtali, and the P-Js followed by motorcar. A Police Sergeant was also on transfer, and looking down from the top of a very steep hill they saw in a drift below them an overturned wagon: boxes, crates, furniture, scattered everywhere, and donkeys quietly nibbling roadside grass. �Oh, poor Sergeant�, they thought, �how awful, all his household goods flung about in the dry river bed.� When they got down they found to their horror it was their own possessions! Before they could pass the wagon had to be righted, the donkeys caught and inspanned and the wagon moved out of the way. It was weeks before that load of furniture arrived, and their first load contained beds without mattresses, basins without jugs, and nothing to cook in.

Their new home, which the Garsides now own, was a pretty thatched cottage covered in pink roses. Their predecessors were keen riders, and as there was no stable they had turned the bathroom into one, with the bath as the feeding trough: not an ideal arrangement. A beautiful stream irrigated the garden, but seven inches of rain one weekend were too much for the little stream which promptly burst it banks and went in through the back door � with inches of water rushing through the house and seeping into the rooms � and out of the front door, cascading down the high and wide flight of steps taking with it mud, sticks and leaves. The roof was not very waterproof, and on one occasion the P-Js sat up in bed to enjoy their early morning tea with open umbrellas over their heads. To preserve food two petrol tins were kept in a sack with a tin on top to drip the water.

Everyone grew their food and made their clothes; there were- no hairdressers, so everybody looked the same: the only comfort was that everybody looked peculiar.

One Sunday afternoon in very clear weather and high wind a veld-fire began, and P-J rushed off to turn out the bandits and collect all possible helpers to counterfire and put out the flames to save the threatened school and village. Up their mountainside fire came on three sides: Mrs. P-J collected their child, the horse, the dog and precious cat, all very frightened, and with cat in basket, dog on lead, horse by halter and Collette by hand, round and round the flowerbed in front of the house they went, changing direction when they got giddy. The fire passed and no sparks fell on the thatched roof.

There was a great occasion when song and noise came on the wind from Pork Pie. One of the Martins had shot a marauding lion, and a throng of Africans singing the great Lion Song eulogising the hunter streamed behind the great beast tied to two poles and carried with pride through the village. Their burden was put down in front of the Office to the continued shouting of their song. Everyone congregated to watch the scene, but were soon driven away by the pungent smell of the King of Beasts.

Donkeys were very much bound up with their lives, and when at Nachtmaal they invaded Mrs. P-J�s lovely precious garden and ate it all flat, she impounded the lot. When Collette was returning from school on a temperamental donkey it got rid of her and galloped to the house minus child and attendant messenger: Mrs. P-J and the gardenboy rushed off and found the anxious messenger and sobbing but unhurt child.

When Mrs. P-J was ill with blood-poisoning from pruning roses, Dr. Rose was away and a doctor out from Umtali for Mr. Longden was asked to see her, and decided to operate straight away. The boy with the key to Dr. Rose�s surgery was located and the carvers which had been used to cut off Daantjie Steyn�s leg were brought up to the house and Mrs. P-J sterilised them in a baby bath on the No. 8 Dover stove. The doctor gave her morphia, her husband gave her chloroform, and out she went. The doctor told P-J to bring her into hospital first thing the next morning, and she hadn�t come round properly when he wakened her and told her to get up. She tottered along to the bathroom, washed, dressed and got into the car. As a result of the anaesthetics she had to stop every half hour, and it took thirteen and a half hours to reach Umtali hospital. There she heard them planning to amputate three fingers, and when her husband came up at visiting hour she was dressed and ready to go � which she did without signing out. It was a long journey home again, and it took many months to get her hand really right.

Lack of a doctor on the spot was keenly felt. When the P-Js came they were riddled with malaria, and once P-J was unconscious in one bedroom and Collette delirious in the other. But neighbours were kind and helpful, everyone helped everyone else, and in spite of the drawbacks it was a lovely life and the Powys-Joneses adored it.

Longden�s illness was serious and he was not expected to live. Mrs. Longden, being a practical woman, ordered a coffin from Umtali. By the time it arrived on the Post Lorry Longden�s condition had improved, so the box was safely stowed away in one of the hotel�s spare bedrooms with the door firmly locked to save shock, horror and embarrassment. Longden was advised to live at a lower altitude, and in 1928 he and Mrs. Longden moved to Umtali and later to Natal.

In 1927 Hanmer Brothers bought Fairview and Heathfield, imported Merino ewes and by 1929 the flock numbered 800 and proved the suitability of establishing the industry on a considerable scale. William and Peggy Hanmer made their home on Fairview and both worked indefatigably for Melsetter until they moved to Inyanga in 1952, when their son Tony ran Fairview. Some of the five Hanmer children were born at Fairview, and for Janet�s birth Dr. Rose attended and Sister du Plessis came from Umtali. It was midwinter and very cold, and Peggy was in a draughty room with the walls not up to the roof. The primitive conditions evidently weighed on the well-trained nurse�s mind because when Peggy was asleep after the baby was born Dupie had a dream in which the devil said that the woman would die if she did not give her some air, so Dupie went through and opened a window. A little later she dreamed that the devil returned and asked what was the good of opening a window when the woman was already dead, so Dupie went back to the all too well ventilated bedroom and this time wakened Peggy to reassure herself that she was alive.

John Olivey first heard of Melsetter in 1928 when J. C. Kruger wrote in the Rhodesia Herald about the great possibilities for Merino sheep in Melsetter, and he and some friends decided to go and have a look at the area. They read up Melsetter in the 1924 South & East African Year Book and Guide: �98 miles South of Umtali the road leads along the watershed. Coaches run weekly, fare 80/- each way; luggage allowance 30 lbs. Wagons take five or six days during the dry season. Settlers have been tempted chiefly by the fertile land and favourable prospects both as regards agriculture and cattle raising. (Small Hotel). White population of the township 114 and of the district 746 (1921). Natives about 23 000. Even the birds and insects frequenting it are said to be peculiar to this area.�

As they set out from Umtali they visualised 98 miles as taking three to four hours, but the journey took all day and early nightfall. Crossing the Mpudzi river was the first hold-up, where the heavy sand drift was impassable for cars on their own, and for 10/- one was towed across by oxen which had first to be located before being inspanned.
They arrived at Melsetter Hotel about 8 p.m. and were not made very welcome so made enquiries for another hotel! As there was a fine smell of curry they thought supper could not be far off: John learned later that a bush �peculiar to this area� smells very like curry. Mine host opened the bar and soon mellowed sufficiently to produce some cold meat and vegetables.

Before leaving Salisbury John had made enquiries about Government land, and was told of a farm provisionally reserved as an Experimental Farm, which the Government would sell provided the price were right: enquiries in Melsetter proved this to be in fact the Chimanimani Mountains � and he looked elsewhere. Sawerombi was brought to his notice, and the party was introduced to John Martin who had the selling of it for Longden. He in turn introduced them to Stanley, who provided horses and took them over Sawerombi, going out via the Waterfall on the old pioneer road and returning over Pork Pie.

They went to a tennis party at the School, where Mr. and Mrs. Hallas made excellent hosts and a good time was had by all who had turned out to see the new arrivals. The court had very little clearance behind the back lines, and on one side a large rock of approximately the right height was used to hold up the net while the other side was supported in a more conventional fashion by a tree. John�s party decided that the balls must have been brought in with the early settlers: one even disintegrated in mid-air.

Negotiations for the sale of the farm proceeded, and on 1st October 1928 transfer passed to John and he settled in.
Besides the annual Gymkhana and Race Meetings and weekly tennis other pleasures were found in horse rides and picnics. People sent their horses out to Rocklands on Saturday and met there on Sunday to ride through the Pass to the Portuguese border post. There, if prior warning had been given, the Commandant entertained the party to lunch with periperi chicken, wine and a gramophone of old vintage. The Commandant had only one musical piece, so �England, Hope and Glory� churned out during lunch, with everyone enjoying everything. Back at Rocklands Mrs. Martin, friend of all, produced tea and cakes in her small front parlour, while Mr. Martin entertained the men with home-made peach brandy, and the weekend picnic was declared a great success.