31st May 2012 – Stay at Satara Camp

31st May 2012 – Stay at Satara Camp

Again we left camp at 6am and headed out for our morning game drive. We saw very little during the first few hours, 2 black backed jackals, a herd of wildebeest and zebra then another herd of zebras and giraffes,a herd of impala and 4x ostriches (our first sighting of them). We then stopped off at TImbavati Picnic Spot for the loo and to stretch our legs before heading back to where we saw the lions yesterday to see if they were still in the area. Not long from the Picnic Spot we saw 2 honey badgers right next to the road. It was an amazing sighting, especially in the middle of the day but unfortunately as soon as we stopped they ran off so we didn’t get any good photos of them – better luck next time! At around 25km from this site we saw a dead male lion only 20 metres from the road; it looked like he had died from TB as his coat was in poor condition.

Then around 8km from where we saw the lion pride yesterday we saw 2 lions in the bushes sleeping. They looked like young male lions but it was hard to tell for sure.

We drove on and when we arrived at the sight of the lion pride there was nothing there. We then decided to head onto N’wanetsi Picnic Stop as it is famous for its views. We stopped and looked at the view. Shortly after we left the picnic spot we saw a bateleur eagle right next to the road eating a rabbit. As soon as we stopped it flew off but we decided to wait and see if it returned. It was our lucky day! Not long after we had stopped it returned, but each time a car turned up it flew off again. Luckily no one was as patient as us and as soon as they had all driven off it returned. We got some amazing photos of it eating and we couldn’t believe what happened as suddenly we were surrounded by up to 20 vultures circling the eagle! Before we knew it a vulture swopped in and scared off the bateleur eagle and before he had a chance to eat the kill a tawny eagle swooped in and scared off the vulture. Unfortunately he soon got scared off by all the vultures and so flew away carrying a small part of the rabbit, possibly the intestines. Bizarrely the vultures all just sat around and watched the rabbit but no one ate it. After a while all the vultures flew off and the bateleur eagle didn’t return so we drove on.

A few minutes down the road we came across a large herd of around 10+ elephants on both sides of the road. There was a yearling that obviously wanted to show his dominance and trumpeted and charged at a vehicle as it drove past. It was quite amusing as the elephant was so small but had he been any bigger the car would not have found it so funny.

Next to the elephants was a herd of buffalo – this meant that we had now seen 4 of the 5 BIG FIVE, just the leopard and we would have seen all in one day!

We returned to where we saw the dead lion earlier to see if anything had eaten it. Nothing had yet but there were lots of vultures so we decided to wait around and see if anything would come and start eating it. After a couple of hours of waiting and none of the vultures had dared come to eat it, we think they needed the lappet faced vulture to open up the carcass, or a hyena and as neither were there they couldn’t eat any of it. So after 2½ hours we decided to move on. We drove further along the road where we saw a large rhino and took some good photos of him as well as visiting the dam and see a tree squirrel coming out of his hole which we also took a few photos of.

After this we decided to drive back to camp past the lion carcass one more time. As we arrived there were 2 vultures eating the lion; we couldn’t believe that this had happened as soon as we had left! However, they didn’t seem to be having much luck at gaining entry to the body so after eating his eye they gave up and returned to their nearby tree. After waiting a further 5 minutes nothing more happened and we left as we had to ensure we made it back to camp before that gates shut.

30th May 2012 – Stay at Satara Camp

30th May 2012 – Stay at Satara Camp

As usual we left camp at 6am to go out for our morning game drive. It was most definitely our quietest morning drive so far. After driving for around 1½ hours we arrived at Leeupan waterhole to see what we would see – not much. There were a few giraffes some impala and some birds but that was it. We did hear what we thought were hyenas chattering but we couldn’t see them.

Leaving Leeupan we saw a rhino with its baby in the road but as soon as they heard us they bolted – they were very nervous which I guess is understandable given all the rhino poaching that is happening in the park at the moment.


Soon after this we saw 3x lionesses in the road but they were on the move and walking from one side of the road to the other. There were some wildebeest on one side and one of the lionesses chased them which was great action to witness. She was in reality too far away to catch one but as she started the run the two wildebeest closest to her were not on the same wave length and ran in opposite directions and collided head-on. They had enough of a head start to still get away but it was nearly a fatal mistake. We didn’t stay with them long as they soon wandered off into the bushes.

Further along, on the riverbed of Siloweni we saw a herd of around 17 elephants including 5 babies. This was great to see as we hadn’t had a good sighting of a herd of elephants on this trip so far. We sat and watched them for a bit wondering if the lionesses would come down to the water as they were not far away and had been walking in this direction, but they didn’t come so we moved on.


We then stopped off at Tshokwane Picnic Spot Wayne witnessed a group of vervet monkeys steel a man’s breakfast that he had left unattended for a minute! As we left the picnic spot we saw around 25 giraffes in the waterbed. We had never seen this many giraffes all congregated in the same area. They we just eating and enjoying the early morning sunshine. It was quite a sight!

Further along, at Mazith Dam we saw 3 elephants, a small herd of zebras and a large herd of waterbuck as well as a couple of hippos and a heron!

By 11am we had arrived at Satara and as we couldn’t check in until 2pm we went out for another drive. After driving for about 5 minutes, we were stopped by a car coming from the opposite direction who told us about a pride of 16 lions that were stationary around 16km ahead. We rushed down the S100 to where they were so we could see if they were still there. They were about 200m from the road so the sighting wasn’t great but we decided to sit and watch them. We were pleased that we did as we witnessed a few good things. The best thing we saw was a herd of zebras walk towards the lions and one of the lionesses hid and stalked them. At this point Wayne turned into David Attenborough, whispering things like “she has got to get to cover, they have not noticed her, she is in behind them, they are walking straight into the trap, this is it”. Unfortunately the zebra spotted the rest of her pride which were lying down in the shade and so they started to run. She chased after them but their head start meant that she wasn’t able to catch one. It was a great thing to see and something we can now cross off our viewing wish list for this trip!

We also watched as one by one the lion cubs walked past a group of vultures and each one chased them away, playing and practising for when they go on a hunt. We sat and watched them for around 2½ hours until they went into the bush and could no longer be seen them. It was a great afternoon but also very tiring.

29th May 2012 – Stay at Skukuza Camp

29th May 2012 – Stay at Skukuza Camp

At 6am we left Lower Sabie Camp and headed up the H4-1 and within 20 minutes we came across 2 wild dogs running along the road.


We turned back to follow them along the road. We watched them playing and smelling as they trotted along. Suddenly Wayne spotted a big cat, it was a leopard. We could not believe our luck at seeing both a leopard and wild dogs at the same time! This has got to be a once in a lifetime sighting! The leopard bolted from the bushes at the side of the road toward the wild dogs. It followed the wild dogs along the road, stalking them as if they were prey. The wild dogs noticed and so started jumping up on their back legs. They appeared to do this so that they seemed more daunting but strangely did not seem to be too concerned about the stalking leopard. The leopard would charge at them at full pace and stop suddenly when they turned around to face her. Eventually the wild dogs disappeared into the thicket and so the leopard lost interest and went her own way. Wow, what a sighting! This whole encounter lasted around 30 minutes.
At 6.50am we saw our first impala! Not bad for our first hour!

We continued up the H4-1 and stopped over a dried riverbed to have a look around. We could not believe our luck. There was a second leopard! What are the chances?! He was hiding in the grass reeds but soon after us arriving he started walking away from us along the edge of the riverbed marking his territory. It was a shame he wasn’t coming towards us, but nonetheless it was a great sighting.


We also visited Leeupan watering hole where we saw 2 giraffes fighting – they were knocking their heads and necks against the other. It didn’t look vicious so we believe they were merely practicing! The smaller of the two giraffes was not really keen on the fight but the larger one kept insisting. It was pretty funny actually!

We also saw a few ground hornbills which appeared used to humans as they came right up to the car. It looked like they were used to being fed from people in their cars. We did not oblige and so one near Wayne found and picked up a crab instead!

We arrived at Skukuza at 12noon but as we cannot check into any of the camps until 2pm, we decided to call Tempest Car Hire about our puncture. They originally requested that we drove a day’s drive to their nearest depot to collect another car, when we refused to do this they just suggested getting it repaired and keeping the receipt as they would then reimburse us the cost. We were pleased that we had paid for glass and tyre damage to be included in our car hire cover. We visited the garage on the camp where the mechanic found a thorn in our tyre. He removed it and carried out a temporary repair – this looked like a rusty nail stuck in the whole and then sealed shut, but hey, we didn’t care so long as it did the job!

After getting the tyre fixed we went to the shop and bought ourselves some lunch to eat by the river. We then returned to the shop to stock up on a few supplies we needed to make lunch and suppers for the next few nights. By this time it was 2pm so we could now check in. The room was standard for our trip – 2 single beds (which we pushed together), a bathroom and an enclosed patio area – it had netting around it so that we could sit outside but the mosquitos couldn’t get to us – which had a kitchen area in it too (stove, sink, table & chairs, crockery and cooking utensils).

That afternoon we went for a game drive (3-5pm). We saw an elephant bull right by the camp entrance, rhino, giraffe, mongoose, impala, kudu and a warthog coming out of his burrow. This seems like quite a lot of animals but the drive felt quiet.

At 5pm when we returned to camp we sorted through our photos, made supper, drank some Savannahs whilst watching a gecko on our patio netting sitting in wait for insects to come towards him before catching them to eat!

28th May 2012 – Stay at Lower Sabie Camp

28th May 2012 – Stay at Lower Sabie Camp

Again we had set our alarm for 5.25am – this time we were both already awake so it was much easier to get up. At 5.50am we were in our car and queuing with other guests waiting for the gate to open at 6am.

After our long game drive yesterday we had decided to do a morning drive before heading back to camp for a rest and lunch etc.

During our morning drive as stopped off at a picnic sight to go to the loo and another visitor commented that our tyre appeared to be a bit flat. During our morning drive we saw kudu, giraffes, hippos, baboons, rhinos, a snake (around 50cm long), millipede (around 15cm long) and a little tortoise in the road as well as elephant, klipspringer and impala.


We than saw 4 CHEETAHS!! This was very much unexpected especially as we were so close to camp. There were around a dozen cars already pulled up so we were very pleased to get a spot to be able to see them.

They were on the other side of the river to where we all were. Being far away was probably a positive thing in this instance as the cars did not scare them off. They looked like they were searching for something to hunt but unfortunately there was nothing around for them. They walked along the riverbank which meant we got some reasonable photos. We were very pleased for our 400mm lens. Unfortunately the man in the car next to us wasn’t this lucky as he just had a standard lens on his camera. Much to our amusement, to try and take a closer photo of the cheetahs, he tried to put his binoculars at the end of his camera before taking the photo. I don’t think this worked but it gave us a good laugh! We spent around 1 hour with the cheetahs watching them until an elephant bull appeared close by and we saw the cheetahs stalk towards him but he just ran at them flapping his ears which chased the cheetahs off up into the bushes behind. We didn’t get back to camp until 12noon, but we didn’t mind as we were delighted to have been able to see them. As soon as we arrived back at camp we wanted to look at the photos and were pleased with the outcome.

After looking at the photos we had a rest and went for some lunch at the camp restaurant before getting our tyre pressure checked – it had gone down a lot! We got it re-pressurised before deciding to head back out for an afternoon game drive. This started off a bit uneventful, not really seeing much although we did getsome good giraffe photos and also saw some wildebeest, elephants, impala, zebra, vervet monkeys etc. One the way back to camp we decided to stop off at the nearby waterhole (Sunset Dam) where we watched the sun set and also took some good photos of hippos fighting, of a hippo ‘roaring’ at a heron as well as seeing the local baboon family cause havoc with all the cars trying to enter the gate before it closed! It was quite comical and thankfully we managed to enter the gate with 6 minutes to spare!

26th May 2012 – Stay at Crocodile Bridge Camp

26th May 2012 – Stay at Crocodile Bridge Camp

The drive from Pretoria was pretty straightforward and uneventful and we arrived at Crocodile Bridge Gate at around 2.40pm having stopped just once for fuel on the way.

As we drove over the bridge to enter through the gate we saw some elephants in the river and thought this was a great omen for our time in Kruger! After driving over the bridge we parked up and went to reception where we bought our Wild Card and checked into camp for the night. We then went through the park gates and headed into camp (as this was right next to the gate). We unpacked the car and had a quick look around.

The camp was clean and well kept. Our room was too. We had 3x single beds and a bathroom. Outside we had a patio area with the stove, sink, fridge, cooking utensils and a braai. We decided that as we had arrived early we might as well go for an afternoon game drive so we headed back out into the park. On our 2 hour game drive we saw several animals including 3x rhinos crossing the road in front of us.

When we got back to camp we made stew and drunk a few Savannah ciders. We also planned our route for the next day before having an early night ready for an early start the next day.

27th May 2012 – Stay at Lower Sabie Camp

At 6am we packed up our car, checked out (put our keys in the ‘key box’) and left camp.

The early morning drive was quite although it did get better a few hours in and we ended up spending a full 9 hours driving, until arriving at Lower Sabie camp at 3pm. We ended up seeing many animals including lions lying in the road together with a hyena.

We also saw rhino, impala, buffalo, owl, mongoose, giraffe, hippos, elephant, zebras, bushbuck, stalk, ground hornbills and a ground squirrel in a tree! As well as all this we saw an injured lioness on the river bank, a lioness near camp and a male lion lying down in the bushes – lots of lion sighting for day 1!


Most of this was seen in the morning as we didn’t really see much from 10am-2pm. Once we had arrived at camp we were both very tired after a long day in the car. Our room was very basic and a bit tired looking but it was OK. It consisted of 2x single beds, a bathroom, fridge and a patio area with a table and chairs and a braai. We heated up our left over stew from the night before, had a brief wander around camp – we watched the river and saw a bushbaby in the tree directly above where we were standing before going to bed.