SAFARI!

Last weekend we all embarked on a three-day safari at the Imfolozi Game Reserve. It was about a four hour drive from African Enterprise. We stayed in big 8-person tents that were equipped with bunk beds, sleeping bags, and pillows.
There was a river behind our camp and we often saw animals drinking from it. Our camp was set up in the middle of the reserve, and it was not protected from animals. Several people from our group claim an elephant walked through the camp at night. Some of the people had decided to stay awake awhile, and they actually saw the huge animal brush up against one of the tents. A few girls in that tent woke up and were extremely scared! I wish I hadn't slept through that!
There were bathrooms, but Saturday night we ran out of water, which made for a real camping experience. I ended up only being able to get one shower which was on Friday night! Yuck! It was very hot and dry in Imfolozi, and since there was no electricity, there of course were no fans or air conditioners at our camp.

We split into four safari trucks when we arrived, and my group saw four of the Big Five (Elephant, Rhino, Buffalo, Lion...we didn't see Leopard)! One group actually saw a leopard, which was extremely rare since it crossed the street in front of them at 1130am! Kari got candid photos of me being excited about the animals. I thought I'd share them, haha!

About thirty minutes in to our first drive, we had a very close encounter with Dumbo.
Here is a video!!!

In case you didn't catch how close Dumbo got to me, here is a still version:

My face after meeting Dumbo:

Here is another video and some photos from throughout the weekend:

I found Pumba!

Widebeest- so hideous!

Our safari driver, Shannon, teaching us about elephant dung!

Ashleigh tasting elephant dung- she really did it!

White rhino

Saturday morning we found lions resting under a tree! They were hard to see because they were a bit far away, but I was SHOCKED at how big lions are!

Here is a photo Jeff took. He has a nice zoom and is quite the photographer:

sunset

530am!
SunriseCape Buffalo with White Rhino in the background:

We also saw hyena, which were much larger and intimidating than I thought they would be. I'd say elephants were our most common animal, but we definitely saw a ton of cape buffalo, rhino, and giraffes!

At one point on our Saturday afternoon drive, we found ourselves in the middle of a herd of elephants! At first we thought only one or two were trying to cross the road ahead of us, but hundreds and hundreds followed! We had them on all sides of our vehicle!


Here is a video:

On Sunday morning we went on one last early morning drive, came back to camp for breakfast, and departed Imfolozi for St. Lucia to take a boat tour, where we would see hippo and crocodile!
We spent some time in the town of St. Lucia waiting for our boat tour to begin. This is what many of the outside markets in South Africa look like:

St. Lucia!

We got on this boat for a 2 hour tour

"Safari Kari" and I making our buffalo impressions:

Crocodile!

The drive home was crazy. We were all exhausted, disgustingly dirty, and just wanted to be home! One of the vans got a popped tire on the freeway, and we had to stop for awhile to fix it. Anyway... I improved my buffalo face:

The safari was amazing!!! I wish you all could have seen it!
-KTO