A satisfying win

South African batsman Herschelle Gibbs sends his latest exclusive postcard from the tour of Zimbabwe.

What better way to start off the new season with a satisfying knock on a real flattie wicket after weeks and weeks of practice in the nets.

It's always good to get out in the middle and do battle again especially after the long three-and-a-half month lay-off from the end of the West Indies tour.

It was good to also have my opening partner with me when we walked out to the middle on Friday morning.

He was struggling with a neck injury the week before the tour started and was pretty doubtful he would make the trip.

Kirsten scored a double century

But Gary Kirsten responded to some rest and treatment and fortunately for us he came to the party with a great knock of 220, his third Test double century!

The Zimbabweans bowled a bit too many loose balls and this enabled Gary and I to get off to a bit of a flyer and provide some momentum for a really big score.

We ended up with a pretty decent total of 603 declared and we knew that we had our work cut out for us bowling them out twice on this flat wicket.

And so it is even more satisfying starting off the season with a good Test match win and hopefully the appropriate the sign for great things come for the season ahead.

The two new bowlers in our team fared quite well on their debuts with the wicket suiting Claude Henderson's turn a bit more than the raw pace of Andre Nel.

Andre bowled with good consistent length and was rewarded with four wickets in the first innings.

Invaluable

I'm sure he will take this experience forward with him this season and in the years to come.

Claude built a lot of pressure by hardly bowling a loose ball and took wickets at vital times throughout the match.

Claude is obviously filling in for the injured Nicky Boje and he has taken his opportunity well knowing that Nicky is on the brink of recovery from his long term knee injury.

With the wicket becoming really dusty and the bowlers footmarks coming into play from day three onwards, we thought we might have some luck and finish it off in four days.

However, Andrew Flower has shown some great resilience and form and carried his team into the fifth day with two invaluable century knocks.

We came to Harare with a bit of a cloud of suspicion as to what we could expect since most of the newspaper reports have been quite negative following all the farm invasions.

However, we have found Harare to be quiet and peaceful and we have also been put at ease with some extra security at our disposal.

I never took the field on the fifth day due to a spasm in my lower back and was confined to the physio's table to allow the spasm and pain to settle down.

HD Ackerman was initially brought up as cover for Gary and was supposed to go home after the Test match but (un)fortunately he now has to stay over a few extra days as cover for me while my back comes right.

From me in Harare, this is Herschelle Gibbs for BBC Sport Online.