An iMfolozi Birthday

With Friday being my birthday we decided to head to Imfolozi for a weekend in the bush. Why I didn’t take the Friday off I’m not sure? None the less, Sharon picked me up from the office at around 3:30pm and we began the journey to the gate. After fighting through the Friday afternoon traffic in Umhlanga we finally made it onto the open road and, by the time we passed Balito, we were travelling freely.

Around 2 and a half hours later we crossed the cattle grid and arrived at the gate. After the usual formalities we entered the park and had just less than an hour to reach camp. This meant game viewing had to be restricted to the “better” animals. Sharon and I both made our guesses as to what the first animal would be and were once again both wrong. This time it was buffalo that made an early appearance in our viewfinders and binoculars. Shortly after that we saw a beautiful bull elephant crossing a plain, and finally a fantastic sighting of a spotted hyena on the move for his evening activities.

We arrived at camp before the 7pm curfew and made our way straight to our safari tent. Thankfully it was still light as the camp is not fenced and the tents are located (relatively) in the bush. This meant frequent visits from animals and Sharon was less than excited about the prospect of unpacking in the dark.

After unpacking the bags we sat down on our deck, cracked open a beer, and began the weekend’s relaxing. Our visitor of the night was a beautiful genet which hunted for food around our tent before vanishing in the darkness.

For those of you who have not stayed in the tented camp, there are various options but all are relatively similar. They consist of a raised deck (roughly 2 or 3 feet of the ground) upon which there is a reed kitchen and a canvas tent (or two). The kitchen has a gas stove as well as a fridge and locks with a security gate to protect your food from monkeys. The deck has an outdoor table for eating as well as chairs to relax on. Finally the tent consists of two beds, a cupboard and a fan. It does have an en-suite bathroom in the back (also built from reeds) with a toilet, shower and basin. What makes the shower especially appealing is that the reeds only go up to shoulder height allowing you to look into the bush while showering.

Feeling rather relaxed Sharon snuck off into the tent and proudly brought out my birthday gift. I eagerly ripped open the paper and found myself holding a fantastic camera bag – something I’d wanted for a long time but hadn’t yet bought myself. In return I snuck off into the tent and brought out Sharon’s Christmas gift. Yes it was a bit early, but considering what it was it seemed like the right time to give it to her. She repeated my eager gift opening to reveal a pair of Nikon Monarch binoculars. Both beaming ear to ear we spent the next short while playing with our gifts before heading off to bed for the night.

Sleep that night was disturbed on several occasions, as it normally is on your first night in the bush. Firstly it was by the (very) close-by call of a spotted hyena. I lay there relaxed listening to the beautiful sounds of the bush and then drifted off to sleep again. Sadly the second disturbance was by mosquitos and we were forced to drag ourselves from our beds to drop the nets. This was less relaxing. The third and final disturbance was by a hyena (I think) that lay outside our tent crunching something. At first I thought it was my car bumper as it sounded plastic and this had happened to several of my friends. Thankfully when morning rolled around it turned out it was just a few old bones.

Saturday morning started early for us and we were out of the gate (who has a gate without a fence) by just after 6am, coffee in hand. We started with the usual Sontuli Loop (playing the odds) but hadn’t even made it to the loop when we chatted to a passing car only to hear about a lion kill on the road on the other side of Mpila Camp. We quickly turned the car and headed directly for the scene of the zebra kill.

Sadly when we arrived the lions had already pulled the carcass off of the road and into some very deep grass where it was hidden. Apparently there had been a handful of hyenas which had disturbed them and forced them to protect their kill. Thankfully we could still see the lions, especially a beautiful male with a well defined mane.  We watched them for a while before continuing down the road where we amazingly ran into another pride of lions less than a kilometer down the road.

Since we were passing by the Centenary Center and had never been in we made a quick detour to take a look. It’s highly impressive and boasts a lovely capture center with a lot of artifacts from the early 1900s to now, focusing on the rehabilitation of the white rhino population. It also has capture bomas which you can visit with a guide if there are animals in them. Sadly there weren’t on our visit. Finally there is a market selling all sorts of African curios as well as a small coffee shop. Since neither of us had money on us we vowed to return the following day.

Back on the road we headed for our initial destination, Sontuli Loop. The picnic site was amazingly quiet but it was amazing to see just how much water was in the river. What was normally a wide sandy river was now a raging torrent of muddy water. There was also a lot of ground water around which meant the animals were less likely to be hanging out around the river. Through Sontuli we stopped off at Bhegane hide (which was full of water) before heading back to camp for lunch. It had been a great first drive.

Sharon quickly bashed us up a pile of chicken, mayonnaise and pepperdew rolls which we enjoyed on our deck as dark clouds rolled in and darkened the sunny day.

After lunch we climbed back into the Jeep and were well into the park when the rain began falling and quickly cooled what had been a hot day. This saw the animals spring to life and suddenly our viewing doubled. Thankfully the rain didn’t last long and, after cooling the earth, vanished as quickly as it arrived. Highlights of the drive included a lion in the riverbed as well as a beautiful spotted eagle owl sitting on a branch at eye level.

Thankfully the owl remained there the whole day and we got to watch it on our way home as darkness fell. You could see it getting ready for it’s evening hunting when it began stretching its wings and neck. And then, without warning, it took off. Sadly both Sharon and I missed the photo opportunity but thankfully it landed on the side of the road. This meant another chance at getting a photo of it taking off, but it was not to be. It really is amazing just how fast they get off the ground. After that there were rabbits a plenty as we made our way back to our tent.

Back in camp we were enjoying a drink on the deck when a nosey hyena passed just a meter or two behind Sharon. This saw her hairs prick up and she spent the rest of the evening, on the deck, shining the torch into the bushes while I braaied our dinner in a slight drizzle.

The next day was over 30 degrees. We decided that since we needed to be out of our tent by 10am we might as well pack up in the morning and spend the day travelling through the entire park.

Despite packing up in the morning we were still on the road by just after 6am. We started with the south of the park and explored Sontuli Loop and various other roads and hides. From there we headed to the Centenary Center where we bought a giraffe for the baby’s room before heading out of iMfolozi and into the Corridor. There was a brief moment of excitement when we spotted a cluster of vehicles examining a tree. They told us there was a leopard but we certainly couldn’t see it and eventually decided to move on.

We then entered Hluhluwe and decided on some back roads before going to Hilltop Camp for lunch. The back roads provided some fantastic rhino sightings including 9 in one watering hole. We also discovered a hide with the world’s longest walk in. I measured it at close to 300 meters but it felt longer. In fact we met a lady along the path who had refused to continue and was waiting for her husband.

When we reached Hilltop Camp we found a table outside and waited for over 10 minutes to be served. We even tried hunting down waitrons but nobody was interested. Eventually we gave up, bought an ice cream from the small curio shop, and then continued through the park heading for the gate. We had the usual sightings but the intense heat meant that it was very quiet.

When we reached the gate I think we were both happy to wind up the windows, turn on the air-con and cruise home. It had been a beautiful 2 days in the park but all good things come to an end. I can’t wait for our next visit.