Kgalagadi Park is one of the largest SANParks (South African National Parks) and the only one comprising two National Parks across border, a smaller part in South Africa and the bigger rest in Botswana. The name Kgalagadi means “place of thirst” in the local language because it is located within the Kalahari desert. We were so eager to get here that we forgot our camera bag at the Molopo Lodge where we stopped for lunch on the way. Only when we arrived in the Park did we realise it was missing. PANIC! Luckily, the lodge owner was so nice and kept it safe for us so the only thing we lost was the two-hour round trip. Phew! A pretty small price to pay.
As it turned out, that wasn’t the only mistake we made for this part of the trip. Firstly, we were pretty late with our planning so all the wilderness camps further north in the park were already fully booked by the time we enquired. We were forced to stay in Twee Rivieren Camp for all the three nights we were there, which was really unfortunate. The best way to explore a Safari, for us, is to stay one night a each camp and move on the next day so that you don’t have to drive the same road twice. Besides, the wilderness camps are much more adventurous and interesting because they lie deep in the park with lots of opportunities for game watching at sunset and during the night. The second mistake was our choice of transportation. You really need an SUV for a park like Kgalagadi to be able to go off-road deep into the Park to look for the most interesting animals. Our sedan shamefully failed as we tried to cross a small sand dune. Our third mistake, luckily our last, was the shortage of time of our schedule. We could have easily spent the whole week in this park because we both liked it so much. The pleasant weather in the desert during Spring time, the excitement when spotting a new specie we hadn’t yet known, the enormity of the Park, its color, its smell. We loved absolutely everything we saw and enjoyed every minute of the trip. When we left we already knew it wasn’t our last time there.
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Our “home” and our car – the latter was certainly the wrong choice for that parkEntering the ParkHundreds or even thousands of little weaver birds are building these nests, sometimes you even see them on top of power poles
SpringbokFighting springboksThis springbok obviously had been very lucky some time ago!
VultureA herd of wildebeestCrimson-breasted shrike
Sometimes it’s not easy to spot smaller animals with good camouflage like this jakal
Sleepy owlyawning cheetah one early morning
It took a while before we spotted the first giraffesand then there were plenty of them
Impressive gemsbok, A ranger once told us that their horns are riffled to cause more damage when pulling them out of their opponent….I guess he knows how to defend himselfHe was standing right next to our carLunch breakThey’re having a break too. Totally unimpressed of our presence only 10m away from their sleeping place. We certainly didn’t want to wake them up.We couldn’t easily spent the whole week here.
Sunset at Two Rivers RestcampA native San inhabitant. A couple hundred years ago they used to be the only people living in this area. Nowadays there are only small groups left and some of them, like this guy, try to make money buy selling some hand-crafted works to tourists.
After 5 days in Cape Town we hit the road for the North, driving through Western Cape province – a huge area with the least population in South Africa. It was actually our anniversary but we must have forgotten it while planning this trip so we spent the entire day sitting in the car. Even though the main roads in SA are pretty good maintained, it’s a very long drive from Capetown to Kgalagadi National Park so we decided to take a break and spent the night in Kenhardt, a small town in the middle of nowhere in the Western Cape. The landscape started to change slowly but dramatically, the further North we were, the less green and the more deserted it became with not a single car/person or tree in sight. Although the drive was exhausting, it was deliberating at the same time. We were starting to feel at ease and leave all our worries behind.
Driving through Western Capeendless roadWild flowers along the road, you can see them for only a short period in SA spring timeChanging landscape as we go
Arriving in Oude Herberg in Kenhardt, the number 1 hotel in town – and the only one. We received a very warm welcome from the owner – a nice lady in her 50s. She even cooked dinner for us herself, very tasty steaks, I believe it was springbok. The room was kind of old-fashioned and unique: the toilet was separated from the rest of the room by a folding-screen ;-). It was simple, but very authentic. We took a walk after dinner around the very deserted town, trying to imagine how life in a place like that would be. Finally we found the most beautiful thing Kenhardt had to offer, its incredibly bright sky with a zillion stars at night.
The watch-dog, I think she liked me.Sunset in Kenhardt, more romantic in picture than it actually was 😉And the journey continued the next morning
On our last day in Cape Town we hiked up Table Mountain via Skeleton Gorge hiking trail starting in the Kirstenborsch Botanical Garden, which is a more interesting trail compared to the shorter one starting in the Table Mountain Park J once did.
Received some “tribal make-up” from the waitress after breakfast in the Botanical Garden.She said this was a wedding custom in the African tribesThe trail was actually even steeper than it looked on this picture.View to the South-EastMade it to the topBloubergstrand in the background
Spot P!Spot her againClose to the end of our hiking trip with the Lion’s head in the background, one of Cape Town’s landmarks.
September is a good time to go whale watching in Hermanus. Southern Right Whales are on average about 14m long, 41 tonnes heavy and can live up to 50 years. A pregnant one can reach a weight of 80 tonnes. They come to South Africa during the local winter time to mate, calve and nurse their baby which they carry for about 13months and only once in every 3 years. Impressingly they do not feed at all during this time. In fact, they fat up themselves between Jan-June down in Antartica and literally “starve” for the rest of the year. Human, try to feed a baby who sucks up 600 liters of milk (!) from you per day for 8 months long WITHOUT feeding! That is truly a nature wonder.
The tour often goes on like this: you go out there on big tourist boats searching around until you see any whale in sight. Then you turn off the engine and wait for them to approach you. Yes, otherwise they’d feel “disturbed” and dive away. The three-hour boat tour in such a stormy weather was a hard one on me that day. But we did see some whales and one of them even made a little dance for us, so it was all worth it I guess.
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Exploring Hermanus downtown while waiting for the boat.
