We had two great trips in 2002 and 2003, unfortunately then photos are still on 35mm, so I will skip these years and start at 2004
August 2004:
We had booked 4 nights at Skukuza from the Monday to the Friday, but waiting over the weekend became too much. So we made a holiday of the trip to Kruger staying at Crystal Springs for the Saturday night and Moholoholo for the Sunday. We did the conservation tour at Moholoholo, with Brian and enjoyed every minute of it. (except for Punkaloo and LuckyCharm who were sprayed by a leopard and stunk to high heaven for the next two days)
We entered the park at Orpen Gate and travelled down to Skukuza where we were to spend the next 5 days:
Taken at Nsemani Dam in warm August sunshine :
On the way down the H1-3 to Skukuza:
Early morning on the H4-2, at what we now call leopard rock (but that will come in the 2008 section)
We had this little girl all to ourselves for a brief 20 seconds as she ran into the middle of the road, posed and then disappeared back into the bush without a trace.
She seemed no larger than a normal domesticated cat, but I would not have wanted to get out and pat her
The early morning drives down from Skukuza to Lower Sabie on the H4-2 are often busy but usually always deliver great sightings. This morning it was cold and misty and we did not rate our chances but the Lower Sabie King came out to visit:
And he brought his brother with him; they were intent on letting all the females in the Lower Sabie area know that they were there and available
And not too long before the wife appeared….. and put an end to the roaring
I love this sequence, he just walked slowly down the road, he owned, like the king he was…
Then proceeded to roll in elephant dung, much to the whole cars horror
Then raised his nose to all who were watching, as if this was the done thing to do
We followed him down the road (H4-2) for about 5 kms and were surprised to see a troop of baboons heading up the road towards him, as they got closer we waited to see what would happen
then out of the mist this car came flying past and ended the entire event, lion off the road and into the bush and baboon scattered (the cars number plate was “KITTY” - a bit ironic )
It was still a great sighting no matter how it ended
Sunset Dam at its best, before the algae
This mother Baboon would not leave her dead baby behind, we watched the troop for 15 minutes as she moved along carrying the dead baby with her. A sad sight to watch..
In 2003 we had a great drive from Skukuza to Lower Sabie (H4-2), then up to Tshokwane (H10), then back down to Skukuza on H1-2. We were lucky enough to have 3 separate Cheetah sightings on the one drive, two with kills the first had just killed a kudu calf and was lying next to it, getting its breath back, at the second there were three males on an Impala kill.
Still captures from the video footage are below(mentioned before that we only had a 35mm at this time, and were not very good photographers). The first picture was just past Mlondozi and the next just before Orpen Dam
So we tried this again in our 2004 trip, but all we got was some great general game sightings on the H4-2.
And the same followed for the H10..
There was a stop at Orpen dam, to stretch legs and use the loo, at the end of the H10 drive everyone was bursting. The girls rushed off to the loo and LuckyCharm returned screeching in horror…. “The toilets gone, someone stole it, it’s just a hole in the ground”. We explained it was a long drop, (she had never seen one of these before) but no way was she returning to THAT loo, so what happened was Dad having to make a plan and build our own loo behind the toilets !! Had we known that Tshokwane was just a few minutes away, we could have made another plan, but it was our first time up that way (still Kruger novices & had no Garmin)
We reached Tshokwane with no special sightings (like the year before), and with a car full of despondent Dad, Mom and Kids we drove back to Skukuza.
But a surprise awaited us just before the Kruger Tablets.
This couple was just off the road and quite the exhibitionists..
My oldest one Roxy was on the video camera, she was 13 at the time, and when she saw what was going to happen, her first comment was “aaahw, Dad !!” The answer was “it’s educational”, she kept on filming and we have a really great recording of the events. LuckyCharm was 4 at the time watched intently and thought this was great, even though she had no idea what was going on, and hopefully still does not for many years to come
THE EXPLANATION GIVEN AT THE TIME WAS THAT THEY WERE DANCING
Some of the pictures are a bit blurred at the edges, as I was trying a new lens and it did not capture the high action too well
These were a few snippets from our August 2004 trip, hope you enjoyed them.
