Day 3 - Journey to Kruger N.P

God's Window

So this morning was a ridiculously early 0400 start. We had about a 9 hour drive to get to Kruger before nightfall so that we could learn to pitch out tents before being plunged into darkness. Can you imagine faffing about with pegs and string in the dark?! 

The first few hours, the landscape was flat as a pancake with mostly agricultural land and a few “housing estates” consisting of corrugated roofs. The flat landscape made it relatively easy to spot the odd wild Ostrich and baboon running about. Further into the morning the scenery started to change into mountainous views as we started to increase in elevation. 

We stopped a few times in the morning for coffee and breakfast and then again to pick up some food for lunch before having a picnic stop at a place called Blyde River Canyon, the third largest canyon in the world, following 1) The Grand Canyon and 2) Fish Canyon in Nairobi. Even not at its greenest it was still a pretty breath-taking sight. 

Our next stop was a place called Blyde Potholes which were found by luck by a British Gold Hunter hundreds of years ago. Sadly we found no gold today! These are not your standard potholes, in fact I wouldn’t call them potholes at all, more like huge crevasses that have been formed over centuries by running water. We had lunch here and spent most of it fending off hungry monkeys!

We then quickly stopped off at a place called Gods Window. After a steep hike for about 20 minutes we made our way through a rainforest and was presented with a spectacular view. On days when it’s not foggy (which unfortunately wasn’t today) apparently you can see Mozambique to the far left!

Amazingly as we were about 1.5 hours drive our tour leader shouted “ELEPHANTS TO THE LEFT” and out of the undergrowth and in front of our bus walked a line of 6 elephants all being ridden by handlers - It all happened so quickly that none of us got a picture. Luckily enough that wasn't the only opportunity we had to see elephants that day, 10 minutes before we entered Kruger National Park, we drove over a bridge and the truck came to a very quick halt. Tshepo entered the back of the truck with a huge grin on his face and pointed out of the window, we all raced to the side of the truck and below us amongst the river trees and on the river islands were about 15 elephants of all differing ages happily eating, swimming and wading about in the water. It was once i'd taken my shots and was just sitting there watching these beautiful animals in total peace that I was overcome and almost shed a tear. I think the realisation that I was finally in Africa and seeing such incredible sights already had officially sunk in.

We got to our campsite (in the dark) and it took Jo and I about 15-20 minutes to get the tent fully put together and packed with mattresses, sleeping bags and backpacks. Not bad for first timers even if I do say!