South Africa - Kruger National Park

We left our lodge near the Drakensbeg Mountains just after eight to travel well over two hundred miles to Glenthane Lodge in Mpumalanga province. Here we were a two hour drive away from the Kruger. The journey was uneventful until we stopped for our eleven o’clock break. The ‘restaurant’ at which we stopped was empty and tired. The manager/waitress welcomed us to what we believed was a refreshment stop for tea but was in reality an episode from the Jerry Springer show.

Within a short time of being served refreshments we had learnt about the manageress’ trouble with new management, her dogs - which were now to be put down, her family, her learning difficulties, her views on men, aids and sex. All in a voice whose timbre and pitch would have been useful if lost at sea! The female members of the party listened with fixed grins on their faces, I delved deep into my road atlas and Chris retreated into deep internal meditation. We left without a backward glance.

My family and other animals

Our journey was otherwise uneventful. We were to chill out at Gethlane Lodge for a day until heading for the Kruger. The lodge was a timeshare complex. We were in a fair amount of luxury again and there were all sorts of activities on the site: mini golf, table tennis, tennis, sauna etc. We arrived late afternoon and decided to eat at the site restaurant. The meals looked very reasonable: steak and chips for £3.50. We should have known. We were entertained by Eric the waiter, who forgot most things and ran everywhere to rectify the situation. Sarah ate her way through boiled lamb stew and the rest doggedly ate half their meal. We fled again. At least the apartment was self-catering and we had our own braai.

The trip to Kruger began the next day at five – when we rolled through the lodge gate. We wanted as much time as possible in the park. The drive took longer than expected. Within ten minutes we had lost our way in the local town and the main roads had ‘potholes’ signs every few yards. These ‘potholes’ would last for ten miles at a go on the main road. They were wide and frequent and would have shredded our tyres. All in all we took two and a half ours to reach our destination and the Kruger trip began. We were going in through the Orpen Gate: and as we waited to be registered we could see in the distance cars slowly moving along the roads and occasionally herds of impala crossing. We were excited.

It is difficult to describe the Kruger. We were not on a trip – we were having a unique experience. The South African side of the Kruger is almost twenty-five thousand square kilometres. The whole area is cut across with roads, some tarmaced – others gravel. Throughout the park there are camps discretely hidden. The animals have possession. We saw a large number on our first day, and desperately wanted to see the predators. However we realised that ‘animal spotting’ and ticking off the ‘big five’ was not the way to proceed. We saw the animals because there were prolific in numbers or we were lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time. The key to the Kruger was to enjoy the experience, go to the areas where wildlife was likely – such as drinking holes – and be grateful.

That first day we were heading from the Orpen Gate to Oliphants; a rest camp with a spectacular view some one hundred miles away. Within ten minutes of Orpen Gate we were ‘in the right place at the right time’. We came across a herd of about forty elephants, an extended family, eating by the side of the road and preparing to cross to go to the nearby river. Bebs warned us all to be as still as possible as a spooked elephant can roll your car without warning. Promptly, some sort of insect flew into the car, resulting in a mammoth arm flapping session by Bebs and spooking the elephants as promised. Adrenalin pumping and hearts beating we waited for the animals to calm, marvelling at their magnificence and grace. As more and more cars arrived to see the sight and inconsiderately left their noisy diesel engines running, the elephants became pretty agitated and eventually headed across the road with their young - trumpeting in warning. We realised how puny we were in comparison.

We travelled by tarmac and gravel tracks throughout that day. We saw giraffe, zebra, wildebeest and impala in great number. We saw warthogs wallowing in the mud in various water holes. What amazed us was their camouflage. We were there in the dry season with the grass brown, high and sparse. Yet let a giraffe get a few yards into the trees and it was lost. We realised that with the predators we could be within a few yards of them and see nothing. Our only regret was not having brought a good pair of binoculars.

We had our lunch at Satara Camp which had a restaurant and all the modern conveniences. We set out to travel over the gravel back roads. One thing that we hadn’t considered before entering the Kruger was the magnificence of the bird life. In many ways more spectacular and certainly more colourful than the land animals. One of our abiding memories on the second day was sitting on a river bridge in the car and watching a stork float unmoving down the length of the river ahead of us. Its flight took it to two yards ahead of the car.

The Kruger covers an enormous distance and within its confines certain animals congregate in definite areas. On the afternoon of the first day we came across something which was to become amazingly a common occurrence, hippos basking in the river accompanied by great crocodiles – many of which were sunning themselves on the bank. We saw herds of the Great Kudu; an antelope with huge twisted horns and dromedary like backs. Finally we reached the Oliphant River just short of our evening destination. Again we were in the right place at the right time. A vast family of elephants were having their late afternoon drink and among them was a solitary buffalo; ill and a target for any marauding lions. Later we learnt that shortly afterwards there had been a kill at the bridge by a pride of lions. Not however our buffalo.

The Oliphant’s camp is set a hundred metres above a great bend of the river. It is a popular watering hole in the dry season but unfortunately for us there had been heavy rain in the previous weeks and the landscape was fairly wet. We sat on the viewing terrace as the sun went down, a quick process in the tropics, and spotted in the far distance two lionesses coming down to drink. We retired to bed in our roundels. We were up again at five for a morning trail drive. Chris and Bebs were up at the same time for a walk.

I have already mentioned the phrase ‘the right place at the right time’ on a couple of occasions. Our organised drives proved the truth of this maxim. At Oliphants we were going on a sunrise drive to spot the animals at what is meant to be one of the best times of the day. We were then driving a hundred and more miles south to Szukuza Camp to do the same at sunset. Our morning drive was a disappointment. We had an experienced ranger as our driver. We spotted a solitary hyena and heard in the distance the yapping of the rest of the pack; we learnt a lot about the life of many of the animals such as zebra; we spotted some rare gazelle. However despite going deep into the bush, and coming across fresh rhino dung, we saw little else. Chris and Bebs meanwhile were on foot tracking a rhino which was intent on staying ahead of them, and hoping the lion they heard roar on getting out of the vehicle had already eaten that morning. They learnt much about bush craft and by the end of the morning we were all fairly expert on the type and timing of dung droppings. After breakfast we headed out on the drive to Szukuza.

We started the drive to the new camp by stopping at a nearby vantage point. Again the river was teeming with hippo and crocodile. We drove on, seeing hornbills, eagles and vultures and then at a watering hole we saw a pride of lions sheltering out of the heat under a nearby tree. We stopped for a brief lunch. Again, in the afternoon we realised we had come into a new animal territory. There was suddenly at the side of the road a huge herd of buffalo grazing and sleeping in the afternoon sun. They were enormous, their horns huge and threatening. Yet they seemed totally languid, contemplating the watching cars with disinterest. It was on this drive that we saw the flight of the saddle-billed stork that I mentioned as well as heron and the odd iguana. Eventually we arrived at Szukuza.

Szukuka camp is the size of a small town – it even has a nine hole golf course! It was meant to be in the centre of ‘predator country’ and we had booked a sunset drive. This was perhaps our most disappointing experience. Our guide had stated that the previous night they had come across seven lions. Our trip was fruitless. Sarah sat with a powerful torch in our wagon gazing into the bush. She did it with great dedication for over two hours. The only eyes we saw were of impala and hares. The trip was saved from sheer frustration when, just short of the camp, we came to a river bridge and found the grass at the side being grazed by a herd of hippo.

Somehow the setback of the evening made us more determined to make the most of the final day. At six, part of a convoy of cars, we rolled out of the camp the following morning. By seven we had seen nothing. Then, as fate required, we headed back to a nearby bridge. In the middle of the road appeared vague shapes – we slowly drove through an extended family of baboons. On the bridge itself we saw more shapes coming towards us. Not baboons but a family of hyena returning from a night hunt.

They passed either side of the road; large, grotesque but fearsome – eyeing us calmly as they passed! Their mouth and teeth were awesome. We were heading to lower Sabie Camp for our lunch and to be near a gate to leave the Park that evening. Again we came across herds of buffalo. All immense but surprisingly slow and languid.

Outside Lower Sabie Camp is a vast watering hole. We stopped at it to realise with amazement that it was full of hippo: some thirty or more enjoying the water or lazing in the sun. Wherever we looked previously placid stretches of water, sometimes only five yards from the car, would erupt as a hippo rose to the surface to vent water and gather air. Again they were accompanied by large numbers of crocodile.

We stopped at Lower Sabie, took on provisions, and headed back to the water hole to eat our lunch. This time as we sat watching a huge herd of impala came down to have a drink; carefully skirting the crocs which lay unmoving. A crocodile came too near the hippo and was driven off with much thrashing. We moved on, passing a Klipspringer, a gazelle, casually standing on a local road sign watching the traffic.

Our final afternoon was fairly uneventful and we decided to head to a watering hole near our leaving gate for the final hour of our trip. We hit the jackpot. A herd of ten elephants was there and as we watched two started ‘rutting’ – if that is the right word for elephants copulating –in the water. Half an hour later we prepared to leave – the elephants were still going strong. We could see in the distance, coming down a nearby hill, a stream of elephants coming to drink. We headed towards the gate when, with only ten minutes of daylight left Bebs ordered us to stop. She had seen something.

In the murk of the evening, in the final minutes of our trip, a rhino was leading its youngster down to the watering hole!

The last two days were spent in chilling out at Gethlane Lodge. After the experience of the Kruger life seemed suddenly very flat. We enjoyed the sporting facilities. Sarah learnt how to play tennis and Bebs was champion tennis player. A veil will be cast over Sue and her rage-venting demonstration at crazy golf. Bebs was lucky not to sustain injury. We had a traditional braia. It was time to return.

On the final day we headed back to Johannesburg Airport where we said our farewells. Sarah was held up once more by South African bureaucracy and instead of a leisurely last meal together we snatched a quick bite in the departure lounge. We were all leaving within a three hour window. Chris and Bebs were heading for Australia. They were leaving Africa and its experiences behind and flying back to the world of work and Western ‘civilisation’.

The rest of us prepared to return to England with our memories.