My photos are not uploading currently. I will fix it this weekend and add pictures!
So I am a little behind posting about our weekends! Ooops! :) Forgive me?
Alright so Saturday was again AMAZING! Let me tell you all about it!
We began our long day around 6:00 am
with a 45 minute car ride to Addo Elephant Park! The park is about 40,000 acres
of cage free natural habitat for the elephants and other animals! When we
reached Addo we were able to go through the park in our own vehicle, which was
nice because that meant Jordie (Our FreeWalker mom) was our tour
guide. Jordie used to work at Addo when she was getting her masters in
Elephant Behavior so exactly where to take us to see the elephants. She had a
list of all the elephants the "family" they belonged in and how to
identify them based on markings or characteristics. Her passion for the
elephants is amazing! It was incredible to see how quickly she was able to
point out individual elephants! We stayed at the watering hole for about an
hour and a half and saw around 70 elephants! I wish I had video taped the
entire encounter! There were elephants playing in the water, Mom elephants
chasing their sons, boys chasing boys and then little babies just aimlessly
running. At one point, a cow (female elephant) chased her son after he was roughing up with another elephant. They
ran right up next to our van, then between other vehicles and into the grass.
When they finally stopped,
the little elephant decided to use the bathroom right in front of the van. WOW!
That was something that immediately brought commentary and giggles to us! The
coolest part of watching the elephants is seeing how they interact. Keep in
mind these are absolutely in the wild. The park has no interaction with the
animals other than when you drive through it. They have absolutely no interest
in what we are doing! Elephants are so smart! Jordie was telling us some remarkable
stories about the elephants! She said that one time a woman had just found out
she was pregnant and hadn’t told many people yet and the elephant started
rubbing her belly! How cool is that?!
We left Addo and headed to Kwantu to ride elephants! Ahhh! It was awesome! There are four female elephants at the reserve and they ranged from 11-20 years. I rode the youngest elephant Mandebvu who is 11 years old. I was fortunate enough to ride with the main game reserve tour guide and he told me so many neat things about my elephant and the elephants in general. The passion these people have about these magnificent creatures shines through when they are talking about them! It made me sad riding the elephant because I had just spent hours watching untamed elephants and that is how they should be. Don’t get me wrong, it was an incredible experience riding one but I don’t think I would do it again. Elephants need to be free and not cooped up behind an electric fence. I don’t think I will be able to visit a zoo anytime soon without feeling a little guilty.
We left Kwantu and went to Schotia Private Game Reserve. Murray grew up with the owners son Justin. Schotia was the first private game reserve on the Eastern Cape. They have all sorts of animals, I sat in the front of the safari jeep next to our safari tour guide Scott. The jeep was wide open, no windows, and some seats didn’t even have side doors or anything holding them in and let me tell you this was a VERY bumpy ride! The first part of the tour we saw an elephant, and lots of ostrich, impala, kudu, waterbuck, wildebeest, springbuck, eland, and red hartebeest. We each got to take turns riding in the trekker seat while Scott drove. The trekker seat was a seat with handles on the hood of the car where you held on for dear life and hoped we didn’t get too close to the big five animals. When I was up there, I didn’t get to run into any animals sadly!
Scott spotted a giraffe and let us get out of the
jeep and walk over towards it where we were literally on the other side of a
tree from a wild giraffe! We felt fine and safe until we looked down the hill
and realized the only two rhino in the park were right behind us. We slowly
(cannot make sudden movements near wild animals) walked back onto the jeep and
drove up to the rhino. Rhinos are nearly going extinct because the Japanese
want for the rhino horns. They believe they’re medicinal but really a rhino
horn contains the same things as fingernails and hair, but since it’s seen as
medicinal thousands of these animals are being killed for their horns and
rhinos cannot reproduce fast enough to save their species. We got a little too
close for comfort to these rhinos in the park! Rhinos are herbivores so they
only eat grass but if they feel threatened they will charge. We were within an
arms length of these rhinos and don’t let our smiley faces fool you, we were
scared for our lives!
Once again these creatures are so amazing and breath-taking to see in their natural habitat. The place we ate was a huge circular hut that is surrounded by a fence to keep us safe which we needed because during dinner we heard the female lion roar and looked out the window with a spotlight and there was an entire family of lions sitting under a tree right outside the place we were eating! It was pitch-black out because there were obviously no streets, roads, or lights other than what was coming from our spot lights on our jeep.
We were able to find the lions right away this time thanks
to the female roar and them being right outside where we were eating. Lions eye
structure is different from other mammals including humans so they are able to
see better at night and the spot lights do not bother them. When our jeep was
next to the lions we had to be completely still and silent. At one point the
lion pack crossed our jeeps path and the lions were surrounding our jeep and
within two feet of my door. I was honestly too scared to even take a picture
with flashes so it was hard getting good pictures when the spot lights hit
them. We were out following the lions for a good 45 minutes and it was finally
time to head back to the main gate and head home. Jordie had set up for our
safari driver Scott to drive us all home since he lives in port Elizabeth too.
The drive home was 45minutes long and all of us girls talked and played name
games the whole way home. We were home by 1130pm and were in bed by midnight.
We were so happy to be able to sleep in today (Sunday) for the first time since
we have been here!
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