Bush Walks & Animal Encounters

Our approach to Leg 2 was different from Leg 1 because we knew some of what it was all about. We adjusted our equipment slightly, and I chose a pair of white desert gaiters to completely cover my shoes and prevent anything coming in through the mesh of my trail running shoes. They stood out like sore thumbs and attracted a few laughs from the group which had also adjusted, but only by one person. Fortunately, the bush changed them from…

The final day of leg one is 18km, but you have to walk it by lunchtime to allow enough time to fetch your vehicles that were left 6 days earlier at Pafuri. Those 6 days felt like a lifetime, the start of the journey, just 5 nights previously was so distant, and a shift had taken place inside of me. It was the first time I felt the full impact of living so close to nature for that long. No phone,…

The last full day of this leg, what an introduction it had been. We had not seen a lot of game, but we had been introduced to a way of being in the bush that we had never experienced before. Something had enveloped me and us that we had never felt before. A mental shift was taking place, a new perspective on what it is to be human had been revealed by the experience of walking and camping in such wild…

It’s been a little while since I have written an entry in this diary, so I will aim to be consistent and tell, the story of my Kruger Trail experience. Day 4 of leg 1 was the first day we arrived at camp early enough to explore our surroundings a little bit. This would prove something that happened on only 3or4 days of the entire journey. The camp spot was set among the granite koppies you can see from the main…

15 May 2019 It was on this day that we saw and felt another side to the Kruger. Deep in the hills of the eastern Soutpansberg, we awoke in our riverbed campsite, had a coffee, packed our backpacks and headed south along the drainage lines winding our way through granite domes. It was still quite early when we came across an eland carcass in a cable snare. Trapped and left to rot, the hyenas had a free meal. A little further…

14 May 2019 Overnight we heard animals come and go from the trickle of water we had collected ours from. The buffalo were the most obvious with their hooves clancking over the rocks when a herd moved in or out.It was my birthday and Michelle produced a cake for me out of her tiny bag. She would make a habit of this, pulling delights out of her bag an unexpected times, sometimes as late as the fourth day of the leg…

13 May 2019 I’ve read a few accounts recently and have really enjoyed reading the stories and experiences of The Kruger Trail. So I will share mine, day by day over a period of time. That’s if I can remember each day, they seem to blur, but I hope the photo albums we collected will jog my memory where needed. So much happens on the six legs of The Kruger Trail (TKT). We started Monday the 13th of May 2019. The…

In August I laughed at my brother-in-law when he realised he would be in the middle of Kruger, without comms, for the World Cup final. Then I accepted a booking to walk Pafuri over the same weekend. When I realised, I had a moment of regret, thinking what if the Boks make the final? I thought of a few places we could camp out that night that might have enough signal to watch it on the DSTV App, but those thoughts…

People have become disconnected from nature- that’s a fact that is undisputable, it shows every day, everywhere, from the street corner to social media. The number of people in the world who remain connected to nature is fewer and fewer, and in general they live with very little monetary wealth. It’s what keeps them connected, they can’t simply buy it from the shop, or turn it on and off. Their resources come through a direct channel, they must collect water from…

I woke in my tent at @siyafundawildlife at 1am yesterday morning and already in my mind was that I had left my boots outside and would a hyena come along and drag them off into the bush for a good chew. So I got up, walked across the camp to collect them and happy to find them still there. Climbing back into my sleeping bag I know felt awake and like we so often do nowadays checked my phone. Before I…