Having heard nothing back about the generator yesterday, Mike decides to come with us to the national game park and just before 8 am we are piling onto a minibus with ten others.
It takes just over an hour to drive to the Hluhluwe game reserve with our guide/driver, Samwara. We go through hundreds of acres of planted timber forests as there is a thriving paper production industry here.
As I have been told, the majority of houses are in gated compounds. High wall topped with barbed wire and barred windows and doors indicate a worrying crime rate even here. Even modest houses have wire fences around them, some of them little more than a modern take on a mud hut.
We arrive at Hluhluwe, one of the oldest game reserves in Zululand just after nine and begin the drive around the park. The bus is air conditioned and closed in although some of the other buses are open sided which I would have preferred. We are not allowed to get out of the vehicle which is a bit disappointing but when I hear how quickly an elephant can charge when it takes it into its head to do so, maybe that’s no bad thing.
Here’s what we see.
There’s great excitement when we come across a herd of female elephants with their youngsters. One large female shows a little more interest in our vehicle than is comfortable and Samwara starts the engine just in case (they can cover 50 metres very quickly) but after a bit of ear flaring she decides to eat the nearest tree instead. The herd move away from us, keeping the young in the centre surrounded by adults. Once they are behind us, the trundle down the road. A little further on we come across two young bull elephants taking mud and dust baths.
We see lots of dung beetles rolling their beautifully rounded balls of dung along the road. Apparently the female creates the balls of dung then sits on it while the male rolls the thing along. Sometimes they fall off but clamber back on.
Sadly, we see no leopards or lions. They are in the park but do not tend to hang around by the side of the road like the other animals do. There are hiking trips in the parks and this is where you are far more likely to see them I think.
One of the most amazing sights though, is one of the amazingly gentle and loving rare breeds of Michael water buffalo. How lucky am I that I am married to one of them?
We had thought we were going to the Hilltop restaurant for lunch but end up being taken to a take away place near for burgers, not quite what we had intended. Next to the snack bar is the usual local craft market but unlike many of the places we have visited, there is no pressure to buy. In fact, they seem to ignore us which is much preferable. I want to buy a woven wire bowl but Mike points out that it will probably rust within a very short time so I buy a wooden one instead.
We get back to the marina around 5 pm, exhausted even though we have sat in the car for most of the day. But what a day!
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