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Monday, December 4, 2017

Kruger National Park (South Africa) - Dunlop Volleys

KRUGER NATIONAL PARK (South Africa)
02 DECEMBER – 05 DECEMBER 2017

This is an entry written specifically for our fantastic guide in Kruger NP,  Robbie Williams. It relates to an incredible encounter that we experienced on the third day of our safari, 04 December 2017.

But first, here's a bit more about Robbie in his own words;

'I'm currently doing an autobiography on my life in Kruger and outside of Kruger. The intended name of the book is Never Know Enough. The book is intended to be about being in and out of the straight path and then back into the straight path, and especially, how nature has saved me, got me through certain difficulties.

I've been working in the park for the last 24 years. I'm a Reaction Unit Officer for the Anti-Poaching Unit and I have my own Anti-Poaching company, as well as my own Safari Company which is called Robbie Williams Safari's.'

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Ever since I was a child I had known it was my mothers’ eternal dream to go on safari in Africa. It would often come up in our family conversations when discussing our top of our list destinations. However dreams can have the propensity of remaining just that, aimless thoughts that lie sedately in your mind, uncomplicated and uncommitted to ever finding a way to realisation. It had seemed, in my mind at least, knowing the financial situation of our family growing up, that my mothers’ dream would always be just that, a fantastic dream without the means to be realised.

We were a lower middle income migrant family that lived in the suburbs of Sydney, Australia. Not that we ever struggled in life, my father worked tirelessly as a Storeman for our national carrier, Qantas, for nearly 30 years. But making plans for what would have felt like an adventure for the rich and famous was somewhat beyond our financial means , and also contrary to our completely mundane, biennial visits to Belgrade, Serbia, where our relatives lived. Admittedly we were fortunate to have that opportunity but it was made possible only via substantially discounted airfares, (which we could afford), through Qantas, due to my fathers’ tenure with the company.

In recent years our family circumstances changed. My father passed away five years ago and I, now older and earning a reasonable salary, was now in the fortunate  position to be able to make my mothers’ dream come true, which is something that I had personally always wanted to do for her.

Thus this brings me to a story that took place in Kruger National Park, on a Nhongo Safaris tour,  guided  by the wonderful Robbie Williams, who I now consider to be a life-long friend.
For me personally I had always thought that in going on safari you needed to have a particular kind of passion or yearning for a specific style of experience. As I said, this was a dream that my mother always had, it was never mine. Truth be told, at the start of this adventure I anticipated that the only real amount of excitement that I would have would be the joy and happiness I received from knowing that my mother would be fulfilling her eternal dream. But hey, life is never short of surprises and you know the quote that goes, ‘Africa changes you forever…once you have been there, you will never be the same’. Let me tell you, not a truer word has been spoken. Africa, in particular Kruger NP, had a wonderful impact on me.

This story however is not about my own minor epiphany but rather about an encounter our safari group had with a somewhat curious and cheeky leopard that earned the nickname ‘Dunlop’.

Sighting location: 112rd, Southern Kruger
Date: 04 December 2017
Time: 09:30

During our second morning in Kruger our guide Robbie had wanted to follow up on the sighting of a pride of lions. I don’t recall exactly where it was but somewhere during the drive to the last known location of the pride, Robbie received a call of a dual leopard sighting on a road nearby that was occurring at that moment and thus made the decision to go and investigate.

It was probably a 5-10 min drive later that we sighted two safari vehicles stopped on the road, and right in front of them were two amazing looking leopards, with beautifully dark rosettes, light to dark golden coloured fur, a shortish ringed tail and beautiful white bellies. These cats were simply majestic.

Robbie stopped about 15-20 mtrs away from the other vehicles and it took about 10 seconds for us really to really comprehend what was going on. On closer viewing it appeared that one of the leopards had taken an interest to the tyre and mudguard of the front right wheel of one of the safari vehicles in front of us, and there we sat in our vehicle just watching as this cat pawed away and then licked both the tyre and mudguard for what seemed like an extraordinarily long period of time.


Investigating the vehicle in front of us - Kruger National Park - South Africa


A question from a guest in our own vehicle to Robbie was, ‘Is this a common thing for them to do?’, to which is responded, and I’m paraphrasing, ‘No, this is highly, highly unusual’.

For me personally I didn’t care whether it was unusual or not, the sighting was absolutely mind boggling and magical. It felt like there was a big playful cat just roaming around the streets of downtown Kruger NP looking to be mischievous and alleviate a bit of boredom from being out in the wild all day, taking a break from having to utilise its natural instincts to survive. This schism, the clear break that we tourists have from the reality of being in the natural habitat of wild animals is really a danger as our awareness of what is real becomes blinded by a false sense of security.

Now, I’m not sure what the trigger for Dunlop was but after a few minutes he got up and started to move, tracking directly toward our vehicle.


When I saw it coming for us, yup, that's when I started holding my breath

Kruger National Park - South Africa


Approaching slowly, almost languidly, the mood in our vehicle started to change gears. Cameras ready, phones pointed and held high, poised to capture fantastic shots, the leopard made its way to the front left tyre of our car. Rubbing itself against the tyre at first and then climbing under the vehicle, again it started pawing and licking, and then biting first the wheel and then mud guard. Sprawled out on the dirt road, laying on its back and looking upwards, it was, I’m sure, an exhilarating site for all those other groups that had now surrounded us.

In many ways this was the unforgettable dream sighting that we all wanted. The perspective however, which I feel in a situation like this gets kind of lost, is that this is not a Safari Disneyland. These animals are wild, we’re inhabiting their environment and believing in the predictability of their actions is both as ignorant as it is possibly stupid.

Robbie, constantly calling for updates for the positioning of the leopard from both within the vehicle and by radio to those that were surrounding us then said something that snapped my brain into a state of hyper vigilance…’Guys, keep your hands inside the vehicle, be as still as you can’.


...and thus earning the name, 'Dunlop'

Mechanics come in all shapes and sizes in Kruger NP

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa


Kruger National Park - South Africa


After what felt like an eternity Dunlop got up and slowly started walking down my side (the left hand side of the vehicle), I was seated on the highest bench on the back left hand side. All of a sudden I felt an overwhelming rush of anxiety and fear. This situation and this action pushed me into a sense of panic. But, to completely understand my blinding burst of fear I need to recount a situation, or rather an encounter some 7 years earlier to which I immediately regressed.

Years ago I had been travelling through South America and during my time dedicated some 4 weeks  to  undertaking volunteer work at a Wildlife Sanctuary in Bolivia.

Parque Ambue Ari was, and still is, a park that cares for many different types of animals, inclusive of such beautiful animals as jaguars, panthers and pumas. The work of the dedicated staff and myriads of volunteers that move through the camp involve, for a large part, taking these domesticated cats  (I say that facetiously), out for walks in the jungle environment of the Bolivian Amazon. Volunteers literally tie a rope onto the collar of a selected cat, wrap a harness around themselves and click themselves in via a carabiner. These volunteers, of which I was one, were tethered by a 3mtr length of rope to a power, unpredictable animal. That is all the protection that we were afforded.

If you want to read about the encounter then you can find it here: Parque Ambue Ari - The 3:10 express to Yuma

Now, youthful exuberance aside, there is something fatally flawed in believing in the total safety that we implicitly placed in that process. I discovered quite quickly that the false faith that I trusted to my 10min training and induction was crudely misplaced when on the second walk that I did, with a fully grown female puma, she turned on me, pinned her ears back, snarling and with animalistic fervour grabbed my leg with both its paws, claws cutting through my trousers, and then wrapped its jaw around my right knee. Let me tell you, there is nothing quite like the dismay, complete fear and overwhelming disbelief of being attacked by what is effectively a wild animal.  In an attack that lasted a matter of seconds the hundreds of thoughts that populated my mind all ended the same way, this attack could potentially kill me, this shit is real!

For whatever reason the attack was only short and the puma backed off, but the fear that accompanied that attack has always lived with me. This moment was now just about to be revisited.

Back in Kruger, sitting in an open vehicle, exposed on the back seat, I was frozen stiff. There was a leopard not 30cms from my feet, hovering with all the wild ferocity and unpredictability that a cat of that nature should have. Anything could have triggered an adverse reaction, if it has been spooked or simply curious and had jumped into the vehicle, what then? What would be our reaction? What sort of panic and what some of carnage could have ensued in that sort of scenario?

I simply held my breath and willed it to walk away, anywhere else at the moment was good enough.

‘Dunlop’ passed around the back of our vehicle and walked around to the front right hand side near the driver's door.

Robbie had armed himself with a baton of some sort, I’m not sure exactly what it was, but he and I both knew that in a real attack, what it could be used for could be counted on zero fingers. At best it could have been a momentary stall.


See the people hanging out of the vehicle...that's called tempting fate

When the leopard jumps up for your throat, maybe you'll reconsider your need for the epic Instagram photo

Kruger National Park - South Africa


For other passengers in our car I know that this experience was not fear driven but sheer excitement, I’m sure had they have placed their minds into the possible consequences then their thoughts may have been  different. Better for them I guess. Ignorance truly can be bliss.

Perhaps a minute later ‘Dunlop’ made his way off, tracking back passed us and along the dirt road we had driven in.


Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa




I literally breathed a sigh of relief.  A crazy, crazy encounter that in many ways we were both fortunate to experience and fortunate to get out of with just our photos and nothing else added.

What an experience! What a head spin!

To use a catch phrase from Robbie, TAB, That's Africa Baby!

Saturday, December 2, 2017

Kruger National Park (South Africa) - Your dream



Kruger National Park (South Africa)
02 December - 05 December 2017

The intro that I’m using below also doubles as the intro for the second of my Kruger Park entries. The reason for this is because it was scheduled to act as the opening entry for Kruger but I added it into a piece that I wrote for my friend & Kruger park guide extraordinaire guide, Robbie Williams. He requested a write up for a book that he’s writing, so the intro also became part of that story.

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Ever since I was a child I had known it was my mothers’ eternal dream to go on safari in Africa. It would often come up in our family conversations when discussing our top of our list destinations. However dreams can have the propensity of remaining just that, aimless thoughts that lie sedately in your mind, uncomplicated and uncommitted to ever finding a way to realisation. It had seemed, in my mind at least, knowing the financial situation of our family growing up, that my mothers’ dream would always be just that, a fantastic dream without the means to be realised.

We were a lower middle income migrant family that lived in the suburbs of Sydney, Australia. Not that we ever struggled in life, my father worked tirelessly as a storeman for our national carrier, Qantas for nearly 30 years. But making plans for what felt like an adventure for the rich and famous was somewhat contrary to our standard , and somewhat mundane, biennial visits to Belgrade, Serbia where our relatives lived. I,(we), were fortunate enough however to have substantially discounted airfares, (which we could afford), through Qantas, due to my fathers’ tenure with the company.

In recent years our family circumstances changed. My father passed away five years ago and I, now older and earning a reasonable salary, was now in the fortunate  position to be able to make my mothers’ dream come true, which is something that I had personally always wanted to do for her.


On our way to Kruger National Park - South Africa

On our way to Kruger National Park - South Africa

On our way to Kruger National Park - South Africa

Numbi Gate - Kruger National Park - South Africa


It’s a funny thing but something feels right with the world when you can help someone else achieve their dream. Much in the same manner, before my father passed away, literally two (2) months prior, I was able to send my parents on a holiday where dad got to visit some of the places that he’d talked relentlessly about seeing during his life. And these weren’t major touristic spots, they were small towns in fact, places where he had stayed during WWII with his family after they had left their destroyed home in Belgrade and moved, and shifted, with the tidal swings of the war. Thankfully he was able to do this, it was just in time, and it goes to show that sometimes you can leave things too late if you're always planning for the future, waiting for that optimal time..


Mum made it!
Numbi Gate - Kruger National Park - South Africa

Nhongo Safaris!
Numbi Gate - Kruger National Park - South Africa

So for my mum at least I hope this experience will survive a long, long time in her memory.

As I said early, the idea of a safari was never a romanticised type of dream or adventure that was burning inside of me. The excitement that you would expect to have when commencing something like this just wasn’t there, and for Inga it seemed, the feeling was mutual.

Arriving  at the Numbi Gate entrance to Kruger National Park we changed vehicles, got into our safari equipped ride and was introduced to what we would discover to be our fantastic guide, Robbie Williams.

Now first, from an historical perspective, Kruger is known as being South Africa’s first national park, is iconically South African, and has been part of the national psyche for as long as anyone can dare to remember. The romanticised idea, obviously conjures up images of glorious sunsets, campfire tales, dirt roads, braais, khaki shorts, big game and close call wild life experience.

Our first stop was at the Pretoriuskop Camp, situated in the South Western corner of the park, it is one the oldest and spaciously laid out, with a mix of lodging, comfortable bungalows, some small shops and eateries. This was going to be base for the next two nights, whilst for the third we would be based at another camp within the park.

After a morning driving from Johannesburg we were allowed some time to settle in, have some lunch and then get prepared for game drive later in the afternoon.


Kruger National Park - South Africa
Robbie Williams in the drivers seat

Robbie Williams and David Crouch

Kruger National Park - South Africa

The goals for most people coming to the park tend to be the same – a desire to see the Big 5 game animals – Lion, Leopard, Rhinoceros, Elephant and Cape Buffalo. The actual term , the Big 5, was coined by big-game hunters, and really refers to the most difficult animals to hunt on foot. I know that for both my Mum and Inga, seeing any animal in the wild was going to be a thrill. For me personally, I really wanted to see a giraffe, that desire coming directly from a project that I did when I was 10 or 11 years old whilst still in primary school. The second goal or desire for me was just to experience the African bush.

Heading out of Pretoriuskop Camp around 2:00 in the afternoon, the sun was high and the day was warm but not excruciatingly hot, for us it felt like the perfect day to get out and explore.

It must have been only a few minutes from the gate of the camp ground when we encountered our first animals, several Kudu right near the road. All the tourists in the car where immediately amazed and an audible ‘awww’ was heard as pulled up by the side of the road. I say tourists, but let me say that in the car it was just Mum, myself, Inga and Robbies’ friend David Crouch. So the amazed tourists were really just my family, marvelling at some Kudu, which I know now, to people that do this every day, it just like ordering a Big Mac from McDonalds and being astounded at the culinary delights that is a McDonalds hambuger.


The Big Mac of Kruger
Kudu in the wild!
Not so unique we found out!

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa


Still, the thing that actually was very cool was the silence and simplicity of the bush. The obvious raw nature of the wild, the sounds made only by an animal moving as is rustled in stride, that’s something that really stuck with me. Living in major cities, as I’ve done all my life, you get use to background noise, there’s always something going on that you don’t really tune into but you know that’s there. If you were to focus and deliberately isolate those sounds there would be a raft of identifiable sounds that make up the soundtrack of your daily existence. Out here in the bush its far more simple, for earthly, more real somehow. The wind through the trees, the movement of animals nearby, the call of a bird off in the distance. It was that purity and the simplicity within that purity that I found such delight it. I didn’t even know it at the time but reflecting on the experience, many months removed now, it stands out as a true highlight.

Of course as we moved on and started to get use to the encounters, coming across such animals as Kudu, Rhebok, Steenbok, Waterbucks, Impala, etc., became common place and somewhat predictable in their frequency.

In one of our first major sightings we actually went to a water hole to ‘just see what’s going on’,  to paraphrase Robbie, and were luckily rewarded for the choice be encountering a herd of elephants frolicking and attempting to cool themselves off.


Elephants cooling off in the African sun

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Who said African elephants can't dunk?
Kruger National Park - South Africa


For some reason I personally did realise until that point just how amazed I would be to see these animals in the wild. I mean there they were, animals in their habitat, uninhibited, unscripted, undirected, just acting as they would any day of the week. They were in the water hole just cooling off, as you do. One of the elephants, we were told one of the younger ones, actually got up and walked by a row of vehicles parked  near the water hole and crossed to the other side. Then there, on several occasions it decided to just dunk itself in the water, get up, and then do it a few more times. It was just a great thing to see. These majestic animals doing typical things in their world.

As the afternoon continued we managed to come across some zebra, hyenas, baboons and finally for me, even the elegant, but at same time ungainly giraffe. Standing so still, at a wonderful height, their movements are so smooth, graceful and beautiful. Taking deliberate strides and it traversed the shrubbery, their long legs propelling them a distance that visually looked to be quite a distance.


Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa


Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa


Cutting through the bush
This place was just a treat to experience

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa

Sunset in Kruger National Park - South Africa


Another thing that you pick up on very quickly is that even for a giraffe, at that height, once it moves away from the main road and into the bush, you can’t freakin see them. I’m sure professionals like our guide Robbie could pick them but for me I found the way that they blended into the background to be both fascinating and disconcerting. I know both Inga and I thought, if given the opportunity,  would we step out of the vehicle and take a quick toilet break behind a bush somewhere – the resounding answer to that of course being a HELL NO!!!!  I would imagine that by just wondering off, even a few metres from the road you would be putting yourself into a position of becoming the prey quick smart. You’d have no time to react, to be able to defend yourself or escape. These animals live in this environment and live on their abilities to hunt, find food and do it with stealth, on a day to day basis. An unlearned human would be toast out there!


Sunset in Kruger National Park - South Africa

Hyenas at dusk

Hyenas at dusk - Kruger National Park - South Africa

Kruger National Park - South Africa

The beautiful colours of a Kruger NP sunset

Kruger National Park - South Africa


As the afternoon drew closer to the end and the sun started to colour the African sky with its own inspired artistry we headed back to our camp. It’s was amazing, for me at least, to recognise how that short drive changed my perception of this part of the world so dramatically. Earlier that day I entered the park without much interest, with no excitement and by the end of the day I had been completely won over by all of it. It’s beauty, it’s greatness, it’s simplicity and it’s silence. There’s a hundred reasons as to why this part of the world is so special and so endearing, I think in the short few hours of that day I got to realising a few of them.