It's Raining Rhinos!

Wow! What an amazing day! On the recommendation of one of the other guests at Utopia in Africa, Baylie and I went in search of Chimp Eden today. It is a beautiful sanctuary for rescued chimpanzees run by the Jane Goodall foundation. We arrived just as a tour was starting and for an hour we watched the guide feed the chimps and tell their individual stories. It was a great start to the day.

We then set out for the Malalane entrance gate at the bottom of Kruger National Park. We are staying at the Skukuza Rest Camp which is a pretty long distance from that gate, but we wanted to drive through the park, hoping to see a little wildlife on the way. We immediately saw some small deer…a water buffalo…a wildebeest…a troop of baboons…two giraffes…a zebra…and suddenly what Baylie first thought was an elephant, but NO – a rhino with an enormous horn! When Baylie was here before, she went on a five hour trek with a special rhino tracking guide and they finally saw ONE rhino. Within an hour we saw three more from our car just hanging out by the side of the road! We were feeling pretty amazed and ready to rest our eyes from constantly scanning every bush for movement, so we stopped at a marked picnic area to make some peanut butter sandwiches. We sat at the table nearest our car and immediately noticed movement in the bushes MAYBE 50 feet away. Suddenly a trunk rose up and grabbed some leaves off the tree. There were two elephants so close we could hear them chewing. There were several other people in the picnic area and a small store selling snacks. We went ahead and enjoyed our lunch in silence while constantly watching the elephants. At one point a family came over by our table to take some pictures and the dad asked which way we had come in to the park. We talked for a moment and he said that yesterday it had been “raining rhinos”. I am now waiting for it start raining lions! This place is simply stunning.

Tomorrow we are going to go on an official game drive, so who knows what we’ll see!
I have a ton of new pictures to post of course…but not the most accessible wifi, so they will have to wait.
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