More from Skukuza.

What a great afternoon we had. A couple set up camp next door and invited us to sit and visit. They are Hannes and Erica from Joburg. They had gotten up at 3 am to drive to the park and arrived around 9 am with their 17 yr old son and his friend in tow (who, like all teenagers promptly went away to do their own thing). It was really enjoyable talking with them and hearing more about the country and the customs. They translated some of the words we had been seeing and not understanding.

Around 3 pm they invited us to join them in their Mitsubishi 4 X 4 bakkie (small pickup truck) to go out of the compound and look for game. It was pretty funny at times as Hannes took it as his personal task to find us some elephants, which we didn’t see (lotsa dung though!). We did see a troop of baboons including a very small baby who appeared to be only days old. As you will see it hasn’t gotten the colouring yet and was very unstable as it kept trying to leap around and was falling off the rocks, etc. It was very entertaining watching them. We also saw two water buffalo lying on the sand and enjoying the water!

Relaxed water buffalo

Grazing Duiker

Baby baboon playing

Baboon family

It got a bit crazy here starting pretty early as more and more campers started arriving for the holiday weekend.  As we had mentioned everyone has a reservation but no assigned spot to camp so they just pack themselves in where ever they can find room, including right on the driving path into some of the spots. This is making us a bit concerned with how it is going to work finding our spot at the next place as we make our way there tomorrow on Easter Saturday. We do have it reserved but. . .  It will take about 3 hours to drive the 72 km due to the 50 km speed limit in the park.

We have a very early wake up time of 4:20 am tomorrow we have booked a seat in a  parks 4X4 vehicle for a morning “bush drive”. No guarantees are offered as to what you are going to see but I know Hannes will be glad if we see elephants!

Remember our posts may be spottier at any time due to lack of WiFi. . .