Kruger Park and the Big 5

3 Full days in South Africa's premier national park, Kruger Nat'l Park, and Heidi and I were still dying for more animal time. We saw lions, a leopard, two cheetah, secretary bird, lilac breasted rollers (the blue and purple one in the picture), white and black rhinos, tons of hippos, elephants, giraffe, zebras, wildebeest, and impala. And we even got a puff adder which is a kind of very venomous snake.

We camped out and stayed in a rondavel on thanksgiving night after having dinner with Jim and Cheryl who were spending 4 days in the park. The animals were definitely used to people gawking at them and were not shy. We would constantly have to stop to let giraffe and elephants cross the road. A few times I thought an elephant might charge us but I havn't seen it happen yet. They do this puffed up stance, waving their big ears at you, and charge just a little. It reminds me of the sea lions at Santa Barbara with their fake charges. The elephants do seem a little bigger now that we have moved on from the old Land Rover to a tiny rented Hyundai Atos. Its built like a little bubble though which makes game viewing very nice.

We would get up early, 4:45 am to try and see the big cats active and about. It is such a great place to drive yourself around in. The park has an incredible diversity of animals and in great abundance. We finished off with two big male lions and a leopard on the last day as we drove out of the park and south to the town of Neilspruit. Here we rewarded ourselves to a second thanksgiving dinner at Spurs before checking out the latest installation of Harry Potter. I already can't wait to go back.