With knowledge of the little things expanded we leave today for the greater Kruger big 5 game areas. Our first stop is the Balule Reserve.
We had a later start to our day which was welcome and after our 0830 breakfast loaded up the jeep and headed up hill and down dale to the exit gate where we swopped back into the minivan. Enroute of course we set the camera traps - John and I chose the stretch of road where we saw the tracks with Dillon the other morning while Ionna and Kim chose a crossroads in the valley where they had seen Tara and Dan looking at some tracks. We will see what's on them next week which will be exciting!
Our first stop on the open road was Hoedspruit for some souvenir shopping and the consumption of a very scrummy ice-cream before continuing on to Raptors Retreat, the lodge where we had all our meals and Ximongwe River Camp where we stayed in a big house, all to ourselves, overlooking the river. Ionna was captivated by the ververt monkeys in the large tree next to the house.
Johan was our guide - he owned the camp and was also building an eco lodge on his property which we understand On Track Safaris will be using when it's finished in June.....it would be great to try it out as he was an excellent guide.
As Becky was a few minutes late for the afternoon drive we voted she should sit on the front trackers seat which became very interesting as we turned our first corner into a small herd of 7-8 male elephant - one was over 50 years old with big tusks. They were quite chilled so she was fine!
Other wildlife seen included Impala, bushbuck, kudu, waterbuck, red and yellow hornbills and a black backed jackal stalking guinea fowl. All meals involved a 20-30 minute game drive to Raptors Retreat depending what we saw. Becky benevolently offered up the trackers chair and so we had a rotation of Kim and Ionna trying it out and becoming addicted to the front seat! On the way back from supper Kim's arms flapped madly as we approached a large elephant who was probably responsible for the sizeable tree blocking the road which required a detour to get back to camp!