There is a wake up call at 5:30am. H and I were already awake by this point. Coffee, rusks/biscuits in the main lodge and then onto the game trucks for our morning game drive. It was chilly this am when we left. Fortunately they give you hot water bottles and blankets. Double jerseys, beanies & gloves all part of the gear for a morning game drive. It didn't take long for the rangers to find 3...
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Last night we could hear an owl hooting outside our window and so S and I went to track it down. We found a pair of them in the trees right outside the house we were staying in - African Wood Owl - which we had last seen in 2016 in Namibia. Really nice to see especially since we haven't seen an owl for some time. A sub-group went for a run this morning around the...
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We woke to a cold, misty morning at Hazyview. It was 2 degrees when I woke up at 6am. It actually didn't feel that cold - though I'm not experienced at feeling 2am! We had a late morning breakfast and then after breakfast walked around Dullstroom again. We eventually left Dullstroom at around 11am. We could only check in at our next accommodation at 4pm so we decided to detour via Pilgrim's Rest and God's Window....
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We had a 4-hour drive to OR Tambo airport to pick up R&J who flew in from Cape Town today to join our group. We decided to have breakfast at 7:30am so that we could get to JHB airport around midday. That should have also timed it well for arrival of MOSK (or SMOK or SKOM whichever you prefer). I say "should" because just as they were about to board their flight they discovered the plane...
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Today's drive was a 7-hour stretch from Matjiesfontein to Bloemfontein on the N1. We had breakfast and headed out just after 9am. Fortunately for most of the drive today the traffic was pretty light and therefore the drive was fairly easy. We did a few toilet stops and one stop for fuel and then we stopped at Richmond, Northern Cape for lunch. We chose Vetmuis Plaaskombuis for lunch - to be fair it was seemingly the...
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This trip has been a year in planning and we have counted down to departing today. You can take nothing for granted these days with Covid and we were never sure whether it would happen or not and if it did happen what restrictions would confront us. The good news is that we left this afternoon for 2.5 weeks of holiday and celebrating my 50th birthday. We had originally planned to fly up to game park...
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Only 3 people decided to head out for the morning game drive - H & B decided that a sleep in was necessary but S, K and I headed out. I'm pleased we did because we saw another lifer (Monotonous Lark) which took my lifers for the trip to 4 and my total lifer list to 479. S is not far behind me on 469 having closed the gap over the last 7 days by seeing...
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Young male lion from previous day It was overcast for the most of the day and the temperature never got much above 27 degrees. It was actually relatively cool at times especially when driving with the window open. We did head north for our morning drive. Unfortunately, due to the heavy recent rains up north, some of the dirt roads are still closed. That included the river drive that H and I love to take when...
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The Kruger never disappoints. The drive from Olifants to Shingwedzi (our camp for the nest 3 nights) was one of those memorable ones. We left at 6:30am and the drive was similar in distance that we did from Lower Sabie to Olifants. We saw a reasonable amount of game on the drive up towards Letaba but just outside Letaba (about 5 kms from the camp) we saw lion on the side of the road and covered...
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50 years ago, my wife was born to D&B. The reason we are doing this trip at this time (and thankfully we could despite Covid), was to celebrate H's 50th. H had chosen Olifants as the camp she wanted to be at because she loves the view so much. We left at 5:30am for the morning game drive. As a once off special we all loaded into the same car so we could be together for...
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