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 Safari in Entabeni

By Howard Wayne    (c) 2006
jewishsightseeing.com, July 29, 2006

ENTABENI, South Africa—One of the unique aspects of South Africa is the profusion of game reserves.  These are not hunting parks, but rather places where people can see wild animals in their natural habitat.  The Wild Animal Park in San Diego cannot compare.

Mary, our niece Nicole (a college student visiting us for a week on break from Notre Dame) and I headed north from Pretoria on the National Highway into Limpopo Province, then off the main road to the Entabeni private game reserve in the Waterberg range.  To get there we had to traverse a ten kilometer dirt road, enter a gate in the middle of an electrified fence, and proceed along another dirt road for another three kilometers.  Two days after we arrived, guests driving those last three kilometers were turned back by lions on the road.

Entabeni consists of about 47 square miles of former farmland which has been returned to nature and stocked with animals.  It has a lower and upper elevation, connected by a narrow, 45 degree angle road which is accessible only by four wheel drive vehicles (or mountain goats, if they can outrun the lions).  We stayed in a tented facility – luxurious as tents go, with running water, two dim electric lights, and a heating device to warm one’s bed – but nothing except canvas between us and the nearly freezing temperatures outdoors.

The day starts at 6:30 when the guide comes to the tent to announce that it’s safe to go out.  Because of lions we are confined to the tents during the night, and on two nights we heard lions roaring.  On our final morning we were told to stay in the tent until the guides chased the lions away from tent #7 (we were in tent # 11) – they had made a kill nearby the camp the previous night.

Awake, one’s first instinct is not to shower.  The tent shower, other than a modesty covering, is open to the world and it is cold.   Instead, one tries to stay warm while getting dressed, and then make it to the reception area for hot tea and teeth-breaking biscuits which are edible only when soaked in the tea.  By 7:30 we load into a Toyota Land Cruiser – a truck open to the air and equipped with bench type seats and a cow-catcher device in front.  We’re all under several layers of clothing; I’m also wearing my African safari-style hat and carrying binoculars and camera.  The advantage of the cold (it was nearly the start of winter here in late May) was that it kept the bugs down.  Entabeni is not in malaria country.

Our guide/driver was a member of the Zulu tribe named Amos, who was trained as a tracker by his grandfather.  Typically a tracker sits in a seat on the hood of the vehicle and has the job of looking for signs of the animals.  Amos had to search for the animals while driving.  He was very good at it. 

We were told not to stand up during the trip because it breaks the silhouette of the vehicle.  To the animals, while we’re in the truck we look like a part of a large creature; if we stand up we appear smaller and more vulnerable.  Interestingly, when we visited the Cheetah Reserve a few weeks earlier, children in the group were put in the middle seats.  If they were on the outside seats they would look like food to the cheetahs.

On our first drive over the veld (or plains), we encountered a pride of lions concealed in the high, brown grass.  There were two females (female lions do most of the hunting), a very large male, and a smaller male who was some distance off.  One of the females began to stalk an impala – antelope-like creatures which are in profusion at Entabeni and whose function is to be lion food on the hoof.  This impala must have seen the lion and took off running.  The lions then got onto the road and were between us and the camp.   We could move no faster than they walked without risking overtaking them.

We saw that large male lion on that last day we were at Entabeni.  He was near camp, eating part of the wildebeest kill (wildebeests weigh over 400 pounds).  When he saw our vehicle and another he roared, made a mock-charge at our truck, then picked up his piece of wildebeest and went further into the bush.

The game rides last about three hours, much of which is riding under the African sky looking for animals.  Shortly after 10 in the morning we’re back in the camp and are served a large breakfast outside of the reception area.  Other than lunch a few hours later (which we limited to fruit and small sandwiches), the rest of the day is open until the 4 p.m. game drive.  It’s a good time to take a shower (things have warmed up by then), read, write, and perhaps sleep.

In the early evenings we’re back looking for animals.  By 6 p.m. it is dark and there is an explosion of stars in the sky; stars that cannot be seen in an urban setting.  These are stars that are not visible in the northern hemisphere.  I saw the Southern Cross and Amos showed us how, in conjunction with two other stars, it could be used to navigate south.  Very faint stars and the curve of the Milky Way were visible to the naked eye.

We continued to look for animals, needing to use a spotlight to see them.  On our last night, on the upper elevation, we found a herd of elephants.  There was a baby in the herd and the adult elephants were protective of it.  Since the elephants could have easily trampled us, we did not stay too long.  We drove on to Etabeni’s unlit airstrip, where we stopped and shared a bottle of wine under the stars.  All that was left was descending that 45 degree angle narrow road at night – without the use of the spotlight since the guide needed both hands to steer and manipulate the gears.  To Nicole it was like an E-ticket ride at Disneyland; the young think they are immortal.  When we reached the bottom the headlights on the truck went out – and we were plunged into darkness – for an instant.

Back at camp, we were greeted with hot chocolate (it was cold again) and a three-course dinner.  Then Amos, armed with a rifle, escorted us back to our tent – lions may be in the vicinity and he spotted lion tracks in the camp on one of the evening.

While on game rides we came across giraffes, rhinos, and a hippo (or at least the part of it that was barely above the surface of the pond).  The second time we encountered rhinos, a family of them, they were nervous and watched us warily.  A rhino charge could tip over truck.   After failing to outwait them, we backed out of there.

We saw only a few zebras.  They must not have been raised around lions, because when the zebras were brought into the game reserve the lions started killing them at up to twenty per week.  When one zebra was killed the rest would run a short distance and stop; easy prey for the other members of the pride.  But it would be foolish for a single lion to hunt zebras, since a kick from the black and white creatures could break a lions jaw.  With a broken jaw a lion could not survive.

One thing I have noticed here is how few tourists there are from America.  It is a long (17 hour flight from Atlanta), expensive trip.  The tourists we encountered at Entabeni were from Europe and Singapore.  Americans, by going only to the more-heavily-visited venues, are missing out on the great experience of game reserves.  Mary and I plan to go on safari at least one more time before we leave.