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African Travel Specialists Luxury Private Guided Safaris Botswana Kenya Rwanda

The Best African Safaris for Australians Combine Adventure with Highly Personalised Service

For those who are tired of the impersonal business of booking a holiday online only to find themselves on their own at a destination that doesn’t meet their expectations – expert help is available. Safari Guru, a boutique business owned by man-of-two-flags, Deon De Villiers, offers an ideal solution.

Deon’s background includes the management of renowned Safari Camps and luxury lodges as well as Africa-wide travel. As a South African, and a former local, there’s little or nothing he doesn’t know. His African travels led him to spend years in other African countries too, and as a former IT executive who was flown from luxury hotel to luxury hotel, he has first-hand experience of travel from a customer perspective. “It’s about making people feel special,” he says.

Safari Travellers Want More Than Jaws, Claws, and Paws

African wildlife is certainly among the big attractions for conservation-oriented travellers. But there’s more to it than jaws, claws and paws, says Deon. They’re looking for a full-scale African experience, and they want to learn about the local people and patronise establishments that actively uplift often-impoverished communities and lead the way locally in conservation.

Variety is the spice of life, so for some, a tour might include several nights enjoying cities like Nairobi or Cape Town before being whisked off for their journey into the bush. Many client’s don’t know this but there is also a huge variety in safari experiences – certainly no ‘one bush fits all’ experience! So through careful questioning he is able to discover exactly what they’re dreaming of when they dream of Africa and exactly what might fit their expectations, interests and lifestyle. Whether its leopard sightings or photo safaris, hot-air ballooning or boating experiences with hippos, crocodiles and birds, vast plains with lots of game or thick woodland full of elephants that capture their imagination and fulfil their story, Deon is able to match people to places.

But there’s more to Deon’s service than just cities, villages, and safari camps. He delves deep to discover those little details that make people feel valued as individuals: the wines or other drinks they love, the foods they prefer, and even the snacks they’d like to nibble while out in the safari vehicles are all part of the brief. Host camps are given specific instructions, pleasantly surprising their guests with all their favourite things.

Getting There and Getting Home Needn’t be Stressful

Exploring a new country is exciting, but it can also be stressful. Getting from airports to hotels, and dealing with any unexpected happenings that may affect itineraries, are par for the course of global travel, and not all travellers can say they’ve enjoyed a stress-free experience.

But this does not have to be the case if you have an experienced professional like Deon making sure that your safari logistics and planning are sound, and offering backups of both foreseen and unforeseen risks as far as possible.

“We manage every detail from airport transfers to bookings and cancellations,” he says.

Using the Covid-19 crisis as an example, he explains how his team on the ground helped a couple who had a swift change in plans. “Our personal Cape Town based guide took them for lunch in the heart of South Africa’s famed wine region, Stellenbosch, and then to the airport to catch the very last British Airways flight out of Cape Town,” he says with quiet pride. “The day was a lot more pleasant than expected, and by the time they landed back home, all outstanding bookings had been rescheduled so that they can resume their adventure at a more favourable time.”

Not Just Another Booking Agent

Booking agents are two-a-penny, but De Villiers is much more than that. Thanks to his personal experience in Africa and individualised service, travellers may end up visiting places they otherwise wouldn’t have discovered, moving outside the mainstream “tourist traps” and package tours and into the wilderness of their dreams.

The magic of Africa means different things to different people, but thanks to his expertise and dedication to enhancing the overall experience, Safari Guru, under the leadership of Deon De Villiers, ensures that his clients have the magical experiences they envisioned, and more, with full support and backup along the way.

For more information visit the African Travel Specialist | Safari Guru website or call Deon De Villiers and his team of experts on (+61) 0427 782 226.

Syndicated by Baxton Media, The Market Influencers, Your Digital Marketing Agency.

African Travel Specialists Luxury Private Guided Safaris Botswana Kenya Rwanda was originally published on Baxton

#African Travel Specialists #Guided Safaris #Luxury Travel #Safaris Botswana #Safaris Kenya #Safaris Rwanda

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ktkski2017-blog · 8 years

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Ol Pejeta Safari

February 12, 2017

Today we returned from Ol Pejeta Conservancy – a 90,000 acre not-for -profit wildlife conservancy that contains the last three norther white rhinos in the entire world. It also houses the Sweetwaters Chimpanzee Sanctuary, which is one of several recipients from Jane Goodall Institute’s orphaned and abused chimpanzees.

We left Chogoria Friday afternoon after we completed our 12th day (of 12 days in a row) of working in the wards. Throughout the week I rotated with Dr. Jason Brotherton (Internal Medicine-Pediatrics specialist) in the morning and then joined either female or male adult medical wards. While rotating with Jason I met a now 43 day-old infant who was born premature at the hospital between 24-26weeks. In the United States, babies are able to survive outside of the womb between 22-23weeks (although they require an incubator). Chogoria has one incubator and the baby had been doing well, gaining weight, so she was graduated to outside of the incubator this week and was able to maintain her weight! She does not have an appropriate suck reflex so she is unable to feed herself and instead has an oral-gastric tube for feeding. She is still putting on weight so I will be able to follow her for a few more weeks while here in Chogoria. Otherwise we mostly saw pediatric patients with viral pneumonias, gastroenteritis, constipation. There was a 14 year old with bleeding gums and likely diagnosis of AML who arrived Thursday who will need to pursue chemotherapy in Nairobi. Her mother insisted that all she needed was prayer. We agreed that prayer is great but that she would definitely need chemotherapy as well and we invited the chaplain to come and counsel the patient and her mother. Her mother agreed to seek out specialist attention and was very grateful for the care and attention. Friday morning rounds were completed on time (with the help of starting one hour earlier to ensure prompt completion of rounding), however there was a significant amount of follow-up required so we had to rely heavily on our team (Musa and Janet) to follow through with the tasks and ensure that our patients got good treatment. Right as we were leaving we discovered that a surgical patient was returned to the medical floor with a chest tube despite the discussion that we had had with the surgeon that this patient needed decortication and clean out of his lung to remove infectious material. Sigh.

We met up with Dunsten, the Kenyan we had hired to drive us to and from Ol Pejeta Conservancy, and who we hired to take us on game drives for the weekend. As I was walking up to the meeting point I realized that the safari vehicle was actually a minivan. Ummmm – How is this going to make it through the safari? It says on the back of the van that it has 4 wheel drive, but the clearance under the vehicle was maybe 1 foot. There were two sliding middle doors (one was out of commission) and the windows in the back of the vehicles were shaded and unable to be opened. And, it turns out the windows on the sliding side doors only roll down approximately 6inches. Ummmm – How is this going to allow for any kind of photos while on safari? Clark had some wishful thinking that the roof would raise up like other safari vans we have seen – nope. I was very disappointed and kicked myself over and over that we didn’t clarify the type of 4wheel drive vehicle he actually meant when we hired him (and put a down payment on) the weekend??? We didn’t have a choice this late in the game so we hauled our backpacks in to the trunk and filed in to the van.

We drove North around the perimeter of Mt Kenya to reach Old Pejeta, which is on the opposite side of Mt Kenya than Chogoria. The mountain was shrouded with clouds and very intimidating, especially for Luke and I who had already put a down payment with Dunsten to summit it the following weekend. The drive took 3.5hours and involved slowing down frequently to go over the speed bumps that seem prevalent on Kenyan highways. There was also a traffic jam in a few cities/towns as the main markets take place surrounding the highway so there were people and cars everywhere. Dunsten grumbled about how unsafe motor bikes are. Meanwhile all of the seat belts in the back two rows of the van were broken in some way, so I spent the ride holding on to the bar in front of my seat like some kind of scary amusement ride so that when he slammed on his brakes to go over the speed bumps I didn’t go flinging forwards. I kept remembering the story told by Ethan from several years prior how a van-full of patients were admitted to Chogoria with femur fractures after a Matatu accident. So while the drive took approximately 1 hour longer than expected, I did appreciate his caution while driving. We could tell that this was not his car because he kept reaching for the shifter down to his left instead of on the dashboard (as Kenya was a British colony until 1963, everyone drives on the left side of the road and the driver’s seat is on the right of the car). He seemed nervous while driving, unintentionally slowing down to a very slow rate while talking on his cell phone, and jerking the steering wheel to the left every time he passed a car going the opposite direction. Didn’t necessarily boost my confidence in his ability to show us a great safari, especially since I was already grumbling about the type of vehicle we were riding in.

We arrived at Ol Pejeta and went through the lengthy check-in process despite the fact that we had actually booked and pain online already. Lots of stamps and carbon copies later, we vacated the blazing heat and drove toward the Stables (the name of the overnight accommodations we pre-booked). On the way Dunsten drove past the driveway we needed to take (poorly marked, to be fair) and in the process of backing up, he ran in to the cement and rock sign causing a dent in the car – also not necessarily improving my confidence in this safari experience. The Stables were actually previously the horse stables (surprise) when the land was previously private property. It later became housing for researchers who were hired to categorize the animals and plants there decades prior when it became a conservancy. Actually – we met a British couple while we were staying there who were able to tell us a bit more about the stables. The husband was previously employed as a researcher at this very facility when he was a member of the royal army. He states once the Stables opened up for non-researcher budget accommodations for tourists, he and his wife returned so he could reminisce about his time spent here in Kenya. They have since been back several times and volunteer with an organization called Mt Kenya Nursery that helps to educate school children on ecology and then donate trees for them to take home and plant. Luke and I had reserved a double room and were welcomed to a bungalow with thatched roof and mud walls that had two double beds in it – one of which was covered by mosquito netting. It also had a private bathroom complete with shower; the bathroom was carved out of the round room by a partial wall that the headboards of the beds backed up to. The crescent shaped bathroom was split in to three sections – sink, shower, and toilet – by two partial walls. Lena, Jen, and Clark had each reserved single rooms that were located in nearby bungalows that were divided on the inside to separate single-bed rooms and shared bathroom facilities.

The main building had several outdoor seating areas which is where we ate our meals (included with the cost of the rooms) cooked by several hired chefs. The food was really well seasoned and they had great vegetarian options. When we pulled up to the Stables, there were a handful of undergraduate students doing some cardio exercises on the lawn. They were students from Princeton and Columbia doing a study abroad program focusing on ecology in Kenya. They were at the Conservancy for the week learning about the wildlife, accompanied by a professor from Columbia University. We sat around the table and enjoyed a cup of tea that had been set out by the kitchen staff in preparation for a delayed dinner, meeting/learning about the other dinner guests. We also met Matthew, a British ‘cartographer’ who had been at the Conservancy for two weeks mapping certain plants as a volunteer. He was drinking a White Cap beer and we looked on with jealousy so he told us how to seek out our own for the following day as this was his last one. Dinner was hearty and delicious and dessert included chocolate ice cream (hit the spot)!

After dinner we were met by Sammie and Simon, employees of the park and trained game drivers. We had pre-booked a night game drive with them (which was a great idea in hindsight). We loaded on to their certified safari vehicle with large open tops and drove off in to the night. It was definitely chilly here at 6,000 feet altitude and I had forgotten all of the cold-weather gear back in Chogoria, so Clark loaned me a windbreaker. We had a ton of fun driving through the night (night drives are reserved for only certain vehicles – so we were mostly alone). Simon panned the spot light left and right and looked for the reflection of animal eyes. We saw a striped hyena almost right off the bat (relatively rare to be seen on game drives we were told). We also saw an elephant, a jackal, numerous gazelle, bucks and impala, a hippopotamus, and zebras as well as Grevy’s zebras (rare/endangered, so we were told). We saw several white (southern) and black rhinos, which was the first time I have ever seen any in the wild. We got pretty close to one large old rhino while he was napping. He didn’t really like the light shining on him so eventually he got up and chased after our vehicle as we drove away. Sorry dude! We passed the rhino cemetery where all of the rhino that die in the park are buried. We were told that three rhino were killed over the past year by a strong pride of lions – this was not a good thing as the park is particularly focused on protecting the rhinos (they have rhino guards posted around their rhinos). We later found out that they actually had removed six male lions over the past month and relocated them outside of the park to break up the pride. While on the night game drive we also saw two giraffe “necking” – which is actually a battle between two giraffe whereby they swing their necks and pound them in to the neck of the opposing giraffe. Youtube it. We did see a tree full of baboon, silhouetted by the full moon. The car pulled up to shine a light on the baboon but we quickly started to hear an increase in the number of monkey noises and frequency of transfers between branches – so the guides quickly drove off commenting on how you don’t want to start things with the baboon. I did get a few blurry photos but it was pretty cool to see it in person. One animal that I had not seen previously was the white-tailed mongoose, which was really neat to see running through the grasses. There were countless hares running along the roadside and a massive line of water buffalo. We did not see any big cats on the night drive. I am also sad to report that we did not see any honeybadger although I was told they do have them in the park. When we returned to the Stables after our drive, I prised my cold hands from the bars on the top of the vehicle and jumped in to bed, finding a warm water bottle in there that had been placed by the housekeeper. I set my alarm for 3:30am to look at the promised lunar eclipse and promptly fell asleep.

I first woke up from being overheated and later by my alarm. I sleepily silenced my alarm thinking that it had been kind of cloudy before going to bed and fell back asleep without poking my head out of the bungalow to take a look. I was then awoken a few hours later by the sound of a rifle going off nearby our bungalow. As there was little noise after that, despite craning my ears to listen for any animal or human noises, I went back to sleep to be awoken by my alarm announcing breakfast time. I emerged to hear stories about a blind elephant wandering through camp and breaking the water tower, dramatically told by the university students who had been sleeping in some canvas army-style tents in the middle of the yard. They reported that the elephant had been there around the eclipse time and so they had to wait to emerge from their tents until it had been scared off by the rangers posted at the camp. Jen and Clark had gotten up to see the eclipse although they indicated that it was really only a shadow (we later searched the internet to discover that it had been a prenumbral eclipse, which is simply a shadow). They had not seen nor heard of an elephant in camp. The elephant had later returned and had been scared away by the rifle blast. The camp was surrounded by electrical fencing so it’s hard to say how this blind elephant made it in to camp. Luke did not wake up to the sound of the rifle, by the way.

Breakfast arrived on Kenyan time, however that gave us ample time for coffee and black tea. After eggs and toast we got in our safari minivan and headed off for a daytime game drive. Dunsten slowly drove us around the eastern most portion of the park. We were able to get close to giraffe, zebras, southern white rhinos, impala, gazelles. We saw warthogs, however they were really skittish and difficult to approach. My theory is that they might actually be hunted as our camp has this huuuge grate over the firePIT (4feet wide, 4feet deep) as well as a rotisserie grill big enough for a warthog on site. But this is simply conjecture and I would not want Ol Pejeta to be held accountable for my suspicion. We also saw elephants but really only at a distance. I later saw two up-close and near the road destroying some tree/shrubbery, however the safari minivan had a intermittently broken reverse option so it took a few minutes to actually engage reverse and then when Dunsten backed up we ended up off the road on a small ridge, so we couldn’t back up to put them in view for a photo-op.

During the drive we came upon an elephant taking a mudbath so we stopped the car for a tea break. I had purchased a thermos back in Chogoria and had made some tea during breakfast. We passed out coffee mugs and poured the tea, ate some biscuits. After we stretched our bellies, we ran in to some park rangers who gave us a tip that some lions were seen earlier that day near the river. We headed toward the river. After some detours, we found our way to the river and followed the road north. We pulled off at a stop labeled “hippo viewpoint” and saw that this was a sanctioned space to get out of our vehicles. David, an Ol Pejeta employed guide, was there and gave us a walking tour of a section of the river. Unfortunately there were no hippos on that section of river by the time we toured it. We did see a group of baboon on the other side of the river. David talked about the hippo family that lives in the park and where/when best to view them out of the water. He also pointed out several types of trees and plants including the yellow fever acacia tree and the main shrubbery that covered most of Ol Pejeta that has berries enjoyed by the baboon and elephants (the lead berry spelling?). They were suitable for humans to eat too – we tasted a few: kind of like a blueberry however with a large center pit that takes up most of the berry. He also told us about the rhinos in the park, namely the endangered white northern rhinos. Currently there are only three left alive in the entire world –housed in this very park in a special endangered species section. There are two females (mother and daughter) and an older male (not related to the other two). Currently they are unable to conceive due to the females ages and some problem with their uterus (unsure if that menopause or some disease he is referring to). Their eggs and sperm have been cryopreserved and they are going to attempt in vitro fertilization of a fertilized egg in to a black rhino in the park. Because the white rhino are significantly bigger than the black rhino – the black rhino mother will need to undergo a C-section for delivery. After our walking tour, David mentioned that he could show us the location of the mating lions – so he jumped in to the minivan and we headed out to seek the lions. We passed several safari vehicles heading the other direction having confirmed seeing lions. We turned on to the indicated two track path off of the main road and bumbled about over the path with our minivan. It scraped against downed tree branches that other vehicles had powered over and we had to maneuver some tight passageways, but we found the lions! Easy to see if you follow the line of cars (although there was only one when we arrived). We got a great view of the young male and older female lions through the trees and had time for one photo each before Dunsten pushed forward. We lost sight of them and requested that he back up to regain our previous great position, but instead he pushed forward and to their left until he was maybe 30-40feet away from the couple, who were lounging under a tree. David explained that lions mate every 20minutes or so for 4days straight. During their rest time they relax and sleep to keep up their energy. They fast for the entire 4days and then afterwards make “a large” kill to satisfy their appetites. While we were sitting there, snapping photos, the couple stood up and walked away from the vehicle behind a nearby shrubbery to mate again. Seconds later, they were resting again under another tree maybe 100 feet away from the vehicle. We had off-roaded to get up close to the lions and were now nosed up to a patch of shrub-trees. Because the minivan was having a bad day, we were unable to put the car in reverse to get out of the position, so instead we headed forward and one of the tires fell in to a hole so the van was resting on the ground. We tried rocking the van while we were in it, however that did not work. David jumped out to assess the situation and decided that we needed to get out of the van and help push it out of the hole. Luckily a lady in a safari vehicle pulled up behind us and was able to watch our backs as we all pushed the van out of the hole. We didn’t fancy being the lions’ “large kill” and were pretty sure this is the exact thing we should NOT have been doing (we signed away liability of our lives should we get injured by wild animals while at the Conservancy when we first arrived). We eventually were able to drive the car forward out of our compromised position and jumped back in the van for a few more lion shots. By this time we were all hot and hungry, energized by the productive morning, so we headed back to camp for lunch.

Lunch was a lentil stew with Indian spices (yum!). After lunch we took a siesta and coordinated ordering of our dinner time beer (brought in to the park by staff). Matthew (the British volunteer ‘cartographer’) told us about a swimming pool that was available for our use at the nearby shwanky hotel. We wandered that way and found a really nice pool overlooking the savanah and Mt Kenya. Unfortunately Luke and I didn’t bring anything that resembled a swimming suit so we just dipped our feet in the blue, cool, freshwater, chlorinated, open air pool. Jen, Lena, and Clark took dips and found it very refreshing. So did a small frog – however I feared for its long term survival in chlorine. We lounged on the lounge chairs and then returned for an afternoon ride. We opted for the chimpanzee sanctuary and learned about how the Conservancy was serving as a sanctuary for these abused chimpanzees. These apes were previously stolen from their natural environments by poachers who often killed the parents for the illegal bushmeat trade and then smuggled the orphaned chimps to be sold to families as pets for their children. When the human children and child chimpanzees get older, the chimps are often kept caged or are killed. The sanctuary kept a cage that one of the chimps had been rescued from after living in it for 9 years. It was appx 3x2x4feet in size (approx the same size as a chimp). There was education about the difference between monkeys vs apes and apes vs humans, with apes being 98.6% similar to humans. We were able to see a few of the chimps near the viewing platform (the sanctuary houses 35 or so) and I brought binoculars so we could see a few in the distance playing on the jungle gyms created for them out in the bush. When the group of chimps near the platform got ‘conversational’ their loud calls were extremely intimidating. Several chimps made begging gestures and someone threw down some nuts to feed them. At other times it seemed like the chimps were mocking the tourists.

After the sanctuary we half-heartedly got back in our minivan and went out of another game drive. After several tries we really didn’t see much (not atypical for a hot afternoon – most afternoon drives are not very exciting cuz most animals are lounging in the shade due to the heat). Closer to dinner time we hear a rumor about several lions out making a kill so we sped over to the other side of the park (in the dust of another vehicle that we were following as Dunsten had gotten the lion tip from them). Once we arrived the lions must have completed the task and went elsewhere. Jen saw a zebra with fresh scrapes and blood on it, grazing in the field. We returned for dinner dusty and tired. After an awesome shower and clean clothes, we enjoyed potato leek soup and coconut bean stew with cabbage for dinner. After sticking the beer in the freezer, we eventually enjoyed some cold lagers (Tusker and White Cap were the two brands we compared). Jen, Lena, Clark and Luke then played some euchre while I relaxed. Then we checked out the giant fire pit. Paul, one of the chefs, tossed in some logs (small trees) and told us about how it is traditional in Kenya for the whole family to sit around the campfire at night and share stories from the day. We asked him about where he learned to cook and he said he actually went to college and then later learned how to cook at a hotel near Lake Victoria in the rift valley. He asked us questions about our experiences at Chogoria hospital and picked our brains regarding the physician strike and our opinion of it. We ended up getting in to some politics, which attracted Matthew to come over and listen. After Paul had to leave to go home, we asked Matthew about his time here at camp. He told stories about the people who have stayed here the last few weeks including the previous group which was actually a group of American naval officers. He said they would often be working out in the yard with their shirts off and large muscles. He shared that two of the officers decided to hike Mt Kenya, however the larger of the two had to turn back due to altitude sickness and actually went to hospital to be evaluated. Evidently he didn’t speak to anyone for about 24hours after he returned and Matthew speculated that this guy has never not succeeded at a physical task before. Luke and I again got nervous about our upcoming Mt Kenya hike. Matthew also shared his experience being invited along to relocate the male lions. As he was around camp, he was invited to help out along with several dozen other locals/other Kenyans. With typical British humor he nonchalantly stated that through trial and error they realized that after tranquilizing the lion, they needed to get the lion in the cage within 30minutes. I picked up on it and asked what the story was that led them to that conclusion. He said they previously were working under the assumption that the lion would wake up within the hour, however once the first lion was tranquilized and fell asleep, they used ropes and hands to drag/carry the lion toward the cage. They had gotten the lion partway in to the cage when it had woken up. “You’ve never seen a group of people scatter faster than that” Matthew postulated. Evidently he and many other Kenyans were taking photos and selfies with the unconscious lion, assuming a longer unconscious period. Once the lion awoke, it was surprised and ended up backing the rest of the way in to the cage except for its paws – so the faster thinkers closed the door most of the way and then they poked the paws until the lion pulled them in to the cage. That would have been something to see!

To be continued…

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