Cape Town to Hluhluwe

It was another early morning today as we had to be up at 5:00 am to get to the airport to fly to Durban. The check in process went smoothly and after we went through security the first thing we saw was Iron Maiden's 747 "Book of Souls Tour" plane parked on the tarmac. Apparently they are playing two dates in Cape Town over the next week.

I must add that security when flying domestic in South Africa is very different than what we are used to. There is no liquid limits nor do you have to take your shoes off. The no liquid limit was great as I was able to bring two bottles of wine with me in my carry on bag!

The flight was a short two hours, which was much nicer than the two ten hour flights to get here! Once we arrived in Durban we boarded the coach and headed for the Hluhluwe Imfolozi area. We drove directly to the St . Lucia estuary where we boarded a flat bottomed boat for a river game cruise. This was our first chance at animal viewing since we landed in South Africa.

It was about 3:00 pm when we boarded the river boat and we travelled up river in search of hippos and crocodiles. We did not have to go far before we spotted our first hippo. Hippos are nocturnal animals and as it was late afternoon they were just starting to get a bit active. We were able to view several dozen hippos along the river including two young males posturing for attention and several baby hippos playing near the shoreline. We were also able to hear several of the hippos making their distinctive laughing sounds, which always brings a smile to my face. We only saw two crocodiles and even then neither were very clearly visible.

There are many fires burning in the area as the farmers are burning the remnants after clear cutting areas of eucalyptus trees. They burn the remaining stumps before planting new trees to clear the soil of possible diseases and to ready it for the next planting. Eucalyptus is used for building beams and making paper and their other forestry species is pine which is used for furniture building. This area has thousands of acres of forestry and is very scenic. An offshoot of the burning is that there is a lot of smoke in the sky's which gave way to some stunning backdrops over the river and a spectacular sunset where the sun was burning red.

We finished the river safari and made our way to the hotel for the evening in the Imfolozi valley. The hotel was pretty much in the middle of nowhere so we had dinner in the dining room and then retired early as we have another early start tomorrow.Read more