Well, as there seems to be a relatively strong general concern for my safety, I figure it would be timely to write a quick post to let you all know that I am in fact in one piece, and have not been eaten by any of the big 5 animals available for viewing at the Kruger National Park. This is not through a lack of trying, or threats from my fellow travelers, I am just convinced that the buffalo pictured below was much tastier prospect.
The first day in South Africa was certainly an eventful one, with me getting a rather nasty feeling at the counter in Sao Paulo when they said that they didn’t have any record of my baggage. I did however take them on their word that they would have it on the flight – perhaps my general cynicism should have prepared me for the inevitable event of landing in South Africa without a change of clothes, toiletries or virtually any of my chess books for the tournament. Nonetheless, my lovely and extremely hospitable host Judy met me at the airport, took me back to my lodging for the night to allow me to freshen up before we went to go buy the essentials that I would need for my Safari.
After an eventful evening where I played a few games of chess, learnt some Afrikaans and had a really nice evening with Judy and her family. The following morning, bright and early we headed off to meet the first of the Indian contingent to arrive. Eisha, Harika and Meenashki (who spent the remainder of the tournament trying to shrug the various nicknames which were attributed to her), had all arrived slightly early to join us on the Safari and definitely appeared to be more than slightly apprehensive about being in such close proximity with dangerous animals… they were pretty excited about the safari though!
I took this opportunity to go and collect my luggage from the airport, as it had arrived just under 24 hours late before the group of us rendezvoused with Graham Jurgensen and Dave to grab a traditional South African lunch and finalize plans for heading up to Kruger National Park the following morning. After a reasonable start on the Monday, we headed along the N4 at what would, to me 3 months ago have been an alarming fast rate. Having experienced similar speeds and much worse driving recently, all without a seatbelt I felt “perfectly comfortable” (well that’s a slight exaggeration) knowing that this was the most secure I will probably be in a vehicle in the next 12 months.
A quiet evening ensued, in which a few beers and a rather good curry (thanks Dave!) were consumed, and we got ourselves into Savannah mode in preparation for going Lion spotting in the morning.
An early start meant that basically as soon as we entered the park we ran into a herd of giraffes crossing the road looking for an early morning feed. Whether it was the way they chew their food (which is simply awesome) or the fact that I figured that all African wildlife feels the same way about early mornings that I do, but I was rather glad that the first group of slightly disgruntled animals we met on Safari were herbivores (or as some of our fellow travelers affectionately described them “vegetarians”). Having these majestic creatures walk at some points comfortably within 5 meters of the cars was definitely the perfect start to a Safari. Literally 3 minutes afterwards, we got waived down by a passing vehicle directing us to an area where we could go and view Lion. We sat there, in awe for a good period of time as one extremely lazy male lion, and two female lions chilled out sleeping and giving us the opportunity to really soak in the beauty of one of the true beauties of the African savannah.
In awe of the luck we had just had, Dave and I were enjoying the regular banter that goes along with being stuck in a car with a good friend – especially when you have very different expectations of the wildlife you want to see. For me, everything was amazing - at this point, Impalas, small birds, warthogs and native mice were still exciting. However, Dave had seen all this and more having experienced three days safariing at the Pillensburg. I did however get his nod of approval when I successively spotted Kudu and Giraffes one after the other…. Well that was until Graham, our wonderful host who was in the lead drove back and yelled at us something like (seeing as this is a pg blog I can’t repeat verbatim) “You silly damned Aussies, as if you are here watching flipping Giraffes… There are flipping elephant up ahead, and I don’t think you flipping well want to be you if we flipping well miss them!”
Fortunately, as Dave and I do generally feel attached to our limbs and appendages, we managed to get to see two adolescent male bull elephants (don’t ask how we know they were male; let’s just say it was rather intimidating). The experience was quite fascinating, the guys just eat and eat and eat some more – we were feeling pretty good about ourselves, as we were the first cars there and got to spend a good 5 or so minutes enjoying the site all to ourselves. Not too long afterwards, other cars did arrive which began to ruin the tranquility of our moment – it also made us a little more wary of our surroundings, as most of the late arrivals weren’t as cautious about giving the animals (which were 3 times the size of the Audi) their due space. In particular we decided that should Mummy Elephant show up, we probably didn’t want to be there.
A few minutes later we hit the local watering hole, where we got our first sightings of Crocodiles, and Hippo… once again we got called “silly” Aussies as Dave and I were in awe of what we were seeing, completely ignorant of the fact that 20m away there were 3 leopards chilling out. Fortunately, we arrived just in time to see one of them, albeit fleetingly as it ran into some bushes – it staggered me how small it was. Sure, it was a juvenile animal, but it not only had the capacity to kill me, but also carry 3 of me up a tree, whilst being about 2/3rds of the size of me! The assassin of the Savannah certainly was impressive, and seeing its sleekness and grace as it moved off was something to truly behold.
So far, we haven’t even had lunch, yet we have seen 3 of the Big 5 (Elephant, Leopard, Lion, Rhino and Buffalo). We had lunch, looking out across another of the watering holes and, whilst seriously considering what life would be like if I lived here really I just soaked in the atmosphere. So close to some of natures finest specimens, enjoying a cup of coffee with good friends seemed so close to paradise for me that I really didn’t want to leave. On the way back to our accommodation that night, we completed probably one of the luckiest days of Safariing, by driving past two groups of White Rhino. They were a long way off, and somehow – whilst driving – Graham (our wonderful host) managed to pick both of them on the horizon.
This completed what I thought was the perfect day of Safari – I turned out to be wrong, when we arrived back at our wonderful pad, our good friend Gawain Jones had arrived with Heindrich, and we proceeded to have a Braii (South Africans do claim to chuck on a god BBQ, as it turns out they don’t have misplaced confidence in their abilities on that front!), and listen to the African night. The sounds of lion roaring, general chatter amongst the animals turning in for the night and the sunset is something I will never forget. So to Graham for organizing it, Heindrich for his help throughout the trip and to my fellow wayward travelers from (literally) all corners of the globe, thankyou the trip will be something I will never forget
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| A young bull going in for a fight. One, two, three, four... five?? ooohhhh |
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| Zebras and Giraffes chilling out. Bridging fact: Giraffes have a heart which weighs 20kg, and only sleep around 20 minutes per day! |
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| The lion cubs stole our Braai meat, we figured we'd let them be! |
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| Whats the scarier prospect. A lap around the car, or sitting across the board from this guy? Right now, im closing my eyes and running! |
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| The piercing looks these guys gave us made it extremely difficult to believe the driver when he said that they are unable to distinguish us, and only really see the larger mass of our car. Can you believe this was 4m away? |
