Kruger

19/6/08 21:47 berch-en-dal camp - Kruger
Another day, another camp site - Berg-en-dal, it's called. This one's rather nice, as usual. They also have four enormous awards on the reception desk for 'rest camp of the year'. I'm slightly confused as to the scope of this award, since I believe there are only a few rest camps in Kruger Park. Still, they are very shiny.

We left Jo'berg at 8am, on Kurt. We are now sixteen. In addition to The QFR, Heather, Christine, Erich and myself, there were two more Dutch blokes, a couple from Northern Ireland, and a couple from Cape Town. Driving out through the suburbs, Quintan proved to be a wealth of knowledge on local history. Despite the reported high crime levels, it appeared to be an affluent place. Jo'berg was built on the gold rush, and mine dumps still litter the place. You can definitely see the difference in standards between SA and Botswana. Having said that, there are one or two things that don't quite add up. We were in a service station shop when the power failed. Everyone carried on like normal, and within two minutes it came back on. Apparently, this is a regular occurrence in South Africa, yet Quintan had been telling us, just five minutes ago, that the Jo'berg area has pollution problems since there are huge coal reserves here and several coal-fired power stations. We actually dropped into a shopping mall at one point, and saw a huge sign on one shop which said something like, 'We have our own electricity. No power cuts, GUARANTEED!'. Quintan is tall and rangy, with a permanent grin revealing white, even teeth that hint at falsehood. He reminds me of what I imagine the BFG might have looked like in his middle years – and is, again, a man on whose shoulders 'avuncular' sits most comfortably.

Once we reached Kruger, we had an hour 'game driving' until we reached the camp. Those of us who've been on the Cape-to-Vic trip are totally blasé about seeing elephants, now, so I was making an effort to hide it for the sake of those new to the trip. We saw a few other animals, but not much that I hadn't seen before. Reaching the camp, seven of us had elected to do an evening game drive (aka, subsequently, as the 'Not another bloody Impala' tour). This was an optional extra cost, and we were loaded into an open truck similar to that which we used at Chobe. It was a full truck of twenty people, and I was slightly disturbed to see the three middle-aged Afrikaans women next to me putting on hats and gloves. Five minutes out of the gates, it started raining.

To be fair, the rain didn't last long, and we didn't get wet, but it was fairly cold when we were moving. Myself and three of the other passengers on the sides each had a spotlight, which we pointed at the bush, trying to pick out the reflections from the eyes of nocturnal animals. With all the criss-crossing search beams, we looked a bit like one of those robot thingies from the 'future' scenes from the Terminator movies. We saw a few animals we'd seen before, but the big news is we saw a leopard! In fact, we saw two – and they weren't fleeting glimpses, either. That's another of the 'big five' ticked off the list...

In Ella, we had a big list of all the animals on the door, to tick off as we saw them. In Ghanzi, we saw a cheetah, but it was in a fenced enclosure, for breeding. Lee suggested we should cross it off the list, but I and others argued we shouldn't. To my mind, the 'challenge' is seeing these creatures in their natural habitat. It's akin to hunting, in many ways. I 'bag' an elephant by taking a photo of it. Continuing the analogy, a great photo is equivalent to a 'clean kill'. I bagged a leopard at night tonight, and I'm very pleased with the photos I'll be taking home to show people – as opposed to the animal skin. Of course, we delighted in telling the others of our 'kill'. The defacto windup statement when part of the group comes back from an optional activity has become 'we saw a leopard', so it was fun to say this as we climbed off the truck and get the usual disbelieving chuckles, before revealing the photos.

Oh, the other thing you need to know about African Game is that, to sound like you know what you're talking about, you must never talk in plural. I don't know if it's an Afrikaans thing, or just a simple convention, but if you're going hunting or game viewing, you must always talk as though you're seeing single animals. Viz. 'You'll see leopard, lion, maybe some hippo...'. You can use a word to suggest plural, like 'some', but the animal itself is still singular (incidentally, it's also much more convincing in a thick white-African accent). eg 'we'll see some kudu, some giraffe...there may be warthog...'

Anyway, another early morning, but we're well used to that. It's funny how the remaining Cape-Vic campers have been turned by Bjorn into a crack camping team – that we all have the same routine. It's funny to see the 'new guys' struggling with tents, not being back at the truck on schedule. In time, zey vill learn.