Day 10 South Africa - AM & PM Game Drives

Wake up call was at 5:30 AM. It was hard to leave the bed, not because I was tired (which I was of course) but because it was freezing out. When I went to bed last night, I only covered myself with a sheet for much of the night. By morning, I was using the duvet. Man, it was cold!

We dressed, then headed over to the restaurant for tea and rusks. These ones were better, sweeter and not as hard as before. Yesterday, I took the middle far right seat. This morning I sat in the middle of the front row. We saw some zebras up close and I was a bit surprised they didn’t run away while we were parked nearby.

We pulled over at another stop and were told we could come out of the vehicle. Now what? I wondered. Another wild animal? But no, we examined a termite hill up close and personal. South Africa has 6 different types of termites. There was steam coming out of the top of this one and we each climbed up to feel the heat emanating from the top.

Matthew, our tracker, spotted fresh elephant dung so we set off to find the animals. We found a big male and watched in fascination while he ripped trees apart like nobody’s business. After that, we criss-crossed the area looking for the rest of the herd. The roads cover the game reserve quite well. Lawrence, the driver, stopped the vehicle and shut it off, waiting for the herd to come by. We could hear them cracking the branches of the trees long before we saw them. About 10 of them crossed the road in between us and another vehicle. It was quite a  thrill watching them go by.

When we returned to the lodge at 9 AM, it was breakfast time and we headed straight there. After breakfast, I got ready to go for a nature walk at 10:30. Our guide was someone new and he carried a big gun with him. Just before we headed out, he loaded the ammunition and read us the rules: no running, and follow behind him single file.

I was a bit nervous but I needn’t have been. Instead of seeing animals, he showed us lots of different plants and told us what they were used for and how animals used them. Many plants were various herbal remedies or teas and our guide wove a strong piece of ‘rope’. He peeled the outer bark away from the softer part, then twisted and uniformly wove 3 pieces together.

We basically stayed on the road and didn’t go all that far but it was most interesting and it felt exciting to be walking out and about like that!

When I returned, Donna and I walked down to the water hole where we saw the tiniest bit of a hippopotamus. We watched for quite awhile but he was not interested in coming out very much. The property is nicely laid out and there are fancier units past ours. I am quite content with what we have!

Bucks and does of some kind wander all around and we saw some lovely warthogs again. 1 PM was lunch, kudo stew was on the menu and it was wonderful! The meat was tender, the gravy was tasty and there was fresh homemade bread as well. I am going to have to do a lot of walking in the next few days to burn some calories!!

After typing this, I had a little lie down before the 3:30 PM game drive began. We knew what to expect and so we began to search for something interesting. Impala are a given and you are guaranteed to see them every time you go out. Our Kruger guide told us they are the MacDonald’s of Africa because everyone eats them! They even have the rounded M on their backsides, haha!

We hadn’t seen any lions yet on this trip and our guides knew we would love to do that. Eagle-eyed Matthew, out in front on his special tracker seat did find some lioness tracks. We circled round and round an area and I thought i was a lost cause. How could anyone spot a lion in so dense an area? It seemed akin to looking for a needle in a haystack. But on our third pass we saw the lioness trotting purposefully along, ignoring us thankfully.

After she disappeared into the bush, we could hear her gentle roaring – what a thrilling sound it was! Lawrence figured she had made a kill and was either calling to another lioness in the area, or else calling for her cubs to come. He was right. As we were on the move we saw some cubs on the road right in front of us! I was so stunned and delighted that I completely forgot to pick up my camera and start shooting! Believe it, that is a first for me! As we watched, a bird flew up and away from the area and one cub jumped up as if he could get it. How priceless, just what my kitty cats back home would do!! Yes, I know I overuse exclamation marks!!!

The sun had set by then and Lawrence stopped the vehicle in front of a gorgeous tree for a photo op. When it got dark, we could see two glowing red patches on the mountains across. These were fires that had gotten out of control. Because of all the grass in the underbrush, much of it gets burned on purpose once every four years, otherwise a sudden fire could do some serious damage. In this reserve, they try to burn once every 5 years. Because of the burning and the dusty roads, the sky is often hazy in a lot of areas. This game reserve had wonderful blue skies though, for the most part.

Supper tonight was a braai barbeque and we sat outside around a large fire. The evening was quite cool and we were given blankets, just like in the jeep. I had lamb and a piece of chicken and they were very delicious! I am done journaling early tonight so I just might get to bed early too!

Day 9 South Africa - School & Game Drive

We had a late departure today, 9 AM, but I got up at 7 in order to explore the grounds before we left. After brekie I found some lovely (just kidding!) warthogs. They are really, really ugly. But it is so interesting to watch them eat. Most of the time they eat like a normal pig, but occasionally they kneel down on both front legs in order to tug at some particularly delicious morsel. Tres cool!

We headed out on the highway, then turned off onto a rough gravel road, then onto some really poor pavement. In all, it took us about 45 minutes to get to the G Adventures Planterra sponsored school. It is a preschool for ages 1-5 and we were invited into the class of 3-4 year olds. It was a large class, easily over 30 kids. They sat in rows on little colorful plastic chairs and most of them stared at us in wonder, although there were a few shy ones.

Their teachers are volunteers and are supervised by someone with training. The children get breakfast and lunch as well. If the parents can’t afford the nominal fee, they can volunteer to help out instead. The classroom wasn’t all that big, and the walls had a few posters and charts with colors, numbers, etc. to help the children learn.

The teacher asked the kids to recite various things for us like numbers, colors, months of the year, nursery rhymes and songs. They actually shouted their responses and they were quite loud at times! I was surprised that they were learning the same songs that preschoolers learn back home, like “The Wheels on the Bus”.

After a bit, they children got a recess break and went outside to play and interact with us. Like kids everywhere, they loved to see their picture on the back of the camera after you took their photo.

When it was time to go, we headed back the way we came and covered some of the same road we had taken yesterday. We went past orange groves and packing plants, most of which had just completed the orange growing season. We also passed some tremendously large termite hills! I had no idea they could get that big.

We arrived at where we are spending the next 2 nights. Hurray! It is a beautiful private game reserve called Chisomo Safari Camp. We were greeted with wet washcloths and a welcome drink then given the key to our tents. Talk about luxury camping! I could certainly do this style of ‘roughing it’ more often! We have our own bathroom, shower and again, there is mosquito netting around the beds.

We were served lunch in the dining tent then we had about 30 minutes to get ready for our first safari drive. We are in 11 passenger jeeps again, but these ones are open – no roof. There is a seat at the front of the vehicle, outside in front of the bumper for the ‘tracker’ to sit. He watches the tracks and tries to figure out where the animals are.

Unlike yesterday, we drove on trails, and at a much slower speed. There are many, many roads criss-crossing the game park and we wandered up and down with our eyes peeled. We also went where I thought we couldn’t go, off-road, into bushes, water, and sand. I was sure we were going to get stuck. Many times we couldn’t even make a turn properly without going back and forth until we made it! Another big difference from yesterday was that the foliage was so close, we literally had to duck and lean in to avoid getting hit by tree branches. Some of the branches were quite thorny and we were told that others were poisonous!

We saw giraffe, white rhinos, yellow billed hornbill, tree squirrel, civet, waterbuck, and nyala. After awhile, we got to a spot and were told to climb out! I couldn’t believe my ears! Nor could I believe my eyes when we walked past a male cheetah resting in the grass! (and another one we couldn’t see very well). Our guide said we were too big to be prey so we didn’t bother them. It was an amazing and rather scary experience.

We did some more driving then stopped in the middle of a clearing for a refreshment break. They set up a table with a table cloth, some snackie type foods, and the water or pop we had ordered previously. The sun was setting and the water went down nicely after driving on those dusty roads.

Shortly after that as we were headed back we saw a leopard. Apparently it was a male and he was huge. We drove where there was no road to try and keep up with him but we lost him. The light was poor and I didn’t get any clear photos, but it was quite an experience.

We came back in the dark and the spotter shone a big searchlight from side to side to see if he could find any night animals. A civet cat crossed the road in front of us and wandered off into the night.

We arrived back at about 6:30, had a delicious supper at 7:30 and it is now after 10 PM. For some reason I am beat!