South African Summer: Pretoria and Beyond

Pretoria Skyline with a ton of haze.

This past weekend was my last planned trip before heading back to home in less than three weeks (oh, how time flies). My roommate Noelia and I decided that a couple days in Pretoria, the capital, would be nice. Plus, Monday was a public holiday (Women's Day) so we did not have school and everything was closed.

Noelia and our ridiculous drink specials at the bar!

To be honest, I had not heard much about Pretoria before planning this trip but I did know that it was centrally located and offered us the chance to explore a bit of Jo'burg as well as a nature reserve, Pilanesberg, as day trips. We took Greyhound because it was the cheapest and easiest option and left on Thursday at 12 arrived around 3 (because Greyhound makes a ton of stops along the way and is never on time) and were picked up by the backpacker from the station. Since Thursday was a pure travel day we explored our day trip options and attempted to book them ahead (which did not happen). Pretoria is a fairly safe city during the day but people do not suggest you walk too far at night (we had no problems). There were two restaurants in our area so we picked one and not only did they have drink specials but food ones as well so we took advantage.

I just love signs!

Church Street Flea Market

Friday we woke up early and left the backpacker and walked around the city (which is walkable but still pretty big) and saw the Union buildings (where Mandela and all presidents after have been inaugurated), Church Square (parliament, war statues) and a slew of other government buildings. We walked by the Zoo and the aquarium, saw many of the embassies, and did some bargain shopping around the Union buildings. It is not a pretty city but a very busy one.

One of the Ugly 5!

Just beautiful!

A family of elephants.

Blue Heartebeast (he is ugly)!

We awoke on Saturday morning and got dressed warmly for a full day of game drives at Pilanesberg (www.pilanesberg-game-reserve.co.za). It is one of the smaller parks in South Africa (versus Krueger or Addo Elephant where I was 3 years ago) but you have a better chance of seeing the Big 5 (Elephant, Leopard, White Rhino, Lion, Buffal0) because of its size. They also have something called the Ugly 5 (Warthog, Hyena, Crocodile, Marabu Stork, Vulture) and the poor Blue Heartebeast is the 6th one (they are pretty awful looking). The day included pick-up at 6, two game drives, lunch, and transportation to and from the hostel (it is about 1 1/2 hours from where we were staying). Our guide Eugene was wonderful and we got pretty lucky seeing plenty of animals. Our first game drive was from 8 to 1pm and we were able to see giraffes, rhinos, springbok, elephant, crocodile, springbok, warthogs, zebras Blue heartebeast (pretty good I think). We broke for lunch at 1 (springbok steak for lunch) and were back out by 2:30. The best time for game drives is before 12 and after 4 because the animals are not sleeping but because of our time restraints we had to hope we would get lucky at our 2:30 game drive. Much to our dismay, we just missed a leopard (who had killed a springbok and taken up to a tree to protect it) and then sat watching it for awhile (but it had just gone over the mountain when we got there). Anyway, we saw a few more animals we had not seen earlier like hippos, waterbok, two giraffes play fighting and a dik dik (the smallest antelope in the animal kingdom). Along with my last trip to a game park (last time I was here), I have seen all but one of the Big 5 (missing the leopard) but even though we did not see it, it was a pretty awesome and exhausting day!

My flower for women's day as well as my ticket in!

The Soweto hostels- no electricity, water, etc.- built for apartheid and still used

The entrance into the Apartheid Museum.

As for Sunday, we were picked up, along with a couple other individuals and taken to the Apartheid Museum (http://www.apartheidmuseum.org/) in Jo'burg. Honestly, I wish we could have stayed longer (we only had 2 1/2 hours) because it was incredible to be there and to see it. It was like being at the Holocaust Museum for the first time; words cannot describe what you feel, what you think, and it is difficult to understand or comprehend why human beings would do such things to other human beings. It was an amazing experience and I am so thankful I got to go (because I didn't get the chance last time I was in Jo'burg). From there we headed to see Soweto (South Western Township, the biggest one made up of 28 smaller ones) and we toured hte area, the informal settlements (the tin roof houses with no electricity or running water- pretty awful) as well as the Soweto museum (http://www.soweto.co.za/html/p_hector.htm). Another pretty exhausting but education day.

Overall, the trip was a fabulous last jaunt around the surrounding areas of Potchefstroom.