MAy 19th & 20th

May 19th

The “Break”

So we leave White River at 7am on Friday morning to head to Joan Giressel’s Game Park. The directions were very vague and went a little like, head that way, take a right at the garage and don’t follow signs to this place but that place. As we were driving down one of the really long roads two of the local women pointed to the feld (bush) and showed us our first elephants.

We got to Joan’s (which is a private game park by invitation only) and met the Canadian team. Following breakfast we went to the pools for a bit - which is right next to the water hole for some of the animals. So we saw water buffalo, elephant, a baboon and of course monkeys.

After the afternoon tea, we headed out for the evening game ride. It started as a slow, cold evening but then we happened to run into some elephants – and let me tell you they weren’t so happy to see us – they has some babies with them. So as some were giggling out of nervousness and other we praying we managed to make a u turn and get out of there. The other highlight of the evening was the lion – we watched her from about 15 feet away. We figured we weren’t being considered for dinner when she laid down in the road and started grooming herself. When we got to the 2nd stop of the evening – by a large water hole – I asked for a 2nd beer. I think that’s the first time I could say I really needed a drink to calm my nerves – the prospect of being charged by an elephant didn’t sit too well with me.

We got home to a beautiful BBQ. One of the staff had cooked a lamb in a hole in the ground – literally dug a huge hole, lit a fire, put a lamb in and then buried it. We had dinner in what I would describe as a fortress – this rounded maze of walls with a fire in the middle and all individual tables set up for each of us.

May 19th

Stuck In The Middle Of A Cat Fight

We were all up before 6 am for the morning game ride. The fashion we all have on for these rides is amazing. Wrapped in whatever cloth we can find on top of our clothes, blankets from our beds, hats, sunglasses, etc – you wouldn’t believe how cold it is – especially since we’re driving in a Hummer with no roof and windshield.

The morning started out pretty quiet – a few impala (which are considered fast food in these parts – they run fast and are often dinner ;)), elephants, hippos. We then got to a point with a few female lions. They were having a lazy nap and we were about 10 feet from them. We left them and went for a drive and drove right into two huge male lions – they were coming down the street with a few other tourist kombis after them. I got some great shots. So then Jeffrey (our ranger) took us back to the females – knowing the males were heading that way. So we sat there for about 10 minutes, 10 feet away from the lions and then we see the males coming along. We though they were going to come up, play around, maybe cuddle a little. Oh no, not at all. It turned into a huge lion right and I have to say we were right in the middle of it. I was waiting for the male lion to jump our car to get to the female lion on the other side – thank god he went around. I’ve never seen anything like it before. I have video but most of it is me shaking and trying to flip the camera around to get the shot. One of the Canadians has to keep telling everyone to be quiet and settle down because the first reaction when it all started was holy cow (that’s the PG wording) we really figured someone wasn’t going to make it home. After all the lions finally stopped and raced away, we told Jeffrey we’d like to visit some nice calm giraffes.

Doug, from Rotary, told us that not many people see what we saw in their entire lifetime of going to game parks.

The Car Climbed Up The Tree

We went for an evening ride. Along the side of the paths and through out the feld there are prickly trees – I have photos to prove it but the pricks are about 4 inches long on some of them. One of the trees swiped Sandy (the Canadian) sitting in the back seat and gave her quite a few cuts around her eye – thank god it missed her eye ball or we would have been in trouble. My jacket got stuck a few times yesterday and I got one in my palm tonight – and man they hurt. We told Sandy she should just tell everyone she got into a fight with a lion and she won.

It was a really quiet night – we saw 2 big elephants, a baby elephant and that’s about it for a 3 hour ride. We did get the car (which I think was a Toyota land rover with no roof) to climb over a tree that had fallen in the path.

We got home, couldn’t figure out why it was so dark and quickly learned that the power was out. I wasn’t too excited about walking around in the dark with the electric fence not working (i.e. animals could very easily get in and have me for dinner). About 30 minutes later the power came back on – we’re hoping for a full night of power.

May 20th

5:30 am
We got up early for our last game ride. 2 hours out there – we saw a baby elephant and a bunch of grown ones and we also had some quality time chasing large male lions down the car path before they veered off into the woods. We had a quick breakfast and then hit the road for a 3 hour drive to Tzaneen.