208 days ago
208 days ago
Upon arrival, we were told about the range of excursions that we could go on, including the world's highest bungee jump at Bloukrans Bridge, hunting Springbok (the animal, not the rugby team) and going on a horseback safari. As I'd never ridden before, so I jumped at the opportunity for a weekend of riding/walking and seeing some of the big five first-hand - (the big five are S.A's large animals: lion, leopard, rhino, elephant and buffalo, the same creatures which also grace their bank notes).
The twelve or so of us on the safari were split into two groups by our tour guide, Lloyd. One group were novices who had never ridden a horse before and the second group consisted of those who had.
On the first day, the novice group set off at a nice slow pace. We had three guides - Lloyd the head guide, one other who rode in the middle of the group and one who rode at the rear. We spent an hour or so getting used to the horses, trying to stop them from eating grass and trotting, and were told that the horses would need a rest each 90 minutes or so.
It was a wonderful position from which to observe the wildlife show. We saw herds of zebras, giraffes, kudus, springboks and gazelles, plus loads of different antelopes that I can't even remember the names of! As we passed the far edge of a clearing after about two hours of riding, we pulled up and Lloyd pointed out an adult rhino approximately 1km away across a clearing. We began ridding for the next 30 minutes and Lloyd was continually leaving the front to go back and look at something. He stopped us again and informed us that since we first saw the rhino, it had been following us, presumably in defence of it's child who we could see with it's other parent up on a hill.
This development urged Lloyd to suggest we ride on until we were safely away from the rhino and then rest the horses who had been working for around 2 hours and 45 minutes. We rode on, circling, for another 45 minutes, then came to a stop in a clearing with clumps of bushes all around. We were told to loosen the saddles so the horses could breathe and stood around chatting. I started smoking a cigarette and felt quite happy with how the day had developed so far...
At this point, one of the two support-guides sprinted off as fast as his little legs could carry him! I saw him run and was rather puzzled - I turned to look at Lloyd with a quizzical expression on my face and, as I turned, couldn't help but noticing that the fully grown 6,000 lbs of rhino which had been following us was about 20 metres away slowly stalking in our direction!
This was potentially dangerous as rhino's can run faster than we can and have a massive horn! Also, they're quite protective of their young!
In the panic, Lloyd shouted to all of us "JUMP BACK ON THE HORSES!!!" forgetting in the melee that we'd all loosened our saddles- uh oh! So obviously, we all tried to jump up but as we put our foot in the stirrup, the saddle slid off! I was quite close to Lloyd when he shouted, "RUN!"
We weren't waiting about. We bolted like crazy people running from the men in white coats holding syringes and little plastic cups of sedatives! After about 30 seconds at full pelt, I looked back to see if we were being followed, at which point the horses, who had been rather calm and huddled together, bolted off in all directions.
We continued to run (for about 6 or 7km!) until we felt safe. We got back eventually and Lloyd confided in us that this had never happened before. I can't help but thank the first guide who ran off, I'm not sure when we would've realised our mate rhino was coming to say hi otherwise!
{jcomments on}
