We regularly Safari in South Africa…our knowledge of where to go and where to stay is extensive and our experience spans nearly 40 years…in that time we’ve seen a lot of changes. I was just 24 years old when I first visited Kruger National Park and I’ve clocked up an accumulative time of over 3.5 years in the park…YES! I love it and it’s wildlife. John joined my love for Kruger after first visiting 11 years ago. This is what he wrote at that time about his initial introduction to the park…..

Impressions from a first safari

It’s 04.45 when we are roused from our semi conscious state. It’s the ‘early morning’ alarm sounding in our roundavel, and its pitch black and there’s a nip in the air. We are at Berg-en-Dal camp Kruger National Park.

But, let’s rewind 24 hours or so. My wife, Jenny, and I had left London’s Heathrow Airport the night before on an overnight South African Airways flight to OS Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg. Picking up our Toyota Fortuner we had headed north eastwards away from the conurbation of Jo’burg and Pretoria picking up South Africa’s N4 motorway to our destination. 

Several hours later, we had entered the small town of Malalane which sits at the southern end of what is to be our home for the next two weeks, Kruger National Park.

So, we are in the northeastern corner of South Africa in what is South Africa’s oldest national park, established way back in 1926. With the Zimbabwe border to the north and Mozambique to the east, a vast area of 7,500 square miles of SA is designated by UNESCO as part of the Kruger to Canyons Biosphere. If that all sounds a bit highbrow, then don’t be put off because that is not what Kruger is about to us. It is simply our heaven on earth.

With vast swathes of Africa’s natural habitat lost to man’s intervention, this is an area where human beings are privileged to enter a land that the wildlife can call their home. Kruger stretches around 220 miles from north to south, and approximately 40 miles from west to east (and the Mozambique border). To the south and west, nine entry gates control access to the camps dotted across the park, which covers an area roughly the size of Wales.

With a combination of tar and dirt (gravel) roads and a global speed restriction of 40 kph, the national park is ideal for safari lovers like us to self-drive. Yes, there is a place for the park controlled safari drives, too. With the rest camp gates closed from sunset to sunrise, the SAN Parks’ organised game drives, particularly at sunrise and sunset, offer an ‘escape clause’ to witness the wildlife in a nocturnal environment. The additional height offered by the safari vehicles can be an advantage too, particularly when the bush grass is long.

And so, back to 04.45 and a Berg-en-Dal wake up call. A quick refresh of the body and we’re ready to go when the camp gate opens at 0530, we are ahead of sunrise by about half an hour. The feeling of anticipation is intense. What will be the first sighting of the day? An impala? Probably. Hopefully, a night predator returning after a kill. Or lions sleeping on the tar, with the roads deserted overnight of course. The tar retains the heat, offering a treat for these big cats when man has gone.

Around half a dozen vehicles form an orderly queue as the impatient wait for the gate opening continues. After a few minutes, despite it seeming like an eternity, the SAN Parks officer allows our ‘escape- at a shade after 6am. That nip in the air is still evident as we await the heat of the African sun to dramatically change this landscape later in the day. This morning, our first sighting is not to be an impala but a spotted hyena about to end its night’s work, scavenging for food. 

We both wonder what other sights the bush has in store for us today……

With John’s love of Safari firmly embedded from his very first moments in Kruger National Park 2J’s continued most years to make what can only be described as their ‘pilgrimage’ to South Africa…people always ask why we don’t get bored with going to the same place and I always answer “The Bush (Mother Nature) only shows you what it wants you to see and that is always different, every hour, every day every year”….and so we continue to Safari with the same excitement we had the first time we went.