Another long Qantas flights from Auckland to Johannesburg, lots of time in airports and short stop in Sydney.
Picked up at the airport by Jaco in his red Kombi and off north to the hostel in Pretoria. Knew we were back in Africa – the smell of Sasol and boys in the back of bakkies (utes) Straight to bed – jet lag is horrendous, we lost 10 hours . We landed at 4.30pm and our bodies thought it was 2.30am then next day.
The next morning we drove north and stopped at the restaurant over the motorway for breakfast. At Louis Trichardt we turned east to drive through Venda. A densely populated rural African area.
We entered Kruger at the Punda Maria Gate and drove straight to Punda Maria Camp to buy wine and beer.
The first thing we noticed when we drove into the park was the elephant dung on the road. On our previous visit (See South Africa 1995) we struggled to see and elephant and now dung was everywhere. The elephants use the road as it is an easy pathway . Our first animal was this elephant at the side of the road – a bit of a change .We drove to Sirheni camp for the next three days.
After three nights we moved from Sirheni Camp to Bateleur Camp
From here out of Kruger National Park and to Pretoria to catch the train to Cape Town