Back on the Road

And so they decided to go back on the road. This time I was not going along but Tenery, Tsonga and the Pick 'n Pay savates were taken and they will tell the story of the next road trip.

The Kats of Kgalagadi

Her mother wanted to come to SA with her friend Renate, and they made up their minds to land beginning March. It was still hot in Pretoria then but since both aunties had things to see, buy and visit, it worked out. Coen also had to stay in town until after the 12^th because of the start of his creative writing course.

Road to Hotazel

And so, after fetching the aunties at the airport, they started with the shopping. Then there was a visit to the peridontist who did not have good news. In all this, they managed an outing to Bela Bela to ‘take the waters’. It was a lovely day and the spa was still quite empty when they arrived. They did the hot pool and then the not so hot one for +/- 2 hours and then went to the Ocean Basket where they had a nice seafood platter before heading for home. 

Suddenly one of her clients popped out with an urgent translation to do. It was Thursday and he needed it by Monday – 226 pages. First, the document came in garbled and when it did get in, some pages were missing. But, out of goodwill she accepted the job and told them she will do her best. Meantime, she had to feed the people at home, invite some in-laws for dinner and help organize the car for the trip ahead, make reservations in the various establishments on the way and also round up her yoga classes.

Vanzylsrus Hotel

Van Zylsrust hotel

Working until late, she managed to deliver the most urgent part of the job on time and made an  agreement that the annexures to that document will follow. 

Tortoise on the road

This way she managed to get the packing done and the road trip set out. They could not find  accommodation in Kuruman which was their first chosen stop. Finally they pushed to Vanzylsrus and slept there in the very folkloric Vanzylsrus hotel. The people were very welcoming and of great help with everything. They even sent some faxes for them. The rooms were comfortable and the food was great. The personnel was a bit slow to understand the English but all in all, a good time was had by all before they took the road to the Transfrontier park.

 Community birds' nest

This is a dirt road, good in most parts and rather corrugated in others. But it was a shorter distance to the park gates than from Upington. Soon they settled in the lodges and had a good rest after some snack lunch. She sat at the kitchen table and worked on her translation while the others rested or visited the place. Later, that afternoon they took a game drive with some interesting surprises – they saw cheetahs among others.

Working at the lodge

At first the cheetahs were next to a tree behind bushes but it rained and they came out to stretch on a flat river bed – rivers in that part of the world are usually dry. 

Back at camp, they made a quick dinner of bully beef and pasta. It was a fairly clear sky and they could see Venus and Jupiter close together and practically in a horizontal line. She worked for a while longer and then went to bed. Early the next morning they were out of the camp as soon as the gates opened. Along with the multitude of ruminants: Oryx, springboks, wildebeest, steenboks they also saw cheetahs, lions, black back jackal and bat eared foxes. It was a very productive morning.

Black backed Jackal

They took another route and saw (the same ?) 4 cheetahs walking up a ridge. Then they practically fell on a family of lions just by the road. There were about 10 of them, in all shapes and sizes. One black maned lion was sitting on the other side of the road and got irritated with all these cars coming and going around his family. He got up, charged the one car, marked his territory and joined the rest of his family. They suspect this was the same family of lions of which they saw the 6 cubs 5 months earlier.

They stopped to go to the loo at one of the picnic spots, and for some refreshments too. A lady approached and greeted them. She asked if they had seen cheetahs that morning because they were looking for one with a collar – they were researchers. Coen had taken pictures and the researchers went to see the pictures to see if they could figure out if the cheetah had a collar on.

Small world, one of the researchers happened to be Gus Mills who came to Uganda to help out with the lion project they were involved in. He actually stayed with them for a couple of days. After 12 years, they meet again in the park!

At the gate, the ranger recommended that they take the main road to MataMata the next day since there has been interesting sightings on it.

Back at camp, they had lunch and a nap, she worked some more and then they went on the afternoon game drive. It was still hot but they saw quite a bit of game on that trip too.

That evening they opted to dine at the lodge restaurant. It was ok food, nothing wow! A. Renate’s lamb was tough and mother found her ice cream too sweet.

Hyenas

Next morning, they had breakfast first and then started out in the direction of MataMata. That day, again they saw lions, cheetahs, and even hyenas along with the other game and birds: bustards, eagles, secretary birds etc. They stopped at the other picnic spot to have a bit of lunch. It was very pleasant there. 

Lioness in our midst

On this  part of the road it was another smaller family of lions that they saw, mainly females and cubs.   The one female came to check the cars, confidently walking among the cars parked there, posed for photos and went back to her family.

Further north they encountered a small group of giraffes. One had died and its young one was grieving next to it – it was quite a sight. There was another cheetah closer to MataMata and cars were lined up with people expecting to see her hunt. 

Giraffe and dead giraffe

Sunsets in the desert

Cheetah stalking her food

On their afternoon game drive, they saw her again but she moved out of sight. Afterwards they learned that she made an unsuccessful hunt that day. Next morning, early, they left for one last game drive and saw her cross the road in front of them. They reversed the car and followed and waited. Again she shifted out of sight. 

Back at camp they packed, checked out of the park and went into Namibia. The road to their next destination was a well-graded sand road. There were corrugated parts but not as shaky as in the park. 

Birthday

It was A. Renate’s birthday and she had forgotten. They were setting up at Auob Lodge for the night. When they got there, the people remembered them from their last trip 5 months ago. They were given their rooms and settled down for a nap, they had stopped for a picnic lunch on the roadside. 

In the afternoon, they had some nice tea and cake and settled by the pool. When the sun was further down, she did a few laps in the pool to cool down. Dinner was a tasty affair of game steaks followed by a small dessert. A. Renate’s share had a candle on it, she had talked to the manager of the place to see what she could do for the occasion. The staff sang for her too.