Kruger
My body's clock kicks ass. I don't have anything to keep track of time or wake me up while I'm on this trip but I got up at the exact right time, 6am, and was driven out to one of the entrance gates for Kruger National Park.
The park is a huge area of North-East South Africa (ahaha) where you can watch all the wildlife in it's natural environment. However animals aren't usually too keen on being seen, so it can be a bit of a challenge tracking them down. Kruger doesn't have many open plains where you can see a long way, it's a lot of bush and trees, so often you can't see more than 10 metres beyond the truck.
It's the start of winter here though, and despite the fact that it's 15 degrees, the grass is much thinner and lots of the trees have lost their leaves, which improves chances of spotting animals.
The Big Five, as they are called, are leopards, rhino, lions, buffalo, and elephants. They're called the big five because they're the most dangerous to track and hunt on foot.
We saw all but the leopard! We also saw crocodiles, hippos, giraffes, monkeys and baboons, antelope (called cudu after the sound they make when they run), lots of very cool stuff. It can sometimes take more than an hour before you see anything at all, depending on where the animals happen to be at that time.
And leopards are apparently very difficult to see. Even our guide said he only sees about 2 a year, and he runs safaris every day.
After about 7 hours in the jeep we arrived here at a rest camp in the park, and the guides cooked some great food and we sat around listening to baboons touching the electric fence. Despite being a vegetarian, I tried bultong, which is dried antelope meat. I'm not so bugged about eating meat out here, especially when the animals aren't farmed. Out here I feel like I'm part of nature rather than being worried about abusing it. Bultong is nothing special though, haha. Too salty.
There were 2 other travellers in the jeep with me - Laura, from the UK, and Elmer, from Holland. They're going to catch a ride with me down to Swaziland in the morning, where we'll be staying at a place called 'Mthunzi's Paradise Village'.
Now it's time for bed!
The park is a huge area of North-East South Africa (ahaha) where you can watch all the wildlife in it's natural environment. However animals aren't usually too keen on being seen, so it can be a bit of a challenge tracking them down. Kruger doesn't have many open plains where you can see a long way, it's a lot of bush and trees, so often you can't see more than 10 metres beyond the truck.
It's the start of winter here though, and despite the fact that it's 15 degrees, the grass is much thinner and lots of the trees have lost their leaves, which improves chances of spotting animals.
The Big Five, as they are called, are leopards, rhino, lions, buffalo, and elephants. They're called the big five because they're the most dangerous to track and hunt on foot.
We saw all but the leopard! We also saw crocodiles, hippos, giraffes, monkeys and baboons, antelope (called cudu after the sound they make when they run), lots of very cool stuff. It can sometimes take more than an hour before you see anything at all, depending on where the animals happen to be at that time.
And leopards are apparently very difficult to see. Even our guide said he only sees about 2 a year, and he runs safaris every day.
After about 7 hours in the jeep we arrived here at a rest camp in the park, and the guides cooked some great food and we sat around listening to baboons touching the electric fence. Despite being a vegetarian, I tried bultong, which is dried antelope meat. I'm not so bugged about eating meat out here, especially when the animals aren't farmed. Out here I feel like I'm part of nature rather than being worried about abusing it. Bultong is nothing special though, haha. Too salty.
There were 2 other travellers in the jeep with me - Laura, from the UK, and Elmer, from Holland. They're going to catch a ride with me down to Swaziland in the morning, where we'll be staying at a place called 'Mthunzi's Paradise Village'.
Now it's time for bed!
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