The Crazy Americans Take Lesotho and Kruger!

I have officially returned home to Stellenbosch unharmed after my 10 day roadtrip to the Kingdom of Lesotho and Kruger National Park with two other American friends! The majority of the people who knew about this roadtrip were convinced that my friends and I would not make it back in one piece - whether by car accident on the deadly N1 highway, rural crime in Lesotho, or lion attack on the safari, they were sure the Crazy Americans (a name that has for some reason stuck to us) were going to meet their death. We were very happy to prove everyone wrong...

We departed Stellenbosch last Friday afternoon and hit the open road, planning to spend the night in the small town of Touws River, which is about 2 hours into the trip. We reached Touws River, however, and found the accommodation a bit sketch so we continued on and ended up driving all the way to Colesburg, which was our intended second night stop. After grabbing food at a petrol station and taking a nap in the parking lot, we continued on our way to Lesotho. The last four hours or so of the journey were on very rural, dirt, pothole ridden roads and considering we were in a medium size sedan, we found this leg of the drive very slow going. Still, we had such a great time driving (something we don't get to do often here) and the scenery was beautiful. When we reached the Lesotho-South Africa border we were shocked at how easy the immigration control process was - there basically was none. No car check, no nothing. But as you will commonly find us saying here, TIA. This is Africa. So we crossed the border, stopped to ask a few directions, drove along crazy mountain side roads and finally found ourselves at our backpackers!

We spent three days at the Malealea Lodge in Lesotho and it was absolutely incredible. Lesotho is known as the Kingdom in the Sky and that description really is fitting because the small nation is almost entirely up in the mountains. The majority of the population is rural, poor, and herds sheep and cows for a living. It has to be the most 'traditional' place I have ever been in the sense that it is so untouched by the western world. This being said, there is not a whole lot to do there. We took it as an opportunity to relax, get lots of sleep, and detox from everyday life.  We spent one day hiking on our own - it was amazing hiking in such an untouched land. There were local herders and their livestock everywhere along the mountains so we hiked to the sound of nomadic songs and cow bells. We walked around a local village one day and went into the 'city' of Masuru another day. The most inspiring part for me was the night sky there - there is no way for me to describe just how many stars I could see. It was like the sky was bright from the stars and even a few planets.  And all the constellations are backwards from what we know in the States which is a bit weird! There must be very few places in the world where you can see stars like that! The morning that we left Lesotho we got up early to watch the sun rise up over the mountains, which again was an incredible experience.  We could see candles being lite on nearby mountains as villages awoke and roosters were making a racket everywhere. All in all, it was just an experience you won't find very many places in the world!

After Lesotho, we drove to Johannesburg, stayed there one night, and then got picked up bright and early the next morning for our Kruger National Park safari! Besides Jess, Whitney and I, there were two other girls our age, a 30 year old guy, and an older woman on our safari with us.  To be honest, I was not all that excited about the safari leg of our trip just because I thought it was going to be super touristy but it turned out to be amazing! The small group made the experience more national geographic like and our guide knew everything there was to know so I learned a ton. We saw the South African Big 5 - lion, leopard, elephant, buffalo, and rhino; as well as giraffes, zebras, hyenas, and much mores. We camped two nights and stayed the third night in a lodge. We slept to the sound of lions roaring in the night, we saw a ton of baby lion cubs, herds of elephants and buffalo crossing the street, and even got close enough to touch a few of the animals. While I have seen all of these animals at the zoo, it was incredible to see them in the wild.