Kruger Park, South Africa

I have made 2 weekend trips to Kruger Park in South Africa. The park is an easy drive from Maputo as it is just a few kilometers past one of the border crossings. The one-way distance is probably about 100 kilometers. The first trip was the weekend of July 17-19, 2010 with my band of 5 IETA colleagues (4+ me) and Rhondette's mother and cousin who were visiting from the states. Oh yes, Rebecca's husband Kirk was also visiting, and Bret Miner and Tracy (last name forgotten) drove in from Pretoria where they are doing their IETA TDYs. That adds up to 10 of us, which was just enough to fully book Camp Shawu, a bush camp affiliated with the Shishangeni Private Lodge. In Kruger, a private lodge is possible because they can lease thousands of hectares of space that is reserved for their own safari drives, and there is no public access.

Eight of us were picked up in Maputo by the driver of a nice Nissan van arranged by the travel agent from Johannesburg. It turned out to be her husband driving. We split the roundtrip cost making it less than $50 each. Findlay, the driver got pulled over in a Maputo police check point for speeding through a radar trap. It cost him a 100 Rand bribe to get out of it....about 14 dollars. We arrived on time for a late lunch and an afternoon/evening safari drive on Friday, July 17. Everything was included in our room rate, and the camp has it's own chef.

The afternoon safari drive got quite cold after the sun went down because this is Winter in South Africa, and it gets close to freezing during the night. The safari driver packed blankets to help us keep warm. They drive after dark to try to catch a glimpse of noturnal animals using a spotlight. On one of our evening drives we actually saw a civet and a serval. The latter is a long-legged cat a little bigger than a large house cat with spots like a cheetah, but a much smaller animal. Brendan, our ranger driver said he had sighted this animal only twice in his several years driving, so he as quite excited. Too dark for pitures, sorry. At the end of the drive, Brendan told us that it would be 10 times colder in the morning, and that he would awaken us at 6 AM for a 6:30 departure. I had purchased a wool sweater, a scarf and had packed a lightweight sweatshirt and hooded windbreaker, so I was able to survive with many layers. We went back to camp for a nice dinner together, and turned in early to get rested for the morning.

When you have a group of 10 friends for a weekend of taking all meals together and sharing the wonders of the African savannah together you have a very special experience. The Maputo IETA TDY group was the core, and all of us had become good friends. They were all a generation younger than me, but we had the same need to stay together to prevent loneliness and to decrease our risk as compared to traveling about alone, so the generational gap was closed. I was the unofficial chaplain of the group who was asked to pray every time we gathered for a meal. We were truly blessed in all of our time together.

The early morning safari drive was cold. It was so cold that only 5 of us showed up for the second morning drive on Sunday. I have included a picture of the 5 of us taken by Brendan. The picture includes from left to right, Brett from Pretoria, Kirk and Rebecca (husband and wife), Jasmin and me. It turned out that it was a tad warmer on Sunday morning so we made the right decision. Breakfast was after the morning drive, so we gathered again, ate a nice breakfast and packed up to get back in the van. The trip back to Maputo was uneventful.

Exactly one week later I was back at Kruger with Charlene and Annie who had arrived in Maputo on Wednesday morning. This time I was driving a rented Toyota Sprinter (Corolla-like) and we stayed at the Shishangeni Main Lodge. The food an safari drive patterns were the same. We had a great time together and actually saw some species that we had not seen on the previous weekend. Let me give you a few pictorial highlights. This is a truly beautiful place.

Below is a picture of Charlene, Annie and I on one of our morning safari drives. Annie is a second grader now, she started school today. Everyone who visits Kruger Park wants to see lions. We were lucky, and saw females on both trips. Below is a picture of one of them. The males are harder to spot and we saw one only at a great distance away, so it could not be photographed. Next is a picture of a white rhino. Black rhino are rare, and we didn't see any. These animals can be dangerous, but our guides kept us in the vehicle when they were around. Camp Shawu had a large pond behind the cabins and there were always 20-30 hippos in it during the day. These animals stay cool (or warm) in the water during the day, and graze at night. This picture doesn't show you the crowd, but I liked the yawn, so i selected it. While we are doing the big guys, here are a couple of shots of elephant. They typically travel in groups. The one by himself is minus one of his tusks....I wonder how the other guy did in that disagreement.

At the top I put a collection of more graceful animals, including female impala, zebra, cheetah, and kudu (the antelope with the beautiful spiral antlers). There are hundreds of thousands of impala in the park. The rangers told us that they were the McDonalds of the park because of the markings on their rear. The other animals are much less common. We were really lucky to get as close to a cheetah as we did. This guy didn't seem to mind us at all.

Below the graceful animals are warthog, African buffalo (note the egret on the back of one of them), giraffe (also pretty graceful) and crocodile. Oh yes, one of our last sightings before leaving the park on the second trip was a pair of baboons. You get to see one of them. The beautiful bird is quite common in the park. It's a lilac-breasted roller. Finally, all the way at the bottom is one of the magnificent sunset scenes that we were treated to during our afternoon safari drives.

We didn't see leopard while there, but raced back to the lodge area one morning after Brendan got radio report of one near the lodge. A few in the group caught a glance of the tail as he ran into some distant bushes, but I didn't see it. Too bad, but we did see quite a lot.

I don't know how this will seem to you just seeing the pictures. Many of these animals can be seen at a good zoo, but when you see them in their normal habitat you are just awestuck at almost every sighting. There are no barriers between you and them.