Reset search
Satellite
Search this area

South Africa Diphuti

Discover travel destinations of travelers writing a travel journal on FindPenguins.
Travelers at this place
  • South Africa 2025
    1
    Day 25

    Hungry hungry hippos

    April 25 in South Africa ⋅ ⛅ 26 °C

    Today we took a family trip to see Jessica the ever-so-famous hippo.
    Last year she had a 2 weeks old newborn calf, and wasn't to be bothered, so we socialised with her grown up adopted child Seun instead.
    This time around, her calf being old enough to be left alone a little, she came around with Seun for the snacks.

    Those are free hippos. Both were orphans raised by the people who own this property, but they can come and go as they please, they just seem to believe that they are part of the family.

    They are somewhat less dangerous than wild hippos, but only because they choose to be...    Read more

  • South Africa 2025
    Day 18

    The wedding

    April 18 in South Africa ⋅ ☁️ 20 °C

    It felt strange not adding a footprint for the wedding that took us back to South Africa in the first place: Avron's cousin Angela and her husband Evgeny.
    We didn't take many pictures, because there was a photographer doing that much better than we do, so we'll probably make a footprint when these pictures are released.
    But the venue, an old tobacco shed in the middle of a grapefruit orchard, by the foot of the local mountain range, was too pretty not to show you.    Read more

  • TravelerSüdafrika 🇿🇦
    2
    1
    Day 3

    Blyde River Canyon

    October 13, 2024 in South Africa ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C

    Heute morgen um 7 Uhr gings weiter von Pretoria über die N4 zur nächsten Provinz Mpumalanga. Insgesamt waren wir 510 km unterwegs 😨😁Kurzer Stopp in Dullstrom und dann über die Landstraße, mit teilweise extremen Schlaglöchern (Potholes) Richtung Drakensberge (Panoramaroute) . Da wir im Bus immer Routieren, durfte ich heute als Beifahrer mitfahren. Es gab ein straffes Zeitprogramm und unser Guide Izaak ist streng 😉Da erlaubt sich keiner zu spät zu sein. Von der südafrikanisches Gelassenheit kann bei ihm auch nicht gerade die Rede sein, er heizte durchs Land als wenns kein Morgen gäbe und jeder der zu langsam vor uns fuhr wurde auf Africaans verflucht 😂🙈Aus diesem Grunde bin ich heilfroh, morgen wieder auf den billigen Plätzen mein Dasein zu fristen 😅Bin nun auch nicht die beste Beifahrerin 😵‍💫Es ist ein wirklich wunderschönes Land, mit so unterschiedlichen Landschaften, dass man gar nicht weiß wo man zuerst hinschauen soll. Über die Panoramaroute sind wir dann zum Blyde River Canyon gefahren. Übrigens hatten wir in der Spitze heute 38 Grad 😅 Was einem leider zuerst auffällt... Die Südafrikaner halten nicht sehr viel vom Umweltschutz... Das Land und die Wegesränder glitzern vor lauter Müll und Plastikflaschen, das einem ganz anders wird 🤨☹️Vom Blyde River Canyon sind wir dann weiter Richtung Lowveld mit Stopp bei den Three Rondavels, mit einer mega Aussicht. Über den Abel Erasmus Pass fuhren wir dann zur nächsten Lodge : Blyde Mountain Country House 🤩Eine sehr schöne Unterkunft, inklusive 5 oder 6 kleinen Hündchen... Da geht mir ja das Herz auf 😍Morgen früh um 8 Uhr (Ausschlafen ist angesagt 😁) fahren wir dann zu unserer ersten Etappe in den Krugers NP.... Ick freu mir 🤩🤩🤩Read more

    See translation
  • Südafrika 14.02.-07.03.2024
    1
    1111111211
    Day 5–7

    Krüger Nationalpark

    February 18, 2024 in South Africa ⋅ 🌙 25 °C

    Nach dem auschecken sind wir zum Hoedsproet Endagered Species Center gefahren und haben die erste kleine Safari gemacht. Cheetah‘s, Geier, Wildhunde und Nashörner waren die ersten Begleiter. Weiter ging’s dann in den Krüger Nationalpark zur Karonge River Lodge. Erstmal sehr beeindruckend was hier mitten in der Wildness steht. Kurz auf‘s Zimmer, noch ein kleiner Snack und auf zur ersten Safari. Was soll ich sagen ? Absolut beeindruckend diese schönen Tiere in freier Wildbahn zu sehen . Besonders fasziniert hat mich ein gigantischer Elefant. Gegen 19:30 Uhr waren wir dann zurück und den Abend mit all den tollen Erlebnissen haben wir dann beim Dinner ausklingen lassen.Read more

    See translation
  • Südafrika 🇿🇦
    Day 2

    Ankunft in der Makutsi Lodge

    March 3 in South Africa ⋅ ☀️ 30 °C

    Erste Eindrücke vom Gelände
    Ursprünglich hatten wir ein einfaches Rondavel mit einem Doppelbett gebucht, nun aber eine Villa mit 2 Doppelzimmern, 2 Badezimmer & einer grossen Terrasse erhalten 🙆🏼‍♀️🥰

    See translation
  • TravelerJoburg to Nairobi
    Day 8–12

    Final Johannesburg days

    August 12, 2024 in South Africa ⋅ 🌙 15 °C

    The trek back to Johannesburg stayed largely on the main route, saving some time. The 120km/hr speed limit was more like an advisory, with 40% of the traffic easily above that. Fortunately the motorway was in reasonable shape. The haze from the coal burning was pretty evident, with few clear spots across the route over the Drakensberg ranges. Originally a riding target, but passed up as a very challenging start, and a long way off course. Such as it was.
    Back to Ronel's slightly familiar bnb, where I reassembled the Pugsley, disgorged the gear trove and braved the Johannesburg streets and byways to shake down the reassembly. A couple of steep grassy climbs reminded me it was 1500 masl, 30x my usual NZ riding altitude.
    A repeat the following day wasn't much better but covered a wider area 4 good bike shops including 1 where I was treated to decent coffee, and contained a pretty desirable Hope Pro4 single speed hub. I'd been looking for one for a couple of years. The irony. Not this time it seems.
    These few days included a trip to Braamfontein. The base for Wits University and it's highly regarded museum, which unfortunately was undergoing renovation, so not much on offer. The nearby Origin Centre was a great primer fit the next days destination. The Cradle of humankind, probably the most important paleoanthropological site in the world, tracing millions of years of evolution.    Read more

  • Misadventures Of WandaGhost and the Gnu
    Day 11

    The Kruger to Jessica Hippo

    February 1 in South Africa ⋅ ⛅ 31 °C

    Even though we could have had a lie in we were up at 5:30am. I’ve had a cold for days now and now it’s in my chest. I had hardly slept since we got here and an overnight temperature of 30°c didn’t help.
    We had a 2.5 hr journey to our next location but we weren’t booked in until 1:45pm so we had hours to kill. At 7:30am we slowly started taking the tent down but by 8:30am we were ready to leave so we popped to the cattle barón take away and got a coffee each and drank it watching over the watering hole. Then we payed our last visit to the shop getting some more food supplies and water and I even managed to get some Vicks for my chest and some cough medicine. And we finally left at 10:30am.
    We were driving the Satara to Orpen road again and we just trundled along at 30kph in third gear the whole of the 48km treating it as a game drive. Obviously we got held up in an African roadblock. Of Wilderbeast with their babies on the way.
    Once we got to Orpen camp we followed the exit signs a road we had never taken before and a few hundred meters later we checked out of the Kruger.
    We got to our next destination with 45 minutes to kill and it was already 40°c outside and after waiting at the side of a dirt road some brits pulled up next to us and said they were here for the same thing to.
    Just before 1:45pm we crossed over a low lying bridge that had waterfalls all around it and then we pulled up to the gate just as it opened.
    We were here to see Jessica the Hippo. She is a real wild hippo who had been found washed up in the floods with her umbilical cord still attached in the garden of an ex game warden called Tony 25 years ago and she has been there ever since. He hasn’t trained her. She is free to come and go whenever she pleases and she even has access to his house. He bottle fed her from a baby and she has broken 5 beds but never harmed him or any guests. She is world famous because she can go but always chooses to come back, and last year she had a baby called Loki.
    After a brief chat and watching an old news story about Tony, his wife who has since passed away, and Jessica we were introduced to Jessica and Loki.
    The remarkable thing is that Jessica was nowhere to be seen when we arrived and Tony called her in Afrikaans and she chuckled back and came trundling down the river with Loki. Then we fed her sweet potatoes while rubbing her nose and then bottle fed her sweet tea.
    Hippos kill more people in Africa than any other animal so the relationship between Tony and Jessica is amazing and the fact she lets us anywhere near her baby is incredible.    Read more

  • Südafrika
    Day 3

    Blyde River Dam

    October 24, 2024 in South Africa ⋅ ☁️ 23 °C

    Heute ging unsere Tagestour zusammen mit unserem Guide „Kingsley“ zum Blyde River Dam, dort sind wir auf dem Hippo Trail gewandert , haben einen Wasserfall besucht und im Anschluss konnten wir die traumhafte Landschaft bei einer Bootstour auf uns wirken lassen. Einfach wunderschön. Es blieb noch Zeit für die Besichtigung einer Schlangenfarm und einer Mangoplantage.Read more

    See translation
  • South Africa 2024
    Day 18

    Hippos !

    February 29, 2024 in South Africa ⋅ 🌙 22 °C

    If you don't know who Jessica the hippo is: Google her. With 150 documentaries made about her, she's an international star.

    Basically, a day old hippo was saved and hand reared 24 years ago by a local game keeper, and although she was successfully reintroduced into the wild, she chose to come back every day for snacks, snuggles, and a comfortable bed.
    She loves people and has been very popular for years.

    As it happens, she had her second calf ever this week, and she was encouraged not to play with guests and focus on her baby.

    So we got to play with Xian, 12yo, the second adopted hippo who follows in her steps. He is is not has much of a people lover than she is, but loves his snacks, so he swims to the pontoon when visitors arrive.

    Again, they are not in captivity, they come and go as they please. It's all on their terms. Which is quite unique for a hippo, especially seeing as they are the African animal species responsible for the greatest number of human deaths.

    To interact with them in such a surreal experience...    Read more

  • Südafrika
    Day 3

    Bush Walk

    October 18, 2023 in South Africa ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C

    Heute ging es um 6:00 Uhr los für einen morgendlichen Spaziergang durch den Busch. Unser Guide Luke folgte mit uns den Spuren der Nilpferde bis zum Olifant River, wo wir dann auf eine Gruppe der mächtigen Tiere trafen. Sie sind für die meisten -durch Tiere verursachten- Tode im Krüger Nationalpark verantwortlich. Auf dem weg gab es auch sonst noch so einiges zu sehen: Kudos, Krokodile ein kurzer Blick auf einen Leoparden und natürlich wieder viele Impalas.Read more

    See translation

Join us:

FindPenguins for iOSFindPenguins for Android

  • 2025© FindPenguins
  • Home
  • About us
  • Group Tracking
  • Press
  • Terms
  • Privacy Policy & Cookies
  • Help Center
  • Legal notice