Detailed review by hannibal
hannibal(48)
England, United Kingdom98%
Kruger is surely the most famous of the South African wildlife parks and one of the most famous in the whole of Africa (though possibly the Serengeti might challenge that). Kruger was the final park of our 2 week trip in Southern Africa and the last which we visited. I think this was well planned by the trip organisers as some of the other parks might have seemed less impressive if we'd been to Kruger first.
We spent three days and two nights there and found it to be an extraordinarily 'organised' park where everything worked, all the places were well signposted and there were lots of facilities. This wasn't what we'd been used to in the other parks and came as quite a surprise. On the downside, we went from the peace and quiet of spending nights in basic but almost empty campsites to the culture shock of the Kruger's well-equipped but far too busy sites. Whilst it's quite a novelty to find restaurants, shops, bars and even toilets and showers that work properly, the price you pay for all these conveniences is being far too close to other people and losing the sense of quiet. It's fair to say you don't have to 'rough it' in the Kruger.
The wildlife is exceptional and you have a pretty good chance of seeing a large number of top notch animals. Whilst I didn't get a good clear photo of a rhino throughout our trip, I certainly got far more shots of rather more of the rhino than I'd achieved elsewhere. I still don't know how such big animals are so good at hiding in grass! Another highlight was watching two male giraffes indulging in the most silly fighting of the animal world, belting one another with their necks. A real case of 'this is going to hurt me just as much as it hurts you'. Elephants were seen in great numbers, often with their young. We very much enjoyed the adults hiding their little friends from the intrusion of the cameras. Our finest find was a group of female lions and their cubs playing and prowling in the grasses close to the roadside. Birdlife was also excellent with big hornbills, and vultures and many other types I couldn't identify. And with something like 500 species of birds, it wasn't hard to find something you'd not seen before.
On our second evening we made an organised night drive around the area surrounding out campsite. It was cold, hard to see much and quite difficult to understand what we DID see, but the guide was very excited by our rare sighting of a civet cat.
I'm glad we went to Kruger, impressed at what a well-run park it was, but it's not my favourite because of the slightly 'Disneyland' feel of the place. It's just so commercial and so full of visitors (even in the middle of the South African winter) that it can feel a bit like you are very unlikely to have any experience that you won't be sharing with half a dozen other vehicles.
Kruger National Park10
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