Our Kruger experience started on a charter bus- surprise!- that we took to the airport dark and early on Monday morning. Check-in went astoundingly smooth for the sixty or seventy collegians and alum. We stopped and grabbed a quick breakfast, yummy toast and eggs and tomato, the entirety of which I proceeded to spill into my lap. We boarded our appropriately colored Mango Airlines plane and landed in Johannesburg a mere two hours later. Then we took a charter bus- surprise!- to Kruger, which was about five hours away.
The lodges at Nkambeni were pleasantly tented and rather open to the wilderness of Kruger. They were very clean and nice, but I couldn’t actually sleep all week for fear of a spider in my sheets or lizard in my pillow. A cool experience overall, though! The food was also awesome- I don’t think anyone had any complaints, as long as you didn’t make the mistake of asking for a grilled cheese. Global LEAD's first safari experience was on Tuesday. Our wake-up call was a loud knock and “hello” at the tent door. Everyone was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, no doubt expecting to be stupendously mauled by one of the thousands of anticipated lions first thing that morning! It didn’t quite work that way, though. We crowded comfortably into a fleet of thirteen-passenger Land Rovers, making our way quietly toward the African bush.
My group immediately spotted a rhino in the distance, and a myriad of other fascinating creatures were unveiled throughout the day including: wildebeests, giraffe, crocodiles, impala, elephants, warthogs, meer cats, impala, buffalo, hippos, birds of all sorts, impala, kudu, rock jumpers, zebra, mongooses, and even the rare but beautiful impala. A few groups of lucky dungheads even spotted a Leopard! By the end of the first day, we were all well on our way to seeing the Big Five.
On Wednesday we took mini buses to Chimp Eden, a fascinating reserve sponsored by the Jane Goodall Institute. A woman named Sophie showed us around, feeding the chimpanzees and telling us some very disheartening stories about how our furry friends had been saved from the cruel hands of circus and pet-owners over the years. We learned that chimps should never be kept as pets, as they are naturally very aggressive and five times stronger than the average human male. A full-blown male chimp fight, for example, involves removed testicles, faces, and limbs. Yikes!
Our nighttime safari drive was Wednesday night! Again excited at the prospect of seeing a lion or leopard hunting prey in the cool, misty twilight, we bundled up and crept along the evening route. My group waited patiently in one spot until we finally saw a Serval, which is an extremely rare, nocturnal, cheetah-like feline. Wikipedia declares that the serval is “reputed to be the most effective hunter of all mammals in the animal kingdom.” Even our guide Jaques was quite excited that we saw it!
By Thursday, I was starting to doubt the very existence of lions, let alone the prospect of us actually seeing one in person. But as we spotted a few more animals throughout the morning and the sun appeared for the first time since 1972, our spirits lifted and lion sighting rumors spread before lunch! Joanna stood over our guide as he scarfed down a sandwich and we were off again, desperate to find the lion before the rain let loose! We finally found two gorgeous lionesses lounging in a humid, grassy opening. They were sound asleep and barely glanced up as our vehicle parked next to them; lions clearly have nothing to fear! We filmed and photographed, thrilled to have finally concluded our lion hunt and big-five sightings. We even saw a male lion in the distance less than an hour later on our way back to camp.
The safari taught us a lot about animals, extinction, and the circle of life, but our biggest lesson manifested in learning quiet patience between animal sightings. I think we learned a lot about each other during those intervals, anticipating the next animal and entertaining ourselves with games like “Jelly Tots.” I’ll always remember how exhilarating it was to look for and observe these beautiful animals, and I hope that preservation efforts of their natural habitat continue to succeed. WE SAW LIONS!!!! So cool. ☺
Carter Coyle and Joanna Harbin
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