Kruger National Park It’s the ultimate do-it-yourself wild animal viewing experience, writes GEETA PADMANABHAN
PHOTOS: GEETA PADMANABHAN
Wild encounters At the Kruger National Park in South Africa
It’s all about roads. The metalled tarmac out of Johannesburg allows the tour operator (TOR) to push for 110 km/hr. Out of the city, the trailer van slides into South African wilderness and sets hearts thumping. The first whiff of the famed ani
mals of Kruger National Park (KNP) is 450 km away.
The N4 highway is an intrusion. It cuts through vast plains fenced by distant mountains. Whizzing past are the taxis, mini-vans, whose trigger-happy crews transport black South Africans to the city for work. The roads have look-out points where tourists have been mugged. Signposts sport bullet holes. And it’s probably the only road with a hippo warning.
The Mizoram-sized KNP is the ultimate do-it-yourself wild animal viewing experience. Its 3,000 km of criss-crossing roads link a network of self-catering rest camps, bushveld camps and beautifully built private camps. Choose lodges with attached bathrooms or tents pitched on raised platforms. Tourists are unanimous – bathing rooms and toilets in South Africa, even in the deep bush are spotlessly clean. Petrol/diesel is available in rest camps (credit cards/dollars accepted) and all the major sites have curio shops. Rough-it-out? Naah, unless you have signed up with a conman for a tour operator.
Campsite to campsite
At Crocodile Valley, check in, unload, grab a bite and go off game “hunting”. Thrill includes spotting animals and hearing the TOR say, “Good sighting!” It’s distinguishing between a dried branch and the brown eagle, between stones and a tortoise, a black boulder and a cud-chewing wildebeest, large red stones and mating lions. It’s realising that, in the wild, you remain caged while animals roam proudly free.
Animal trails are a blackboard for tracking lessons. “See the S-shaped marking?” asks the TOR as we cruise around. “Made by an elephant’s trunk.” Before we leave the camp, we can identify dung – elephant’s or rhino’s? Pellets in bunches are an antelopes’. Scattered, they were probably dropped by a giraffe. Strewn fresh branches means an elephant has gone ahead. Overlapping pugmarks – lion? Cheetah? Rhino – look at the three toes!
Note the body markings. Impalas have M on the back, the waterbuck a C. Kudus have lines on the flanks. Lions are dark behind the ears and tips of tails. Under the leopard’s eye is a line of white hair reflecting light onto the pupil. The dark “tear marks” on the Cheetah’s face reduce glare from the bright sun. It’s a day hunter. Soon identifying becomes an obsession. On the morning out of the magnificent park, we squeal at a new set of pawmarks – till the ranger says, “Excuse me, they were made by your shoes.”
Variety is the spice
April is off-season but we’re treated to a boastful variety of animals: a kudu with magnificent horns, rare ground hornbills with red and blue necks, shy steenbok rushing into the undergrowth, a herd of elephants choosing to move like Chennai traffic. Majestic giraffes with ox-peckers on their long neck. A stag party of male impalas. A group of six aggressive white rhinos, three lions sitting on the side of the road, frisky zebras prancing across. At one point, wildebeest fill the horizon, sitting, standing and grazing. At another the dramatis personae change to buffaloes. A trotting giraffe, a surprised eland and a spectacular view of sunset. As darkness falls, a pack of wild dogs appears from nowhere to outride us to the camp gate. At night hyenas patrol the fence.
Days are hot, would love to join the 20-odd hippos in the lake. Wait, a herd of impalas stands still. “Something is spooking them,” says the TOR driving away. Wart hogs, waterbucks, terrapin, dung beetles … “People talk of the big five (lion, leopard, buffalo, elephant and rhino),” says the TOR. “There are the small five – the leopard tortoise, rhino beetle, buffalo weaver, ant lion and elephant shrew.” True.
At the Skukuza camp, read a pictorial history of Kruger and watch the Sabie river swollen with crocs. Look up the fruit bats hanging in the dining huts. Timboti, the bush camp (camp beds, fans and the ubiquitous open grill) has baboons swinging on branches to clear the electric fencing. Rules include “Silence from 9.30 p.m. to 6 a.m., no roller skates, skateboards and bicycles, put down the fly screen flap against inquisitive baboons”.
You can’t ignore the birds. Lilac-breasted rollers take off, a brown snake eagle lands on a tree stump. Maribou storks pray on bended knees, a shrike circles overhead; cape and white-headed vultures are indifferent to photographers. Blacksmith plovers and guinea fowl scamper past the rock python lying smashed on the road.
Finally, the Tshukudu bush camp – a 5,000-hectare private game reserve with African style safari cottages, a dining room and a fully equipped kitchen. Here you take morning walks with Savannah the cheetah and Churbi the lioness, visit the cheetah and lion breeding centres. Have a lovely porcupine as dinner companion. You do the night safari on an open vehicle and spot bush babies. Travel to stroke Jessica, the home-grown hippo. Learn to play African drums from Jacks, the friendly ranger, and devour pip-free African oranges. And then return to Johannesburg through the spectacular Drackensburg mountains.
“Is it safe?” people ask. Sure you’ll be more secure at home behind locked doors, punching the remote for Animal Planet or Nat-Geo, but boy, you will miss out on a lot of fun. Kruger is just a case of following instructions and taking precautions against stomach flu. For the rest, it’s pure paradise.
Are you ready?
* Wear jeans and embroidered tops/T-shirts. Indian embroidery gets “oohs” and “aahs”.
* Carry a flashlight and a water bottle at all times.
* Carry dry food as you travel. Stock a few fruits as well.
* Take malaria tablets before you leave.
* Pack a minimal first-aid kit.
* Learn something about India. Everyone is curious.
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