Suthards in South Africa

Next we found the female white lions. They were in a group of four, with two white lionesses and two african lionesses. They really make you think they’re cuddly and soft and sweet, don’t they? And look at how they stand out against the landscape! It’s amazing they’re able to hunt at all.

This girl has some scratches and cuts on her, so she’s definitely been busy.

One thing we all will never forget because we heard it so many times: Do Not Stand Between a Hippo and the Water!

Here’s a hippo and her baby in the water. Did you knows hippos can’t swim? They stand on the bottom!

Baboons at a watering hole:

This adorable antelope is called a Steenbok. He’s very small and travels in a pair with his life-long mate. So cute and tiny!

And now for the male white lions, the last big animal we saw before we left Sanbona. These two are about 4-5 years old, and were born on the reserve as cubs (they’re brothers):

The scratches on his face are from tussling with his brother. Sound familiar?

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Sanbona Game Reserve is an amazing resort. It topped the Trump in Chicago as far as luxury in amenities and appointments, and it’s no surprise that the food was beyond any expectations as well. Our rooms were beautiful, with patios that looked out onto the wildlife reserve. We could see a small watering hole where springbok were gathered when we set down our bags!

I wanted to share some pictures from Sanbona, the landscape here was beautiful. A dry, rocky desert environment with no wind and no rain but an abundance of plants, flowers, and animals. I actually asked our guide Rudy if they had planted all the beautiful flowers, but he laughed and assured me that they were all wild, naturally-occurring plants. It reminded me of a landscape I might have seen at Disneyworld it was so beautiful.

Now onto the wildlife pics! Below is what’s called a “Hippo Highway”. The hippos travel along these pathways single file in a very rigid way so that the earth gets downtrodden and makes these very noticeable pathways. We saw these throughout South Africa, they’re immediately recognizable!

Male Kudu, Jake’s research topic. He now has an actual “kuduzela” in his room now, a birthday present. It’s a horn made from a kudu’s horn.

This beautiful bird is a beecatcher, known as a sunbird. They are a striking green color that shimmers in the sun.

Here’s a white rhino we happened on. Isn’t their skin odd? It’s apparently 3 centimeters thick, which can protect them from lion’s claws as well as almost everything else in Africa. You can also see how the reddish dust of the soil completely covers their hide and helps to camouflage them. You wouldn’t believe how hard they can be to spot!

We ran across a group of four giraffe chomping on trees, they’re so pretty to watch.

The kids enjoyed our breaks so they could stretch their legs and warm up a bit. Constantly driving in the vehicle makes everyone cold!

This gorgeous animal is a black-backed jackal. He was quite a ways away, the 300mm lens I ordered used with my 1.4x extender made this shot possible. And I’m so glad it did. What a striking creature!

More to come later!

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Our guide arranged a picnic lunch for us at a secluded spot he knew of named Windmill Beach. We had a leisurely morning playing badminton and climbing on the rocks. As the tide came in, the boys couldn’t resist trying to get wet, but quickly changed their minds once they felt the freezing cold water. You can tell from our clothes we were expecting it to be colder than it was, but the variable weather patterns make it hard to plan!

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I have to share these pictures with all of you. The baboon hike was one of the highlights of our trip. We all really felt close to these animals, and loved seeing them in their natural habitat.

First I want to give you an idea of how high we hiked to see these guys. This pic is from about 2/3s of the way. Remember, our hotel is right on the ocean to the left, and we started from just above sea level. The bushes you see at the bottom are about 12 feet tall.

At this point, Alli was begging us to carry her (and the guide actually offered to!). She was NOT happy at all.

We stopped here for a quick break while the guide scouted out the baboons a bit.

Finally, the guide motioned us to follow him (up, of course), and we saw the baboons! I hope you can get an idea of the slope on this hill/mountain, it was very steep even if not all that tall (relatively speaking, of course). I was constantly worried about slipping, and with good reason as we all fell at least once.

I could post another 30 pictures, I really loved these guys. One actually walked right by me and touched me as he went, pretty cool.

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I want to share some photos now that I can!

These are taken from the “backyard” of our hotel in Cape Town (aka Long Beach). I love surfing pics, and the lighting was amazing. The color of the water makes you feel as if you’re on an island in the Caribbean. It almost makes you think it might be warm — but it’s NOT! It was some very cold water.

What a beautiful sight to greet us every morning and every evening! There’s a fantastic tradition in South Africa called Sundowners, which is just a fun name for “Drinks at Sunset”. I fully intend to carry on the tradition here in the U.S. because it’s a wonderful one. Every night for Sundowners we’d sit on the deck of the hotel and watch the surfers (and paddleboarders) out on the Atlantic.

Speaking of paddleboarders, there were quite a few of them mingling with the surfers. I’d never seen a paddleboarder surf a wave before, is that something new? I’ve just seen them on the calm gulf waters and rivers here in Florida.

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We did a day long safari today with our guide, Rudy. We started with a late morning and breakfast at 9:00am. I had French Toast with bacon, Brie, and grilled tomatoes for breakfast before we headed out. I need to start bringing my camera to meals as the cuisine here is terrific. Bryan and Alli had a yogurt and muesli parfait with honey that Bryan said was like eating a Snickers bar.

We started out seeing baboons and springbok off our patio before we even left, a very good omen! I sat in the front of our land cruiser with Ty and Jake. Bryan and Alli sat behind us. It was cold again today, but the sun tried to come out. When we stopped it felt wonderful.

First, we saw the elephants. There was the matriarch of the herd with other females and a few juveniles. The bulls keep to themselves and only visit the herd for mating. You can see a baby here with his mama.

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Location:Near Worcester, South Africa

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Today our driver, Dave, who had been our guide in Cape Town, arrived to transport us to our next stop at Lake Pleasant. The drive was another long one, through twisting mountain passes and dramatic cliffside views of the Indian Ocean. We stopped for a bite at a pub and enjoyed calamari and chips (which seems to be a staple on all the kids menus here) and some pizza. And by chips I mean French fries. I think the kids are going to have a hard time switching back to ordering fries instead of chips, they licked it up so easily.

We checked in to the hotel and found that our travel agent was treating us to dinner in the hotel restaurant, what a nice surprise! We ended the day with a relaxing meal and some time with the kids’ much-missed old friend, The Disney Channel.

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Location:Garden route, South Africa

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We started with a 6am wake up call from Rudy and hopped out of bed onto our nice warm heated floors, jumped in the gorgeous shower and headed off to breakfast. I ordered eggs Benedict with salmon and while we drank our coffee, Rudy brought out a plastic box with a lid. He opened it to show the kids a five inch long scorpion he had found outside for them. He had a special UV flashlight which made the scorpion glow a fluorescent shade of green. The kids were in awe, I was sligly scared, and we were off to a great start.

We jumped in the open land cruiser to find blankets and a heated water bottle waiting for each of us. We wrapped up and headed out into the desert, the temp was about 38 degrees, we estimated.

We were tracking the male lions and were quickly rewarded when we spotted them behind us!

These gorgeous creatures were running along the road and we were able to drive ahead of them and wait for them to cross our path. They ended up crossing within inches of our vehicle. We could see a herd of giraffe along the way that had stopped and were standing perfectly still as they watched the lions pass a safe distance a way. It was odd to see these four huge, tall giraffe come to a halt and all point the exact same direction with their long necks. Rudy explained that as long as the giraffe could spot the lions they felt safe, and only if the lions disappeared while they were watching would they panic and run.

Next we saw this hippo glaring at us, and Rudy told us that hippo are responsible for more human deaths than any other animal in the wild.

We headed back to the lodge after a stop for coffee in the bush and a few more animal sightings. I’ll post more pictures when I can access mine. Alli and Jake both made some purchases in the gift shop at e lodge, and we were very sad to leave such a comfortable hotel.
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Location:Sanbona Game Reserve, South Africa

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First let me explain that just before we left Cape Town the card reader I used to get pictures from my camera to my iPad stopped wording, so I’m working with only a small fraction of pictures taken with Allis camera for now. Anyway, after we saw the elephants we ran across a herd of giraffe grazing peacefully.

Continuing on, we saw several antelope and learned about the various plants and birds in the area as well. At midday, we stopped on top of a mountain and had a delightful picnic lunch of chicken pinwheels, biltong (a dried meat similar to beef jerky but much softer and tastier), spring rolls, and other assorted finger foods. The picnic was yummy and fun, with the kids climbing all over the mountain and looking under rocks for scorpions. Thankfully, they didn’t find any. We spent the afternoon game viewing some more and got to see lots more animals, including some lionesses. We returned for dinner at the lodge which consisted of eland filet for Bryan and Jake and lamb curry for me, with a starter of butternut squash soup and malva pudding for dessert (it’s a traditional dessert served with custard similar to sticky toffee pudding). It was pretty chilly at night so we were happy to have heated floors in our room! We had an early night in anticipation of a 6:30am game drive the next day.

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Location:Sanbona Game Reserve

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We arrived at Sanbona Game Reserve this afternoon after a four hour drive from Cape Town through the mountains. I had no idea how rocky and mountainous South Africa is. We are now in a desert landscape despite the temperature having dropped.

It was in the mid 50′s today and cloudy. We arrived at the lodge just in time for a quick lunch before heading out on safari. I had creamy spinach ravioli with a lager and the kids had burgers or fish. We bundled up for the game drive and met our guide, Randy (who bears an uncanny resemblance to Sark from Alias). We each had water, a blanket, and a hot water bottle to help keep us warm. It helped but it was chilly! We all have windburned faces now, except for Jake who wrapped his face entirely with his scarf. Guess he was smarter than he looked!

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Location:Brede River DC,South Africa

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