Road To Addo Elephant Nature Reserve

 

 
Guy Lying On The Road

I was driving back to the Armagh guesthouse on my final night in Storms River when I noticed something on the road.  I slowly drove closer and noticed a black guy with just his pants on lying in the middle of the road.  Another car approached from the opposite direction in this village.  It was a good thing that it was not daytime and I was not distracted by views around me.  Otherwise I may have run the guy over.  I had come to a complete stop and the guy was illuminated in my car headlights.  As the other car approached, it became clear that it was a police van with 2 cops inside.  They both got out and approached the man.  One of the policemen nudged the guy with his foot and the man moved slightly.  They realised that he was drunk so pulled him off the ground and walked him to the back of the van and dumped him inside.


From Storms River to Addo Elephant Park

I was driving along route N2 from Storms River to Port Elizabeth, which is just south of Addo Elephant Nature Reserve.  Just before reaching Port Elizabeth, the speed limit signs on the highway told us to slow down from 120 km/hr to 80 km/hr to 60 and then there was a police road block with a dozen police cars and around 40 police officers.  The first officer who spoke to me through my car window said they were stopping cars for drugs and weapons searches.  I was told to drive to a spot in the grass where 3 police men and women would search my car.  So, as I tried to park my car, a large black policeman told me that the car was fine where it was.  I asked him if he could wash my car.  He didn't like my sense of humour so I told him it was a joke.  He then asked me for my driving licence so I opened the boot to get it out of my small zip bag. Unfortunately, I had missplaced the key so was frantically looking for it at the back of the car, throwing underpants, socks, t-shirts, and shoes around.  The policeman and 2 police women were looking in bewilderment.  The policeman said not to worry and to proceed.  I told him that I was adament to find my keys and kept looking.  Then I found them and got my licence out.  He didn't know what to make of the old UK drivers licence with no photo on it and the pink and green colour.  I was getting bored as well so told him that tomorrow is my birthday and that he and the other 2 ladies should sing happy birthday to me.  The two policewomen were not interesting in the slightest in singing but the policeman did say happy birthday.  I told him to give me a bear hug which he did and then I got into my car and carried on driving.

Addo

I arrived at Addo village which is near the Elephant National Park.  A Swiss man and his French wife were running a bed & breakfast.  I managed to haggle with Swiss man to get the price down a bit but he was a bit inflexible.  They are not the best people to haggle with.  And the French lady kept saying 'My Engleeesh eess not so guuud' and sighing.  She had been living in South Africa for 3 years. 

Birthday With The Elephants

I drove into the park with my hire car full of optimism of seeing the Big 5 - Elephants, Lions, Leopards, Buffalos, and Rhinos.  They advertise the park as having all of these animals, although the majority are elephants.  It is 444,700 acres and takes an hour to drive from one end to another.  I drove non-stop for 7 hours and clocked up 130 kms.  For the first 3 hours I didn't see a fly.  I was mainly in the northern part and then headed south.  I stopped a guy and asked him if he had seen any animals and he said that they are all in the south so I carried on south.  Then I came across herds of elephants going towards watering holes that were created by the park for them.  Had it not rained a couple of days earlier, more of them would have come out from the bushes to the watering holes, instead of drinking the rain water in the bushes.  It was wonderful to see the mothers and the fathers and the baby elephants going on an outing together.  They are so communal and family oriented.

I also saw some zebras and large turtles, and well as buffalos.  However, I didn't see any lions or leopards, or rhinos.  When I asked where the rhinos were, the park officials said they couldn't tell anyone because of the problem with poaching.   Since the beginning of this year, 45 rhinos have been poached in South Africa. The horns are sold for many thousands of Pounds.  The horns are crushed for use in chinese 'medicine' according to various sources.

For my 2nd night I stayed at a wonderful B&B down the road called Rosedale:  http://www.rosedalebnb.co.za/
The owners, Keith and Nondumiso, are a lovely couple who are very welcoming and down to earth.  The rooms are very clean and comfortable, and the breakfast is delicious organic food, nearly all from their beautiful farm.  You should try the scrambled eggs and homemade bread....mmmm !!

Panic !!

I made a call to my carhire company in Cape Town to ask if I could extend my carhire by a few days so that I could drive back to Cape Town in a leisurely pace.  They told me that it would cost me more than double to extend my contract because there was a sudden great demand on their cars and their prices had shot up.  I Skyped the carhire brokers who told me that their rates had gone up for my car as well.  It seems like the stock market, with prices going up and down on an hourly basis.  So, you need to lock into a deal at a certain price for a certain period of time.

So, I had 3 days to get back to Cape Town, just under 800 kms.  So, I headed back down to Port Elizabeth, which everyone I have met says is a dive of a place, then along route N2 towards Plettenberg Bay, staying one night, then over to George and up the N12 to Oudtshoorn.  From Plettenberg Bay, the police had closed off part of the N2 westwards because of trouble in that township just outside of Plettenberg Bay that I had experienced a few days before.  It had escalated and apparently the locals were throwing rocks onto the busy motorway at cars and also throwing blazing tyres onto it as well.  All the traffic was diverted for around 10 miles around this township through dusty roads up in the hills.  It was a crazy site.