Enter South Africa, enter civilization. As we got closer to the Mozambique – South African border it got increasingly clear that we approached more developed and richer parts of Africa. Oncoming traffic mainly constituted of South Africans on the way to spend their summer holidays at the beach. Thus instead of overloaded minivans and trucks carrying goats on their roof, we now met even more overloaded 4x4s, towing boats, waveriders, quads and dirtbikes. Also the roads got increasingly better, showing a clear inflow of money from South Africa. The bordercrossing was straightforward and though the lines were long it didn’t take more than an hour.
Our first “shock” came when we stopped at a Spar Supermarket to get some groceries. It was huge, clean, well stocked and CHEAP! We walked around like two five-year-olds in a toy store, taking in the, for us, highly unusual sight. In fact, we were so confused by the experience that we didn’t buy anything more than some milk and bread.
We spent the night in Neilspruit, a town southwest of Kruger National Park, with the intention to spend Christmas in the park. Unfortunately so had the rest of South Africa (at least the ones not going to Mozambique) so ALL the parks campsites were fully booked… We are talking of a place the size of Israel, offering more than 4,000 beds and room for about 2,000 caravans. While making new plans we decided to spend the next few days as mall rats, drinking Café Latte and hot chocolate while enjoying the WIFI in the Riverside Mall. Wonderful!
Instead of lions in the Kruger we settled for crocs in St Lucia. St Lucia is a small, coast town most famous for its national park, the St Lucia Wetlands Park… and the hordes of drunken Afrikaans invading the town every summer. We somehow managed to find a semi-nice backpackers hangout where we could park our car and pitch the roof-top tent. Almost forgot, on our way to the coast we passed through the Kingdom of Swaziland, a small landlocked country bordering to South Africa and Mozambique. On our way out of the country we managed to pick a border without any customs, why getting the appropriate (or any) stamp in our Carnet proved to be quite a hassle. Luckily we managed to find the most enthusiastic custom’s official in all of Africa and she fixed everything for us.
Back to St. Lucia. For once Christmas wasn’t all about eating, this year we actually had to spend more time finding the food than cooking and eating it. We managed to find something resembling gammon in a Spar deli, made our own meatballs and beetroot salad, gave up on turning coke into julmust (a Swedish soda), and almost broke down crying (I from joy) when some Swedes offered us two cans of pickled herring. Thus we got a light version of the traditional ‘julbord’, but it all tasted amazing! We also got some physical exercise this Christmas (something normally avoided in favor of eating) as the place we were staying at offered free morning walks in the national park. Wonderful!
A few days before Christmas a Land Rover Discovery full of South Africans and diving Equipment pulled in. They soon pitched the largest tent known to man and hit the bar and the braai (barbeque) before the last peg was in the ground. We had a great time hanging out with Paul and his mom Maria, colleague Monique and student/friend with benefits Ken. The last night before they left the boys had conceived a contraption of doom… a bong… a funnel with 4 feet of pvc-pipe attached to it. Ken started with a massive three beers in just as many seconds. That record stood all night, probably mainly because he looked like he was in considerable pain for quite some time afterwards. Even though Paul and Ken shared an impressive 20 beers they were packed up and ready to go at 7 AM the following day. Amazing, and also a bit scary. Did I mention that more than 1,000 people die in traffic accidents in South Africa over the Holidays?
During our stay in St. Lucia we also visited the local Crocodile Centre, housing crocs from all over the world and also a rather impressive 5.4-meter Nile Crocodile. We arrived in time for the weekly feeding and were really anxious on seeing this huge beast in action. What a disappointment. OK, it was 5.4 meters long, but what people had failed to mention was that it was about 1.5 meters wide. The poor thing looked more like a toad than a croc and was to lazy to eat… not that it needed to, but anyway. The smaller ones were a lot more entertaining though, splattering the crowd with pieces of chicken as they tore their food apart.
We were however lucky enough to see a wild 4+ meter croc a few days later… a somewhat more impressive sight.
Leaving St. Lucia on the 25th (in Sweden we celebrate Christmas on the 24th) we drove for three days to Addo Elephant National Park. Surprise, the park has specialized in elephants. =) We stayed at a nice place called Orange Elephant, and decided for the first time to ditch the roof tent in favor of the smaller, but more wind resistant, ground tent. Wise call, it’d turn out, since the winds got worse over the next two days. We slept well in our small tent and were awakened by lions roaring in the distant. Thanks to this wake up call our main goal for the day was to spot lions. The only of the big five we are yet to see. Thus we spent a whole day in the park seeing loads of elephants, antelopes, zebras, snakes, mungos, leopard tortoises, coyotes… but no lions. When we came back to our campsite at 7 pm, it was only to once again hear… lions.
When checking out the following day the owner, who looked just like Paul Sr in American Chopper, told us that overlanders stay for free if they have traveled through Africa. Best thing we’d heard in a long time! Thank you once again!!!
We are now in surfer hotspot Jeffrey’s Bay, trying to find a nice and calm place to spend New Year’s… we are getting old.
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