Africa - Cape Town - Thorny Bush Game Reserve

Day Three

Another full day ahead of us in Cape Town, with a trip to the Winelands and a wine and cheese tasting at the tour of the Fairview Winery.  We stopped at the Taal Monument (www.taalmonument.co.za) , where the tour guide provided us with the history and the importance of the monument to the Afrikaan language.

The De Oewer Restaurant located in the historic town of Stellenbosch was host to our lunch.  They are located just across the street from a rugby stadium and today they had a tournament of college rugby games and we were able to catch snatches of their games.

On to visit Table Mountain that overlooks Cape Town and the harbor.  A cable car takes you to the top of Table Mountain with great panoramic views of the city, Robben Island and surrounding areas.

Today, we transferred to the Commodore Hotel located on the V & A Waterfront.   A lovely hotel, located near the wharf that has numerous restaurants, shops and just a fun place to hang out.  We enjoyed dinner at the City Grill and dessert at the Meloncino Restaurant.  We all would have liked to have more time in this area.

So much to do in Cape Town, but tomorrow we are off to the Greater Kruger Park Area and the Thorny Bush Lodge.

Day Four

We left Cape Town at 600AM for flights departing to Huedspruit Airport.

A half-hour transfer and here we are at Thornybush Waterside Lodge.

There was time for lunch and a quick rest, then out on our first evening game drive in open Landrover vehicles.  The goal, of course, to see the Big 5 (Lion, Leopard, Elephant, Rhino and Buffalo).  Ryno, our driver along with his tracker, were confident he could find us some great wildlife.  Well, Ryno did a fantastic job and the first evening we saw:

Cape Buffalo, a Leper Tortoise, Saddle Bill Stork (endangered – only 400 remaining), Warthog, Impalas, Zebras, Elephants, Wildebeest, Hippo and a Leopard.  Three of the big 5 were already scene.  My favorites the Zebras with their fantastic stripes, the Elephants – as we saw 2 young males going at it less than 3 feet from our jeep. Yikes!

Of course, we were all surprised to see the leopard on our first trip – we heard they can be elusive.

Wake-up call 500AM – back on the trail by 545AM, we’ll see what next that we can find along the trail…..