Blogs from Kruger National Park, Mpumalanga , South Africa, Africa - page 15

Last day here in South Africa! We stayed the night in a rest camp called Crocodile Bridge since it's on the Crocodile river and the last camp in the park before you leave. I'm now off to New Zealand for more adventures! Long journey to Auckland but I'll post more news and send you a post card as soon as I can! Take care Lots of love Flat Stanley... read more

The next day we left Orpen Gate camp and drove towards Olifants rest camp which was 100 km away, it took us 5 hours to get there! We stopped quite a lot on the way to look at the animals and birds. By the side of one of the road tracks was a 'kill' which had hundreds of vultures around it, hooded vultures and white backed vultures, quite amazing to see them. We arrived at Olifants later on in the evening, this time we stayed in small round African style huts. Olifants has an amazing view over the Olifants river where you can see the hippos in the water below and some crocs! We went out for a night ride but didn't see much apart from a Spring hare which is like a small kangoroo.... read more

One of our main purposes for visiting Africa was to see the wildlife. Kruger National Park (KNP) seemed to be the perfect destination. After Stellenbosch we headed back to Cape Town airport to catch a flight to Joburg. We did not intend to stay in Joburg but what we did not realize was that it would be a 6 hour drive just to get to the gates of KNP! It would take another hour within the park for us to get to our lodge, the Imbali lodge. KNP is huge- it's bigger than Israel! We come into the park around 6 PM. Our lodge has sent a vehicle to pick us up. Within the one hour drive to the lodge we see buffaloes, elephants, Kudus (a largish deer type animal), Rhinos and most pleasant surprise of ... read more

Back to KrugerTuesday, August 24. We load into safari vehicles at 5:45 am and drive into Kruger Park by 6 am. The morning is not as eventful a day as yesterday. Saw the usual: elephant, buffalo, eagle, zebra, wildebeest, and giraffe. But not in abundance. Our one unusual spotting is a hyena which is lying in the grass right next to the road. It stays put, posing for as long as we’re stopped. Back to the hotel just after lunch. We’ll go out again at 2:30. Another giraffe? Ho humMight be a good time to mention how quickly one becomes inured to the site of these wonderful animals. The first time we spot an elephant in the distance, our hearts pound. Now we see one and it’s “OK an elephant, what else is there?” This is ... read more

Kruger Heading south and our self drive Safari-Kruger After our 4 hour Rwandan flight we taxied into Tambo International airport at Jossie in South Africa. Bought a nice big bottle of Absolut, changed some dollars for Rand and jumped the shuttle to our overnight accomodation. Caught up with Rita and Ros, two of our fellow tourers from our Morocco tour and it was really good to see familar faces. They took us on a city tour of 'Jossie' short for Johassesburg which looked a bit old and yes dark in spots, but did have some beautiful old heritage buildings and it was a great opportunity to get a locals insight into living in South Africa in 2010. We crossed the Nelson Mandella bridge to a local Portugese restaurant (ex Mozambique) - probably the best meal since ... read more