Day 3: Morning Bike Ride

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With the winter nearing (although you wouldn't think it, since there hasn't been a day below 80 degrees, and no rain) the sun sets around 6pm every night. This event coincides with all of the rest camps inside the park closing their gates at 6pm. Every one must be in for the night; no one can leave unless you schedule a game drive. Each morning, the gates then open back up at 6am, and people are free to travel the park as they please (as long as they stay in their cars).

The morning of our second day in Kruger saw us waking up at 5am. We had booked an early morning bike ride. We were picked up at 5:30am, and the 3 of us (6 people could go each morning, but we were the only ones this particular morning) were driven 10km outside the camp at which point we started our armed bike ride in the bush.

The whole trip was about 3 hours (glad it ended when it did, because it was getting hot!) and although we didn't see many animals, our guide was very knowledgable. we did stop for about a half an hour in front of a huge pod of hippos approximately 50 feet away in the water. It was pretty amazing. We even saw a baby hangin out by its mother that would surface every so often.

We returned to Olifants rest camp around 9am, checked out, and started our relatively short drive to our next camp, Satara, known for its lions. Satara didn't have quite the view that Olifants provided, but it was a larger camp with a swimming pool, a larger camp store, and a more game-drive options. Since we hadn't booked anything for that night (our 2nd night at Satara was covered since we had booked a night drive before leaving Deutschland), we booked a sunset drive (4:30pm - 7:30pm).

After driving for just over an hour and seeing only zebras, wildebeest, giraffes, ostriches, elephants, and many of Kruger's 125,000 impala, I gave up thinking that we were going to see any lions (kind of a re-occuring theme for me everyday in the park). However, after rounding a turn in the road, our guide noticed a herd of waterbuck that seemed really nervous. He stopped the car, and it was at that moment we saw 2 female lions croucing in the tall grass. We stayed by the lions for the next half hour following them as they walked non-chalantly down a dirt road.

Another highlight of the sunset drve was seeing an elephant about 20 feet from the truck, and having him trumpet at us. Other new animals we saw were spotted genets (small cat-like creatures) and a jackal.

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Photos

African Sunrise
...sunrise over the Olifants River on our morning bike ride

Hungry Hippos
...one of the many hippos we saw

Armed guides/guards
...our bike guides, John and Vusy

Olifants Rondavel
...the morning when we were leaving Olifants

Kudu
...the symbol of South Africa's national parks