South Africa: Rocktail Beach Camp & Phinda Forest Lodge
Rocktail Beach Camp and Phinda Forest Lodge
March 15th-28th 2017
Merrill O
This years March adventure took us to South Africa but on our way there we had a long layover in Frankfurt, Germany where we got to hit up up several museums including, the Historisches, Dommuseum, Fotografie Forum & Museum Judengasse.
We had another "short" flight into Johannesburg. After dropping off our bags, we went off to the Sterkfontein Caves and the Cradle of Humankind Museum where they found some of the earliest humanoid remains. Lastly, we got a driving tour of Johannesburg before catching up on some much needed sleep.
The next day we drove from Johannesburg to Rocktail Beach camp which it was an adventure. Dirt roads, hairpin turns, and a lack of gaurdrails that is starting to become a theme. At the end we raced against the setting sun to get in the gates before they closed and we were locked out for the night. Luckily we made it and all was well.
Diving was done with Mokarran Dive Charters. Sam and Jacque were our guides for the dives with Captain Daryl. Getting into the boat was always an enjoyment as we were going out via rubber sided zodiacs. The dives were good, the only complaint is we were only able to do 5/8 due to winds and general conditions. (They can only offer two dives per day due to tides). However we did see dolphins that we got to snorkel with during a surface interval so that almost makes up for it. While it was not as much diving as some of the other dive places I've gone, there was still plenty of interesting things to do between dives. The offered nature walks, scorpion hunts, and a visit to Lake Sibay, a very large freshwater lake, with hippos and crocodiles. (We only saw the nose of hippo and no crocs).
Pineapple Reef
58’ for 61 minutes
79°
Elusive
64’ for 62 minutes
79°
Aerial
50’ for 67 minutes
79°
Gogo’s (Granny’s)
58’ for 68 minutes
79°
Elusive
60’ for 62 minutes
79°
Safari
After that we traveled to Phinda Forest Lodge, where the cabin we stayed in, was larger than my apartment back home. We did two game drives each day (only one the day we arrived and the day we left), but saw very cool animals on pretty much every drive. Unfortunately, we missed seeing a leopard, the only one of the Big 5 that we missed, but followed some tracks for quite some time. Highlights were being arms reach of both cheetah cubs and a lion, as well as hearing/watching a lioness eating a warthog while her sister stalked her and tried to steal it from her. (All in grass taller than them. Sometimes you could see them sometimes not, but could hear them, and the crunching of bones at night.)
