We saw tons of animals today. We got up really early and packed into the bakee to drive around Kruger. We spotted impala, kudu, steenbok, rhinos, elephants, hippos, warthogs, and many, many birds.
While it was still early morning we stopped at the top of a mountain and had breakfast.
We drove to Skukuza, the main center of Kruger. It’s the largest tourist village so we walked around a bit. They also had a “Little Heroes Memorial” where all the dogs of Kruger were buried. It was really sweet and a lot of dogs were buried there after dying protecting their rangers from poisonous snakes. Also at Skukuza I bought a little mammal, bird, and tree checklist, which I bought mainly for the mammals but throughout the day I got really excited trying to identity birds and trees. I would run to every tree plaque and look for its checkbox in my little book.
We also spotted ground hornbills, a rare and endangered bird species. They’re endangered because they make their nests in trees that elephants frequently push over, and because they only raise one chick every many years.
We stopped by a rest stop to eat, and there were tons of mischievous monkeys everywhere. Paulien was sitting on this tree
when a ververt monkey came and stole her hot dog! They’re really sneaky.
On the drive back we saw more animals, including these super cute hyenas.
The day ended with dinner. It was a really nice and peaceful day, and it was funny getting our “safari eyes”. I’m surprised how quickly I’ve learned to differentiate between all the antelope species, even those who look almost the same. I felt cool whenever I was the first one to spot an animal, and it became a game between all of us of who can spot the animal the fastest.
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