I am not very succinct with my ramblings about what we take but I’ve started with the odds and sods which make life easier…then I’ve sub headed the clothing, electrics, essentials and other bits….. hope you find it helpful.

We are intending to cook quite a bit ourselves, so this does need planning. South Africans tend to be big on barbecues or braii as they call it. So the first thing we pack is a self contained barbecue set….very cheap on amazon about £20. It contains everything you need…tongs, long fork, metal slicer, wire brush etc…I’ve taken the skewers out and replaced them with wooden ones and I’ve taken the chefs knife and the salt and pepper out because I don’t think the airport scanning machine will like them much. We’ve also packed oven gloves, dish cloth and tea towel two melamine plates, bowls & dishes, two knives, forks and spoons and two cups. Most the accommodation in Kruger provides this if you book the right type, they also provide a fridge, sink, hot pate, and plough dish barbecue with a grilling grid which you can raise and lower ( hence the need for oven gloves) …. But we booked late and took what we could get not all our accommodation offers this although all has the barbecue.

You could buy most of this fairly cheaply when you’re there. We are fortunate in that we have friends in Johannesburg and we leave a cool box and pillows at their house. We will leave the melamine plates etc there when we return.

You may well ask why pillows? Because the ones in Kruger all seem to me lumpy chip foam which balls together to make hard lumps or just one piece of foam…they are very uncomfortable so we have bought 2 luxury pillows from Mr Price…very cheap you could give them to one of the camps cleaners when you leave…we take pillow cases with us.

What else do we take…..even though September and October are the start of spring it’s still chilly at night and we like to take The Parks Board sunset and night drives on their open safari vehicles. We take jeans, layer t-shirt and long sleeved top and a light weight fleece jacket and a scarf, they often give you a rug. Then we can start in t-shirt and gradually put layers on.

Food wise we take a plactic caddy of coffee and sweeteners. We take a flask which we fill with ginger cordial……that’s what I drink all the time and you can’t buy it there, We decant the cordial into empty coke bottles when we get there…then we can use the flask for its true purpose and have hot coffee when we have early morning self drive game viewing……..nothing better than having a coffee while watching a waterhole or a lion having its breakfast 😁😁

Electrics…ummm always a hard one as there is often only one plug socket in the room which has the aircon plugged into it…so…we have a South African double socket. This way we can keep the aircon on and still have a socket. We have 2 South African to Uk plugs ( just incase we find another socket …we are always optimistic 🤣🤣 )And we take an extension lead with 4 uk sockets and a multi usb charging socket….yup it seems a lot but we have to charge 2 cameras, 2 iPads, 2 iPhones, 1 laptop for downloading all pictures from both cameras everyday….then there’s the occasional toothbrush charger, hairdryer etc… There are usually sockets outside where the kettle can be plugged in…but BE WARNED you can’t leave anything unattended…not even while you nip to the loo because most the camps have monkeys and they will steal anything…the last thing you want to see is a vervet monkey up the tree with your camera battery or trying to use your iPhone 🤣🐒🐒 We’ve seen it happen. I’ve even lost a yogurt from the table while I turned my back to get another one out of the fridge……please don’t encourage these little tinkers because when they get too cheeky the Rangers have to cull them, so you’re signing their death warrant.

Clothing…this is what we take..

3 pairs of long trousers each – to mosquito- proof our legs in the evenings

3 pairs of shorts each

6 T-Shirts each

12 pairs of pants each

6 pairs of socks each- we only wear them in the evening so we wear them twice.

5 bras – me only🤣

1 pair of sandals each

I pair of closed walking shoes each – sketchers

I long sleeved top- polo or thicker blouse

1 fleece each

1 scarf and fingerless gloves- I don’t like to be cold🤣

Other must take with us –

First aid/ medical bag containing plasters, antiseptic cream, cold remedy, antibiotics, moisturiser, eye drops, Imodium, senakot, paracetamol, bite ease/ anthisam cream, antihistamines.

Shampoo and conditioner

Toiletry bag

Travel hairdryer

SA maps, Kruger guide book, animal and bird ID books- all can be bought there but as we have them we take them with us.

Washing detergent – fairy pods. Some of the camps have washers and driers…if you’re lucky they’ll be working and take R5 coins….but if you’re not lucky the cleaning lady or man at the laundry may do your washing for you. We generally drop it off in the morning, go for a drive and pick it up later. We’ve always done this and we pay some money up front and promise the rest when we pick up…we give a big tip and a couple of washing pods which surprisingly always seems to bring a bigger smile than the money.

Binoculars…2 pairs if you have them…but I dropped one of ours and I haven’t replace them as we tend to use our camera lenses .

Torches…a must as electricity is unreliable

Money – we take Rands with us because although a lot of places do take cards, the toll roads do not take international cards. Sometimes the camps in Kruger have electricity outages and although they have generators these don’t usually allow the internet to be connected…so you can get petrol but unless you’ve got cash you won’t be able to pay for it until the mains electricity returns which can take 6 hours….a waste of good game viewing time. You’ll also need cash for tips etc. There is a cash point in Skukuza Camp which works if they are on mains electricity.

Well!, I think that’s about it..we fit all this into 2 medium sizes cases both weigh about 20kg. We also take two hand luggage’s which are small wheeled rucksacks and contain our cameras and mine also contain 4 pairs of knickers because I am neurotic about our cases getting lost/ delayed and not having a pair of clean knickers 🤣🤣 The day ruck sacks come in handy for putting clothing layers in when we go on the Parks Safari vehicles.

Hope that helps with your packing…actually apart from the barbecue equipment the space it takes up we would usually use for smart evening clothes but we don’t need them on Safari…..our packing tends to be much the same wherever we go in the world.

The next time I blog we will be in South Africa 👍