Our days: 5am wake up call. 5:30 3-hr morning drive. 8:30 breakfast. 9:45 bush walk. 11:00 nap/read/watch hippos. 2:00 lunch. 3:00 nap/read/watch hippos. 4:30 3-hr afternoon drive. 8:00 dinner. 10pm sleep. Repeat.
- We stayed at the Althusa Lodge just outside Kruger Park in Sabi Sands.
- The view from our porch never failed to entertain us, particularly the eight or so snorting hippos!
- Our safari “group” was a French couple, their two boys and another couple. Coincidentally, they all lived in Sweden.
- Our trusty leaders, trekker DeBeer and Ranger Ryan.
- The easiest thing to spot were the many different antelope.
- Impala.
- Waterbuck, identifiable because of…
- the ring on their bum.
- Male waterbuck.
- Kudos with its curly-que horns.
- Wildebeests are actually another form of antelope, too.
- Wildebeest.
- You see them hanging with the zebra quite a bit.
- Water buffalo
- Brand new baby water buffalo
- Pumba! (warthog)
- Warthog
- Hyena
- Leopard
- Although they are big, giraffes were VERY hard to spot.
- Even elephants could hide very well.
- It’s a lonely life for an older male elephant.
- During the day, we took bush walks.
- This tree was stung by a hornet and swelled up. Then the hornet lays their larvae inside.
- I was intrigued by these termite (not ant) hills. Termites are plant eaters while ant are carnivores.
- The termite hills are full of nutrients and are extremely solid (and sometimes very, very tall!
- This spider had a web that could capture a bird (not that the spider would/could eat it!!
- Leopard turtle
- Baboon
- Our first lion sighting
- Second group of lions – four brothers – were checking out…
- a group of water buffalo but never went after them.
- We ran into them again at night.
- And we also saw this hyena at night.
- It was too dark and we couldn’t use a flash when we finally saw some rhinos, but alas, our ranger and trekker found some for us in the morning!
- They are such fierce and weird looking creatures!
- We almost ran into this elephant!
- Two of the “Big 5” in one pic!
- A new group of really big lions to cap off our morning and our last drive.
- Breakfast
- All of a sudden, a herd of elephants were on the other side of our pond!
- What a fabulous treat to end our safari!