All in the game, except for the cat

February 19, 2006|Laura Hambleton, Globe Correspondent

HLUHLUWE, South Africa -- Stalking the elusive leopard in South Africa is a fine art that requires being in a game preserve in the right season, at the right time of day, and in the company of the right guide.

And yet with all those variables in alignment, sometimes luck is the most important -- and most elusive. At least that has been our experience in the two years we have scouted this country's game preserves, from the large to the small. We have gone in winter, spring, summer, and fall; at night, in the predawn light, and in the heat of midday; accompanied by rangers who have a lot to say and others who barely speak.

But we have had no luck.

That doesn't keep us from persisting. Along the way, my husband, three children, and I have discovered parks well worth visiting that are much less well known than Kruger National Park, South Africa's best-stocked preserve and, coincidentally, the size of Wales.

In our travels, we have ticked off four of the big five game (a term once used to describe the most dangerous animals to hunt): water buffalo, rhinoceros, elephant, and lion. But, alas, not the leopard. We have woken to giraffes snatching leaves from treetops outside our tent and black-backed jackals chasing blue wildebeests in Ithala Game Reserve. We waited nearly 30 minutes as a male white rhino tried to mount a female standing with her calf before she grunted him away in Hluhluwe-Umfolozi Game Reserve.

In Hluhluwe, alongside our safari truck, a male dung beetle pushed a perfectly spherical ball of dung while his mate held on for a ride. A herd of elephants charged our car in Pilanesberg National Park, and we were watched by the yellowish eyes of bush babies clustered in trees on a night drive in Marakele National Park.

The terrain of the smaller parks is fertile and intimate. Often, we were alone on the road in our car or in a park safari truck. Kruger may offer the greatest concentration of animals and one of the widest ranges of geographic diversity in southern Africa, but the price, especially in the southern region of the park, is crowds.

During our first trip to Kruger, the night drives at Skukuza, the park's largest rest camp and administrative headquarters, were booked well in advance -- and we were shut out for the three days we were there.

As a result, we muscled our way through the roads, neck and neck with other game viewers. A later trip to the far reaches of the northern section of Kruger at Shingwedzi rest camp proved more fruitful and enjoyable -- and a lot less crowded. In addition, high-end lodges have sprung up along the western boundary of the park, offering more tailored tours, less frenzied game viewing, and near-guarantees of sightings.