After much anticipation it was finally Thursday, the morning myself and four other exchange students were planning on renting a car and driving to Kruger National Park for a safari filled weekend! The plan was simple, rent a car, leave Thursday afternoon, drive to Kruger, stay for 3 nights, see as much as possible, then head back to uni Sunday evening.
The first hitch in the plan however, came Thursday morning. I was in a lecture when I received a message from my friends saying that there had been a problem renting the car. The one person in our group with a credit card didn't have a drivers license, so they wouldn't rent the car to us. As soon as I heard this news I wasn't able to focus on my class anymore ... how were we going to make the 400km+ journey to Kruger without a car?? Were our weekend plans shattered before we had even left Joburg??
Thankfully however, it could be sorted. The rental agency wanted someone with a bank card that had the owner's name on it and with raised numbers. I was apparently the only person with a card like this, but it was my Australian debit card, not a credit card. So I set off in an Uber to the car rental place in the hope that my card would be accepted. My Uber driver was very good about the situation, advising me that if we couldn't get a car he could drive us to Kruger instead - for a reasonable price of course. Luckily my card was accepted, and we were soon able to rent a car and drive it back to uni! It was such a relief to have the whole situation sorted, and it seemed as though our plans were coming together.
So we drove back to uni in our Honda Accord, picked up the other members of our group, filled the car and were away to Kruger! An Australian, 2 Malaysians, a girl from Japan and a guy from Mauritius - what a multicultural group!
The drive was very pleasant, it took us a little while to get out of Johannesburg, but once we were out it was nice just to look out the window and watch the scenery go by - we were leaving the city for the time and finally getting to explore this beautiful country. After about 2 hours of driving I took over, the first time I had driven in about 7 weeks. I was fully expecting to not have to drive for the whole time I'm in South Africa, and I nearly didn't get my International Driver's Permit because it was $40 and I was lazy, but I had bought it (although I reckon I could have gotten away with not having the permit), and I found myself driving in Africa for the first time (although in all honesty it's not that different than driving in Australia ... but I can now say that I've driven a car cross-country in Africa?!)
Driving was pretty simple, it's on the left hand side, and for most of the beginning of the trip it was all freeway at 120km p/h. The Honda was also very smooth to drive, and I found it very easy to go over the speed limit ... After a bit however the road changed to a highway ... and the speed limit continued to be 120km p/h. That was slightly daunting, to be allowed to go so fast on a road where I would usually expect it to be 100km p/h, and in some areas 80km p/h. A lot of other drivers definitely took advantage of this opportunity.
It got dark as I was driving, and as we were winding through the country side, the roads slowly got hillier. We encountered three road blocks where construction was occurring and had to stop. The view really was stunning in some parts though, one of the downsides of driving was that you had to focus on the road rather than the mountains! I ended up driving for the last 4.5 hours straight, although it didn't feel that long. With the road blocks we had to stop for 10mins+ at a time and it gave me a bit of break. As it got darker we decided it would be safer to continue driving rather than stop at a dimly lit petrol station in the dark and switch drivers.
The last bit of the drive was a rocky gravel road. We were getting closer to Kruger and I kept my eyes peeled for wildlife that didn't show up. We made it though, at about 8:30pm to Kruger Inn Backpackers, where we were warmly welcomed and spent the night chatting and getting ready for our safari into the park the next day ....
Not a bad spot for a roadblock.
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