Off the Grid, Part 2: Kruger National Park, South Africa

     So both of the side mirrors (or wing mirrors in South Africa) were stolen during our one night in Maputo. Whoops. It was all my fault. I had booked our place in Maputo and all Scott had asked for was off street parking. I could have sworn that the place had said off street parking. I was obviously wrong. But it happened and there was nothing we could do about it, so off we went to cross back into South Africa. It didn't take us too long, I hopped out and walked up to the border and was still in line to get our passports stamped when Scott pulled in with the car. With some slight confusion we made it across the border and back into South Africa, where we were greeted by amazing roads and grocery stores. We stocked up on supplies for the next few nights and we were back on the road.

Last Mozambique sunrise

Speeding towards the border

     Our next destination of the trip was Kruger National Park. South Africa has the big five game animals, unlike Rwanda, and I was really hoping to see a bunch of animals. I think Scott was a little nervous about how excited I might get over animals. And he had reason to be. Within 50 meters of the entrance gate we came across two giraffes and an elephant. I think I made him stop for about 15 minutes. In Rwanda it is very rare to see the elephants, but in Kruger... not so much. It's an enormous park, approximately 450 miles in length and we saw upwards of 100 elephants in our two days there.

Welcome to Kruger!

Hadn't been in the park for 5 minutes before we came across these guys!

Hello Mr. Giraffe and Mr. Bird!

     The plan was to stay at the Skukuza camp our first night, which meant that we had a little over 100 km to meander through the park observing the animals. Scott decided to take a road that followed the Sabie River, which provided plenty of sightings (and plenty rolling of eyes at me). Before we had even hit the river I saw my first ever rhino in the wild. We couldn't tell if it was a white rhino or black rhino at the time, but it was pretty cool. I was later informed by Barry that in fact it was a white rhino. It was much bigger than I thought it would be. He had clearly just taken a little mud bath and was enjoy some shade underneath a tree.

Rhino!

As we hit the river the animals just multiplied. I saw so much. And thankfully, Scott had bought not one, but two Kruger National Park info books. Both equipped with a checklist of animals, one even with reference photos of them all. You can imagine how Scott felt as I more than happily embarrassed the heck out of him by ticking everything we saw. He has no idea that as a child my sisters and I use to count every deer we saw on our camping excursions with our father. I would keep tally to report back to our mother first thing when we got home. In reality though, the picture list was quite useful in identifying the less common birds we saw.

Zebra & Impala (yes that is something in the middle of
the road, a young zebra was having some fun) 

Wildebeest

Baboons

Croc!

And I was so excited to see my first (but not the last) herd of elephants. They crossed the road just in front of us. There were about 15 of them ranging in all ages. They went down to the river to play and we were able to continue watching them from a bridge. Below is a video clip (you can't hear Scott laughing at my amazement... probably because I just kept repeating the same things) of them. But I'm fascinated with elephants and how their trunks work. I just think they're so cool.

Another guy later on our drive

And yet another elephant crossing!

     Eventually, once I'd gotten my elephant fix we arrived and checked in at the camp. We were staying in one of their tents so there wasn't much set up for us to do. We each had a glass of wine on our "porch," read a little, and watched a group of warthogs (that are so ugly they're cute) run through camp, before heading over to the restaurant for dinner. While we could have cooked ourselves, we decided that it would be one less meal to worry about so we splurged on steaks. Red meat is in no shortage in South Africa and it is so incredibly good and cooked perfectly. I was in constant food heaven on this trip.

Camp first night in Kruger

They kneel on their front legs to eat, probably because
their necks don't bend very well, but I'm no expert.

Our tent was right on the edge of the camp and just as I finished getting ready for bed, Scott popped his head in the tent and asked if I wanted to see a hyena. I clarified that this animal was outside the camp (i.e.- behind a big fence) and not just outside our tent. Sure enough, there was a hyena scavenging along the camp fence looking for any food scraps people may have tossed over it. It was very dark though so it was hard to study him.
     Fortunately, Scott is an early riser and we were up and on the road before 6:30 am. And I was very lucky in what we saw first thing...

Two spotted hyenas were still out and about, checking out something down at the river, though we weren't sure what. If you look closely the one on the left has blood on its front right paw. They were maybe 10 meters from our car. We didn't stay long to observe them, partially because we had cars behind us and also we had a schedule. We were meeting a park guide at 2 pm and we had about 5 hours of driving to get there. However, we had a few moments of luck and got to see some pretty nifty things along the way.

We decided to back up and give these guys room to cross the road

      We stopped for breakfast at a rest stop and Scott pulled out his skottle to cook some breakfast. We decided on egg sandwhiches. I somehow picked the worst table in the spot but we made it work. Why was it the worst table you ask? Well, as you know by reading this blog of mine, we have monkeys run all over the hospital in Rwanda. They are funny to watch and while I know they're wild, they're probably somewhat domesticated. They never approach you unless you're offering them food (which I never do) and they're just nice. They make the children laugh in pediatrics and they're fun to have around. Well in South Africa... they're wild. Truly wild. So me picking the table that was somehow the closest to them but still a distance away I thought would be fine. Nope. It almost resulted in out bread being stolen and did result in Scott doing some shouting, yelling, general waving of arms, and finally tossing some rocks their way. Needless to say, we ate pretty quickly and cleaned up and got back on the road.
     We saw three rhino on the move as we continued our drive and then some ostriches just hanging out. I had no idea how vicious those birds can be. Scott told me that people use them as "guards" because they won't eat meat like a dog would (people are known to poison dogs here) and they've been known to scalp people. After that I decided that there is a reason they survive in the wild and to not underestimate the ostrich. We were now driving through an area of the park called Satara, known for lions. I really wanted to see a lion. I've never seen one in the wild and Rwanda is still working on a deal with Kenya to purchase some. I kept my eyes peeled. We happened upon a waterhole and pulled over to get shots of this little guy...

Terrapin decided to hitch a ride!

There were a lot of game hanging around, impalas, zebras, waterbuck... then they all took off. "Well something made them run." We didn't see it at first, but then there she was...

On the prowl.

 We thought she was hunting as she seemingly was stalking something, first one direction, then the other before she finally decided to just plop herself down. She didn't even drink any water, but no other game was headed towards the watering hole anymore. We watched her for awhile before needing to move. We hadn't gone far before we saw a second lioness headed towards the watering hole. I was amazed at how well they blended in with the grass. I'm certain we drove by more and simply didn't spot them.

     We finally reached our destination and just as our park guide, David, arrived. We were headed out on the Malopeni Eco Drive, one of Scott's favorite things to do in the park. Essentially, we were going to drive down some more 4WD terrain and camp in the bush and hope that a lion wouldn't find us to be a tasty midnight snack.

They weren't joking about 4WD

 So off we went on some serious 4WD roads into the bush. We saw several giraffes but not much else on our drive to camp. It took us almost another three hours of driving to reach our camp right on the river. We didn't have much daylight left, so while David watched, Scott and I had the tent and sleeping pads and bags all set up, a fire going, drinks flowing, and dinner started within the hour. He made a comment that it was probably the fastest he'd ever seen a camp go up in all the years he's been doing this. I couldn't help but laugh (then again perhaps it was the red wine) as Scott and I met in college in the Outing Club, also known as hiking/camping/climbing/watersports club. Between the two of us, we've probably done it all.

Camp our second night in Kruger

     For dinner Scott made me guess one of the meats I was eating and while I wasn't correct as far as the animal, I was correct on the organ bits I was nibbling on. My description of, "It looks like liver wrapped in fat" was incredibly accurate of skilpadtjie. It was pretty good though extremely rich. Thankfully, he was smart enough to also buy me a steak and braai that for me along with some veggies.

     We stayed up remarkably late for us, as in 10 pm, enjoying wine and talking with David. The stars were unbelievable and just like in Akagera, I was able to see the Milky Way. We could hear the hippos coming out of the water and grazing on grass, but then all of a sudden we heard a lot of hooves. David jumped up from his car and flipped the lights on of his truck. "Buffalo!" he said. If we weren't careful in letting them know where we were, they could have easily run through our camp and trampled us. That made me feel safe. Even safer, was his answer to my question, "Why are they running?" "Lion." Fabulous. I was seriously camping with lions. And while Scott passed out easily in the tent, I laid there listening to the different sounds for what felt like hours before finally drifting off.
     In the morning David asked me if I'd heard the lions. Glad that I wasn't certain what I was listening to otherwise I probably never would have fallen asleep. We got dressed and walked down to the river with David and his rifle. We saw a bunch of hippos getting in and out of the water and a lot of tracks in the sand. Overnight a turtle had clearly come out of the water and headed straight for our camp. We could see where the buffalo had run and a few antelope were on their way down to the water for a drink. I'm sure there was a crocodile or two out there as well, but I couldn't spot them. We headed back to camp where Scott fixed breakfast, I got freaked out at a lizard in the bathroom, and David filled us in on more details of life in the bush.

David pointing out a hippo and their calf
about 30 m from camp 

     We headed back to the gate and after spotting more warthogs and elephants arrived about 11 am. We had to debate our next move. Either we could drive through the park back the way we had come the day before and exit from one gate before heading onto Part 3 of our adventure, or we could exit the park at the gate where we were sitting and start Part 3 immediately. I wasn't going to lie, I was a little animaled out and while I would have loved to see a male lion, we could drive (and by "we" I mean Scott) for hours and not spot another one. I was exhausted, I'm sure he was exhausted, and there was the promise of a swim in a refreshing river at our Part 3 destination...

     Decision made. We drove out of Kruger after 2 nights of awesomeness ready to tackle Part 3 of our adventure!

Read Scott's renditions of our adventure here!

Lessons Learned:
1) Never underestimate an animal, wild or domesticated.
2) It's good to get out of your comfort zone, whether that's an experience, trying a new food, or shouting at monkeys.
3) Liver is surprisingly delicious!