Unexcused Absences Entabeni Park, South Africa (he said)

Entabeni Park, South Africa (he said)

by Kent 12 Jan 2012

This post may set a new record for tardiness, but hopefully the photos are worth the wait. A company called Legend Lodges runs a series of resorts and game parks in South Africa, and we had the privilege of staying at the Wildside Safari Camp at the Entabeni Conservancy with Heather’s family.

Elephant herd under the escarpment

Before traveling to South Africa I was a bit dubious of these “managed” game parks, which I figured (in my ignorance) were just one step better than a zoo. But the reality was night-and-day better than what I expected. There is very little truly “wild” Africa remaining (due to poaching, development, mining, etc.), so these private game parks recreate a natural food chain of native animals in a contained (but enormous) area. Entabeni is definitely no zoo; the park’s five ecosystems support ruminants with thousands of acres of grassland to graze; the lions kill ruminants and other park animals for food; and scavengers and vultures live off the remains.

The camp is an all-inclusive arrangement. Three tasty buffet meals a day, snacks, a communal fire pit (it gets cold in Africa once the sun goes down), gorgeous tent “rooms”, and multiple safari options round out the experience. Couple all that with a first-class staff, including highly-trained rangers, and I cannot recommend a visit highly enough. It was not cheap (~$500 for the two of us for a 24 hour stay), but then again you can easily pay that much for a day at a resort where the most cherished activity is sitting in a chaise lounge by a pool while a waiter brings you tropical drinks at $18 a pop, meals not included.

Our stay included a multi-hour afternoon safari drive (with happy hour drinks and snacks included), and another multi-hour safari drive early the next morning before breakfast. We were in Africa in their late spring/early summer, so we had the benefit of timing our visit with the appearance of many baby animals; another good time to visit is during their winter, when the thinning vegetation allows visitors to see animals from farther away.