Tuesday, June 5, 2018

Addo Elephant National Park

  April 2018



In April this year,  we were lucky enough to have Steve and Chris, our cruising buddies from “Scott Free”, (with whom we must have sailed about 10 000miles!) fly out from the UK to spend nearly a month with us. Having done all the typical Cape Town touristy “musts”, we squeezed in a trip up to Addo, with detours via Cape Aghulas, Garden Route, Prince Alfred Pass, and various wine regions!

Priscilla's rooftop tent was replaced by two waterproof transit bags for our luggage so there was plenty of room for the four of us and a fridge for all the important things like beer, wine and meat for the braais.

This trip to Addo was a first for Mary and me, and we wanted to give our mates a real taste of African wildlife. We spent a night in the Matyholweni camp in the south, the next in the tented Spekboom camp, the 3rd at the Addo Main camp, and an indulgent last night at the newly opened, luxurious and very quirky Nyathi camp in the north!
We were very pleasantly surprised, and as can be seen from the photos which follow, not short of things to see and enjoy.......especially ellies!

Lucky sighting.....very few lions in the park
Red Hartebees - crazy eyes?
The large herds of buffalo are
 Foot and Mouth Disease free
Glossy Starlings were everywhere

Speckled mousebird
The first of many ellies.
It was so great to see them so close and very relaxed
Bokmakierie

Sometimes I just sits and thinks!!

OOPS!

Lesser Doubled Collared Sunbird quietly sitting near our tent


Get out of my space!

Olive Woodpecker


Pale Chanting Goshawk
Very common pose...Lean on me brother!


A bit of argie bargie amongst the youngsters
Lots of very cute babies 
Having a little refreshment!
Throwing a bit of mud around






Thats quite a weight to carry around
 and I'm not really embarrassed!