The alarm went off at 4:45 this morning and we got up surprisingly easily. Threw some clothes on and made a coffee to go on our way. It was FREEZING and still dark!!

When our safari van arrived it turned out there was only an older couple and us on the morning drive so it was nice to just be a small group. I have to say that traveling at this time of year has been perfect. We have gotten to do everything we wanted to do without it being booked out. The days are sunny and warm, just cold once the sun goes down and everything is cheaper because it's not high season. If you wanna travel through South Africa we would recommend this time of year.

The driver of our safari bus gave us some torches and said to shine them in the shrubs along the road because if there are any animals nearby their eyes will reflect the light. We were sitting on the right hand side of the bus so we'd yell out if there was anything this side, the other couple will watch the left so all bases are covered. So off we go. And we drive .... and drive .... and drive. At one stage I saw some eyes reflecting but I wasn't sure what is was and by the time I was ready to tell the driver to stop the moment had passed. Ooops.

We drove for quite a while and nothing was happening. We saw a couple of hyenas that were walking along the road and tried to get some photos of them but that was all. Then the guide stopped the bus, she turned around to us and we're thinking she found something good. We look off to the side expectantly and she tells us to look at the burnt shrubs on the side of the road, that is from controlled burning to help control the vegetation - what the?! Umm sorry, we thought we were on the animal safari and there seems to be some confusion.

We continued along the road for about an hour with nothing on our camera except the the backside of a hyena we had seen so long ago and we were about to give up hope of seeing anything else then I saw something twitching in the grass that looked orange and black. I asked the driver to stop and back up all the while praying I wasn't suffering coffee withdrawals and imagining the Gloria Jeans logo. Lucky for me she backed up the bus and there was a leopard just hang out about 10 meters from the bus. As soon as we got up closer to him he got up and started walking back into the shrubs but it was so cool to have seen him. Ok, everyone is awake now and our eyes are pealed. Not long after Elstub spots a huge male lion but he stalks off before we were able to get any snaps.

Thankfully Elstub thinks to have a look on the left hand side of the bus where the other couple are supposed to be on watch. Hey stop, there is a massive rhino 5 meters from us and they haven't seen it?! We could've had lions dressed in bikinis and singing the national anthem on the left hand side of the bus and they would've missed it. Now we have to watch both sides.

Thankfully we also got to see some more elephants and a few giraffes preparing for their day. On the way back to camp our guide did stop to show us a common bird and a spiderweb so that was lovely.

We were back at camp by 8:30am. How do you follow up such an awesome start to the day? By going back to sleep of course. We figured it was a really early start and we had such a great start to the day we should do it all over again so we curled back into our beds and went back to sleep for a couple of hours. We were up and running again at 11:30. That's more like it.

After a walk around our camp grounds to see what it had to offer we jumped back into the car to safari on our own. When we first arrived here we were saying Oh my god there's an impala and now it Oh god, its just another impala. There are so many here. So after many impala false alarms we got to see some warthogs and another elephant with its calf.

On the trip back to camp we saw a group of hippos swimming in the Sabie River. Awesome. Then it was a hurried trip back to camp as they close the gates at 5:30 and if your late you get fined. We had just spent 4 hours on an animal hunt and it felt like we had only been out there for about half of that. I know I keep banging on about it but this experience is just amazing.