Yesterday we had a visit at the Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park. Jim kindly organized the whole outing quite nicely with Jeannius, Eowyn, Wild Tigris, Ocean Jasper, and Crazy Horse crews in attendance. Our tour guide was Samora who had such knowledge of the area, animals, their habits, and their qualities of making us dinner. Samora made the tour interesting and held our attention until the hunger of food outweighed that of curiosity. We finally did make a stop but you can imagine there are not too many fast foods places in a game reserve in South Africa. We saw a herd of 30 female elephants with 3-5 babies. The two males stayed on the outskirts and didn't join in the departure when the herd left. We stayed a safe distance away in our van.
There were too many impalas to count. There were baboons, warthogs, water buffalo, giraffe, white rhinos,snakes, nyala, and wildebeest. We were not able to spot any lions or other cats. There were no reports of sightings of lions that day by other visitors to the park. Samora thought they were more inlands and the high water kept them away from the riverbeds where they like to rest. The most interesting that captured our attention was the dung beetle who lays its eggs inside the dung of rhinos,makes a ball around the eggs, rolls the whole thing while hanging on down roads and across the rough terrain. The size of these balls of dung/eggs was as small as a pea to as large as a baseball. It is quite humorous to watch and guaranteed to bring a smile to one's face.
All in all we are glad we spent the day at the park and feel at least we got a small glimpse of real life in the natural bush of South Africa. There is no feeding of these animals. They strictly maintain their own population control. Their greatest predator is man who is poaching especially the tusks of the white rhino. The park service vigorously defends and fights against these predators. The government is trying to make the punishment more severe to discourage the poaching.Generally, it was a great day of sights, smells, and sounds one never expects in a lifetime. We were all reminded of the TV shows we grew up on in the states about Africa. Never did we imagine we would actually visit "Wild Kingdom" one day! What an honor and a blessing! We got lots of photos and plan to share them with each other. That will be the highlight of our photos I am sure.
Today we hope to leave Richard's Bay with several other boats in attendance. Who knows what the weather may bring-it changes daily and hourly sometimes. How far we get depends on the waves, current, windspeed. In a way it will be hard to leave the friendship, comfort, and delicious food of the Zululand Yacht Club. Ben, the bartender, has made friends with us all carting us around Richard's Bay and in some cases all the way to Durban. He is an energetic fellow with lots of local knowledge and a priority of keeping us all safe. We will miss all the folks here who have been so friendly and helpful to us.
Rosemary, Bill, and Matt