Namibia

Buckle up, this is going to be a long one – because MAN was this an awesome trip!

One of the benefits of being a US employee on loan to South Africa is that I get both US and South African holidays. So since I had nothing to do over Thanksgiving, why not take advantage of the days off to go on a ridiculous trip to another country?

There were a few contenders in terms of destinations, but ultimately we decided to go to Namibia for a number of reasons. (And yes, Mr. Trump, it is Namibia, not Nambia, you idiot). Close proximity to South Africa and relatively cheap flights made Namibia easy enough to travel to for a short 4 day trip, but it is also one of the most unique countries in Southern Africa – in my opinion at least – in terms of diversity of geography and things to do/see. And what better way to see it all then to do a road trip?

In an effort to see as much as possible in a relatively short amount of time, we decided to fly in and out of two different airports, allowing us to make a bit of a “U” shaped drive through the center of the country. Now I have to be honest here. Other than picking the destinations within Namibia that we wanted to visit, and booking accommodation, there was ZERO research or planning that went into this trip. We very much had a “let’s go with the flow and see what happens” type mentality towards everything, which.. had its goods and its bads and... well... you’ll see.

Part 1 – The First Leg of the Journey

The first drive

Departing at 6:30am to maximize daylight, we flew into Windhoek, the capital city, which is roughly a two hour flight from Johannesburg. I had booked a car in advance, so after going through immigration we went to collect our vehicle – a VW Golf was the economy option, as Volkswagen is very popular in Southern Africa. We got in the car, were ready to depart, and realized that none of our phones had any service whatsoever, so we have no way to navigate. While this may seem like a stupid oversight, I had already used my South African phone in both Nigeria and Bahrain (which is outside of Africa) without ANY issue, and on top of that, my travel companion has three phones. Yes, three. She has a South African work phone, a US phone, and a US phone with an international plan. And nothing was working.

So we went back into the airport to execute plan B. I went back to the rental company to get a Garmin GPS for the car, and Morgan went to get a Namibian SIM card because one of her phones is unlocked. We also asked the rental company for a paper map as a last resort backup, but somehow they did not have a map of the full country. Which…just.. not helpful, guys.

Anyway, we got back in the car, both the phone and the GPS seemingly working fine, and set off on our Namibian road trip. There really isn’t much to do or see in Windhoek; most of the exciting destinations are near the coast. So, after loading up on some snacks and water, we began heading towards our first destination, Sossusvlei, which was supposed to be a 4 hour 30min drive. Spoiler Alert: It was not.

Now I don’t know if anyone still uses Garmin GPS devices anymore, but if you do, then Lord help you. That thing was SO out of date and inaccurate as to where roads were. Now to be fair, there is a good amount of road construction going on in Namibia at the moment, and detours can be tricky, but that damn device couldn’t tell a road from the middle of the desert. Literally. There were several points where it told me to make a turn where there was no road and there clearly never had been any road. What are you doing, Garmin?! But relying on basic sense of direction (Morgan’s, not mine), and the fact that outside of Windhoek there is basically only one road going in each direction anyway, we managed to get on the right course.

Namibia is quite a large, but relatively undeveloped country compared to some of its Southern Africa neighbors. The population is only about 2.6 million (for reference the population of NYC alone is about 8.6 million), and as we discovered while driving through, Namibia is overall one of the least densely populated countries in the world. And it shows. We drove for miles, and miles, and miles, and literally saw nothing but wilderness. No towns, no villages, no rest stops (unless you count a bench under a tree), no gas stations, nothing. We kept saying “where do people live!” over and over throughout the drive. Thank goodness we bought food and water before heading out!

I wasn't lyin'... this is a sign for a rest stop. Bench under tree. 

I can see for miles and milesss

Two other interesting things we learned about Namibia in the first few hours; 1) if people don’t live there, telecommunications company don’t build cell towers, and 2) if people don’t live there, cash-strapped governments don’t pave the road. So despite buying a Namibian SIM card, we had no cell reception for the majority of the journey, and because we did no research in advance, we had a small hatchback on unpaved roads. AND because we had to use Garmin instead of googlemaps, the route we took was nearly twice as long.

It might seem like I’m complaining, and not having a working cellphone or 4x4 car could have been a disaster, but despite all of that nonsense, we had a fabulous, fabulous time. Namibia is a gorgeous country, and by driving ourselves, we had so much freedom to stop and make detours as much as we wanted. The topography changes pretty dramatically throughout the country, and by being so remote, it just all felt like a pioneer-type adventure. I’ve been to many African countries, but this was the first time I actually felt like I was in cliché-Africa – the kind of empty, rolling savannah that you see in movies. Think Out of Africa without any weird colonial plantations.

Our little crap mobile

The rolling plains

We crossed the Tropic of Capricorn!

Overall, the first leg of the journey took us about six hours – so an hour and a half longer than originally predicted, but compared to the second leg of the road trip, it was a cake walk.. but more on that later. First, THE DESERT!

Part 2 – Sossusvlei

Our first destination in Namibia, Sossusvlei, is part of the Namib-Naukluft National Park in the Southern corner of the Namib desert. Because you’re not allowed to lodge in the park itself, the closest place we could stay was about an hour from the desert, in a valley that is so remote the area literally doesn’t have a name. Seriously. The address says “70km from Sesriem,” which is the nearest “town.” The lodge sent us GPS coordinates in order to navigate there… epic. There are actually a number of lodges in this valley, although you’d only know it by the road signs, because they are all miles apart and set way back from the “road.” Apparently most of these lodges used to be farms, but because the land is so arid and in the middle of nowhere, most of them were converted into desert resorts.

Anyway, we arrived at the We Kebi lodge after our epic six hour journey, to find that we picked a freaking amazing place to stay. We had our own little straw-roofed hut, and again, it’s in the middle of nowhere, so we were completely surrounded by absolutely beautiful, rugged wilderness. There were even animals wandering by, like mountain zebras, giraffes, oryx, and wildebeest. The lodge makes a big effort to minimize its impact on the environment too -  getting all of its power from solar, and water from boreholes (see Dad, I asked about water).  Even the pool is solar heated! Most of the lodges in Namibia are actually eco-friendly though, because - fun fact #1 - Namibia is one of a few countries in the world to specifically address conservation and protection of natural resources in its constitution! Go, Namibia!

Casual zebra stroll outside our hut

Our view out the door

View from the pool

Wildebeest visit the lodge

One of the first things we did was actually visit a nearby lodge that doubles as a conservation/rescue facility for big cats. We were able to see a leopard, two cheetahs, and four caracals. Most of the animals that come to the site were abandoned as cubs, and bottle fed and raised by the lodge staff. And unfortunately because they all arrive so young and are basically raised in captivity, the guide said they can’t be released back into the wild. But they all have large areas to roam, and seem pretty well taken care of.

The cheetahs were by far the coolest, and, fun fact #2, Namibia actually has the largest population of cheetah in southern Africa not contained within national parks. The cheetahs at the lodge were very friendly though – the female cheetah especially. Her name is Wild, and she literally came like a dog when the guide called her name (well, she did ignore him for a while first...like most cats) – but as she walked up, she was PURRING so loud. I had no ideas that cheetahs purred. It was crazy! Wild also enjoyed having her ears scratched, like a house cat, and spent a good five minutes licking the salt off my hands and arm. Side note: cheetah tongues are very rough!

Meowww

No one tell Rookie this happened... 

The next day, we were up at 4:15am to drive out into the desert and experience the dunes before it got unbearably hot. The trip was arranged by the lodge, and was just us, a guide, and this nice German couple, so a relatively small group. As we entered the Namib-Naukluft National Park, the guide pulled over and walked us through some of the smaller dunes to teach us a little about the area. It was cool to be there that early in the morning because you can see all of the animal tracks left on the dune from the night before.

Sunrise over our van

Gecko tracks in the sand!

The guide also tracked down and showed us tunnels built by dancing white lady spiders, a species of spider only found in this desert. (And no, I didn’t make that name up). These spiders build tunnels at the base of the sand dunes with an interwoven sheet of sand and silk covering the top, which literally swings open like a trapdoor. The spiders can sense seismic vibrations through the tiny hairs on their legs, which is how they hunt prey and communicate, by tapping their legs on the sand. The leg tapping is how they got the “dancing” part of their name. The guide told us that when a male finds a female tunnel, he taps his legs on the sand outside the little trapdoor, trying to get her attention, at which point the female spider either accepts his proposal and comes out to mate, or – get this – she doesn’t accept and she comes out to eat him. That’s some risky business.

Anybody hooome?

We then proceeded to drive to and hike Big Daddy Dune, the tallest dune in Sossusvlei standing at 325m or ~1,070ft. Now I have to say, the dunes in this park are nothing like I’ve ever seen before. And it’s just the coolest thing. The sand is a coppery red color, due to oxidation of the high levels of iron in the sand, and they’re so red that it really feels like you’re walking around on Mars. The dunes are also called star dunes – i.e. they have multiple “arms” stretching out from the peak – because the wind changes direction so frequently, thus sand is blown in multiple directions. 

Up we go!

Are were there yetttttt

Hello Mars

Hiking Big Daddy Dune was the hardest thing I’ve done in a while. It was blazing hot, already 104 degrees at 9am when we started climbing, and the dune is so steep, and the sand is so silky, that every step you take you end up sliding back three feet. It was grueling. But the views were spectacular! And sliding down the dune on the other side was pretty fun.

At the base of Big Daddy Dune is an area called Deadvlei, a dried clay former riverbed home to numerous dead, 600 year old acacia trees that have been scorched black by the sun. Although the trees are dead, it’s so dry that they don’t decompose. The white clay floor combined with the red dunes, dead trees, and heat haze really makes the area feel surreal, like you’re in a Dali painting or something.

So many splinters resulted from this photo

600 year old zombie trees

The whole national park was just nothing like I have ever seen before - very cool experience.

Part 3 – The Second Drive

Drive number 2

Now I’m not going to go into too much more detail about the ridiculousness of driving in Namibia, but I will add that the roads on this part of the journey were INFINITELY worse than the first part. It was like the entire road was a giant rumble strip. There were four different sets of tracks carved into the “road” that I would shift back and forth between, including driving down the wrong side of the road, to try and find any stretch of road that didn’t make my brain rattle against my skull. 

And being in a small car, I was terrified of popping a tire and not having a working phone, so we barely went above 20mph. And that’s not an exaggeration. The journey this time was supposed to take us just over five hours… but.. yea.. it took us nine. And I had to drive the whole way because Morgan doesn’t drive manual. So, new personal record! Wahoo!

Two fun things about this leg of the trip though -

During the second leg of the drive we saw a HUGE heard of mountain zebra run across the road in front of us. There must have been 50 or 60 zebras in all - it was crazy! Unfortunately I didn’t get my phone out quick enough to capture the full run, but I caught a little bit of the herd in the distance once they had crossed.

Second - a bit of hilarity – we knew we were going to need gas at some point during this drive, so we planned to stop in a town called Solitaire, which we were told at the lodge is the largest city in the area. City is a VERY generous word. I wouldn’t even call it a town. Honestly, it’s amazing this little spit of nothing showed up on the map at all. Solitaire is pretty much a hotel, a gas station, a café, and a graveyard for cars. I couldn’t even believe how small it was. When we stopped in the café for some coffee, I asked the guy behind the counter, and he told me that eighty people live in Solitaire. 80. How does that work? I have no idea.

Welcome to Solitaire

Where cars come to die

And what you see is exactly what you get...

But again, the Namibian scenery proved fabulous, and changed quite drastically along the way, starting with the red dunes, then rocky mountains, yellow plains, and finally, the yellow dunes of Swakopmund – our second destination!

Part 4 - Swakopmund

The city of Swakopmund (and yes, this one does actually qualify as a city) sits on the west coast of Namibia right on the Atlantic ocean. The first thing that struck me after arriving – the buildings make the city look like you’re somewhere in Germany. It really looks like Germany.

Guten Tag Swakopmund!

So not surprisingly, I learned later that Swakopmund was in fact founded by Germans in the late 1800’s when Namibia was part of the German South West African colony. I always forget that Germany had colonies in Africa before they were taken away after WWI. But the Germans were particularly cruel colonizers, and systematically attempted to exterminate the whole native population of Namibia, which was considered both the first genocide of the 20^th century and the model later used by the Nazis. Not a happy time in history... Anyway, after WWI, Namibia became a protectorate of British South Africa, and remained under the mandate of South Africa all the way until 1990. Ok, enough history.

But there are a surprising number of Germans still living in Swakopmund and German is pretty widely spoken, which I was not expecting at all. Fun fact #3: the name Swakopmund actually comes from the local language, Nama, from the word Tsoakhaub, which loosely translates to "excrement opening." The name apparently describes the Swakop River during flood time, which carries “excrement” in its riverbed, like dead animals, past the city into the Atlantic Ocean. So, there you go.

The city itself is quite lovely though – safe and walkable, with nice restaurants and German style pubs. We went to this one restaurant at the end of a long jetty sticking out into the Atlantic Ocean. The walls were all windows, so we were surrounded by ocean views throughout the meal. Very nice.

View from the jetty

Din-din

The jetty. Restaurant above at the end. 

Surrounding the city on all sides except the West (which is ocean) is the Namib desert, which in this part of the country consists of billowing yellow sand dunes, also star dunes like in Sossusvlei, but totally different colored. Looking out across the horizon it almost seems like you’re looking at a painting because all of the colors of the dunes blend together so perfectly.

Our second day there, we actually drove out into the desert to go sandboarding on these yellow dunes! It’s pretty much snowboarding, but.. on sand. And it worked way better than I thought it would to slide down because the sand is so soft and fine. Now, I’m not much of a snow sport person - I’ve never been skiing and only tried snowboarding once, so this type of balance was completely new for me. But the instructor was patient, and I was eventually able to slide down the dune pretty nicely! There were some experienced snow boarders in our group, so compared to them I looked like a doof.. but I was proud of the progress I made J

So much sand... 

Beautiful golden sand

Just keep a' paddlin'

Looking cooler than we are..

We also got a chance to “sled” down one of the bigger dunes – lying down on a flexible sheet of plastic. You can go pretty fast too! One of the guides had a speed gun, so we were able to see how fast we each went down the dune. My record was 36 mph, but someone else in the group got theirs up to 41 mph!

Weeeeee!

But, let me tell you. Sandboarding. Is. Exhausting. Every time you slide down the dune, you have to trudge back up through the sand, in the heat, carrying your board, with huge snowboarding boots on your feet. There ain’t no chair lift in the desert! It probably wasn’t the best plan to do this two days after hiking Big Daddy Dune, haha, but it was still tons of fun! However, after a few hours, we were so tired and sore that the rest of the day was pretty much shot.

On the final day of our Namibian adventure, we decided that spending four days in the desert required a cliché desert experience to wrap up the trip – so we rode camels. Every time I see a camel, I have to marvel at how this animal came into existence. They’re just so bizarre looking! From the humps, to the weird two toed non-hooves, long rounded necks, and smushy faces that always look smug – what are you, camel?! Why you so smug? You think you’re better than everyone because you don’t need water?! Huh?! Seriously, ten dollars to anyone who can find a picture of a camel that doesn’t look haughty and aloof.

Look at that smug bastard. 

The camel ride was a little short – about 30min. But it was fun to trudge through the desert, and we even got to trot a teensy little bit. Camels are very lanky, so their stride really sways you back and forth while you’re riding. Makes me wonder what a camel gallop feels like… maybe someday I’ll find out.  

Trot trot trot we camel-ot, camel-ot...

Sadly, after our camel ride, it was time to head to the regional airport in Walvis Bay, leaving the rugged wilderness behind to return to the hustle and bustle of Johannesburg. Four days was really not long enough. There’s much more to do and see in Namibia than we were able to fit into this trip – we really had to prioritize. So if anyone wants to vacation in Namibia – I am 1000% in for going back. But this time we’re renting an SUV. And bringing a map. And maybe a satellite phone… :D

Hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving!

Cape Town

This past year before I left the US, when I told people who’ve been here before that I was moving to South Africa, they would typically ask, “Oh, to Cape Town?” with hopeful expressions on their faces. Then I’d have to watch their face fall, when I said, “No, Johannesburg,” and then endure lectures about keeping my doors locked (…it’s really not that bad guys).

But having visited Cape Town myself this past weekend, I can really see why everyone hoped I’d land there. It. Is. Gorgeous. Set against the ocean with dramatic mountains bordering the city, it is picturesque in every sense of the word. 

Now Johannesburg and Cape Town have a little bit of a domestic rivalry – sort of like East Coast vs. West Coast in the US. Johannesburg is more of an economic hub, where everyone is on the go and time is money. Cape Town is a little slower paced, and has a bit of a hipster flare with its funky vegan-friendly coffee shops and bearded, flannel-wearing proprietors... a lot of whom have taken to wearing fanny packs over their shoulder like a satchel... I mean... c’mon.

While I’m coming around to calling Jo’burg a temporary home, my weekend in Cape Town was fantastic. There is a lot to do, both in and around the city, and Cape Town is one of the most multi-cultural cities in the world, as a major destination for immigrants and expats. The city of Cape Town was developed as a trading hub by the Dutch East India Company and thus has a very old style European feel in a lot of its architecture. All good stuff.

View from our Airbnb

But it’s really the natural beauty that make Cape Town so amazing. Table Mountain looms over the downtown area like a stationary tidal wave, threatening to rejoin the sea on the other side of the city. It’s just magnificent. Further down the peninsula, the mountains continue to impose, forcing twists and turns in the roadways that run along the crystal blue ocean, with the rocky overhangs above. And fortunately, most of the Cape Peninsula is devoted to a National Park, preserving the natural beauty and wildlife that make this area so interesting.

Driving down the Peninsula  

Now. I have to come clean. One of the reasons that I am so enamored with Cape Town is that I got to fulfill a lifelong dream about an hour after I arrived: riding a horse on the beach. Now I’ve had opportunity before this to ride on the beach, but I never wanted to do it if you’re only allowed to do nose to tail walking down the beach. Cuz that’s just lame. Fortunately my travel buddy is also an experienced rider, so we were able to find a place that would let us have free rein… pun intended.

Me and Pocket

It was just the two of us with the guide, which made it so much more fun. My horse, named Pocket, was a bit of a stick in the mud…we had a few minor disagreements, and I really had to earn my beach canters, but it was so worth it. You could not ask for a more beautiful place to ride on the beach. The sand is nearly white, and the ocean is a pearly turquoise blue, plus you have the fabulous mountains rising up in front of you. Just stunning. One bucket list item checked off and definitely a highlight of the trip.

Riding towards the beach 

Heaven on earth

The best views in life are between two ears

What a ride

The next day, we embarked on a full day tour of the Cape Peninsula, including a stop at the Cape of Good Hope, the South-Western most tip of the African continent. The name comes from the great sense of optimism it created by discovering a shipping route from the East to India, first sailed by Vasco da Gama in 1497. But another, more apt nickname, is the graveyard of ships – some 3,000 ships met their demise trying to sail around this Peninsula. (Fun fact: the Cape of Good Hope is also home to the legend of the flying Dutchmen – which is pretty cool.) But it’s a rocky, jutting coastline, and the wind is wicked strong, so I can definitely see why so many sailors met their maker trying to sail this area.

Looking back on the Peninsula

Yes, it really was that windy

Another fun excursion was visiting the penguin colony that lives at Boulder Beach, on the Eastern side of the Cape Peninsula. These penguins are everywhere, and they are so darn cute. You can also get really close to them. There were a lot of signs warning people not to try and pet the penguins, because they bite, and it took a lot of self-control not to reach out and tickle one on the back. I’ll be visiting the penguin twice more, with my parents and then with my friends/sister, so I still have time to decide if it’s worth losing part of my finger. I go back and forth. We’ll see.

Must...pet...

It's literally a penguinfestation. 

Waddle waddle waddle.

Its adorable seeing the penguins cuddle up on the beach – but I think my favorite this is watching them body surf out of the water, then stand up and waddle up beach. The way they walk is just so comical.

The last thing we fit into the weekend was taking a trip up Table Mountain. I do plan on doing the hike up the mountain on a later trip – but this time we took the cable car.

Now, Table Mountain alone is worth the visit to Cape Town. Thought to be one of the oldest mountains on Earth, Table Mountain is six times older than the Himalayas and five times older than the Rockies. The top is made up of mostly sandstone, a relatively soft rock, and the base is mostly granite. About 300 million years ago, the mountain was still at sea level during an ice age, during which the sheets of ice compressed the softer top layer, creating the flat top shape we see today. When the continents split, magma rose up and up, pushing Table Mountain to the 3,558ft it is today. (see, I learned things too.)

We waited a very long time to get on the cable car to ride to the top – over an hour I’d say. Table Mountain is obviously a big tourist draw, and the cable car can only hold about 25 people at a time. Not to mention there is only ONE cable car that goes each direction, which seems dumb and inefficient, but I’m sure there’s some reason you can’t have more than that running up and down. Be it money or physics. But it was 100% totally, completely, absolutely worth the wait.

View of Cape Town

View of the Peninsula

Can't get enough

I cannot say enough how spectacular the view is from the top of Table Mountain. You can see the whole city looking over one edge of the cliff, and on the other side you can see the rest of the mountain range, rising through the center of the Peninsula like a spine, with the beautiful waters on either side. You just can’t go wrong anywhere you look. It was a gorgeous sunny day as well, not too windy like the two previous days we had. The cable cars actually close when the wind picks up, so we were pretty lucky to have nice weather.

We spent a few hours walking around on top – sipping coffee and wine from the little café next to the cable car station, and trying to find the perfect spot to pose for a pic. But none of the pictures do it justice.

If Cape Town was not on your travel bucket list before, I highly suggest you write it in. With pen, not pencil. I promise you won’t regret it.

Kruger

Everyone who visits South Africa wants to visit Kruger. Normally I think that places and activities that are over-hyped tend to be a bit of a disappointment because expectations are so high. I am happy to report that this was not the case at all with Kruger National Park, which was every bit as awesome as described.

Sitting in the northeast corner of South Africa, Kruger National Park is one of the largest game reserves in all of Africa, covering about 7,500 square miles. It is home to numerous plants and animals, including what is known as the Big 5 – lion, leopard, rhino, elephant, and buffalo. The term Big 5 actually comes from the hunting industry, which used it to describe the 5 most difficult animals to hunt on foot. But, Big 5 is used by the safari industry to describe the 5 animals most sought by tourists. Which to me is debatable, because buffalo are not that interesting in my opinion. Plus, I’m all about the zebras.

But! I was lucky enough to see all of the Big 5 on my first safari, which I’ve been told is pretty rare because the leopards are very difficult to find. They are shy by nature, and tend to move around solo, rather than in groups.

My colleague and I arrived at our accommodation just outside of Kruger park in the afternoon, and left shortly after that for our sunset/night drive. The night drive was organized by Kruger Park guides themselves, and we were part of a group of about 15 people, all from other hotels/campsites. It was a larger group than we would have liked, but the lodge we stayed at only does game drives during the day (which we also did, but more on that later.)

On the sunset drive

The sunset drive was beautiful, and is a good complement to the day drive, because you can see animals more active at night. As this was my first safari, I did now know what to expect, but basically you meander through the park, and when anyone sees something worth seeing, they yell stop, and the driver stops for everyone to see whatever it is. A good idea in theory, as you have many eyes on the lookout for interesting wildlife, but it all depends on who you have as part of your group. We happened to have a trigger happy Afrikaner who became known to us as the man who cried eagle. Driving around, he would yell “Stooooooop I think I see an eagle!” So we’d stop…only to find out it was a vulture. Ten minutes later, “Stooooop I think that’s an eagle…. No it’s another vulture.” Insert eye roll here. Dude, 99 out 100 birds in the park is an effing vulture, sit your ass down and be quiet...

One of those HAS to be an eagle, right?! Wrong, sir. Wrong. 

Anyway, once it gets too dark to see, the driver/guide passed out giant torch lights that people held pointed into the bush to keep searching for animals. It’s difficult, but you’re looking for eyes in the darkness. It’s pretty cool though, because the guide can usually tell what type of animal by the color the eyes turn when reflected in the light. During the night drive we saw bush babies, a small spotted genet (which is like a little cat), elephants, impala, zebras, giraffes, lions, and yes, a lot of vultures. The vultures are actually good in a way because if you see a lot of vultures hanging around it usually means lions are nearby, because the vultures are waiting to swoop in and pick at the leftovers of whatever the lion was eating.

Sunset elephant 

Zebras!

Peek a boo.. we see you.. 

The coolest part I think was when we were driving through the dark, and a lioness was lying right in the road. We disturbed her slumber, so she grumpily got up and stared us down for a little while. It almost seemed like she was trying to determine if it was worth pouncing on us. She decided against it and stalked off into the night, but it was interesting to be stared at by a lion for that long.

The day drive, which started very early the next day, was where we saw all the rest of the Big 5. And while I enjoyed the night drive, I think the day drive was better, mostly because there were only five of us in a much smaller safari vehicle, and our guide, who works for the lodge we stayed at, was MUCH better than the one from Kruger itself. Our day guide had a really good eye for finding the animals, and knew a lot of interesting facts about all the animals we were seeing.

We left our lodge at 5:30am, which was not the most fun, but you have to leave so early in the morning, because once it gets too hot, all the animals take an afternoon siesta and it’s hard to see them. When we got to the park entrance, there was already a huge line of cars waiting to get in, but because we were part of a tour we got to go right in, which was nice. The other cars, which were personal vehicles as Kruger allows self-drives, would have to wait a while since the number of cars allowed in the park at any given time is restricted.

Rise and shiiiine

Driving through the park, the most prevalent animal by far is the impala. They’re everywhere. The impala is an important part of the ecosystem though because they are the main food source for the big cats and scavengers. Our guide jokingly calls impala the McDonalds both because the feed millions but also because they have three black stripes on their butts that kind of look like an “M.” Impala apparently also have really good hearing, so you’ll often see zebra hanging around with the impala because they get alerted to approaching predators.

Kruger Big Mac

#bff

Surprisingly the next most common animals we saw I think was elephants. Kruger has over 13,000 elephants that roam around freely, sometimes causing a traffic jam. We even saw some baby elephants tagging along with their mamas, which were adorable.

Pachyderm traffic jam 

Those tusks!

To give you an idea of how close they actually are.. 

As I mentioned earlier, the hardest animal to see by far is the leopard, and we were really lucky to be in the right place at the right time to see it, because the leopard disappeared a minute after we found it. Our guide said it was a female, and he thought the only reason she was close to the road was that she was hunting – there was a big herd of impala close by. But because so many cars stopped to see her, she wandered away hungry. Sorry leopard.

Leopard!

The rhino we saw was also very far away, so I was not able to get  good look or picture...just grey blobs in the distance. I would have liked to see it closer, but getting close to a rhino is not the smartest thing you can do. And to complete the Big 5, we did see the buffalo.. but zzzzz… not really interesting.

Not only did we see the Big 5, we also saw what our guide calls the “Ugly 5” – which includes warthog, hyena, vulture, hippo, and wildebeest. Most of these animals fall under the category of being so ugly they’re actually kind of cute. Except maybe the vulture. Which are just ugly ugly. 

Wildebeest herd

Here piggy piggy  

Hyena crossing

But I enjoyed seeing all of these “reject” animals as well. Warthogs are funny little things. They eat down on their knees, and when they run they stick their little tails straight up in the air. If you can get close enough, they also make little squeaky piggy noises, which I learned in Ghana because people feed them so you can get closer. The hippos we saw were all wading in the water, so again couldn’t get a good look. But hippos are actually the most dangerous animals in the park because they are super territorial and will rip people to shreds if they get too close.

And lastly, we did finally see a few eagles, so suck on that annoying bird man. 

Tawny Eagle