You’ll be pleased to hear we got through the night – Sheila kept the hair dryer by the bed as it was the only implement in the room so at least she could blow dry any creepy crawlies to kingdom come.  Sue had bits of thatch dropping from the ceiling but no bugs. 

Early morning and it’s already 27°, think we’ll be diving for shade today! The hotel has a very colonial feel, very Out Of Africa – just need Robert Redford to come strolling through. 

We went this morning to Addo Elephant National Park.  They are very security conscious, you need passports and driving licences, fill in many forms at 2 entrances and the car and boot are searched.  You have a permit to enter and one to leave when the car is searched again.  It is the only park in the world to host all the “big 7” (elephant, buffalo, rhino, lion, leopard,whale and great white shark). By the time we arrived it was 36° and the car aircon was working overtime. It’s home to over 600 elephants as well as various antelope species and the hard working flightless dung beetles!

All the animals in the park are native to the area – there are no giraffes as they did not travel this far south.  The roads were worthy of any road rally circuit – Sue’s apple watch got very confused. 

It is stunning to see these magnificent creatures in their own environment.  We drove around for nearly four hours and covered barely half of the 500,000 acres.  It is a great conservation success, both protecting the animal species and the eco system.  We also saw a fine selection of Warthogs, Elands and Kudus but really we only had eyes for the elephants.

This beautiful giraffe was in the Addo Wildlife Private Game Reserve just down the road. We did a Sunset Drive and dinner here later in the day and they, not being National, can have any animals in their park.  The giraffes and other tasty animals take their chances with the lions.  They had 13 buffalo not so long ago and now there are just 2 left.  The drive was very dramatic as thunder and lightning heralded rain and we all donned ponchos for protection in our open sided jeep. We also saw hippos just raising their noses above the water not minding the rain at all.

We are really not going for elegance this holiday. Back to Sue’s Apple watch,  it said we had done 7000 steps and climbed 30 flights of stairs – how bumpy were those roads!! 

Lastly Addo is also a premier SA citrus producing region known as ‘Citrus Paradise’. They produce satsumas, lemons, tangelos, oranges and too many more to list. Exports go to Europe and Asia so we’ll be  checking out the area written on the next net of clementines we buy to see if it says Addo!