Cruise day 3
Wednesday we got up reasonably early, had breakfast and set out for our safari about 8:15.
It was in the same direction as the hippo place the day before, but about an hour past it. Sadly I thought it was the other direction, so picked a seat in the sun for the trip and was quite warm by the end.
It’s a narrow highway (N2) with only one lane in each direction and a fair bit of construction. When a wide truck was in front of us, things slowed down a lot. Eventually it pulled to the side and things picked up again.
Much like the guide the day before, the young woman narrating our trip talked about the history and culture of the area. She spoke excellent English despite telling us “I’m just a Zulu girl and don’t speak English well as it is my second language.” I know a LOT of folks who do not speak it as well as she does.
She went into much more detail about things than the woman the day before.
Sometimes strange details about when Zulu men have multiple wives how their individual huts should be laid out on their land. (First wife on the left, second on the right, third on the left, etc. The husband’s hut in the middle.)
She was much more direct about the conditions. “We are trying to recover from the evils of apartheid which destroyed our way of life”. “We must strip our land of resources to try and catch up with what we lost.”
There are miles and miles and miles of eucalyptus trees along the side of the road. They’re not native, they’re imported from Australia because they grow fast and can be ready to harvest in 6-8 years. The road was full of trucks hauling the harvested ones.
“They take much more water than native trees, but produce wood we can afford, so we must put up with them taking too much water. They are owned by companies, not people, but they do make furniture from it which provides local jobs.” “Unemployment is more than 40% and poverty is common.”
When she walked the bus taking questions my wife did ask her about Zulu fight manuals. She suggested one, but it is in Zulu. We’re going to see what we can do with that.
Despite the road traffic, we did get to the Hluhluwe Imfolozi Game Reserve only a few minutes behind schedule: https://www.hluhluwegamereserve.com/
We climbed into the safari vehicles and drove off into the park. The ranger told us that the best time to see animals was early morning, so no promises could be made other than great landscape.
But, almost immediately the road was blocked by and bunch of impala.
Then, some rhinos could be seen on the hill next to us. I’m told they could be identified as Rhino as they were eating grass. Black Rhino eat bushes.
Next were some buffalo walking from a mud pool across the road. I’m told they have an attitude and are known to chase lions away. They certainly had no interest in getting out of our way.
The guide was very good at spotting animals and often would point at things that I had to take his word for. Maybe some giraffes were under that tree, but I couldn’t swear to it.
But, my talent for finding large mammals was working as I spotted the elephants before he did.
They were by a river near some trees and fairly grown. As we got as close as the road allowed, I spotted a smaller one to the other side.
“That one is younger,” I said, pointing to it.
“It’s a teenager and eating,” he said. We watched it almost pull a tree down eating it. Then, it decided it wanted to use the road and came out in what the ranger assured us was an aggressive posture in front of us.
We quickly backed up. Then, backed up some more.
We did have a great view of it.
Before this, I always thought of the land where these animals live as flat. Big plains stretching out all over as far as you can see.
But, these were wooded hills and valleys, not even remotely flat.
We headed up one of the taller hills that gave great views over the landscape. Near the top was another bunch of buffalo that looked at us with a “what? We can look at the view too.” Look before we passed them.
We crested the hill and there was a rhino in the road that looked at us, turned away and pooped on the road in front of us. (It did kick much of it back into the grass.)
We almost, sort of, kind of saw lions.
They were on the opposite hill from where the rhino snorted at us and walked off, but still quite far away.
As we were told, they had been hanging out by the road and behaving themselves. (In the ranger’s words “They’re male and lazy”.) But, some folks drove by in a pickup standing in the back of it.
I guess lions are just all about vehicular safety and went to have a talk with the people riding in an unsafe way. Quickly and loudly.
So, some rangers decided they needed to remind the lions that they were in charge of traffic enforcement, not the lions. So, the lions decided to climb the hill and sit under the tree and sulk.
We did bring binoculars with us. And through them I could see there were some sort of animals under that tree. Lions? Sure, why not. Could have been big dogs or donkeys too. It was too far away for me to know what kind of animal it was for sure. But, I’ll take our guide’s word for it and say I’ve seen wild lions.
(To be fair, at the entrance to the park they are very clear about NOT riding in a pickup truck that way as it is pretty much ringing the dinner bell to predators.)
Going back the other side of the hill we did see some giraffes and zebras. (Zeb ras not zee bras we were told.) I’m not sure about photos of the giraffes as they were under some trees and blended in well.
Then there was the cheetah. Or, so we were told. As we were going down the hill, the driver suddenly hit the gas and we were going down a narrow, twisty, road very quickly.
“Someone saw a cheetah!” He said when asked.
We barreled down the hill, through a stream as fast as an amusement park ride and then stopped at a Y intersection.
“It was just here,” he said.
We looked around. A few birds. A lot of bugs. No cheetah.
We waited.
He hit the gas again and went down the right road.
“It’s down here!”
It was not.
We turned around.
“It’s where we were!”
It was not.
We went down the other road.
“They saw it over here!”
We did not.
We sat and waited. A British woman said it was laughing at us just like her cat does at home.
We all agreed she was right.
After about 10 more minutes we gave up and drove off.
“It just crossed the road where you had been!” Came over the radio.
The driver just frown and kept driving.
We did see a small herd of zebras in the road after that, quite close. Some of them right in front of us.
I also need to mention the warthogs.
They weren’t quite as numerous as squirrels at home, but it was close. We saw more than a dozen. Most just watched us go by. Some trotted out of our way. Some were large, some were small.
Some just sat there as we drove by.
“Stupid warthog,” the driver said when one didn’t move. “Lion’s going to get you.”
When we got back to the start point, two were just flopped in the parking lot by the curb. They looked at us, flicked their ears, but stayed where they were. A couple of more poked around the trash bin the hopes someone had not closed it properly, but walked off when it was clear they had.
Then, back in the bus to return to the ship. Sadly the sun moved enough that I was in the sun all the way back too.
Today and tomorrow are days at sea as we cruise around the south end of Africa to get to Cape Town. So, probably no adventures. Certainly none scheduled.