Facts and figures: Ninety per cent of the population of South Africa is non-white. And coincidently, 90 per cent of the visitors to Kruger National Park are from Africa, but they're pretty much all white. The remaining 10 per cent of the visitors are from overseas, as in Europe, Asia, the Americas and Australia. And most of that 10 per cent come here through prearranged group travel. Almost all of the cars plying the nearly vacant Kruger roads are privat...

Elenka and I got up in the middle of the night and drove through a near-freezing forest atop a safari/jeep, then bounced across an African veldt until way past the sun came up in search of lions and rhinoceros. And boy, did we find them - three female lions and a pair of young males - walking within a short jump and a bite from us. We were so frightened. Then ten minutes later we stumbled upon three massive rhinos. Elenka was in her glory.  Aside from the lion...

 By our fourth day at Kruger National Park we'd seen the 'Big 5' African animals - elephant, buffalo, leopard, rhino and lion. But it wasn't until the morning of that same day four that I caught my biggest buzz. Elenka and I arose before sunrise and were walking our compound perimeter when a troop of baboons, frolicking with a herd of impalas, caught our attention on the other side of the fence. The strands of wire along the top of the fence wer...

  The Viennese are like Muscovites in so many ways. They're indifferent, rude and frequently nasty. Even the marginalized ones, who've been brought in from other countries to do the work the Viennese don't want to do, seem to wish all of us outsiders would just go away. The only discernible difference between a native of Vienna and a Moscow homie is their attire. The Viennese, even when walking their dogs, dress as though they're off to the Ball...

The man on the motorcycle didn't stop, or even slowdown. Ellen and I both saw him coming, but we were helpless. I instinctively turned the wheel hard left, into the opposite lane. It was impossible to avoid impact. He crashed into the right side of our car. Because I had cranked the wheel so hard to the left, the impact was deflected. The motorcyclist flew off the bike, head slamming into the passenger side window. When our car came to a stop at the edge of a...