Safari!

One of the coolest things I did in Africa was a Safari up in Kruger National Park. There were two trips to Kruger, they were the same safari, and the only difference was the accommodations, Explorer and Deluxe. I ended up in the Deluxe accommodations, and I learned that I am not a deluxe person, I am much more of an Explorer. One of the guys on my trip ordered a bottle of champaign with our gourmet lunch... that is not my kind of traveling, but it was good to experience that too, it made me realize that I like tents and campfires better then champaign and 18 hole golf courses. But anyway onto the cool part, the Safari.
We had a game driver named Happy, he was incredibly, well, happy. The head game driver was an amazing character, try to picture this man; a bushy grey beard, a strong South African / Australian accent, he wore a floppy wide brimmed hat and a khaki button-down and shorts. to top it all off he had a peg leg, a legit, pirate looking peg leg, and that is the leg he used for the gas and brakes! I was blown away by what stories this man must have, and I was even more amazed when he pulled out a pipe and started smoking it. Anyway we pulled into the park and the first thing we see is the most rare sight in the park, the Leopard. Not only did we see it in the first 10 minutes, but we saw it leap out of the bushes and attack a wild boor. It missed the boor but it was still amazing. After that we were pumped for the next two days. We saw everything we could want to see, the big five, which are the 5 most dangerous animals: the lion, elephant, buffalo, rhino, and leopard. We saw giraffe, zebra, impalas, hippos, monkeys, baboons. Literally everything a zoo would have, but they were in their natural environment. I was is a game truck with a bunch of people who were avid birders, which was actually really good, because it gave us stuff to look at when we could not find any big game, I saw dozens of birds, my personal favorite was the lilac breasted roller. The way a safari works is pretty cool, anyone can actually drive through the park, and no one is allowed to drive off of the roads and paths, which at first I thought would make it not as cool as a private game reserve, but it was amazing because all the animals come right up to the road anyway. All the drivers have radios so that when one finds something cool they can call and make sure everyone gets there. It was just like the safari drive at Disney, seriously Disney does a great job.
One of the major issues in the park and in all of Africa right now is poaching, not of elephants but of rhinos, since their horns are thought to be an aphrodisiac and panacea in Asiatic countries. In fact while we were there they found two rhinos who were killed. It is a sad thing, but one rhino horn can bring in over 100,000 US dollars, and that makes it a very attractive option for many people. It is a very risky thing to do though because there is a shoot to kill policy when the army finds a poacher. Thats right, they brought in the army to patrol for poachers. The Safari was by far the coolest thing I did, but it is not the most important thing to talk about, tune in tomorrow-ish, same place, same-ish time for a commentary about post apartheid race relations. Take care.