February 28

February 28

We got up this morning at 5:00 a.m. to take part in a bush walk that was led by Claude, the resort owner.  One of the giraffes was contentedly munching on the leaves of a tree very near our balcony.  We started walking to the main resort to meet up with the group but the road was blocked by a herd of Zebras.  We had to wait until they cleared the road to carry on.  We went on an informative 2 hour walk with Claude and saw many different plants and animals.  

After breakfast we had nothing else planned for the day and thought it would have been nice to have a vehicle so we could venture out of the reserve and explore Limpopo a bit on our own.  Claude managed to find a rental company that was willing to deliver a car to Pezulu and by 12:30 p.m. we had a car . . . a very ugly Toyota Avanza cross-over vehicle, but beggers can’t be choosers.  We were just happy to have some independence and freedom to do something.  We got a rather primitive map from Claude, some verbal instructions on how to get to a dam along the Panorama route that was worth seeing and how to find Jessica.  The panorama Route is a very pretty drive through the mountains with a number of viewpoints of the Blyde River Canyon.  The entire drive would take about six hours so we decided to leave that until tomorrow and just go to see Jessica and perhaps head to Swadini National Wildlife Reserve and see the dam Claude told us about.

On our way to the dam there was a hiking trail that led to some waterfalls.  As we were not in a rush we decided to hike in.  It was an easy 20 minute bush walk and the falls were beautiful.  We then hiked back to the car and continued driving to the Blyde River Canyon Visitor Center.  There we found a fabulous lookout that is situated overlooking the Blyde River, just above the dam.  The scenery was breathtaking!  After taking several photographs and visiting the Visitor’s Center we headed back down the winding mountain road to the entrance to the reserve.  

As an aside, every game reserve and National wildlife reserve are heavily guarded against poachers.  The entrances are gated and vehicle coming and going are recorded (at some entrances you actually have to sign in).  Whenever a vehicle left Pezulu the driver was issued an exit permit by Claude indicating what Lodge the people were from.  At some reserve gates vehicles were searched as they left the reserve to ensure there were no animal parts in the vehicle.  It was just a reminder of one of the sad realities of Africa, poaching is still thriving.  Especially the rhinos are at risk for their horns.  The Chinese market for the rhino horn is still very lucrative as the rhino horn is believed to increase your sexual performance.  There is no proof to support this belief but it is perpetuated as many of the people selling rhino horn are now mixing it with Viagra . . . 

We left the park and it was then time to see Jessica.  We met with her owner, Tony, who used to be a game warden responsible for culling many different types of animals, including hippos.  After he got Jessica 13 years ago he decided to quit his job shooting animals.  He says that Jessica has taught him a lot about hippos and a lot about life itself.  Tony aquired Jessica during a flood of the Blyde River in 2000.  Jessica was newly born and washed up on Tony’s property.  He found her and hand raised her and now she is completely bonded to humans.  Although she is not captive and returns to the wild hippos on a regular basis, she still comes home every night to be tucked into bed (literally).  She is not yet fully grown, despite being 13 years old and weighing 1.3 tons.  She is very sweet and seems very gentle.  Julie was in heaven!  We fed her corn and Rooibos tea, scratched her back with our feet and even gave her a little kiss on the nose!  It was quite an experience being able to interact with a live hippo without the fear of having a limb ripped off or being trampled to death (hippos kill more humans than any other animal in Africa).  We left there with a warm fuzzy feeling having met Jessica.  A quick stop at the Pick ‘n Pay for some snacks and we headed home to Pezulu.