Trip report: Southern Africa
OK, so I've had my takeaway and a bottle of Belgian beer. The cats have stopped attention-seeking and the house is quiet because Sally is 20 miles away with an IV antibiotic drip in her arm failing to...
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Day 10: Monday - Addo Elephant Park
Following Lesotho we had a day in the bank. Today was our chance to spend it. My original plan was to head quite a distance further down the coast today, but starting out with a quick hour-long drive through the middle of the game park. However, knowing we had a day spare, and the owner of Aardvark suggested what he regarded as a fantastic campground on the beach - "I take the family there whenever I can", we decided to spend that spare day in the park and try out this recommended campground.
We hoped tonights campground would be quieter. The middle-aged lady camped next to us last night had entertained a couple of guys with 4x4s late into the night, had got quite drunk and laughed like a hyena.
We entered the park. This was not the best time to be looking at wildlife. The greenery provides plenty of cover for them to hide behind, and being plenty of water around the animals aren't forced to hang around a few water holes and therefore be easy to find.
They said there were bit cats here, but this was the only one I could find, but it was quite shy:
Here is an interesting thing. I assumed that we would see lots of Land Cruiser 80s and very few Land Rovers. There is a lot of talk about Land Cruisers in forums and it is easy to assume that is the brand most South Africans choose as an overlanding vehicle. That was not what we experienced. In the first week of travel we saw maybe 2 or 3 Landcruiser 80s. There were plenty of 78 series like ours, though mainly in pick-up truck form; there were loads of Toyota Hilux pick-ups, and there were lots of Land Rover 110s.
OK, back to the animals:
Plenty of these little guys around. The had signs asking you not to run them over:
I think they had the official dung-removal contact, but this was the only one I found working, and on closer inspection he appeared to be asleep on the job:
Plenty of these guys were crossing the road at one point - half going one way, half the other. Must have been shift change time:
I think we had a pretty good haul of sightings. Sally had been keeping note on the checklist the park provided:
Sally is better at identifying these things than me, so I created my own checklist - I got 100%:
The only disappointment was that we didn't spot anything on this part of the list. I kept checking for shark fins appearing above the bush, but I think they must have been lying low, or maybe they were on a later shift:
We headed for the recommended campground on the coast - it was starting to look pretty good:
A short way down the track we found a pull off with places to camp and a long drop toilet. We initially set-up here:
However, the track went further down the river, so we decided to walk down and take a look in case there was a better camping site - we left the Land Cruiser in place to reserve the nice spot we had found:
We picked this up along the way - these bushes are common and you wouldn't want to step or even drive over one of these thorns:
Further along did look very nice, and did have a proper bathroom block:
So we walked back, collected the camper and set-up in the new location:
The only other people camping were a couple in a large overland truck, but they had hid themselves behind a hedge. Maybe for security - their big truck does stand out and security was minimal at this campground:
The campground ran along the river opposite big sand dunes. It was a great location.
Down buy the actual sea shore is a section of Addo Elephant Park. The park rangers collect trash from the beach - they've built up quite a collection:
Stay tuned for the Garden Route...
Following Lesotho we had a day in the bank. Today was our chance to spend it. My original plan was to head quite a distance further down the coast today, but starting out with a quick hour-long drive through the middle of the game park. However, knowing we had a day spare, and the owner of Aardvark suggested what he regarded as a fantastic campground on the beach - "I take the family there whenever I can", we decided to spend that spare day in the park and try out this recommended campground.
We hoped tonights campground would be quieter. The middle-aged lady camped next to us last night had entertained a couple of guys with 4x4s late into the night, had got quite drunk and laughed like a hyena.
We entered the park. This was not the best time to be looking at wildlife. The greenery provides plenty of cover for them to hide behind, and being plenty of water around the animals aren't forced to hang around a few water holes and therefore be easy to find.
They said there were bit cats here, but this was the only one I could find, but it was quite shy:
Here is an interesting thing. I assumed that we would see lots of Land Cruiser 80s and very few Land Rovers. There is a lot of talk about Land Cruisers in forums and it is easy to assume that is the brand most South Africans choose as an overlanding vehicle. That was not what we experienced. In the first week of travel we saw maybe 2 or 3 Landcruiser 80s. There were plenty of 78 series like ours, though mainly in pick-up truck form; there were loads of Toyota Hilux pick-ups, and there were lots of Land Rover 110s.
OK, back to the animals:
Plenty of these little guys around. The had signs asking you not to run them over:
I think they had the official dung-removal contact, but this was the only one I found working, and on closer inspection he appeared to be asleep on the job:
Plenty of these guys were crossing the road at one point - half going one way, half the other. Must have been shift change time:
I think we had a pretty good haul of sightings. Sally had been keeping note on the checklist the park provided:
Sally is better at identifying these things than me, so I created my own checklist - I got 100%:
The only disappointment was that we didn't spot anything on this part of the list. I kept checking for shark fins appearing above the bush, but I think they must have been lying low, or maybe they were on a later shift:
We headed for the recommended campground on the coast - it was starting to look pretty good:
A short way down the track we found a pull off with places to camp and a long drop toilet. We initially set-up here:
However, the track went further down the river, so we decided to walk down and take a look in case there was a better camping site - we left the Land Cruiser in place to reserve the nice spot we had found:
We picked this up along the way - these bushes are common and you wouldn't want to step or even drive over one of these thorns:
Further along did look very nice, and did have a proper bathroom block:
So we walked back, collected the camper and set-up in the new location:
The only other people camping were a couple in a large overland truck, but they had hid themselves behind a hedge. Maybe for security - their big truck does stand out and security was minimal at this campground:
The campground ran along the river opposite big sand dunes. It was a great location.
Down buy the actual sea shore is a section of Addo Elephant Park. The park rangers collect trash from the beach - they've built up quite a collection:
Stay tuned for the Garden Route...
