Mother’s desperate questions after Rika Norris’s body found after three-month search

When 60-year-old Rika Norris left her sister’s home for a walk on May 23, her family had no idea it would be 82 days before they saw her again, and that she would return in a body bag after being airlifted from a remote ravine where she is believed to have slipped and fallen.

For almost three months, the Norris family and hundreds of volunteers searched for her across a vast farm in Somerset West and surrounding mountain areas, using drones, search-and -rescue teams and even a helicopter.

Norris had been staying with her younger sister, Kitty, her brother-in-law, Koos Jordaan, and their 97-year-old mother since January, helping to care for her.

Speaking to the Sunday Times on Monday after Norris’s body was discovered at the Helderberg Nature Reserve, Jordaan said the family was devastated but grateful to finally have closure.

“Saturday was a very difficult day for us because her mother could not stop crying. She kept asking, ‘What did Rika do? Why did she go there?” Jordaan said.

He said the prolonged uncertainty had been extremely difficult for the family, most of whom live in Johannesburg, Pretoria and the North West.

“For three months we did not have any news about her, but we kept going. Even though in the last month four people were rescued in Helderberg Nature Reserve, which is on the west of the mountains and only about 5km from my house,” he said.

Jordaan said Norris knew the area well and regularly walked the routes around the farm.

“On that Saturday morning, she went for a walk with my dog. She knew the route as she would walk two or three times a week. We have a little route around us. I live on a very big farm which is about 4,000 hectares. We live on the slopes of the mountain, but in between orchards,” he said.

Kitty followed the same route when Norris failed to return but could not find her.

“When she got back at about 3pm, she said there was something wrong as she could not see her sister or the dog. I had a search party from our farm, people who live on the farm. We started looking at all the various places and just couldn’t find her,” Jordaan said.

The search continued throughout Saturday night as the family followed tracks, roads and routes through the orchards and plantations stretching up the mountain.

By Sunday, emergency services had joined the search, including police, Wilderness Search and Rescue and the Mountain Club of South Africa.

The mystery was further compounded when eight days after Norris disappeared, her dog returned home alone, muddy and bewildered.