We’re on a wonderful road trip and have reached as far north as we can go in South Africa: the lovely Limpopo River. We’re staying at Mapungubwe National Park – and it’s hot.
It feels as if we’ve moved from the Southern Cape winter straight into summer. Shorts, slipslops and curtains closed at the Leokwe camp cottages to keep out the heat. I love the bushveld, its endless undisturbed vegetation and the big silence. No cell phone reception or wifi here so nothing to detract from the experience. They’ve had stacks of rain recently and the veld is lush. Trees, shrubs and grass are all green. My sister Julie – Action Ads’ owner – was amazed to see how Mapungubwe had changed since she was here just a year ago. At a viewing deck high above the Limpopo she remarked: “Last year this was all brown and rough and now it’s like green velvet.” Poking out of the velvet plain below were two huge baobab trees, which can live for hundreds of years. In dry periods elephants dig into baobab trees with their tusks to get at the moisture in their porous trunks. Over time this can kill the trees. To prevent this, park staff have covered some of the baobab trunks with chicken-wire, wound tightly against the bark, so ellies can’t dig into them. Simple but clever. We’ve seen so many birds and animals today. As I was sipping my morning coffee, I was excited to see a purple roller perched above the Landy. We don’t get them down south. Then vervet monkeys crept up to our widows to see what was for breakfast – but we’re too wily for them and they got nothing. Next the kudu we had seen bedding down in the grass not far from our cottage last evening, stirred in the early sunlight and started to browse on the trees. It’s great to drive along Mapungubwe’s roads that twist through magnificent, orange-red sandstone hills and cliffs that rise up from the green veld. There are cracks and tiny caves in the sandstone where dassies have made their homes, easy to spot because of the white streaks on the rocks from dassie urine. There were herds of fat impala, blue wildebeest and zebra, many with foals, and some klipspringers. Plenty of foraging baboons, elephants eating or taking a mud bath and just one giraffe. There are viewing decks built high above the confluence of Botswana’s Shashe River and the Limpopo, a breathtaking sight. The Shashe meanders around huge flat sandbanks where I thought hippo were sunning themselves, but after a squizz through the binoculars I saw they were cattle on the Botswana side. Although on our side we have to stay in our vehicles apart from designated alighting spots, we saw people wandering all over the Botswana river bank, some carrying nets out for a day’s fishing. Driving along the river road we saw very fresh elephant dung, some very small blobs, and were lucky to catch up with them – a female with her teenager and baby. What a special sight. The moment they turned into the riverine bush they were invisible. I have not even touched on Mapungubwe’s fascinating history and archaeology. Next week!
