Addo Elephant National Park

Addo Elephant National Park is the only park in the world which is home to the Big 7. Southern Whale, Great White Shark are included in the big 7 along with the Rhino, Elephant, Lion, Buffalo and Leopard. When Addo Elephant National Park was established in 1931 and initially contained 11 elephants. This number was dwindling at the time due to poaching. Now as a result of ongoing conservation projects there are 600 elephants in park.

We arrived in the park and straight away we saw over 200 elephants scattered on the horizon. It was unbelievable being able to see so many elephants all at once.. We travelled in our truck in search for more animals. Our guide Cardi and driver Shorty were extremely excited to see a black rhino because there are only 36 rhinos in the park so they are difficult to find. There was a few water holes where we spotted more elephants with zebra and warthogs.

The following morning we drove to Gqeberha (Port Elizabeth) and said goodbye to four girls from our group but also welcomed four more people to the group. We spent about an hour walking the beach in Gqeberha before returning to Addo Elephant National Park to explore it for a second day. We drove around the second half of the park and saw more elephants and buffalo.

That evening I happened to be talking to Liz about my job working in eye surgery. Liz is originally South African but she emigrated to Australia over 30 years ago. She was home in South Africa for her mother's 92nd birthday and she decided to join the Nomad tour before the birthday celebrations. She asked me what clinic I work in and when I said the Wellington Eye Clinic she laughed. She went to school with Arthur Cummings and he was her head boy. She was still in contact with him on Facebook so we sent him a photo of us. It really is a small world.Read more