South Africa – Wow

Here are some first photo impressions of South Africa

Driving out to a couple of wildlife areas we kept seeing these wonderful road signs

Okay we’re ready for all the animals you’ve got

Are we actually going to see some wildlife

promising sights of all the animals that we had been dreaming of seeing in South Africa. We weren’t to be disappointed.

Our first foray into the wilds of the interior took us to two places – Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park and iSimangalis0 Wetland Park.

Neither of them disappointed us. We took a water tour in the wetland areas and then drove through the drier area. On another trip we rented a car and headed inland to higher ground away from the ocean to Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park.

Here are some of those pictures from the two trips:

At the entrance to the park was this tree that was teaming with building their nests. Could have stood for hours watching.

One of the challenges of the game parks in South Africa, both public and private, is to stop poaching.

Seen on the beach in Durban

Although the one above is made from sand we had plenty of opportunities to view the real thing:

Don’t piss me off!

Right – well we didn’t exactly piss this guy off.  There were four others of them in the middle of the road and we needed to get back to our accommodation before nightfall. So, we waited a while they play fought on the road then they kind of moved off.  We made a run for it and roared past them hoping they wouldn’t lunge at us.  Our car was only 1/4 the size of these guys so you can imagine we would have made nice ‘meat-on-a-skewer’ for them!

They also like rolling around in the mud just like me

There were lots of sightings of these guys but along the wetlands we saw different kinds of animals

The wetlands at iSimangalis0 Wetlands Park

Here we took a guided boat ride through the wetlands providing our first glimpse of hippos, crocs and various birds

Ah for the sun and some mud

Kirsten spotting another rhino on the river

Hippos generally lie around in the water all day and then forage at night.

We were unfortunate in that we didn’t get to see any hippos out of the water nor even bothering to rise up as we cruised by.  However, we were glad of that as we were told that these, being one of the big 5 in Africa, are not something you want to meet up with on a path at night.  Hippos, we were told kill over 3,000/year in South Africa!

Along the edge of the water in the wetlands birds build their nests

Great raptors

And great water birds

Beautiful

And then more:

you’re in my stomping grounds

Another animal in the middle of the road.  He flapped his ears at us, lifted his tusk and then roared. We quickly backed up and got out of his way staying at a respectful distance.

Kudu – somewhat elegant but, for most South Africans, very edible

Majestic

Bacon anyone

Of course, this viewing all brings a thirst and what better than a cold bottle of wine to end the day and watch the sunset from our rondaval.

Our one and only night in a rondaval

*Note: all pics have been reduced in size hence they don’t have the same quality for viewing as the originals.  I have done this to save up/download times as the wi-fi here is expensive and the free wi-fi slow.  Hopefully I will be able to go back at some time to uploading the full pixel versions