DIY Safari in Kruger

We actually woke up this morning after the sun rose - it was a little odd after two mornings of pre-dawn rising! After a long stop at the massive Skukuza shop, with all of us helping the GDP of South Africa once again, we started out on our "game drive" for the day. Though our BMW is much better than the crappy Toyota we had in Cape Town, it's not the most ideal vehicle for game viewing because it is so low to the ground. We missed our ginormous Land Rover, and Godfrey and Petros pointing out all the animals to us throughout the day.

The game spotting the early part of the morning was few and far between, but then we hit the motherlode at the akljf;adskljfksle waterhole (I can't remember the name of it, but it was awesome). There it was, just like you see in the movies, wild African animals living together in harmony! When we first pulled into the parking lot, there was a giant 3-foot long lizard (perhaps a monitor lizard?) crossing the parking lot. As we ventured closer to the watering hole, a hippo sunning himself on the bank came into view. Then a crocodile. Then, we noticed across the watering hole were 4-5 waterbuck grazing and drinking. And then, the coup-de-resistance, a small herd of elephants. At first, we saw only 2-3 large elephants eating along the bank of the watering hole. Then, the rest of them came into view, including two very cute little baby elephants (you can picture the high pitched squealing that came out of our mouths as we saw them come into view). After the elephants had a staredown with the dominant male waterbuck, two of the adult elephants and the two babies decided to take a drink. So adorable! After a bit of oohing and aahing as the elephants played in the water, we decided it was time to move on...

We headed off and proceeded to see another rhino (which is rare to see because they are so shy and skitterish), lots of elephants, giraffes, hippos, monkeys, baboons, and more. We even made it back to camp in time to see the second half of the South Africa game, which was very sad for everyone who watched it. :( Tomorrow we head back to Pretoria to see the US vs. Algeria game. It is do or die time for the United States - lets hope our Algerian friends go home sad tomorrow night.