Green is my favourite colour…

It’s amazing how easy it is to book a last-minute safari. Within 15 hours of my flight home from Jo’burg being cancelled on 30 May, I was on my way to Kruger National Park!

BA had put all the passengers in the Birchwood Hotel near OR Tambo International Airport, and the Transport Manager had booked all my accommodation and volunteered to drive me there himself. I’d also had help from a travel agent called Robyn whom I’d only just met on the bus to Kasane!

It took around four hours to get to Kambaku River Lodge near the Malelane Gate of Kruger National Park. It was a long way, but it helped that Evans had a Wi-Fi dongle! I’d really wanted to go to Sabi Sand and then Mala Mala, but I was happy enough to spend three nights at another private conservancy.

I was met by a very nice lady called Anzelle, who told me she’d upgraded me and showed me around the place. Unlike most camps, Kambaku didn’t have a main area, so I stayed in what was a self-contained cottage. Self-drive safaris are very popular in South Africa, so it would’ve been ideal for that.

The rooms were decorated in an ‘if-nothing-matches-then-everything-does’ kind of way, but it was very comfortable and spacious. There was a patio outside, and that was where dinner was served.

The main course was a very good lasagne with an avocado, lettuce, tomato and feta salad. It had been stealthily brought by a lady called Prayer—so stealthily, in fact, that it was only lukewarm-warm when I sat down to eat!

I drank my very first glass of pinotage with the meal, and then Prayer came back to serve me with a slice of what turned out to be a delicious cheesecake. 

In the morning, I realised I’d made a mistake. Kambaku wasn’t in a private conservancy at all. That meant I’d have to go into the park itself for all my game drives. That was slightly annoying, but it offered me a good chance to compare it with the conservancies I was going to visit later.

Kruger National Park

“How on earth can anyone take a decent wildlife shot HERE?!”

That was my first reaction when Nico took me on my first game drive with two other guests. I’d never been on safari in South Africa before, and it was a bit of a shock to see so many trees!

I was soon in for another disappointment. We saw four white rhinos almost immediately, but I hadn’t realised that almost all South African rhinos were dehorned. What a nightmare! It struck me as the original ‘dog-in-a-manger’ policy. They cut off their horns so that other people can’t cut off their horns.

I took one quick look but had to turn away. It was disgusting to see the mutilated creatures. What should’ve been an absolute joy turned into a nightmare. Dehorning is the worst thing South Africa has ever done—although apartheid was pretty bad, too!

A game drive is a game drive, I suppose, but it was interesting to see the differences from what I was used to in other African countries, such as Kenya, Tanzania, Botswana and Namibia.

Let’s start with the positives:

• There are 1,000 leopards in Kruger National Park, so leopard sightings were pretty common, and so were lions. In fact, I saw four of the Big Five in less than three hours!

• The guides used a WhatsApp group to announce the latest sightings by leaving voicemail messages for one another. This was a great way to make sure they didn’t miss out on anything.

• The Malelane Gate opened 15 minutes early at 0545 for open vehicles such as ours.

• The main roads (designated by H for ‘Hard’ followed by a number) were paved. There were dirt tracks, too (with the H replaced by S for ‘Sand’), but the paved roads were a revelation. Apart from one in Botswana, I’d never seen such a thing!

• There were proper cafés where we could eat our meals while in the park. We stopped for 40 minutes for breakfast and an hour for lunch! I had to hide my cameras with a blanket or take them with me to avoid theft, but I was given a cool box every morning with a hodgepodge of goodies in it: a tuna roll, apple, banana, cheese, crackers, Kit-Kat, wine gums, biltong, Nik Naks, breakfast biscuits and buttermilk rusks. I also had a can of fruit juice as well as my water bottle. 

• The guide who drove me on my second day had a Wi-Fi dongle, which was very handy. (His father had been a big Elvis Presley fan, so he’d obviously called his son Elvis…!)

On the other hand…

• There were far more trees and bushes than in the classic safari locations, such as the Serengeti National Park and Masai Mara National Reserve, and far fewer sightings. That was a real problem. It was almost impossible to get a clean shot, and you often couldn’t even see any wildlife in the first place! I was used to seeing at least one animal or bird at all times in Botswana and tens of thousands during migration season in Tanzania and Kenya. In Kruger, there were times when we’d drive for half an hour without seeing a single thing…

• As mentioned above, all the rhinos were dehorned. Enough said.

• Vehicles entering Kruger had to have their windshields up at all times, so that restricted visibility.

• To stop guests from getting too excited, guides always referred to the wild animals in the local Shangaan language on the radio, so it was often hard to work out what we were about to see:

  • Nyarhi: buffalo

  • Ndlovu: elephant 

  • Nkombi: white rhino

  • Ubejane: black rhino

  • Ngala: lion

  • Nkwe: leopard

• Traffic was dreadful. There were often 5-10 vehicles at a leopard sighting, which was a real pain.

• You couldn’t drive off-road, so that was extremely limiting—especially if you wanted any chance of seeing a hunt!

I didn’t manage any 4* or 5* shots of them, but the big cats were the highlight of my trip to Kruger. It was great to be somewhere where I almost expected rather than hoped to see a leopard, and I saw several in the trees feeding on impala carcases.

I also saw several lions, and I was lucky enough to see a whole pride walking down the road. It was early one morning, and Elvis and I were in prime position. I took a LOT of videos…!

There were also a few birds, and I did my usual thing of trying to catch them taking off. I didn’t have too much luck, but this lilac-breasted roller wasn’t too bad.

In addition, I came across a flock of white-fronted bee-eaters driving home one afternoon. There was a field of sugar cane, and the birds appeared to be feeding on the bees that had been attracted to the sweetness inside the plants.

My favourite shot was the one at the top of this article, but I also liked a few others.

Finally, I saw my very first nyala! There were a male and two females just wandering about the grounds. At first, I thought they were young greater kudus, but then I realised. Another new species to add to my life list…

The Hide

One of the reasons I chose to visit Kambaku is that they had a hide. Hides are great for observing and photographing wildlife without disturbing the animals or birds. The hide at Kambaku was custom-built beside a pool, so it allowed me to shoot everything from water level.

It was on a slope, so the background was far away, allowing me to produce good bokeh. It also had a power socket, so I could spend a lot of time there working on my laptop.

The only problem was that there weren’t many birds. A brown-hooded kingfisher stayed for a few seconds, and an African pied wagtail did the same. And that was about it!

I was happy in a way because I had my laptop with me, so I could work on my pictures while waiting for the wildlife to arrive. However, after more than an hour, I decided to call it quits.

And just as I stood up, an elephant arrived! It was a wonderful moment, but I only had my 600mm lens with me, so I had to take videos with my iPhone. I sent them to a few friends, and they were suitably impressed!

As I was going through my photos, I also discovered the 5* shot of the white-fronted bee-eater. Wuthering Heights was playing, and I suddenly felt on top of the world…!

Verdict

I was only at Kambaku for three nights, but I was happy with my choice. Yes, it wasn’t in a private conservancy and I only took one 5* photo, but I saw plenty of big cats, the staff were very friendly, the food was excellent and the hide was a nice bonus.

Next up, Arathusa Safari Lodge…

Species List

Animals

African bush elephant

Black rhino

Bushbuck

Chacma baboon

Common eland

Common warthog

Common waterbuck

Southern giraffe

Greater kudu

Impala

Leopard

Lion

Nile crocodile

Nyala

Plains zebra

Scrub hare

Spotted hyena

White rhino

Birds

African fish eagle

African pied wagtail

Bateleur

Black-crowned night heron

Blacksmith lapwing

Brown-hooded kingfisher

Brown snake-eagle

Burchell’s coucal

Burchell’s starling

Cape glossy starling

Cattle egret

Crested barbet

Egyptian goose

Fork-tailed drongo

Grey go-away-bird

Grey heron

Hamerkop

Hooded vulture

Lappet-faced vulture

Laughing dove

Lilac-breasted roller

Little egret

Magpie shrike

Natal spurfowl

Pied kingfisher

Red-billed oxpecker

Red-crested korhaan

Reed cormorant

Ring-necked dove

Southern red-billed hornbill

Southern yellow-billed hornbill

Swainson’s spurfowl

Tawny eagle

Three-banded plover

Water thick-knee

White-backed vulture

White-fronted bee-eater

White-headed vulture

If you’d like to order a framed print of one of my wildlife photographs, please visit the Prints page.

If you’d like to book a lesson or order an online photography course, please visit my Lessons and Courses pages.