April 8th, 2024

We woke up to more bad weather and we were supposed to dock at 7am and it was almost 8 and we seemed to be floating around outside the port. It was windy and rainy and I was pretty convinced that they were going to cancel this port also. We saw the pilot boat arrive and we slowly made our way in and while it was still raining the wind had died down some. I had to laugh at one of the guys on the dock who was catching and securing our ropes because he was waving and yelling “Welcome, we are so happy to have you here”. He was like a one man greeting committee.

Port Elizabeth recently changed their name to Gqeberha which is very hard to say because there is an actual click in the pronunciation. Apparently they use these clicks in all their pronunciations and it is not easy to do. Our guide tried to explain the clicks to us but it made no sense to me.

Everyone on the ship had to collect their passport and go through face to face immigration but it went rather smoothly and since our tour was the longest we were the first tour off the boat.

We had about a 2 hour bus ride to the private game preserve called Kariega. This game reserve has overnight accommodations and has 2 rivers on it and has all the big 5 animals. We passed lots of countryside on the ride and it surprises me to say that we could have been in any US town. They had lots of big stores and shopping areas and we also saw neighborhoods with nice houses. We did pass by their version of government housing and it was what you would expect. Small 1 bedroom boxes that the government gives you for free. Our guide explained that 8 to 10 people could live in these 1 bedroom houses. We were also surprised by how clean everything was. We did not see garbage everywhere as we have in other countries.

On arrival to the preserve we were loaded into 4 x 4 vehicles that hold 10 passengers and the driver. It is an open top jeep with 3 rows of elevated seats. Luckily the day was mostly overcast which was good for us out in the open but also good because animals are most active when not so hot. We did have some rain but it was not for long and we had rain jackets on.

The 4 x 4 vehicles used for the game drives.

What it looked like from my seat in the 4×4

We had about a 3 to 3.5 hour game drive and it since we were late it did not start until about 11. Our driver was Amber and she was a little bit of a comedian. She explained to us that the male zebras had black stripes on white and the females had white stripes on black. Several people in the vehicle had to think about that one. Zebras were the first animals we encountered.

Always in Africa you get the butt shots

A small herd

A newborn that is about a day old.

The trail we rode on was very muddy due to the recent rain and quite bumpy.

Kudo which is in the deer family Antelope

A baby hiding in the grass Cape Starling bird

Wart hog, no where near as cute from the one in the Lion King

Cape Buffaloes

Baby Cape Buffalo (looks like a cow calf except for the horns

We never saw more than 2 or 3 vehicles at a time. There was no crowding around the animals.

Wildebeest also known as the Gnu

These 2 male lions were sleeping out in the sun/rain. Our guide told us they are 7 year old brothers. They sleep 16 hours a day.

Slept right through our visit

The lions had a great view of the park.

The park is quite large and we would ride around to different areas. We saw lots of herd animals like Wildebeest and different kinds of antelope such as Blesbok and Waterboks.

Antelopes Waterbucks

Another in the antelope family, the Blesbok named because of the white blaze

It was cool when we spotted the giraffes over the trees

2 adult giraffes

Close up please

One of the safaris vehicles viewing the giraffes

The variety of animals we saw was amazing.

Ostrich with antelope in the background

Our guide explained the hierarchy to us and what animals were scared of what and who would graze together.

They have a large herd of white rhinos which are protected by Rhino protection force since they are endangered. They have them all tagged so they can keep track of them but the only people that can see where they are on the Rhino protection people. They have also cut off their horns to protect them from poachers who would kill them just for the horn.

Baby rhino

One of my favorite pictures of the day

After the rhinos we asked if there were any Hippopotamus and off we went to the river. On our last safari years ago we saw all the animals except a Hippo.

Hard to see how big they are

Sort of like alligators with just their eyes and noses sticking out.

This was the only time it got a little congested with everyone heading down to the river to see the Hippos. We were shocked when one jeep told everyone they could get out to get photos which is usually not allowed on safaris.

The only animal we did not see was an elephant. Lots of other people who went to other parks saw them but we did not but we saw tons of elephants last time so we were okay with not seeing them.

After about 3 hours they took us to the main lodge high up on a ridge and we had a wonderful buffet lunch. They had a dish that you put over rice that I thought was beef stroganoff but turns out it was Kudo stroganoff.

The view from the lodge. All of the below is part of the private reserve.

All in all it was a great day and very surprised at how much we saw and helped to lessen the blow of not going on the overland safaris. We do have 1 more safari planned in Dakar, Senegal.

Sunset over Port Elizabeth

Sailing away from Port Elizabeth

We have a day at sea on Tuesday and then Cape Town on Wednesday. It has been very windy and rainy in Cape Town but the weather is improving and should be sunshine for our visit. Also it has been getting cooler. The high for Cape Town is 69 and low of 57 and windy which we are told it is always windy. We are excited for another port we have never been to.