November 8th
We had to get up at the unearthly hour of 5 o’clock for a scheduled 5:30 am, depart to a game park. But as per usual the train had not traveled as far as it was thought during the night and we did not leave the train till well after six. It was a short ride in the bus to the private reserve of Hoedspruit where we had 2+ hour game drive, with an agreeable driver called Daniel.
We saw fantastic, dung, beetles, zebra, giraffe, hippos, a distant lion, and lots of impala also a sable There was a coffee break, and a video of the work of the Hoedspruit sanctuary. After this, we got back in our 10 seater vehicle with Daniel and had a tour of the cheetah rehabilitation sanctuary. Here we saw three rhinos with Molly, a sheep who was their companion, four cheetah siblings on the top of a hill, three wild dogs, a leopard and a large bird who had killed two wives. The intention was to release these animals back into the wild, and this appeared to be happening.
We were back at a station by noon where the train had moved to. There we visited to the chemist to get a few necessities. After the video David had gone into the craft shop, and surreptitiously bought Leo, a wondrously cute leopard cub, who appeared in the cabin as a surprise for me once back aboard the train. Lunch followed on the train and then I had a siesta before the train arrived at another disused station where it took on water and a replacement engine arrived. We were able to walk the length of the platform a couple of times.
And we enjoyed a pre-dinner drink by ourselves on the outside of the observation lounge before dinner. This had an African theme but was really limited to the staff dressing in African dress and some tableware. Afterwards it was meant to be cocktails in the bar, these turned out just to be a selection of the liqueurs for the evening, but the invite did attract a lot more people to the bar after dinner than all other evenings.
Click on any of the thumbnail photos for a larger version
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Click on any of the thumbnail photos for a larger version
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Click on any of the thumbnail photos for a larger version
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