Well, I will be absolutely honest about our thoughts on our “sunrise game drive” – it was awful. We got up bleary eyed at 3.30am, very quickly dressed and brushed our teeth, then walked to the meeting point ready for our drive. We knew it would be cold, so we wore our jackets and long trousers, but just how cold, we did not anticipate! It was bloody freezing! We were chilled to the bone, sitting in an open vehicle for 3 hours, over half of it in the dark, and with very little to see. Why they decided to set off so early we have absolutely no idea as most of the animals were asleep, and in retrospect we wished we were too. We only saw one animal that we hadn’t already seen. It was like a miniature deer, called a springbok. Other than that the viewing were very few and far between. To top it all the rain started shortly after we set off, which made it even colder.

So if you are wondering if we would recommend a sunrise game drive, based only on our experience this morning we wouldn’t choose to do one again that starts that early (in contrast, the one we did at Africa on Foot that started at 6.30am – as the sun was rising – was very good and we saw more). There was a chalk board at the camp when we arrived listing the wildlife sightings the previous day on both the sunrise and sunset game drives, and it was already apparent that a sunset drive was likely to be better. However, we arrived too late to change it. Fortunately we did manage to get them to swop our sunrise drive at Skukuza for a sunset one (this is tomorrow). It is worth mentioning that the other 2 camps we stayed in started their sunrise drives at 5.30am!

On return from our very early game drive, we went back to bed for an hour and then up for a shower and breakfast. All the bungalows we have booked here are self catering so we can make breakfast and a packed lunch up. Yesterday we had our evening meal in the camp’s restaurant and we plan to do this again tonight after the game drive. The food is good and cheap too.

We set off just before 10am for our next stop, Satara. The wildlife viewing en-route was better today, and a bit more frequent, but still not what we expected after seeing so many YouTube videos. It’s not a case of seeing something every few minutes, you can drive quite a while in between sightings. And it feels very safe (again unlike some YouTube videos). The roads are also very quiet, you don’t see a lot of other cars at all.

The wildlife we saw en-route today included elephants, giraffes, tortoises, eagles, impalas, wildebeests, buffalo. Unfortunately we missed a couple of lions. We stopped to try to see them (that’s the only time you see many cars together on the roadside) but we just couldn’t spot them. It had been another driver a few kilometres earlier who wound down his window and told us there were a pair of male lions a few kilometres up the road, and we knew where to stop due to the number of cars parked up, but you can’t exactly just get out of your car to look or to ask other drivers if they can see them. So after 20 minutes or so we gave up and drove on.

Now we are settled in at camp, ready soon for our game drive at 4.30pm, fortunately this time it’s a sunset one. The rain stayed on most of the day – it seems we brought the Scottish weather over with us today! If you come on safari here, make sure you bring waterproofs and warm clothing! Anyway, the rain has eased off now at least. It’s still cold, so we are prepared this time, we are taking our ponchos and a thick blanket from the room to put over us. More later…

We are now back from our game drive. The rain came back on, heavy at times, and the seats were all wet from earlier rain. Even with the blanket, it was still freezing cold. We never expected it to be anywhere near as cold as today has been. The safari vehicles here are pretty big, seats 2×2 and a row of 5 at the back, it’s like a converted Bedford truck similar to the ones Exodus used to use for their overland trips. This time the truck was full, so it made it a bit harder to see and photograph the wildlife.

On the plus side, we saw some pretty awesome wildlife on this trip – lionesses with cubs, a leopard, vultures, an owl, cute baby elephants and more. As it has been wet and overcast today, it got dark early, so at least half of the drive was in the dark using torchlight. The leopard and lion cubs were the highlights, and the person who spotted the leopard must have amazing eyesight as it was so well camouflaged.

It had been our intention to get pizza when we got back from the drive, but the pizzeria closed a half hour before we returned and the restaurant was jam packed. I also had a pretty bad headache by then, so we just came back to our bungalow and had wine & Pringles for dinner! The kitchen is an outdoor one and it was too cold to stay outside to cook and eat.

So now it’s almost time for an early night, and a lie in ( at least compared to today’s early start!) Looking forward to sleeping past 3.30am!

Last night was the first (and I hope only) night we have experienced a bat flying around like a kamikaze in our bedroom! We had taken the torch to bed, and when I awoke to hear something hitting against our mosquito net, I shone the torch and we eventually realised that it was a bat that was “bouncing” off our mosquito net! Jeez we have never been so glad to have a mosquito net over our bed!

It was a bit unfortunate this morning that our bush walk was replaced by a game drive. This was apparently due to the wind, as it was quite windy the guide said it can be dangerous as the wind carries the human scent and could result in an attack if certain animals were to pick up our scents.

However, the game drive was good, and we saw a huge pack of African wild dogs, along with their pups. It is apparently quite hard to see these animals, so we were lucky.

Later we got up close to a pair of white rhinos.

On foot it is highly unlikely we would have seen either, so that was a good consolation.

After breakfast, we drove on to Kruger, about 2 hours driving. Then within the park a slow drive to Olifants Rest Camp to overnight. To be honest we actually saw more concentrated wildlife in Hoedspruit and Klaserie, as Kruger is huge. But today we saw kudu, impalas, an elephant, giraffes, warthog, birds (including an eagle) and monkeys.

On checking in at Olifants we were shocked to find out that our “sunrise game drive” starts at 4am and we have to meet at 3.45am! The sun doesn’t actually rise until around 6-ish, so it will be mostly by torchlight…. we are due back at 7am; might try to get more sleep but will probably just push through and have an early night tonight and tomorrow.

The views are great from Olifants, one of the reasons we chose to have a night here. We went out for dinner and sat on the restaurant balcony over-looking the river as the sun went down (unfortunately the sun doesn’t set over the river – that would have been awesome!)

Now we are just sitting on the terrace of our bungalow, having a couple of drinks before settling in for an early night.

Today is our 26th wedding anniversary! We enjoyed a relaxing morning, again watching the wildlife in our garden. This morning the monkeys came to visit, about half a dozen of them. They were eating the bird food from the bird feeding trays! Cheeky wee things… one even came up to the kitchen window to try its luck at getting into the house! Luckily, when we saw them arrive, we had secured all the windows and doors. It was a pleasure to watch them just making themselves at home in the garden.

We were able to check out later as there is no-one booked in after us, so we left just after 11am and headed to our next stop, “Africa on Foot” in Klaserie game reserve. All went well, and it was easy enough to follow the directions they had given. The dirt road, once we left the tarmac, was rather challenging, but we made it!

We arrived about an hour before lunch, and Paul tried the (unheated) swimming pool (albeit a very brief swim!)

Lunch was lovely and we got speaking to the other guests and some of the staff. Everyone staying here tonight was from Europe – UK (us), France, Switzerland, Germany & Italy.

At 4pm we started our evening game drive, using 2 vehicles, so it was only 6 people per vehicle which made for easy game viewing.

During the drive we passed through a herd of elephants; they were grazing on either side of the road.

Our driver got a call to alert him that some lions had been spotted, albeit about 45 mins away. He headed out there at speed, which was a bit crazy – over lumps and bumps on the roads.

Finally we got to near where the pair of lions had been spotted. We had to wait for a while as the policy was to only allow 2 vehicles. When we got to the lions they were mating, which is apparently a pretty rare thing to see. We felt very lucky. We got to watch them for a while, before heading back to camp. Our sundowner drinks were taken whilst driving, as we had lost a bit of time heading out to see the lions (this was of course no hardship!)

Dinner was served, like lunch, at one big table. It was nice and sociable to chat to the other guests. We finished off with drinks around the campfire. Tomorrow is an early start, 6am wake up for a 6.30am bush / safari walk.

We had a fantastic day today; it was both relaxing, yet exciting. During the night we heard what we thought (and later confirmed) were monkeys running along the roof of our bedroom. We had to get up and double check that we had secured all the doors, as apparently they can reek havoc if they get indoors.

We awoke early and enjoyed watching the birds and squirrels in the garden. We even had a visit from a deer and one of the warthogs!

Our room has both an indoor and outdoor shower, so we enjoyed showering outdoors, a novel experience.

There are several kilometres of trails within the reserve, and as there are no dangerous animals, you are allowed to walk, cycle or drive. We chose to drive to cover more ground. The trails are just dirt tracks, and you get very close to the animals. We saw antelopes, zebra, monkeys, giraffes and more. At one point there were 2 giraffes, we think they were doing some kind of mating, right on the roadside. We waited ages to see if they moved, but they didn’t. So we tentatively got out and took a walk towards them; they were not bothered by us at all. Eventually we decided to risk driving past them to continue onwards to the zebra we could see just a couple of hundred metres on.

In the afternoon we relaxed in the garden, and dipped out feet in the swimming pool (it wasn’t heated, so we didn’t brave going fully in!) Its such a beautiful place to relax, we really love it here.

As evening came we lit a camp fire in the boma; it was serene.

We were recommended to give ourselves a good 6 hours for this journey with stops. The actual driving time is around 2 hours, but there are many scenic places you can stop en-route. None of the walks to the view points are long.

It’s a bit difficult to find out exactly where the Panorama Route starts and ends, different websites tell you different things. I would say it is fair to say that from Sabie to the Three Rondavels is about right. Had we done as originally planned and travelled to a Sabie via Dullstroom and the Long Tom Pass, I’d say it starts on the Long Tom Pass. However, yesterday we were so tired after the flight, and locals had said that both the route to Dullstroom and the Pass was very pot-holed, that we ended up driving on the main highways, so we missed that bit.

At almost all the stops, including view points, you have to pay an entrance fee. These varied from 10 rand to 64 rand pp for the stops we made. Had the Graskop Gorge glass lift and nature trail been operating, this would have been 190 rand pp plus another 20 rand conservation fee. However, it was closed, so we didn’t stop there. Some places were worth paying for the view, some were most definitely not.

If you come from a country which has plentiful waterfalls, I would not recommend paying to stop at all of the falls on the route. Probably Mac Mac Falls was best, although you can only look from a distance and you can’t get to the bottom of them, but the view was pretty. That said we are here in September, at the end of the dry season, so it could be very different at other times of the year.

In our opinion, we’d say definitely give Mac Mac Pools a miss, unless you want to swim in them. This was the most underwhelming stop we made.

We would recommend the following stops – Mac Mac Falls, God’s window, Bourde’s Luck Potholes and the three Rondavels.

For lunch we went to Potluck Boskombuis, a lovely spot by the river. You kind of feel as if you are driving towards nowhere on the way, but it was a nice spot. Most of the food is barbecued as you order, but they did have a vegetarian dish on offer, which I had.

On arrival at Hoedspruit we were met by the manager of our Airbnb lodge (we booked to stay at Pangolin Lodge in Hoedspruit Wildlife Estate). This is a beautiful place, and we would highly recommend it. Have a look at the link here.

Now we are chilling on the veranda. It is warmer here than in Sabie, and a comfortable temperature for sitting outdoors in the evening.

It finally came the time to pack up and get ready to leave North Uist on the ferry from Lochmaddy to Uig on Skye. We were fortunate that we had a nice clam dry day and no wind, so packing up was a fairly easy, albeit lengthy process. The problem with having the bigger tent and electric hook up, is all the extra gear you take to make it more comfortable, and on top of that we had our inflatable canoe.

So once we had managed to squeeze everything into the car, we had about 40 minutes spare on arrival at Lochmaddy for a look around and to enjoy a little bit of sun that had come out. The water was incredibly calm, and a couple of canoeists were out, we thought it would have been a great place to canoe had we had time.

The tiny village has a tiny yacht marina, very cute, with maybe about 6 or 8 yachts in. As we left on the ferry, the clouds rolled in, but this time we were heading towards the sun!

The trip over to Uig was beautiful, the views extended far out to all the surrounding islands, the Cuillins on Skye were clearly visible from miles away and the sea was so flat!

We were super excited as we neared Uig (about 20 minutes out) and a pod of around 15-20 porpoises were enjoying themselves in the water right beside the ferry! One of our fellow passengers said they would likely be fishing. It was such a treat to watch them!

Driving through Skye & Glencoe on the way home was a rare treat, with hardly a cloud in sight. We made a few stops for photos and drone footage.

As we neared Fort William we also got lovely clear views of Ben Nevis. It was a great end to the trip, to enjoy such a beautiful drive back home.

We hadn’t made dinner plans, so a stop at our local Wetherspoons pub for pizza sorted us out before we finally got home. Half our stuff is still in the car needing to be unloaded tomorrow & sorted for our next trip, wherever that might be….

Well, Friday was once again pretty dull and very overcast, with quite a lot of what we call “Scotch mist” that rolled in from the sea. Time was running out waiting for good weather to see the islands at their best, so we chose to head to South Uist and Eriskay, and save North Uist and a return to Berneray for Saturday in the hope of getting brighter weather than we got that last time.

The day started out not too bad on Friday, but quickly the mists rolled in. We managed to see quite a lot of Eriskay (where we headed to first) before the weather got really bad. It’s a small but very beautiful island, with some gorgeous white sand beaches and turquoise seas typical of the Outer Herbrides. Unfortunately one of its most famous beaches, the one where Bonnie Prince Charlie landed, was almost completely wiped out with a sea mist, so we had to use our imagination as to what it would be like on a nice day.

We took lunch at the Politician pub, it’s a lovely place in a lovely setting. The pub is named after the ship “SS Politician” which went down off the coast of Eriskay, along with, among other things, several thousand crates of whiskey – if you have seen the old movie “Whiskey Galore” this is what it was based on!

After crossing the causeway back onto South Uist, we spotted some of the semi-wild ponies, a beautiful sight, just as if they were posing for us to take their picture!

Further into South Uist, we had planned to visit a few of the 20 kilometre worth of beaches along the islands west coast, however after visiting the first couple, we realised there was really nothing to see (yes, the good old “Scotch mist” was still lingering…) We took a small detour towards the east, which is mainly moorland and lochs, and although still very overcast, there was at least something to see.

Back at the campsite we had another night of having to keep reinflating our aerobed every couple of hours, as the duct tape unfortunately didn’t work!

On Saturday, finally the weather picked up! Yippee! We actually had a reasonable amount of sunny spells during our 2nd trip around North Uist and Berneray. Better still, we managed to get out in our canoe. We were both surprised that the water wasn’t actually that cold. However, the air temperature / wind chill was, so we were glad of some warm clothing as we canoed.

Clachan Sands aerial shot from drone

Canoeing, Clachan Sands

A couple of beaches we think are particularly worth a visit are Traigh Ear (walk up to the big sand dune that you can see in the distance for beautiful and far reaching views) and Clachan Sands (coming from the south wait to take the 2nd sign to the sands, the one that goes past the graveyard). Clachan Sands was where we chose to canoe. The only annoying thing there (and in quite a few places) were the flies that keep landing on you (and it felt like some had bitten) and flying into your face. However, during our 8 days we have seen NO MIDGES AT ALL…

On Berneray the West Beach is a must, 3 miles of white sand and dunes. Watch out for the bull in the field that you cross to get there!

We had dinner at the Westford Inn on our way back as we wanted to just chill out for our last night, and also pack away a few things to make it easier in the morning. Their fish and chips were very nice! No room to try a dessert though…

Now we are just sitting in our tent with some wine, partially packed, aerobed now (hopefully) fixed with a bicycle repair kit that Paul found. No WiFi from the tent as we took a quieter out of the way pitch, but I will try to get this posted when we venture up to the facilities block later on.

Tomorrow, we go home the long way, taking the ferry to Uig on Skye and driving home from there. The ferry time was much better doing it this way (11am check in as opposed to something like 6am!) We didn’t fancy trying to pack our camping gear away when it was still dark, so it seemed like the best idea.