Friday, September 21, 2018
We continued our drive on to the
Baviaanskloof Nature Reserve, one of South Africa's largest conservation areas. Francisco had been tasked with determining how accessible this area would be in our little 2WD vehicle. We had noted that there was a stretch of road only accessible with a 4WD, but he thought "some of it" would still be passable. "Some of it" turned out to be a mere 18 kilometers. We stopped to pay the entrance fee, but were basically just waved through since we wouldn't be able to see much in our little car.
It was very beautiful scenery, but the bumpy roads weren't worth it. Our turn-around point was the World Heritage Site Interpretive Centre. We pulled some cookies out of the trunk for breakfast before moving on.
I ended up feeling very sick today with a decent-sized headache. By the afternoon, I was actually worried I was getting sick because I had developed an insatiable thirst to go along with my headache. It was just a couple hours drive to our next airbnb, but we definitely could've planned a different route if we'd known how little of Baviaanskloof we'd be able to see.
We followed this truck stuffed full of oranges for a good portion of the drive and were amazed at how he lost next to no oranges out of his truck bed!
We arrived in Colchester earlier than originally planned and messaged our airbnb host at the
Sundowner Guest House to see if we could check in early. This place was a steal at less than $30 a night. We were literally minutes from Addo Elephant Park.
We stopped at the only restaurant in town,
A Taste of Africa, and picked up an avocado and feta sandwich with chips for lunch.
Besides being right outside one of the entrance gates to Addo,
Colchester is also situated on the banks of the Sundays River and bordered by magnificent sand dunes.
We ate our lunch as we made our way down the bumpy road to see the dunes.
It was super windy and sunny in case you can't tell.
We drove back down the bumpy road and finally entered Addo Elephant National Park around 3:00 PM. The gates closed at 6:00 today, so that gave us an hour and a half to drive into the park before we'd have to turn back. Addo is a
diverse wildlife conservation park situated close to Port Elizabeth. It's one of the country's 19 national parks and is currently ranked third in size after Kruger National Park and the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park.
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| Designated viewing area |
One of the first things I spotted was a dung beetle, and I'm not sure if there's ever been someone so excited to watch a bug play in poop. ✋
Next was a lanner falcon with a dead pigeon.
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| Web of the Social Spider (Stegodyphus) |
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| Red hartebeest |
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| Warthog and Ostrich |
Of course, with it being called the Addo Elephant Park, we had our eyes peeled for elephants. Francisco practically squealed as he caught a glimpse of our first one. I hadn't seen anything, and he had to throw it in reverse as we scanned the landscape. This big guy was partially concealed by these bushes at first.
He wandered around a bit, munching on the vegetation.
Here's a pic to give you a better sense of where he was in relation to us. I had moved to the backseat of the car to try and get out of the sun a bit more since I still wasn't feeling great.
It was honestly so incredible to see our first elephant. We thought he was brown at first, but have now come to the conclusion that he was probably just muddy.
We spotted another elephant not too long afterwards - he was much less muddy!
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| Greater double-collared sunbird |
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| Red-necked spurfowl |
One of the best moments was watching these elephants play in a field. It was absolutely incredible.
The
greater kudu is a woodland antelope found throughout eastern and southern Africa.
Of course seeing our first zebras was a highlight as well!
We drove back to the limited strip mall in town and tried the single grocery store in the area. It was so crowded and overwhelming; my headache and anxiety got the best of me, and we sought the familiarity of the restaurant we'd had for lunch and had another avocado and feta sandwich from
A Taste of Africa for dinner.
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