South Africa - Blyde River Canyon Nature Reserve

Our second full day in South Africa would be spent in the Blyde River Canyon Nature Reserve area. 

We ate breakfast at Hippo Hollow Resort. We used the morning light to take a few pictures of the lovely resort. Claude is locking the door to our home-away-from-home for two nights. These little huts are arranged in a circle with all their patio areas facing the center grassy area. They each have a patio with a grill. Inside is a small kitchen, a nice bathroom, and a big bedroom. Nice place to stay.

After breakfast we all boarded the bus and were off to the Blyde River Canyon Nature Reserve. Our first stop would be at God's Window. These are pictures of the drive to God's Window.

The first two pictures are of the forestry industry in South Africa. We passed at least two paper mills located in areas with no timber. The question...how do you have paper mills with no forests around. The answer...they have a very well run forestry operation of pine trees and eucalyptus trees. They are well controlled in planting and harvesting. Interestingly, the pine trees must be cut down completely, then the stumps burned to replant. All trees are planted individually by hand. The eucalyptus trees only need to be cut down and the new trees grow from the stumps. 

While driving through a town, Beatrice stopped the bus, Alan got out and ran to a tree on the side of the road. This was to show us the Kings Protea which is the flower of South Africa.  

When we arrived at God's Window, our first stop, Alan made quick friends with a group of teens. In this picture they are all jumping up and yelling "Africa" together. Alan does this every where in the world we have traveled with him. He knows no stranger and he loves people everywhere.

God's Window is a beautiful spot. From the top of the cliff on a clear day you can see all the way to Mozambique across Kruger National Park. Amazing view. The neat thing about this view is that it was in a movie. There was a delightful little movie named "The God's Must Be Crazy". In it a Coke bottle is dropped from an airplane and the bush people find it. It is considered a gift from the gods since it came from the air. It is found to be a great tool. Problem...there is only one Coke bottle for the entire village. This causes trouble among the people of the village so the little bushman determines to take it and throw it off the edge of the earth. At the end of the movie the bushman comes to the edge of the world and tosses the bottle. This scene was filmed at God's Window. Here are pictures of the walk out to God's Window and views from the two lookouts there.

Back on the bus for the ride to the Three Rondavels. It was fascinating to watch the lay of the land change.

A rondavel is a traditional circular dwelling with a conical thatched roof. The Three Rondavels are three mountains that appear to be the process of making this circular dwelling with a conical roof. The one on the right is the finished product. 

There is a beautiful lake in this location.

These are pictures of some of the vegetation in this area. The last two pictures are the Coral Tree. We were traveling to South Africa at the end of their winter. These trees were just blooming across the country. So bright and beautiful.

Back on the bus and then the drive to Lisbon Falls.

Lisbon Falls was discovered by a man from Portugal. His home town was Lisbon. Hence, the name Lisbon Falls. 

Our next stop was Graskop Gorge. This was the closest we came to a jungle. There is an elevator to take you close to the bottom. Then there is a trail, wooden walking paths and two hanging bridges to get you across the stream, up the other side a bit, then back across the stream, and up to the elevator. It was a fun walk. Once again we noticed that, when there is a hanging bridge with a sign at the end that says 'no jumping', it is treated by many to be an invitation to jump on said hanging bridge. It is important to not walk on the bridge till these fools are finished with their foolishness. I am also quite amused at the WiFi at the bottom of the gorge in the rocks. When we were in a cave once, there were WiFi spots set up in that cave. Isn't it amazing that we can't just leave that need for WiFi until we get out of these amazing place? 

At the top of the cliff was a frame structure. From these you could pay to bungy jump off the cliff or zip line off the cliff. We had several in our group that chose to do this. Here is a picture of the cliff, the building on top from which one would jump or zip line and a picture of someone hanging from the rope after bungy jumping and another in our group on the zip line. 

This was actually a great thing for them to do. We were to have headed back to Hippo Hollow to visit an elephant sanctuary where we would visit elephants up close and personal. These elephants were injured and needed to be rehabilitated and would never be able to go back in the wild. It turns out that while visiting our sites this day, one of the elephants was injured and died. Elephants are very clever people and develop bonds with each other not unlike humans do. The other elephants were grieving the loss of their friend and they were not allowing visitors for a week. Since we couldn't visit and ride elephants, bungy jumping seemed to fill that need for some and was amusing for those of us not inclined to jump off cliffs or hang on ropes over cliffs.

After our hiking in the Graskop Gorge, we drove to Graskop for a bite to eat. We all dined at Harrie's. Love the local way to say and spell pancake. These are like crepes but thicker. They come filled with something savory or something sweet. We opted to order a savory and a sweet and share. Our savory choice was something like barbequed pork. The sweet was filled with an apple filled. They were both yummy. 

Then we wandered to a store down the street to purchase a book with pictures of animals in Kruger National Park. We were able to pick up souvenirs for our great grandmonsters and two of our grandmonsters. Souvenir shopping this trip was meager at best and that was just fine. Claude also found an impala skin that he was sure had a slimming effect on him!!

When we got back to our room, there were fresh flowers on our bed. Never have had the hotel leave fresh flowers on our bed. It was nice. We had the afternoon to repack the suitcases and ready ourselves for the next three days of safari in Kruger National Park.

This day I also took a couple of pictures of things I like to remember. I usually take a pictures of a local license plate. This one was from our bus. Also the bus windows had warnings on some of them. I liked seeing the English and the Afrikaan. 

After a nice dinner, we set our alarms for an early hour and tried to get some sleep.