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| Page Views: 329 | OUR GAME RESERVE TRIPS by Thailandfan - last update: Jul 26, 2007 |
Mommys and babies | Elephant with twins one is underneath mommy. |
For me the cutest things to see in any game reserve would be the mommy animals with their youngsters.
From the largest elephant baby to the smallest little baboon hanging onto his mommies tummy such a wonderful thing. |
| Our Bungalow In Kruger Park |
|  | Kruger National Park Visiting the Kruger Park would be one of the highlights of a visit to S.A.
Day and night safaris may be taken into the park for visitors with limited time. The best way to see it is however to hire a car and travel around yourself, staying at one of the many camps which range from small private camps to larger camps sleeping a few hundred people.
There are over 2500 kilometres of roads in the park so you can often drive for more than an hour and not see another vehicle. There are many lovely spots with facilities to picnic, just beware the monkeys can be very naughty and are famous for grabbing food from your table. Please do not feed our wild life as it only results in them having to be destroyed as they become dangerous.
For info on the KNP go to www.sanparks.org and you will find info on all the game parks in South Africa. |
Encounter with bull elephant There are estimated to be about 14 000 elephants in the Kruger National Park. At the moment they are discussing culling because the KNP can only maintain round 8000.
They usually are found in small herds of around ten elephant often moms and babies.
You also get some very large old bull elephant and meeting one of these on a narrow dirt road can be an experience of a life time.
In February 2006 we had visitors from overseas and spent a few nights in the KNP with them. Early one morning we went on a game viewing drive but in our own vehicle and came across a very large bull elephant. As we came to a stop about 20 meters from him he decided that he had fallen in love with the car (Silver Toyota Camry) because before long he was flapping his ears, shaking his head from side to side and trumpeting really loud. Wow I've encountered many elephants in the KNP and other wild life parks in Africa but this brute was something else.
Suddenly he started to charge at the car well you've never seen a vehicle reverse like we did that day he must have chased us for more than a kilometer my husband was driving and I was yelling Go Go and the two visitors with us were shocked into silence.
Eventually we managed to get around a corner and do a three point turn then continued to wait for him it is much easier to out run an Elephant in forward gear. After about half and hour of playing cat and mouse with him another vehicle came from the other direction and distracted him. That we our chance to make a run for it which we did.
So much excitement. We reported the matter to the ranger when we returned to camp and were told that elephant had been misbehaving but it was because he looking for a mate. | | | Bull elephant chasing our car |
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| | Tshukudu Game Reserve We love going into the private game reserves as well. There are many in our area.
In February 2006 after the elephant encounter we took our friends into two different private reserves.
The first one does rehabilitation and rescue work. It also has a lion breeding programme as many of the lions in the KNP have feline TB and if uninfected animals are not bred outside the park we could eventually loose the whole lion population in South Africa.
The highlight of this trip was walking through the bush early one morning with 2 lion cubs who had been kept in somebodies garden they had been confiscated and were being introduced back into the wild.
It really was an amazing experience walking through the African bush following these two cubs.
They also have a Cheetah named Savannah. She has a tracking collar on her but comes regularly to vist at the lodge. Just beware she likes Magnum Chocolate icecream and will help herself out of your hand. |
Maduma Boma This is another lovely place to visit. It is not very large and they do not have any dangerous animals so you can walk freely about the reserve.
The only things to watch out for are the monkeys who like to steal food and the warthogs that come regularly out of the bush scavenging for tidbits.
It can be pretty scary when sitting around the campfire at night and you hear rustling in the bush then out of the darkness come the tusked beasts. Not one or two but a dozen or so and they are not shy it is after all their bush.
Every bungalow has it's own plunge pool which is great for cooling off after a hot African day. | | | Warthog visiting our bungalow at night |
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| | More photos in Kruger Park This lovely family of zebra was photographed after a bush fire in the Kruger National Park.
They do controlled burning in the park but often there are fires started by lightning or careless people with cigarettes. |
Babies in the Kruger This playful baby decided to try and scare us but waving his trunk and flapping it's ears. Luckily he was very small still and not at all scary just really funny. | | |
| Jasmine at picnic spot in Kruger National Park |
| | MONKEYS Monkeys are well known for hanging around near the picnic spots in the Kruger Park. They are very brazen and if given the slightest chance will steal your food off of you plate. Please do NOT feed these animals of any of our wildlife as this causes them to become dependant on humans for food and not want to find their own food.
On one of our recent trips to the Park our 9 year old granddaughter decided that she was the newest species of monkey and started swinging around in the trees. |
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junecorlett Wed Feb 18, 2009 11:16 UTC
Lovely family. I am also Thailand fan,,,,and proud granny! | nickandchris Mon Dec 22, 2008 20:15 UTC
Happy Christmas, Michelle. | filipdebont Sat Nov 29, 2008 10:42 UTC
Happy Birthday, Michelle | johanl Thu Nov 27, 2008 22:18 UTC
Happy birthday. Have a great day. |
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