On our first day in Kruger National Park, we entered at 5:45 a.m. and the sun was already well up. As we drove east across the park, toward its border with Mozambique, we spotted impalas, zebras and a couple of elephants to start the day off. We had planned (based on the guidebook) to head north, but one of the rangers suggested some areas to the south--good advice. Over the next couple of hours, we encountered giraffes, wildebeasts, more elephants, kudus, a rhino, and a pair of lions who mated while we were viewing them from 10 meters away. On the bridge over the Olifants River, you were allowed to get out of the car to look for animals around the stream below--we saw crocodiles, hippos and baboons, along with a wide variety of cranes, geese and smaller birds. We left the park just as the gates closed at 6:30 and stayed at the same hotel in Phalaborwa.

The second day in Kruger we retraced much of the same area, seeing many of the same animals (no lions that day, though) and adding african buffalo, spotted hyena, porcupine, waterbuck, a couple of varieties of small antelope, and a leopard (we were unable to get a photo of that one). It was a very eventful two days and each time we spotted a new species was very exciting. The middle of the day was unbearably hot, sweating in the car and drinking liter after liter of water. That evening we drove back to Sabie to relax and take care of some odds and ends before returning to Jo'burg for our flight to Nairobi on November 29th.