South Africa Part II: Addo Elephant Park

On the second day of the trip, we drove from Port Elizabeth to Addo Elephant National Park. This park is a large wildlife conservation park. It's the third largest national park in South Africa. The park is home to more than 600 elephants! It also is home to many other animals, including buffalo, rhino, various antelope species, warthogs, zebra, tortoises, and more. There are even a few hyena and lions -- though we didn't spot any of these, as they are very elusive.

For an entrance fee of about $20 per person, the park allows visitors to drive their own vehicles through the park. The roads though the park are dirt roads -- it got pretty bumpy at times! We were really surprised at how little guidance is provided for the drivers. They basically just tell you to keep a "safe" distance from the animals, to not get out of your car (you can actually be fined if you do), and to yield to dung beetles. That's it! The rest is up to you. Pretty crazy.

These are real signs inside the park - not the most comforting...

 

Yes, that says "beware of lions".

 

We weren't really sure what to expect or how many animals we would really see. We were hoping to see at least one elephant. We didn't see too much for the first 30 minutes, but the scenery was stunning! All of a sudden, we drove up over a hill and there, up ahead, were two elephants. I can't even put into words what it feels like to spot that first full-grown, wild animal in its natural habitat. There are no glass windows, no fences -- nothing standing between you and this humongous wild animal. It really is breathtaking. Another large elephant joined the first two. They just cross the road right in front of the cars. I couldn't believe how close they came to the vehicles.

The endangered dung beetles have the right of way.

Throughout the day, we had a few more viewings of elephants. We saw a small group bathing, one drinking at a water hole amongst a herd of zebras, another hanging out in the brush, two more small groups walking alongside the road, just to name a few. But the most climactic part of the day was at the end of the day. We saw an entire herd eating and playing -- there were probably about 50 elephants! We even saw some smaller ones, including a mother nursing a baby. After that viewing, we had one more encounter -- a large male elephant, complete with ginormous tusks, was walking straight down the road towards our car. Normally, the elephants would cross over the road to the grass on the other side, but this one was just walking straight down the middle of the road. From reading online, we knew that we shouldn't move the car once we were close to the elephant. You are supposed to stand your ground and just let him pass by. But neither of us were that brave, and so we turned the car around and watched him. Eventually, we drove away because we just wanted to get out of his way. He didn't show any signs of being threatened or disturbed, so I think we made the right decision. At one point, he was about 10 yards from our car. So crazy!

Rolling in the mud!

We were just driving down the road when this guy startled us off to the side. It's weird seeing an elephant this large out of the corner of your eye. When we took a picture, our flash went off and his ears went out in the alarmed stance - we decided that was a good time to move along. 

This was the guy that kept stalking us. We were pretty curious about how he broke his right tusk - probably the last car that decided not to move out of his way...

 

 

After we felt like we had gotten our money's worth, we headed to our "hotel" nearby. We specifically picked this one because it was a bit more interesting than all of the other guesthouses we would be staying at throughout the trip. It was a little different to stay in this "hut", but the inside had pretty much all of the comforts of a standard hotel room. It was a fun and unique stay!

 

We also had a delicious dinner at an organic restaurant nearby, called Hazels. Again, we had gourmet meals with wine for less than $30. Incredible!

We were exhausted after spending about 7 hours of our day in Addo park. We saw so many animals up close - it was an incredible experience and a great warm up for our safaris over the next two days!

South Africa Part I

Servus alle,

Our time in Germany is almost finished. Since Matt's contract will be finished at the end of the year, we unfortunately had to find a way to use up the remaining vacation time for the year. We decided to head to South Africa for two weeks full of good weather, beaches, wine, nature, animals, animals, and more animals!

While we were excited for the trip, I can't say we were excited for the journey to our destination. Since we chose not to start our trip in Johannesburg or Cape Town, we had an extra connection to a smaller airport in Port Elizabeth. This was the longest day of travel we've ever had, and we assume it will stay that way for quite some time...

We flew with Qatar Airways, which means we had a layover in Doha, Qatar. The airport in Qatar is brand new and it was definitely the nicest airport we've ever been in! The planes were also really nice and comfortable - we definitely would fly with them again. Our only complaint would be the food - it's a bit strange seeing people each fish for breakfast in the morning...

Our travel itinerary:
Leave home at 12:30pm
Fly from Munich to Qatar - 5.5 hours
Layover in Qatar - 2.5 hours
Fly from Qatar to Johannesburg - 8.5 hours
Layover in Johannesburg - 2 hours
Fly from Johannesburg to Port Elizabeth - 1.5 hours
Arrive at hotel at 1:00pm

...door-to-door it took us 24.5 hours! Needless to say, we didn't do much on that first day.

After arriving in Port Elizabeth, we picked up our rental car. Since Matt's driver's license is now in German, we had to get an international driver's license booklet from the German authorities before the trip. While this a was a new experience for us, a bigger new experience was driving on the "wrong" side of the road. Being a former British colony, South Africans drive on the left side of the road. It's not overly challenging and it becomes routine rather quickly. However, the first few minutes feel really strange.

It was a good thing that driving wasn't too difficult because we had a lot of it ahead of us. Our total itinerary over the two weeks would take us more than 2,000 kilometers along the southern coast.

Our itinerary for the trip:
Day 1 - Arrive in Port Elizabeth (a pleasant beach town in the Eastern Cape) and relax and recover.
Day 2 - Addo Elephant National Park (!)
Days 3 & 4 - Kariega (a game reserve east of Addo for several game drives)
Days 5 & 6 - Plettenberg Bay (another beach town along the famous Garden Route)
Day 7 - Oudtshoorn (famous for ostriches, caves and scenery)
Day 8 - De Kelders for whale watching
Days 9 & 10 - Winelands (!)
Days 11 & 12 - Cape Town (including a day trip to Cape of Good Hope)
Days 13 & 14 - Camps Bay

The map is small, but clicking on it should enlarge it.

                         

Just a few more general notes before moving on:

• Since South Africa is in the southern hemisphere, our trip was actually planned during the beginning of their summer. The weather was already really nice - usually around 75 degrees - and it will only be getting warmer in the coming weeks.
• While everybody speaks English, it's actually only the 4th most widely spoken language in the country. The majority of people, both black and white, speak Afrikaans, which originated from Dutch (the first people to colonize South Africa). This also made it interesting for us, because Dutch and German have a lot in common. We certainly couldn't understand any Afrikaans and reading it was difficult, but there were enough similarities that we could sometimes figure a few things out.
• We mostly stayed at bed and breakfasts on our trip. This was great because every morning they prepared fresh breakfasts for us. We almost always had the choices of eggs, bacon, sauasage, pancakes, etc., and it was always great. Also, most of the places would bring the coffee out still in the French press and leave it for us. We're yet to find this type of service and value anywhere else!
• The currency is awesome for two reasons. First, the exchange rate is really favorable at the moment, which means that a lot of things were less expensive for us when compared to Euros. For example, our first meal in Port Elizabeth was at a highly-rated restaurant where we had two starters, two entrees, beer & wine, and our total bill including tip was around $20! Fortunately, this trend held throughout the whole trip. Secondly, the currency itself is just awesome!

While we didn't do too much in Port Elizabeth after arriving, it was still a great start to the trip! We got a good night's sleep, had a nice run along the beach in the morning, and then set out for our next stop - elephants at Addo!

Before we go - here's a teaser picture of a kudu (look at those horns!) at Addo. It's important to keep the readership interested :)

Auf Wiedersehen!

Matt and Kristin

Bamberg

Servus alle,

As our time in Germany is now beginning to wind down pretty quickly, we recently decided to take a short day trip to one of the popular Bavarian cities that we still hadn't visited. We rented a car on a Saturday morning and made our way up to Bamberg. Bamberg is small city in Franconia (northern Bavaria). By American standards it's a really small city - only about 70,000 people - but it's famous for its well-preserved medieval appearance. In fact, its Old Town is an UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Since it's mostly known for its appearance, we'll spare you any more details and get straight to the pictures. Unfortunately, the weather ended up being a bit dreary by the time we arrived (typical October in Bavaria), so the pictures may not do it justice. We promise it was impressive!

This one area in the town is actually known as Klein-Venedig, which translates to "Little Venice". While it's admittedly a bit of stretch, the area is really cool with the river running between the medieval buildings. This first picture is of the Rathaus, or "town hall".

We were able to find an authentic Bavarian restaurant (never too difficult) frequented by locals. It was really cozy and perfect for a fall day! Bamberg is also famous for a special type of beer - Rauchbier, or "smoked beer". It's not Matt's favorite type of beer, but he still felt obligated to order one with lunch. It's not bad, but it smells a lot like ham, which is a bit strange until you get used to it.

We realize the food in this picture may not look the most appetizing, but this was one of the best Bavarian meals Matt has ever had. And after spending 2.5 years in Bavaria, that's really saying something! Basically, it's meatloaf inside of a roasted onion, with delicious bacon on top, served with mashed potatoes and a Rauchbier gravy!

Bamberg was a perfect day trip! Next stop, South Africa!

Bis bald,
Matt and Kristin