.. if there is such a thing as travel karma (and i do believe there is…) then i had a heavy dose of it on reaching Kruger National Park. After going almost to the end of the world in argentina and chile for some big, big scenery fixes only to be knocked back by the elements… the two days spent in Kruger more than made up for previous disappointments.
.. the challenge in Kruger (apart from getting your new fangled digital SLR on the right setting from the get go.. animals don’t tend to wait), is to clock up sightings of the ‘big five’… the traditional BIG prizes in game hunting… lion, leopard, elephant, buffalo and rhino. 
two hours in and we had already notched up two of them… a couple of crusty old buffalo (their horns really do make them look like they are having a permanent bad hair day), and a really big herd of elephants which were way too up close and personal for me, we narrowly avoided getting boxed in by them… it doesn’t help when a friend has had an all too recent, extremely scary experience with a charging elephant.. (forget cute little Dumbo… these fellas are huge), so with the first sight of flapping ears i decided i had seen enough and was subsequently immortalized on video panic stricken trying to convince our guide Adrian that it really would be a good idea to move on…. Adrian (who i suspect has considerably more experience of elephants than i have), remained calm and eventually reassured me that the warning signs are pretty clear and all was fine…. but needless to say i have been living that one down ever since!!
LaRebe 