South Africa, 2017
In the fall of 2017 Ron and Carol went to South Africa and visited two major cities and four nature reserves.
It took a long time to get there. 13 hours to Dubai and another 8 hours to SA. (It did give Ron a lot of time to get the pictures ready on the flight back.) For travel details see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/41210.html .
Cape Town - Table Mountain. Looking south down the cape. (-33.9582379,18.4025525) For 1st day details see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/41453.html .
Cape Town - Table Mountain. Rock hyrax were all over the mountain top.
Boulder's Beach. A colony of African penguins. (-34.1954803,18.4492533)
Detail showing the red spots above their eyes.
Cape of Good Hope. The last point ships had to round before returning to the Atlantic. Nice day there, the wind was only about 40mph, gusting to 60. They are really having to hold on.
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Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden. The wonderful Boomslang Canopy Trail, a bridge in the trees. It swings gently in the breeze. (-33.9896996,18.4297082) For details see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/41526.html .
Cape Town, Bo-Kapp district. Wonderful old town with every house painted in bright colors.
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Cape Town - V&A Waterfront. HUGE shopping mall and entertainment center. All of Table Mountain seen in the background. 15 minutes later is was in the clouds.
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For 2nd day details see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/41963.html .
Cape Town - Two Oceans Aquarium. The Jimmy Durante fish (actually a Black musselcracker.)
A Fish Eagle. A hippo family ("pod").
St. Lucia Estuary. After finishing Cape Town, the next day they flew all the way across SA to the east coast and a 2 hour bus drive to this estuary. (-28.3683294,32.4097639) For details of the estuary visit see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/42213.html .
A typical homestead. A rectangular house with one or two round houses. (Called rondavels pronounced ron-DA-vels, they are a lot like the Navajo and their hogans.)
Nyala Bushbuck Kudu antelope. Long-crested eagle
The Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Game Reserve (HIGR), next day.
For details of the HIGR visit see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/42386.html .
HIGR. Giraffes on alert. The two adults (only one shows) are fixed on a river bed where there was thought to be a lion. The ranger said other animals look out for this behavior knowing the giraffes are good at detecting predators.
White rhino An Oxpecker on the rhinos Elephants (unmated)
Still the HIGR.
Giraffe detail. Vervet monkey.
Still the HIGR.
HIGR. Breakfast in the bush. This was really roughing it, mainly because the coffee was instant!
HIGR. In one valley there was a large herd of zebra and a large herd of cape buffalo.
Hazyview. African masked weavers (birds) in the tree at the hotel. (-25.0774751,31.109405) For the day's details see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/42733.html .
Next day. A Swazi warrior (performer) in the Matsamo Cultural Village. Beautiful music and wild traditional dances. (-25.7499936,31.4672891)
A large herd of cape buffalo. A male elephant scratching behind his ear.
Kruger National Park. ( -24.9550391,31.713738 )
For details of the Kruger visit see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/42998.html .
Kruger National Park. Box lunch provided by the tour.
Elephant detail. A female lion. Another female lion.
Kruger National Park
Kruger National Park. Cheetah cubs! The entire family of a mother and three cubs was there just as we drove up. The mother and one cub took off running before Ron could get his camera up. Then they were all gone.
Kruger National Park. Spotted hyena exhausted after a hard night. These dog size animals have the strongest jaws in the animal kingdom.
A rhino family ("crash") at some distance.
Impala. Zebra.
Kruger National Park. A male lion. The only one on this trip. Hidden nicely in the trees. There was a female with him that was barely visible.
Tawny eagle. Hippo. A steenbok. They only get 24" tall.
Egyptian goose family.
Hippos with Nile crocodiles behind.
Baboon. Road block. [baboon and impala]
Kruger National Park. Ron and Carol's transport in the park.
Bourke's Luck Potholes. Amazing geological site. Just part of the potholes. For scale note the railing top right. (-24.6740501,30.808589) For this day's details see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/43028.html .
Blyde River Canyon. Third largest canyon on earth, following Grand Canyon and Fish River. (-24.5727737,30.7977654)
Johannesburg Zoo with the city behind. Next day. The zoo is huge and world class. Where most zoos have one or two animals in a field, they had full herds. (-26.1665352,28.035446) For details of the day in Johannesburg see Carol's blog at: https://carolbuckles.livejournal.com/43365.html .
Johannesburg Zoo. Not native in SA, a Siberian tiger.
Johannesburg - 11 Diagonal Street. Interesting building downtown designed to reflect the other buildings in the mirrored glass. (-26.2042868,28.0351495)