Journey through the Addo Elephant National Park

Awoke to a delicious breakfast at sunrise, from the surprisingly comfortable floors of the Xhosa huts we slept in. We then proceeded to a very informative tour around a Xhosa village where we met the chief’s first wife, who welcomed us into her home and showed us a little bit about how she lives in her village and with her people.

From there we made our way to the Addo Elephant National Park, the drive was long and almost everyone had a little snooze on the truck. Once at the national park one of the most noticeable things was the scenery. It is unbelievably different from what we have seen so far; this lush green shrubbery that stretches out to the horizon where it meets with a deep blue sky is incredible.

After lunch at our campsite we took a game drive through the park where we spotted some jackal, pale chanting goshawk and some of the special Addo elephants, which are different from the average elephant because they have adapted to the Addo area and have shorter tusks with some females never developing tusks at all. Many years ago in the 1700’s the Addo Elephant Park was a hunting grounds for hunters and museums, until in the mid 1900’s when there were so few animals left, no lions and only 17 elephants, people started to use it as farm lands and started planting crops. The problem was that the surviving elephants would come and destroy the crops. The farmers then proceeded to hire a professional hunter to kill off the remaining elephants however this caused a public out-cry. General Armstrong then had an idea to build a strong fence around the area stopping the elephants from getting to the farms. The Addo Elephant Park became a national park and currently holds 500 elephants and lions which have been reintroduced to the area.

After a fairly successful game drive we had some dinner back at the campsite and once again started a bon fire, around which Dwayne proceeded to give the girls a very vivid and frightening explanation on the Xhosa mans’ circumcision process, everyone got a good look at Sean’s bum and Glen provided us with the word of the day “miff” meaning ugly, off, or something is wrong.

Quote of the day – Pearl Nkosi: Everywhere-everywhere everywhere I go. Everywhere that I’ve been the only thing I see is...are beautiful people...beautiful people and places (singing) am thoroughly enjoying this experience-priceless...Thanx a million STA TRAVEL