Border Run to Hlane Game Park, Swaziland

One would think that having purchased a 6 month multi-entry visa to stay in Mozambique would allow us to do just that. Well it does except they have set a law requiring us to leave and re-enter each 30 days. This really wouldn’t be that big a deal since we are only a couple hours from both South Africa and Swaziland with plenty of sites to see across both borders. Unfortunately S.Africa has refused to give Pranvera a visa since we do not have a residence permit in Mozambique. Unbelievably frustrating but we’ll figure out how to hopefully do a day or weekend visit at some point.

So our first trip we drove to the closest game park in Swaziland which was a pleasant 3 hour drive on descent roads through beautiful countryside to enter a reserve where we did several self drives on dirt tracks looking for the Big 5. Before even entering we saw a huge baboon on the side of the road watching us cruise by. As we stopped to let Adi see through the back window, we noticed numerous monkey families cross the road under the protection of the large males. A great welcome to our first safari adventure. After entering the park we drove for several hours in the comfort of our air-conditioned cab with Musaagy, our project driver, carefully navigating the mud, trees and animals. Considering this was one of the smaller and less populated parks and it was the middle of a blazing hot day, Adi had a great introduction to Africa’s ‘zoo’s’ (sure beats fighting the crowds visiting the Smithsonian Zoo in DC). We saw rhino’s, hippoes, gazell’s, giraffes, wild boar, monkey’s and tracks of elephants.

The game lodge and camping area was a welcome meal and break from the bush and Adi found some you boys to play with. Two/half hours later we found ourselves back in the comfort of our home in Maputo already planning our next adventure (see next blog entry for our island adventure 2 days later).