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Jesse's Hunting > Hunting Articles > Articles > A Country Boy Goes On Safari - Part 3 of a Series
A Country Boy Goes On Safari - Part 3 of a Series
Brad Swadley - JHO ProStaff
- Dallas, TX
January 03, 2008
Oh my, what was that loud noise that woke me from my deep sleep at 3a.m.in the morning? I shake my head to get my bearings and realize that the security alarm is going off. I finally realize I am in Middleburg, South Africa and come to awake status pretty quickly. It has been an interesting journey so far, and we have come from Pretoria to Middleburg to start the next leg of our trip. We are staying with Gus and Pat Ives, and are eagerly awaiting the morning sun to jump-start us in the morning. Fortunately, it was a false alarm, even though I couldn’t sleep much the rest of the morning.
Alexander the Great
This bull elephant is a regular at Kruger National Park. The locals call him Alexander. |
The drive from Middleburg to Kruger National Park near Hoedspruit was about five hours. We would be going from the highveld to the lowveld. We packed up and at about 7a.m. Pat’s friend, Tish, met us at the house. Pat and Tish are regulars to Kruger, and they had setup our stay there. I should also add that they took very good care of me while I was there. I was definitely not wanting for food or drink while under their care. I think Gus and Johan were a little jealous, but played it off like it was no big thing.
We headed out in two vehicles, towing a small covered trailer. Pat and Tish were in Tish’s small car and the guys were in a Nissan Patrol that Gus had borrowed from a friend. It would come in handy at Kruger as it could seat all five of us comfortably. We were finally headed down the highway, looking over brochures of Kruger. The park is quite large, approximately 100 miles wide and about 200 miles long. Around a corner on any of the roads you could possibly see any animal that was native to Africa.
As the trip unfolded, Gus pointed out several of the diamond and gold mines in the area. Gus has a pump distribution business so he was quite informative about the history of some of the mines.
About halfway through the trip, we stopped to have some padkos. Padkos is a traveling lunch in South Africa. We stopped at an informal rest area and the ladies started laying out food. Based on the amount of food we had, you would have thought there were twenty people joining us. We ate as much as we could until a huge bus pulled up alongside us and started letting its passengers out. The driver let it idle, destroying the serenity of our picnic spot. We loaded up and jumped onto the highway.
About an hour outside of Kruger is a tunnel cut through the mountains. On the other side, there were several gift vendors setup alongside the road right next to a deep valley. We stopped at the first one, and as we were stepping out of the car, we noticed the baboons. They had been coming up trying to steal the ladies’ food and the ladies kept chasing them off. I have to admit, the large male was quite intimidating and I personally didn’t want to make him mad. The ladies seemed to have it under control so I browsed through the knick knacks. Pat helped me pick out some nice carved cape buffalo, a small drum and some other things to take back with me.
We stopped again about an hour outside of Kruger and met our Professional Hunter, Japie, the man we would be hunting with after our Kruger visit. We dropped our rifles off with him, as we felt better doing that than taking the rifles to Kruger with us. You can bring a rifle into the park, but it must be marked and stored in your cabin. I guess that is a good thing, but we didn’t feel that was the best option so we left them with Japie.
We finally made it to Kruger and signed in at the main gate. From here, it would be 55 kilometers to reach our camp, named Mopane. It was named this because of all the mopane trees in the area. They are a short leafy tree, not growing much taller than twenty feet. The elephants love to eat the leaves and limbs of the mopane. I later learned that this is the reason we saw so many elephants while in Kruger.
We made it into camp, after seeing several elephants, hippos, kudu and impala. It was quite unbelievable if you have never experienced anything like it before. Our camp was setup on top of a hill, and had all the amenities you could ask for: a gas station, restaurant, a store and a guest house. Large electric wires encircled the camp and made me feel more at ease. That is until we heard the story that three months earlier in another camp, a guard at one of the entrances left his door open and a leopard killed him. It does make you perk up and notice your surroundings more after a story like that. The cabin was nice, solidly built with a thatched roof, and would sleep up to eight people. We had a beautiful view that overlooked a lake that had a plethora of crocodiles.
We drove around that afternoon and saw several more elephants, kudu and impala. We came back to camp and had a nice brai for supper. We noticed a few hippos browsing the shoreline of the lake and walking amidst the crocodiles. We were all tired from the trip though, and after securing a few things from the store, took an early trip to bed. I listened a little while for the hippo’s bellows, but after not hearing anything, fell asleep.
The next morning we all hopped in the Patrol and headed out with map in hand. Pat and Tish gave us directions and we immediately came upon a mother hyena and her pups at one of the culverts in the road. We took several pictures and headed on. We came upon giraffe, a huge bull elephant, more kudus and a rare bird called the ground hornbill. We took pictures and video of the two ground hornbills we observed as they are almost extinct. Only 1500 live in the world, and approximately 500 of those reside here at Kruger National Park so it was a great honor to see them and to get video and photos.
We saw bush buck, tsessebe, zebra, blue wildebeest and Cape buffalo. It was a great day and it was pretty amazing as I stood 30 yards from a Cape buffalo shooting videos and pictures, without any kind of fencing in between me and him. Only in Africa!
Black Death
Despite the terrifying tales from the likes of Ruark, Capstick, and Hemingway, the author was able to get many photos of the Cape buffalo. |
We headed in that evening and decided to take the night tour that the park offers. The gates on the camps officially close at 5:30p.m. but you can do one of two night tours: one starts at 5:30p.m. and the other starts at 9p.m. We loaded onto what could best be described as a school bus with a heavy-duty canvas as the side covering. It was loaded with spotlights you could use during the trip to try to spotlight animals.
Pat and Tish seemed to know the driver Michael quite well, but we didn’t ask questions. He was a good guide and gave us lots of information during our three hour drive. The excitement for the evening was having a large, bull elephant do a fake charge on us. It made my heart race, and I was unsure if I would be needing to change my underwear or not. We made it through the rest of the trip uneventfully though, and saw several animals, but none of the big cats.
The final, full day at Kruger had us out early in the Patrol looking for either some lions or leopards. We saw a magnificent bull elephant. We found out from the park employees that his name is Alexander. I had never seen one that big, much less with tusks that large. He was a beautiful elephant and one I will never see matched. We stopped for a quick bite to eat at a waterhole and there were herds of animals all around us. I would have guessed in there were in the neighborhood of three hundred animals, comprised mainly of zebra, blue wildebeest and tsessebe. We took a nap during lunch hours and headed back out that evening. We saw several more animals, but no lions or leopards.
The next morning had us packing up and headed out to our next destination which was about an hour away. The packing went slowly and we reluctantly headed out for our last drive through the park. Once again, we saw a lot of different animals, but no lions or leopards.
As we came to the end of our tour of the park, I realized that Kruger was more magnificent that I had anticipated. Later, back in the states, as I reviewed my video and pictures, I realized it would have been nice to spend a whole week there. The camps were great and it was just the greatest thing to be able to drive along and see the animals.
Pat and Tish took a longer route out of the park. They were headed back to Middleburg and Gus, Johan and I were headed to our next destination. It would just be the guys on safari. Next stop, Bloubank Safaris.
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