You've got to ask yourself 'why do nearly 1.4 million visitors go to the Kruger Park in South Africa every year'? Some countries don't get this many tourists let alone just one national park!
Well, we've spent more than 13 months staying in the park over the past 15 years and we still cannot get enough of the Kruger. It provides so many choices for the visitor; you can choose to stay in an air-conditioned bungalows or rustic tents, you can eat in the restaurants or you can barbeque, you can drive on the tar roads or the dirt roads, you can go on a game drive or a bush walk - you name it the Kruger has it. Oh, did we mention all the animals as well!
The 'Super-Seven'
In addition to the 'Big-five, the Kruger has the 'Super-seven'! Cheetah and Wild Dog are added to the traditional big-five of Buffalo, Elephant, Leopard, Lion and Rhinoceros, making these seven the most sough-after animals to photograph when visiting the park.
Some people say that animals in the Kruger are hard to find and photograph as the bush is thick - yes the bush can get thick especially in summer but if you follow the right advice you will improve your gane viewing immensely.
We visited the Kruger in December 2009 and we stayed in the busy camp of Skukuza. Keep in mind that this is the middle of summer when the bush is at its thickest yet we managed to see the super-seven within four days!
This is how our four days went:
Day-1: Wild dog early in the morning with an impala kill, then an elephant bull and a cheetah mother with her five cubs in mid morning.
Day-2: Not one, not two, but three lion sightings in the morning and elephant and buffalo later in the day.
Day-3: A leopard early in the morning and a herd of buffalo in the afternoon
Day-4: Three black rhinos and a herd of elephant.
You'll notice that we had multiple sightings of lion, elephant and buffalo - these animals tend to be common. The rare sightings are the black rhinos (white rhinos are more common), cheetah and wild dogs.
Was it luck that we got to see all these animals? Well it was a combination of providence and planning. Part of our strategy is to use the sighting boards in the camps, speak to other visitors and chat to the game guides the day before we go on our drives and then decide which routes to take based on where certain animals were seen the previous two days.
Mario Fazekas is a wildlife photographer living in South Africa, and the editor of Kruger-2-Kalahari.com. Find more about Kruger Park at his site.
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