20091215 – Visit to Kruger

I have fallen behind in my blogging, so I am going to condense some of the events and activities into a much shorter entry.

On the 15th, we went to the Kruger Game Park. I think that this particular park is famous simply due to its size. Sadly, because of this very fact, it makes it difficult to actually see many of the animals. It is also a bad time of year to visit the park. There is more shrubbery and the air is not as dry, so the animals do not seem to congregate around the watering holes.

With that said, we did see Kudu, Hyenas, Black Bellied Bustard, Giraffe, Hippos, African Fish Eagles, African Buffalos, Warthogs, turtles (small boring ones that kept crossing the street), Impalas, White Rhinos, Zebras, a Steen Bach, and a Water Bach. Our entire tour included a day tour and a night drive. Both tours were in open air vehicles. The day tour was guided by a private guide, and he was a bit boring. It was somewhat frustrating to think that you were paying someone a tremendous amount of money and he had to keep referencing guidebooks to tell you facts about the animals, and in some cases, to simply identify them.

Like I said before, the pitfall of Kruger and possibly any game preserve is that you are not guaranteed that you will see animals. We spent many hours simply driving slowly through the park looking for animals. Happily, we were constantly entertained by the inane banter coming from the back row. It turned out that Allen’s son and his friend accompanied us on this trip! Perhaps one of my favorite moments was when the son sheepishly asked the guide if they could take their shirts off. They were very excited when he said that they could. The shirts came off and the happy talk about how they would be shirtless started up. They were particularly excited by the fact that all of the ladies that we would pass (any age, from younger to elderly) would get to see them without shirts.

The night drive was held by a park official, and he was much better informed about the animals. He also had a sense of humor and could keep a banter going. We were joined by Rolf (Sweden), who was also staying at the Big 5. Rolf was traveling through Africa on a tremendous budget. It was hard to tell if he had money or not, but you could not tell it from his clothes, which were ill fitting and tattered. Still, he was a breath of fresh air compared to the rest of our company on the day drive. We were also joined by a family with a younger child. It was an absolute pleasure to hear his talk on the ride, and to be a part of his excitement and fear concerning the animals.

We got back to Big 5 at about 9, ate dinner, and then went to bed.