South Africa - Wednesday, December 2

This morning we headed off to Addo Elephant National Park, less than a two-hour drive to the northeast. Our first stop was at the grocery store, Pick ‘n Pay, to get lunch snacks for the day. I was giddy with excitement because it was an actual store with great lighting, wide aisles, regular shopping carts, and just about everything you need. The groceries may not be American, but the South African equivalents are pretty close. After living in Cairo for the past six weeks, this seems rather luxurious. In fact, everything I’ve seen so far in South Africa is cleaner and more modern. When you get out closer to the townships, you can tell there is more poverty, trash, and filth, but we don’t go there.

Anyway, Addo Elephant National Park is a massive drive-through reserve. It is large enough to support lions, which are free-roaming here, but we never saw them. We did get to see a herd of buffalo, warthog, kudu, bushbuck, red hartebeest, eland, leopard tortoise, the rare flightless dung beetle, and about 50 elephants. It is amazing to be driving along right next to the animals. What an experience!

baby elephant on side of road

 

Raymond living dangerously

 dead Cape Buffalo

On the way home, Dorothy wanted to try and find taco sauce (nearly impossible here), so we stopped at Pick ‘n Pay Hyper, their Wal-Mart equivalent. This store had 40 checkout lines and was bigger than the Wal-Mart in Orem! Alas, no hot sauce, but we still attempted to make burritos with the green chilis I brought from home. Not quite the same, but good enough. After gulping down a delicious strawberry shortcake for dessert, Raymond had to head out for a High Council meeting, so Dorothy and I stayed behind and played—you guessed it—Hand and Foot. Her final score was more than double mine, so she was pretty happy. When Raymond got home, we played Shanghai and I got them both back by winning by a hefty margin!